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I think you can save Treck somewhat reliably by rescue-dropping Roy a few tiles ahead on your first turn so he can instantly recruit Jerrot, who can then recruit Treck, who can then rescue Roy back to safety (and to recruit Noah). Too late anyway (I missed your last post...), but yeah, Treck isn't the most impactful unit anyway. I always loved his stoner personality, though. Great clear, though! I don't think I ever beat this chapter without having to restart, either... I just checked Allen's averages and was surprised that yours is pretty close to them. HP is the only stat that's more than 1 point off - it's 1.1 below. ;) I guess I always underestimated Noah's base stats because I never bothered with him after seeing his growths (srsly, 30% Strength AND Speed? Fuck off) Jesus, that's one tanky Rutger!

The final boss has 120 HP, so even with capped magic (29), Canas would need a double crit. Crit+hit is only 4 points short, though. Or use Rath instead because ballistae aren't that much of a deal and both of the archers are kinda meh statwise. I don't think either Legault or Matthew are significantly better than the other if trained. But as with Dart, promoting a thief effectively costs you 25000 gold and it's questionable if it's worth it. Since you're forced into Eliwood Mode in your first playthrough, Bartre loses that reason to be used. ;)

...if they weren't forced anyways? And if you wouldn't field them - what would have to be changed to make you change your mind? Of course, I'm assuming no indirectly forced deployment either, for example being the only unit able to seize the throne. For me... FE6: If Roy promoted normally (or at least earlier), I'd probably keep him in my team. If the story promotion was kept in, I might still get him to Lv.20, just to wreck havoc with the Sealed Sword in the endgame. FE7: In my first playthroughs, I always had all three lords fielded, unless they had hit Lv.20 before I got the Heaven Seals. I still try to give both of them enough levels to get to Geitz' chapter, but after that, I usually drop Lyn and occasionally Hector/Eliwood. FE8: I always use both twins, full stop. It helps that I have a bias for non-cavalier mounted units. FE9: Ashnard pretty much falls under forced deployment for Ike, because screw the dragon laguz. ;) In that case, I'd probably drop Ike in favour of another foot unit, just to get a bit of variety in my team. FE10: Same here, actually. I'd probably use Laura as my primary healer from time to time and the Mercs in part 3 have more than enough badass units to choose from, anyway. FE11/12: For thief utility, probably. ;) I like to play around with reclassing a bit, so Marth isn't really my favourite unit in either game.

You do get more options after promotion (paladins and heroes) and since both Hand Axes and Steel Axes are E-ranked in this game, you can a) use 1-2 range from the get-go and b) grind their axe rank reasonably fast with a steel axe. And, as Levant just ninja'd me with, for some reason Dart's promotion item sells for 25k gold, making him basically as expensive to use as Farina (with her 20k recruitment and less expensive Elysian Whip)

You do get a world-class berserker later on, though. :D But yeah, Boyd's one problem is being a foot unit, especially since wissenschaft tries to play a low-ish turn count run. True, Ike/Elincia is implied pretty heavily, but it is also easy to interpret Sorens fixation on Ike in a romantic fashion. I do agree that it doesn't necessarily seem like a healthy (potential) relationship, what with Soren not having any other interests. IRL, they might be one of those couples that are super into each other but don't manage to talk out their first big row. ^^

They even did it at the very start of FE6, just not with a wyvern rider but with a cleric instead. In terms of story, Milady joining Team Roy right then wouldn't be much of a strech either, if she had just found Guinivere traveling with Roy. But I think your build-up theory isn't too far of, so we have to make do with a winged pony instead. ;)

How about sharing that link? Also, "mentioning the Shout Your Abortion movement" is basically attacking a stance NekoKnight didn't take. If you have a problem with SYA (which I can understand), complain to them. You countered literally nothing of NekoKnights post.

Well, have fun! :) Playing fast (or fast-ish) is probably a good way to go if the game isn't challenging you on its own; not using Bonus EXP might be another idea. No mounts seems to be somewhat popular, too, but I lost interest quickly when I tried that - it just made the game slower rather than more difficult. Personally, I really like the mechanics in this game. To me, it feels largely similar to the GBA games, but more polished. The support mechanism is largely the same, but without that annoying wait-120-turns-for-A-Support; Rescue is still a thing, but without the archer carrying a pegasus on his back... It's just disappointing that the non-japanese versions don't have a proper hard mode. And yeah, Titania is ridiculous. Worst Jeigan ever, can't even set up the first boss kill to the lord, 0/10. ;)

But Marcia and Rolf join in the same chapter, so comparing their base stats actually makes sense. ;) In case of Oscar and Mia, there is little point comparing either their base stats or their stats at equal levels. Oscar will almost certainly have collected quite a few levels and thanks to his higher mobility (plus access to Javelins), he will keep his EXP advantage unless the player is really adamant in investing into Mia. Which would be totally fine, of course, but for the sake of this argument ("Who is the better combat unit?") it would be unfair to assume either of them getting special care. But I'd say that's why Rolf is considered so bad. He needs that special care to catch up to the rest of the team, but thanks to his lack of 1-2-ranged weapons (or even just a 1-range weapon) he'll always be less useful than other characters who got the same or even less investment.

Doesn't that mean that literally no country should even concider taking in refugees? Has there ever been a society completely without (non-selfinflicted) poverty? Do you honestly think that at some point such a society will be remotely realistic?

Ah, OK. I don't think that's a big issue though. A Mt+4 or +5 Iron Bow should be affordable and is two or three points stronger than Rolf's Bow anyway; BEXP is another thing Rolf has and Neimi doesn't and it's not like Neimi can one-round enemies at base, either. If you want to use your shitty archers, you'll have to set up kills for them anyway, so the beefier enemies hardly make things more difficult for Rolf.

...it isn't? Seriously, which enemies do you mean? I guess Naesala in Ch. 19 is potentially scary, as well as the dragon laguz in Twisted Tower. But other than that (and the BK, I guess) I can't come up with any really tough groups of enemies.

I'm aware of that, but Rolf is in a game where enemies don't have good stats, where forges can help him overcome initial issues with hitting and killing weakened enemies and where BEXP can be used to let underleveled characters catch up. Of course, these additional resources can be used more efficiently on other characters, but PoR really doesn't require optimal resource management and in a casual playthrough it's perfectly possible to make Rolf a decent combatant (only in PP, of course) very quickly and without making the game super hard.

True, but the strong competition also make his decent averages less impactful because even disregarding his weapon choice, there is little incentive to feed him kills or BEXP when he offers neither higher stats nor special skills or utility compared to all the other characters that require less investment (read: almost everyone). OTOH, the low difficulty of the game makes him look better compared to the other shitty archers in the series. ;) In my experience, even Neimi takes more effort to raise, despite FE8 being FE8, simply because you can't give her BEXP or a forge to help her land the killing blow. It also means that complaining about Rolf is somewhat silly because he's still not that hard to use.

Come on, you know that bows vs. lances is a huge deal. Forgeable 1-2 range is amazing, especially in a game with wimpy enemies and a fuckton of money as soon as you hit midgame. To be fair, part of Rolf's problem is his lack of utility that comes with not having a mount. He also joins in the same chapter as Mist and Marcia, both of which get more out of the BEXP you have at that point (and Jill comes not that much later, so there goes the next heap of BEXP). But honestly, if we compare stats, we should rather look at their bases. Marcia wins Str by 3, Spd by 5 and Def by 2 points, so even if Rolf somehow managed to find a pegasus that is into boys and a lance instructor that is a total asshole, he'd still lose. Your 20/20 stats are completely misleading. Also, while Rolf might earn more EXP per fight (or kill), but Marcia with her better mobility and existing EP potential will still earn way more levels (unless you drown Rolf in TLC), so comparing stats at equal levels is misleading, anyway. I won't try to defend Ranulf, though; being a laguz does suck in both Tellius games.

How can he be a really good trainee if he needs the extra growths to stand out? I mean, he'll turn out alright if you tower grind, but he's not special at all compared to the other magic users while needing a lot more effort to be viable.

Something seems off with these numbers, but I can't quite lay a finger on it... ;) Well, I guess they're from different sources, but the links on wikipedia don't seem to work for me.

Don't bother. Lyn gets it repaired when she rejoines in Eliwoods story.

Lyn and Hector are only forced in a few chapters, so if you don't like using them (or if their level-ups suck) you can bench them and just deal with fielding one or two bad units in these chapters. It shouldn't be too hard to keep them alive in these chapters, even if they were at base level. Marcus is a freaking god in this game. He'll be a great combat unit with high movement despite his bad growths. Especially on Eliwood Normal Mode his bases should carry him almost to the final chapter. Don't worry too much about the lost experience; unless you literally solo the early maps with Marcus, your other units shouldn't fall behind. In general, this game has few terrible units, so don't worry too much about your unit selection. You might want to bench your archers - bows isn't a good weapon type and neither Wil and Rebecca have the stats to make up for it. If you want a bow user anyway, Rath is the strongest choice. The fighters don't really shine, either. Dorcas has alright bases but an atrocious 20% speed growth while Barte can be alright longterm, but sucks at the beginning unless you're lucky with his 40% speed growth right away. But on normal mode you should get away with using anyone you like, really. One exception: Keep one Luna tome for the very final map. You won't be disappointed! :D

Roy can also recruit Klain. I guess Clarine is somewhat to be expected to be the first victim. Better luck with Saul, although you might not want to make him into a combat unit. 2 Luck is still a thing and personally, I wouldn't want to lose my only (trained) healer in this game. I'd probably still use Lugh despite his low Magic, but this is not a recommendation, I just have a huge bias and would drop an Energy RIng on him. ;) But since he can wield Elfire without penalties, the low magic only mostly screws him. GL against those fucking wyverns!

This probably describes my preferences, too. I do like to train up underleveled units (like Fir, Lilina, Astrid or even Nino), but I usually don't bother with units that are just worse than their counterparts even if they manage to catch up in levels, like Matthis or Noah and Treck compared to their respective Chrismas Cavs.

Little nitpick in Soren's concept art: (last line in the notes) I guess the 2nd "tighter" is supposed to be "more slim" or something like that? While I'm not a huge fan of Soren's character, I really like his outfits, especially before promotion. Neither boring nor overly convoluted.

Civilization IV: Kinda old at this point, but still really fun to play. I'm not super good at it though - I'm winning pretty consistently on Noble, which is the "fair" level, but Civ AI is usually so bad that this is hardly an achievement. I still really like how the game forces me to juggle multiple objectives (grab land to expand, not royally screw my economy by doing so too fast, survive Montezuma's inevitable backstab, get the necessary military techs to actually kill Monty, but still keep building up my infrastructure...) and it's pretty rewarding to get to the point where you're able to just walk over your opponents. I do not like some of the more efficient strategies that I would probably need to tackle the higher difficulties (well, that and not making horrible decisions where to invest my resources), I hate that the best strategy in the earlygame is growing your population and then just kill half of it to accelerate production.

What about covering a song? Or, to not make this about any copyright issues, using a snippet from Mozart's Kleine Nachtmusik in a pop song? That's also not what the original composers intended, but it's not really frowned upon. Cheating in single player games just changes the gaming experience for that particular player and doesn't even affect anyone else. That said, I personally try not to cheat at all, although I will occasionally use guides if I get stuck or on a second playthrough if I want to go (mild) completionist. If a game gets too hard or too grindy for me to get through, I rather tend to stop playing and maybe try again a few months later. But I really don't care at all if someone else pumps out all the god mode cheats - if they have fun doing that, it's fine. I've actually read a somewhat interesting discussion about cheating in Pokemon PvP in another forum (although I don't play it myself). It was about RNG abuse to catch 'mons with perfect stats with the help of some kind of external device - one group very adamantly claimed that this would be totally legit because said device only reads but doesn't change anything in the game; the other group replied that of course that's cheating because the developers probably wanted the RNG to actually simulate random numbers but was divided in one part that didn't really see it as a problem and another one that felt that it would give the cheater a huge advantage in the actual fights. €: Sorry, I didn't notice Balcerzak's answer in time. When talking about my personal gaming preferences, I agree with you, but I don't really see the problem if someone else prefers to, I dunno, blaze through FE6 with Percy and Milady joining in chapter 1 because they're only in for the story. It doesn't appeal to me (I mean, I could just watch a LP if I cba to use my brain), but why would I care?

What are you trying to prove, exactly? I'm legimately completely lost. What does the stance of the Democrats and Republicans from 50 years ago have to do with their stance right now? I mean, of course it's important to know about the roots of the parties, but (to once again use a German excample) the fact that the Green Party in Germany had quite a few pedophiles trying to abuse the whole sexual freedom thing does not make the party pedophile right now.