Shiki
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On 10/14/2019 at 4:05 AM, Silverly said:
Is it really? I thought many people’s issue with Septem or at least with Nero in particular was that the narrative really pushed her as a Mary Sue and failed miserably at it. I don’t think that’s the same case with Musashi. She’s pretty open about her flaws and the story never passes over the idea that she can do no wrong nor is she some unflappable juggernaut.
Musashi being handled better is part of the improved writing quality but it doesn't change the fact that this entire chapter revolves around her. If someone doesn't care about or even dislike her then they will get bored quickly.
Speaking of which, I have finished Shimosa. Overall, it's a great EoR chapter. I put it on an equal or above level to Shinjuku but it's still 2nd place to CCC.
SpoilerGameplay-wise it's not difficult by any means. I think that Agartha is definetly harder than this and even the supposedly hardest fight with the Hell duo was nothing to write home about. I don't think this fight was a taste of what's to come with LB3 either.
The difficulty spike does exist but it's completely artifical due to forced supports. Many people rely on their FL for full team setups and being denied of that means you might be missing out on vital Servants. I'm lucky enough to be able to form proper teams with my own roster but others might struggle a lot here, especially if they didn't bother to train any of the free Servants to have some kind of replacement.
In terms of story fights I would rank it like this: Empireo > Hell > Paraiso > Limbo > Amakusa > Inferno > Purgatorio
I was surprised to hear that Lancer gave anyone trouble. This is the one fight where the forced Musashi support can actually be useful. Buff removal completely destroys his Crit gimmick and NP buffs so Musashi with decent Support makes short work of him.
Inferno isn't anything special. The burn gimmick doesn't do anything to make the fight more difficult. If it wasn't for the fact that they force Musashi on you I would have put this below Purgatorio.
Amakusa got nerfed hard. Whenever this guy appears he is annoying because his Ruler class makes it so much harder to kill him which in turn makes his NP a lot more dangerous. As an Avenger though he is a joke.
Limbo is a big Ghost mob and you know what they say: The bigger they are they better you can stuff pyramids in their gaping mouths. or something like that
Paraiso was unexpectedly annoying with her random stun and NP seal. Still not that difficult and falls to the same Rule Breaker spam as other Assassin bosses.
Hell's difficulty lies entirely on Samghata. AoE Charm is never fun, so is her impeding your NP usage with her normal attacks. If you manage to get her out of the way though this fight is pretty straightforward. Kalasutra can dish out some scary damage but it's not something some good old counter-classing can't solve.
Empireo is the only one who forced a retry but that's more because I didn't know about his gimmick. After using all my buffs to only stare down a naked frontline was already a red flag, it then got worse when he got that damage immunity for his last bar without Euryale having her NP ready.
But once you know about that good ol' Matcha tea here made short work of him.I already said this but I do enjoy Musashi's character therefore Shimosa didn't have to do much to make like it. But they characterized her pretty well and there was a lot of good things here.
As someone who has an interest in japanese mythology the references in both history and text are great. It can be a bit lengthy but if it enriches the experience I take as much as I can. If anything the things I didn't get gave me some pointers where I want to read in next.
But people are absolutely right when they compared this to Makai Tensho. This IS Makai Tensho, an almost too-faithful rip-off. They just replaced Jubei with Musashi and shuffled around some of the undead' identities.Fuuma was a good companion for this. tbh he is the only ninja Servant in Chaldea but I do like him and giving him more exposure is always good in my books.
Surprisingly enough I liked the way Shuten and Raikou were handled here compared to anything before it. Both of them are used in a much more comical fashion but them displaying their personality traits in this rather serious setting worked pretty well.Does that mean Kintoki is the culprit? Noooooooo.
On the other hand the original characters sans Munenori were cut a bit short. Aside from some exposition that hinted to their true identity there wasn't that much to make people invested in them. At least Tomoe will get Setsubun but I don't think Chiyome has anything to make her stand out more.
Muramasa got a lot less time than I anticipated. He is not around for the entire middle part and really doesn't do anything significant until the very last moment. Though I guess that's all too fitting for a Shirou Pseudo-Servant.
The Servant cameo were ... bizarre. Was it really necessary to have Tamamo and Kiyohime as different characters? They weren't even Servants. I would have preferred them as NPCs like Onui and Tasuke.One thing I found weird is Ashiya Doman. I'm not sure I understand how this guy survived being struck down twice and manages to be in LB4. Is he supposed to be immortal? Even if he is Musashi should have been able to cut him down regardless as she affects his Karma with the Muramasa (which is the entire reason why she can put the Swordmasters out of their misery).
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So, uh, this happened:
SpoilerAfter 300 SQ and an additional big SQ bundle I finally rolled one copy of Tomoe Gozen.
... I also got NP3 Musashi. Alongside a Rama spook for NP2 and Archer is now my first SR at NP5 (actually fitting as he was my starter Servant).
And yes, I lost some 1-Ups on the way.Dunno how I feel about that. I will have to forget about KH unless they give us a lot during Thanksgiving which I highly doubt at this point.
Oh well, time to save up for the Apocrypha event.Still doing Shimosa though I will have to say; despite being of much higher writing quality this is basically Nero's Septem for Musashi.
Good for people like me who enjoy her, not so good if you don't. -
22 hours ago, Sire said:
However, I heard the Case Files of Lord El-Melloi II finished airing. If anyone seen it yet, how was it? I think I only watched "Episode 0" or something to that effect. I want to get around to seeing it, but am wondering what the opinions are on it.
If you do enjoy Waver as a character or are just interested in his development after Fate/Zero it's very much worth a look.
Though the main plot line is a bit of a mess. I still find it odd they skipped the first book entirely despite it being Luvia's introduction.10 hours ago, Jingle Jangle said:Odd that there isn't a twitter campaign, PV/NP videos, no sq from the release or download milestone. NA can be really stingy with rewards at times.
Well at least there is now a retweet/like campaign (don't bother reading the comments though).
NA getting less SQ has been a thing since time immemorial. This year we miss some retweet campaigns (like the one with the 7M download campaign) and other small stuff like stage play or stream events. Can't exactly give out stuff without reason though I wish NA would put more effort in to somehow hand out those rewards. I can't possibly pull for King Hassan anymore because we lost way too much free SQ this year.
That being said some people expect we should get the same amount of maintenance SQ.
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For some more positive news (
read: how I make people salty😞I got Musashi with 5 10-rolls. Hell yeah.
Now to cry bitter tears when I don't get NP2 Tomoe with my 300 SQ tomorrow.Also the game doesn't approve of me getting her. She only passed 1st Ascension. Why? I have enough EXP and mats to make her fully ascended with 10/10/10 skills.
Gated. By. Saber Pieces. Not Monuments but Pieces.Btw. relevant:
Spoiler
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31 minutes ago, Silly said:
Shamir's best trait is her really good early damage. She starts with 18 Str and Bowfaire, and due to her base A bow rank she will likely be the only unit you have that can use a Silver Bow for a while. She also has the Lance rank to easily go into Pegasus Knight if you want to trade damage for mobility.
Her growths aren't the best though, being below average in both speed and strength, and her base speed of 14 is okay but not incredible for this point in time. I found that she was often missing out on doubling as result, which made her a useful midgame unit but not spectacular. I assume that with a few stat boosters fixing her speed she would be able to remain useful for the entire game (or at least most of it), or alternatively you can keep her in Sniper forever for Hunter's Volley, which would also solve her speed issues (at the cost of only having 5 move).
Earliest Silver Bow is Ch.7 I think which you get from a side quest involving her. I don't think by Ch.6 you can unlock the option to forge Silvers from Steel.
But I would argue both her and Felix occupy the same bow niche but the latter requires more work and needs to be recruited asap. Question does Felix's potential 2 chapter lead weigh more than Shamir's advantages? I would say no and his few stat leads from his growths are already diminished by his lack of Authority (Shamir even brings along a Fusillade battalion).
iirc it is generally agreed that people grow Speed carrots for gardening so her Spd issue shouldn't be hard solve.25 minutes ago, Cysx said:That's B rank though, many should be getting close if not already be there; and silver isn't freely available at that point unless you focused on prof level really hard. Unless she comes with one, I don't remember this much.
No, she joins with A rank. Yes, her and Catherine are filthy cheaters
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11 hours ago, Ari Chan said:
I don’t think it’s fair to place Dorothea in the same tier as CF/SS early boots access and 2 rally bots(who will eventually fall off later on), she still has Thoron at base for 3 range chip and it only takes 2-3 chapters to get her Faith to C rank for Physic which isn’t terribly late considering you can recruit her as soon as chapter 7 and once Dorothea gets Meteor she’ll outclass Mercedes who learns nothing valuable but Physic.
2-3 chapters late is a rather big flaw considering either Marianne and Mercedes can have it much earlier with some investment or just come with it at default with. Dorothea absolutely requires you to recruit her early for Physic access otherwise she simply comes too late to be a good healer.
Combat mages ... are just not good.8 hours ago, LegendOfLoog said:If you recruit them early, you can grab Death Blow as well, which is really strong with Swift Strikes. Leonie is slightly worse, but she makes up for the lack of flight with 4 range and +1 more Move as a Bow Knight. Also has Break Shot for debuffing and a Brave Combat Art in Point-Blank Volley. Pegasus Knight Hilda is probably the best early flier you can get, but she's on the low-end here imo.
Death Blow seems a bit of a stretch considering we want to clear the maps fast and Brigand is definitely an inferior choice to the Cavalier. Plus they get more Lance WEXP which helps to get Swift Strikes faster.
8 hours ago, Lunarly said:Definitely 100% disagree on this notion, a recruitment tier list should 100% take this into consideration, considering quite a few units (SS route Hilda, Ashe, and Lorenz come to mind) are recruited either for their paralogue items or battalions. You might as well just call this a regular tier list (which only considers a unit's performance exclusively) and not a recruitment tier list, and there's already a thread for that.
Here's something you should consider:
Recruiting students in your free time is basically a given anyway as you want the extra items and EXP from paralogues. Past Ch.5 you have full access to all the support-building mechanics that don't require AP and considering the paralogues pay themselves 90% of the time there is very little reason not to do so.This list mostly serves to highlight which units should be recruited asap while pointing out some who can still perform good enough if recruited later.
Take Lorenz for example. You really don't get anything from recruiting him early and you would have gotten more mileage out of someone else like Sylvain or Catherine. You have plenty of time to get recruit him before Ch.7 anyway so why would someone want to waste the very limited support resources in the earlygame on him?
LoR access is trivial, too, considering Sylvain is thirsty enough to bring it to you for free.The only real question is whether I should penalize Ferdinand and Caspar for wasting Byleth's skill EXP which does matter and I didn't consider that before. It's basically the same thing as FE7 Geitz and most lists tend to penalize him for that.
12 hours ago, eclipse said:Ignatz learns Deadeye?
I should sleep more.
10 hours ago, Silly said:Also you are completely wrong about Petra's thief class, as it has one of the better class growths. The enemy thief bonuses are +20 HP, +15 Str, +10 Dex, +15 Spd, +10 Def. This is an incredible stat spread that makes cross recruit Petra's stats pretty great. Many cross recruited students would be a lot better if their default class was thief.
I really should sleep more.
Guess the first change will be to move Sylvain and Ferdinand up while dropping Felix. I guess Shamir, too, considering she comes rather late though I would argue that Shamir > Felix for her earlier access to +2 range bows and having actually good weapon ranks to work with.
EDIT:
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Ch 6: Allows jumping straight to the DK, genuinely useful. However, you likely at least want the march ring in an average run, and there are two stealable magic wands + a levin sword scattered about. Getting the march ring at the very least will take a handful of turns considering how out of the way it is. Depends where your priorities lie.
The wands are fairly inconsequential, Levin Sword is buyable later and more of a gimmick.
It's possible to warp someone to the March Ring chest and move towards to the DK with Stride. But tbh the March Ring costs probably too many turns as it is worth.1 hour ago, Cysx said:Ch 8: Dancing + Stride provides a straight shot to the boss for any flier. Warp isn't needed.
... where are you getting the Dancer from? Warp is absolutely relevant to reach Solon.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Ch 9: Demonic beast chapter, pretty short no matter what. Warping can potentially save a turn, but it's not guaranteed. It makes very limited difference.
There are beasts on the NW and NE corner which are not in range of strided fliers. You can reach one with a Dancer but for the other Warp is your best bet.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Dedue: Haven't played that one on maddening. Warp gives access to the left part, but so does flying, and the best reward requirement is relatively lax. Can't say for certain though.
It's kill boss and warping a strided flier towards the boss cuts at least a turn.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Lorenz: Boss is 13 spaces away from your closest deployment range. By that point you should have several reposition skills. Stride is enough and Warp does not serve any meaningful purpose.
On the other hand Warp enables the same thing as flying + stride so how does that speak against it?
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Dorothea&Ingrid: Wide map that cannot be 1 turned, and where Lysithea will struggle to get in a position where she can provide the push to end the map due to low move. Difficult to say for sure, but initially I'd say very limited utility.
Warping Ingrid towards the escape point save turns regardless though.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Sylvain: Rout map, only marginal utility from Warp.
Actually no. Killing the bosses on the exits makes it easy to manipulate the central thieves to move towards a specific one which will save turns. Bonus points for clumping up and making them susceptible to a gambit wipe.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:Alois&Shamir: Boss is 16 spaces away from the closest deployment slot. Warp saves 1 turn as a result; there is a caveat however; you need to have Shamir recruited by ch7 for this paralogue to be accessible before you get a dancer. If you don't, then dance + stride is enough.
I mean either you clear it ASAP (where a Dancer is out of the question) or you might as well wait until Alois is recruited for the extra battalion.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:From that point on, you have a dancer
Every paralogue except Ashe+Catherine and Seteth+Flayn is unlocked by month 8 so you actually don't have a Dancer at this point. Never mind you get your Dancer at Week 3 (pretty almost at end of the month) so technically even those two have not a Dancer for their earliest clears.
1 hour ago, Cysx said:It's interesting because my question instead is: why would she? Especially if she's primarily used for warp. It's in no way tied to her and Lorenz is not a free recruit. Assuming she gets it is an unfair advantage.
On the flip side why should one not take account of it? Lysithea for Warp use doesn't lock her out of Thyrsus nor does she monopolize its use over others.
This doesn't make any sense.1 hour ago, Cysx said:t's not hard to understand that certain niches don't need to be filled twice, especially not in a context where you can have fortify.
It astounds me that you are not realizing what kind of logic fallacy you're commiting here.
So Marianne is supposedly bad because you have a healer on the other routes. Even though she is capable of doing the same thing as your current healer. Never mind that she will be on a higher level than your current one as the exp gain of healers is low and auto-leveling utterly eclipses it.
Guess I have to demote Mercedes, too, considering she has the same issue.1 hour ago, Cysx said:Fortify doesn't have low range. Your average Mercedes starts with 6 fortify range(when she gets it), meaning she covers 82 spaces around her at once, and grows to about 10 range over the course of the game. If you keep her positioned in between units, she covers your entire team in a majority of situations, not to mention fortify heals more. Thinking Physic is better past the early midgame makes no sense to me. It remains useful to reach stragglers, but Fortify covers a massive part of its utility and also provides a lot more, as well as twice the exp per use to increase its own range faste. If you have a choice between spending a deployment slot on a unit with Physic or one with Fortify, in my mind there's no question, and frankly I don't see how there is in yours.
6 range. Cool.
All the mounted units have already moved 11-13 spaces away from her though. What move have healers again? 4 (5 as a gremory).
Physic is better because of its range. You can actually reach your wounded units which is something mages in this game struggle to do.
Fortify is not that great and you are grossly overestimating its uses.1 hour ago, Cysx said:Others, but not all of them, I'm not asking you to put her at the top, just recognize her ability as a combat unit, which her current placement doesn't reflect at all. And there is nothing elaborate about using a gambit on turn 1. Vengeance is factually the strongest art in the game by miles, and a majority of characters lack durability on Maddening, getting ORKOed is exceedingly common. It is a weakness that this setup stops her from taking advantage of blessing as a survival tool, admittedly. But in a game with canto it's not that hard to make her kills safe.
It's perfectly reflected.
Using a gambit wastes a unit's turn and there are certaintly better things to do then to apply a weak safety net so you can enable someone to kill. It is also bold to assume that Vengeance is the strongest art when Swift Strikes with Relic weapons, Atrocity and Raging Storm exists which also require no setup. -
52 minutes ago, Cysx said:
Lysithea is too high. She's good but she's not the best recruit in the game. Keep in mind you get a free warp recruit in Manuela, and early on stride covers most of the utility warp would in other games. Ch 5 aside, but as you said she will likely not get there by then as a recruit. Recruiting Lysithea alone also implies Lysithea without Thyrsus, and that's considerably less impressive.
Ch.5 is generous considering as a recruit she doesn't get much time to focus on her Faith rank.
That being said Manuela's Warp is not available for a long time either. She has B rank Faith when she is recruited and reaching A rank isn't trivial at all (especially on Maddening). Considering that Lysithea has warp monopoly at minimum for 4 chapters that puts her far above her.The fastest skips require Stride and Warp so that doesn't say much. Not to mention early on you only get a single Stride battalion which makes earlier Warp access even more important for efficent clears.
Considering recruiting past Ch.5 is a trivial matter I don't see why are you assuming Lysithea has not Thyrsus. Until Ch.7 (when the first paralogues unlock) you have a lot of time to recruit other students.
59 minutes ago, Cysx said:Marianne is way high, she provides no utility your resident healer doesn't(unless you build her for lance combat but I don't think that's a thing in this community yet)
That's a nice pitfall you have here. So because you already have a unit that covers a niche makes a similar good unit worthless. Wat.
Guess Franz is trash because Seth exists. That's obviously not true.Not to mention Physic is the only important healing magic, everything else is "nice to have" at best. Restore is mostly niche and Fortify has low range which doesn't bode well with mages having gimped move.
Marianne trumps the other two Physic users in regards of utility because she gets Thoron for 3 range chip, Silence against siege tomes and has an easy time to get a mount thanks to her strength in Riding and eventually Lances.
Mercedes only offers healing spells while her offensive spells are very basic. She just gets different 1-2 range spells which doesn't do much.
Dorothea suffers a lot from the recruitment mechanic because her preferred skills are Swords and Reason. Aka she stars with E Faith. Despite having a budding Talent that weakness in Faith makes it a lot harder to get Physics access early on which is why she is an entire tier below the other two.1 hour ago, Cysx said:She was a meh recruit on hard, but rallies help a lot on maddening, and she's the best rallybot in the game.
Rallying is very good on Maddening but actual units are simply better. Annette doesn't do anything beyond that as her stats are bad and her spell list offers nothing.
Ignatz is similar. He has only Rally Spd but Deadeye + his talent can be fairly useful to trigger the boss in Ch.5 or aggro the AI.1 hour ago, Cysx said:Bernadetta is too low. She gets one of the best arts in the game, vengeance.
Other units can kill without relying on elaborate setups. Vengeance is very overrated and without Blessing her lack of durability will get her killed.
Bernadetta is more carried by her good skill affinities in Lance, Bow and Riding. There might be some niche setup where Vengeance Bernadetta can kill bosses in conjunction pass but Flying + Stride + Warp is a lot easier to pull off.1 hour ago, Cysx said:Cyril is too low
He is a student who has a recruitment lock till Ch.5 and his stats aren't even that great either. That's pretty bad.
PBV is good and so are his many skill preferences but compared to everyone above him there is very little he brings to the table in exchange for his downsides. At the very least Raphael has some uses with Rally Str and being rather bulky (though much worse than Dedue or Catherine). -
31 minutes ago, starburst said:
What I can tell you is that the defensive threshold for Ch 19 is rather low and can be completed with a great variety of units and no special builds, with or without horses, it does not matter.
This is the first time I ever heard of that and I'm very skeptical of what you consider "low".
I skipped Ch.20 in 3 (might have been 2 but probably 3) turns so I know that you can abuse the wind in your favor.
But that's like saying 14x in Binding Blade is good design because you can warp-skip it (which is absolutely not the case).34 minutes ago, starburst said:Then you must love every map bar Chapter 21 and Endgame, which are the only ones where using Dragon Veins is crucial to their completion. (And many players will tell you that Lunatic Endgame does not even require a single Dragon Vein use for it is simpler to fly-skip it.)
I mean I enjoy the first half of Conquest (which I stated how many times now in this single thread?) but the later maps with their gimmicks are awful.
21 doesn't require DV if you have fliers. Are you perhaps confusing it with something else? Endgame being Rescue-skip is something that is probably well-known by now, too.
To DV's credit Ch. 15(?) is an interesting gimmick I can get behind.Also just saying I wouldn't make distaste of Conquests lategame so clear if I didn't properly play it (which is the reason why I don't comment on anything that Judgral or old-school FE did).
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@Tables Pretty sure you and I are on the same page except I screwed up the terminology (this game has so many labels for EXP it's ridicilous). My bad. I will have to update it properly.
Also skill EXP reduced to 4 is still a massive difference because early on you don't get EXP for your mobility skills which are always major requirements for your classes. Not to mention for some units you have to train them in different weapons, meaning you don't always get EXP for that weapon type you need. Some units like Sylvain who prefer a flying class as their advanced class doesn't get EXP for flying during battle either.
It makes strengths a lot more relevant than before (which is why I highly prefer Maddening for a critical evaluation).I took it for granted that units are not rated by the items they bring. Maybe I should clarify that (and no New Game+ of course).
@Silly tbh Authority weakness is a lot more stomachable than other flaws. The best battalions are usually at B rank and fliers don't have the greatest selection to begin with (best is Cichol or the BE exclusive Pegasus). It is also one of the few skills where Byleth is guaranteed to have proficiency at, meaning it's a lot easier to raise than say specific weapon skills.
In general I would say the females tend to be a lot better because a better earlygame matters more. Flying on some of those early paralogues makes it much easier to get the full rewards and the males can't do any of it until they reach the threshold for Advanced classes (which is significantly later). Darting Blow is a good boost to their offensive and allows them to carry heavier weapons.
Lategame performance is not that big of a deal considering at that point you have so many options to kill enemies despite them still being pretty scary. Of course Sylvain and Ferdinand with Swift Strikes can eliminate some of the more egregious enemies on Maddening but such enemies also usually get stomped by Brave weapons (unless it's War Masters which ... are a different beast all together).
Only Petra is the exception because as you said no Lance strength is already bad but she auto-levels Sword and Axe which is a lot worse. Not to mention she promotes to Thief which utterly destroys her durability in the long run. That is the reason why I put her below the two Cavaliers.I would say aside from Lysithea either of the Physic users can be recruited at any point of time (which is why I put them higher than usual). They peak at C anyway and it is reached very quickly either way.
Same could be said for Linhardt though if you want another Warp user it's definetly more advisable to get him early. That being said he is one of the few students who ages like fine wine and can be recruited basically at any point during Part 1.EDIT: Also why are my Tiers suddenly smileys?
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Tables of Content:
- Motivation
- Criteria
- Za Listo
- In-depth explanation (WIP)
1. Motivation
I once said this in a different topic but I don't think the current Tier List thread works well because a unit's viability is influenced by many factors that need to be properly segregated.
One of these aspects is the recruitment itself. In 3H non-recruited units will auto-level to the recommended level of the current chapter. This means they automatically gain skill EXP in their set preferences (e.g. Sylvain raises his Lance and Axe rank) but also their base level increases. It's important to note that instead of the player's class growths these units will benefit from the enemy growth rates which offer higher values.
Therefore a unit recruited from other houses might perform better or worse compared to when they start as a student from your own house. I think this is a good criteria to build a 3H tier list on which motivates this.2. The tier list criteria
- Assume Maddening difficulty
- Assume efficiency, fast-play or whatever you want to call it (just not hardcore LTC that simplify the list to "use, not use")
- No New Game+
- Monastery activities will be factored in but no amiibo, online or paid DLC interactions
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Automatic recruits or house-specific units will not be evaluated
- So no Byleth, Lords, Dedue, Hubert, Flayn, Seteth and Gilbert.
- While it's better to recruit units early on I will look at them based on their entire lifespan, meaning I will factor in how well their usefulness age the longer you put off their recruitment. Being still good despite a late recruitment is a pretty good quality to have, especially since early resources are very limited.
- A unit will be rated on their performance only. Paralogues or Items they unlock will not flow in their evaluation.
- Technically you would have to divide the list for each house's perspective (especially with the Black Eagle routes) but considering how similar the units are I don't think it's necessary.
3. Tier List
Spoiler-A-
- Lysithea
- Catherine
- Ingrid
- Hilda
- Sylvain
- Ferdinand
- Leonie
-B-
- Linhardt
- Shamir
- Felix
- Petra
- Marianne
- Mercedes
-C-
- Manuela
- Dorothea
- Annette
- Ignatz
- Ashe
- Bernadetta
-D-
- Raphael
- Cyril
- Caspar
- Lorenz
-E-
- Hanneman
- Alois
4. Below you will find a detailled review of each unit. (WIP)
SpoilerLysithea: This is a no-brainer really. Warp is the single most busted element in every Fire Emblem ever and it's no exception here. She gets it significantly earlier than the other two users and very likely boasts more range thanks to her absurd Mag growth. To be fair it's relatively unlikely that she manages to learn it in Ch.5 but it is very much available in Ch.6 and onwards which significantly cuts turns.
Even combat-wise she is respectable as mages go. Her Dark Magic unfortunately slows her down a lot but thanks to her fast access to Fiendish Blow its high damage is fairly useful for setting up kills and Death Spikes annihilates mounted in one go.Ingrid: She is the only default Flier among all the other recruits. That automatically makes her stand out from the other students. No other unit auto-levels Flying and even though some have better stats than her Ingrid they require heavier investment during lessons to reclass. She ignores that process and still retains a respectable performance which is further boosted by the many Relic lances in this game. Flying + Stride trivializes this game hard (if not borderline required for some Paralogue objectives) and Ingrid being available at any point of time to do makes her very much one of the best recruits.
Catherine: So by Ch.5 (4 is impossible since the B support is locked and you don't that much EXP either) you can have this unit with Advanced class stats with a Brave Sword on steroids. That's pretty good in my books and makes the earlygame a lot easier which is the hardest part of Maddening. It's highly recommended to support and recruit her as early as possible.
Her only downside are her garbage skill preferences. Sword and Brawling are awful and she has no other revelant strengths. That means if you don't recruit her early she will get a flying mount very late and her midgame can still be suspect if she has to remain a Pegasus Knight past Level 20.
Even so Catherine is probably the best combat unit in the game for a long time and remains decent throughout the game.Linhardt: This guy can be recruited whenever and he will do his job mighty fine. Early on he can serve as a Physic bot and you can focus on his Faith rank for eventual Warp access. Recruit him later and he still does that which is very valuable.
Compared to Lysithea he won't have as much range and his combat is unsalvageable. Despite this his non-combat utility is extremly good, making him of the best recruits in the game.Hanneman: On paper Hanneman isn't that terrible. Strength in Riding is always welcome and allows him to reclass into a Dark Knight for mobility. With Meteor and Thoron he also has a decent list of offensive spells to fall back to.
But unfortunately the Dark Knight is a Master class so you are still stuck with a unit that has low MOV for a long time and with low MOV you're not getting to fight that much. That's pretty bad for a pure combat unit. Putting the final nails on the coffin he is only recruitable after Ch.7 and has painfully low Spd, taking away his only strength. Ouch.Alois: Being the last recruit (or second-to-last for BL) doesn't do him any favors as he misses out a lot of potential skill EXP. Add a flying weakness to it and Alois takes his place as the worst recruit in the game. He has the least amount of time to contribute and his stats at this point are mediocre at best. There is very little reason to really use him and by the time he shows any result the run is probably over.
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8 minutes ago, FoliFF said:
I was planning to get Shamir and Catherine early but from what I read this means I'll have to gift spam them first. I can also see myself dropping Felix for Catherine since they fill similar roles. Which probably is for the better since I rather use new units on every playthrough.
Recruiting Catherine as early as Ch.5 will make your life a lot easier. You can achieve this with a B-Support (easily achieveable if you start working on it in Ch.3) as this will lower the Lv requirement to recruit her.
Catherine (and Shamir) are the only two units that you can get early on that can deal with Maddening enemies on their own. Especially Catherine is a wicked good boss killer with Thunderbrand.
Early recruiting her is also beneficial for her long-term use. The earlier you work on her Lance and Flying rank the better she can serve you post-timeskip. -
51 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:
You are explicitly told how the wind works, turning it into a test of your ability to improvise movements and formations with a turn of prep time to fight the enemies without the wind sending you into compromising positions.
It's still a map gimmick though and especialy the ones that tinker with positioning/mobility tend to be never good in Fire Emblem, considering they usually drag maps out. imo, this one is not an exception to this rule.
If you are masochistic enough to like it more power to you but count me out. I generally dislike any of the DV gimmicks in this game.
Though I guess it helps to LTC this chapter. That's more I can say about Revelations.51 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:You'll notice that Revelation has the exact same map, but lacking Conquest's enemy AI or even any remotely interesting enemies whatsoever, it's just a massively annoying waste of time in a map that's in no real danger of killing you. The maps could not be more different in design philosophy, that's how much of a difference enemy formation and designer intent make.
This comparision doesn't make much sense because you are comparing an endgame chapter with an earlygame one (Ch.9 to be exact). If Revelations introduced the very same gimmick this early on it would have been a disaster with the butchered unit roster at that point.
If anything this shows Fates' map design has no choice but to rely on those map gimmicks to compensate its lacklustre maps. This is especially mind-boggling when Conquest has probably some of the strongest earlygame maps.42 minutes ago, Shrimperor said:There's nothing wrong with Conquest chapter 20.
Hey, look, it's 'bash Fates fans' hour again. I thought we stopped that shit since FE16 release
Last time I checked people haven't shown nearly as much contempt to 3H compared to Fates' "offerings".
You are entitled to like what you want of course but Fates is just not good in my books. -
@Alastor15243 You just critized Revelation's map design but somehow name Conquest's Chapter 20 as one of your favorites.
Guess die-hard Fates fans are like that game's plot I guess.1 hour ago, Shadow Mir said:Agreed. Doesn't help that Ephraim is a moron who didn't really equip himself and his troops well, considering that he and Kyle have Steel Lances, which are too heavy and inaccurate.
Actually I don't mind the Steel Lances here. Iron weapons would have been arguably worse.
Aside from the Soldiers and some Shamans Forde or Kyle don't double the enemies anyway and they wouldn't one-round with them either. With the Steel Lances they can 2HKO most enemies sans Fighters and maybe some Cavaliers if not scoring ORKO against some slower Soldiers.
Sure, they aren't accurate and Mercs will double the cavaliers but as long as it's not FE6 levels of unreliable I rather take that than extending my time on this chapter killing enemies.The bigger problem imo is you only get 1 Javelin and no healer in a map where mages are abundant the closer you get to the throne.
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Ch.5 Fire Emblem (FE6): A massive patch of forests with those wonky weapons stats just don't make a good combination. Doesn't help that a good amount of enemies are Mercenaries with their ridicilously high Spd making it even harder to get reliable hit rates. I'm also not fond of the boss having a Killer weapon this early on and likely screwing you over with a crit.
Ch.26x/28x Night of Farewells (FE7): Unlike 14x in FE6 you don't have Warp for this awful map gimmick, meaning you are forced to play through it. Even worse there are tons of reinforcements on this map to drag it out even longer, never mind Sonia on her throne is annoying to take down.
Ch.5x Unbroken Heart (FE8): Compared to most long-winded maps people tend to whine about this one is imo the worst because you have to traverse it with only 4 units and limited inventory. Combine that with narrow passageways and this map is very annoying to low-turn.
Ch.26 Clash! (FE9): As much as I love PoR, play this map at Maniac mode and then tell me of your experience. Spoilers; you will absolutely agree with me that this is not fun.
Part 4, as in all of it (FE10): Even though I really dislike the unit management in this game at the very least the maps were challenging and interesting (especially the varied objectives). Reach Part 4 and everything good I just said about the gameplay flies straight out of the window.
Ch.19 The Conqueror (FE13): This ain't map design, Awakening.
Kitsune Lair, Winds of Change (Fates): Conquest maps so good and free of shitty gimmicks, am I right? Mmmm, I'm dripping with sarcasm today, I wonder why.
Postgame (Shadows of Valentia): While technically not "maps" traversing through this dungeon is not fun at all. It's very tedious and unforgiving for a rather unnecessary piece of lore.
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19 minutes ago, Dr. Tarrasque said:
I would concur that this map is worse on GD. Dimitri is generally tankier than Claude so he can help with protecting Byleth and Gilbert's always a tank for this.
Let me one up you and say that Silver Snow Ch.13 manages to be even worse.
Seteth is a decent unit but he is not able to take that many hits and unlike Claude you can't really reverse roles with him and Byleth (who you can pump up to be able to stall the enemies).
BE is also the one route where cross recruitment is required because on Maddening the base roster is god awful.
Your first reinforcements are Dorothea and Caspar from the north-west corner, Petra south-west. Needless to say that doesn't cut it (GD has the opposite problem of giving you Hilda and Leonie from SW but Ignatz and lolenz NW) and if Petra isn't a Wyvern Rider she is super dead since she won't be able to handle all the enemies by herself. -
44 minutes ago, DefyingFates said:
Yeah, that is a pretty BL-heavy focus you have there. Neat! Glad it was easier for you than it may have been otherwise 😄
Just going to add here something that somehow many people seem to miss.
Use. Gambits. (and Battalions)
Everytime you face multiple enemies and are at the verge of being overwhelming Gambits can save your hide just being rooting every enemy to the ground and opens up breathing space to nuke down the most dangerous enemy (for Ch.13 specifically the Assassins).
It also blocks other enemies from attacking you since the panicked ones block the tiles for them to move on, even preventing Archers from getting their shots in.Dimitri comes with his own special battalion which covers a lot of tiles. Byleth really should have the Duscur Heavy Soldiers with the +10 Prt bonus and 2x3-tile Gambit for tanking out damage.
Fussilade is however your best bet for this chapter (Archers and Snipers, I think) because it is not only ranged but the whole map structure on your starting position makes it very effective.
Otherwise standard gambits like Assault Troop for its multiple uses or Poison Tactic are also pretty decent. Especially the latter is something you can give to anyone since the Merchant battalions is ranked E and can help the two from the south to starve of enemies (though if they can hit is another matter entirely).
Your fliers hopefully have D rank Authority so they can use at least the Pegasus battalions for the Assembly gambit.Though I will say that Chapter 13 is still bad design as it requires very specific things from the player.
You have to go through Ch.12 first and considering your unit inventory is very unlikely going to be optimal after it you are kinda stuck with what you get (unless you waste turns to reshuffle equipment).
Add to the fact that you are forced to use your original house members (with each house having at least 1-2 dud units) and you get a lot of unwarranted difficulty with this chapter. -
Meanwhile I'm waiting for them to announce the KoRT Interludes.
Shimosa is probably going to on the 3rd of October or the week after if they are using the Interlude campaign as a buffer after Halloween.
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Maddening is fun. Finally the training wheels are off.
Finished the 1st run on BL, now I am on BE (probably Silver Snow because I suspect CF has insane difficulty spikes). Some notes:
Spoiler-
BL has easily the best starting roster
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Dedue is the only unit that has a realistic Enemy phase. That means not only can he block enemy paths reliably but also weaken them so you can feed them to your weaker units.
- However, I ditched him past Chapter 5 as by that point my roster promoted out of paper status and could actually start fighting.
- Any mage that touches him will kill him and you start seeing a lot of them.
- In comparision BE get their butt handed to them because none of them can take hits. Ugh, the BE units are so bad.
-
Annette's Rally utility as I said multiple times is a great boon and even more so on Maddening. She starts off with Rally Str, then gets Res and Spd. She didn't fight at all though and later on she chimed in when I wanted to warp-skip a chapter.
- If I do GD I suspect Raphael and Ignatz occupying the same niche.
-
Felix is the best combat unit in the earlygame. His talent, Crest and good Bow Arts allow him to deal heavy damage to enemies which is another way to feed EXP to your roster. His good Str and Spd also makes him very likely the first unit to actually ORKO enemies.
- If you didn't set your goals to give him a Wyvern though it's going to take way too much time and he wants his Bow rank for Heavy Draw. I just kept him as a Bow Knight so he can circumvent his paper-thin durability.
- Dimitri is a bit lacking because of his low base Spd but once he overcomes that he will probably grow fine. Unfortunately his class options are rather limited and giving him a horse could make his Spd unsalvageable.
-
The rest has good Spd to keep up with the stat inflation in Maddening.
- Sylvain and Ingrid start off mediocre but obviously they grow into good units and at least they have Tempest Lance to get some kills early on. Ingrid carried my run hard and made a lot of early paralogues easier (especially Lorenz's one).
- Surprisingly I found Ashe to be fairly strong in Maddening compared to Hard mode. 9 Base Spd allowed him to escape being doubled earlier than the above two and having Curved Shot from the get-go is also useful to chip in the earlygame. Combined with his decent weapons talents (Lance, Axe, Bow) he made for a solid Wyvern Lord who wasn't even that much worse than Sylvain. I wouldn't put him on the same level as him but I can think of many students in BE or GD who are much worse on a pure combat level.
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Dedue is the only unit that has a realistic Enemy phase. That means not only can he block enemy paths reliably but also weaken them so you can feed them to your weaker units.
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I managed to recruit every single student at the expense of keeping Byleth in his Enlightened One class.
- Male Byleth really doesn't have great options tbh, Cavalier eats his Spd alive and Wyvern Rider requires a lot of tutoring and comes late. Bow Knight also requires a lot of dedication.
- On that note F!Byleth will make your runs a lot easier just by having a flying class a lot earlier.
- It's better to recruit early if you plan to use the unit in question because class requirements are a lot more stricter in this mode. I wouldn't recommend using any recruits past Chapter 6. Your current roster should absolutely be ahead than fresh recruits at that point and even more so the enemies.
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My experience on some cross recruits I used:
- Lysithea is an absolute necessity for BL due to her early warp and you don't want to wait for Manuela (who takes an eternity to get to A in this mode). Unfortunately I barely missed Warp for Ch.5 (which made that chapter so much harder) but beyond that I think this is the one unit you absolutely want to recruit.
- Petra turned out to be very disappointing for a cross recruit (Ch.4). She is too frail and she wastes a lot of her class exp in Swords. Unlike Ingrid or Hilda she doesn't have a talent in Lances so making her a Pegasus Knight takes a lot longer. I just reclassed her as a Brigand and even then it was not good. She was benched before Ch.9.
- Speaking of which Hilda was actually decent for a rather late recruit (Ch.7 so I don't have to face her lunacy in the Battle of Eagle and Lions). Part of it is because of her ridicilous stats but she also levels both Axes and Lances making it easy to focus on Flying to round out her kit.
- Linhardt makes for a good cross recruit even late because you don't care about his combat. You use this guy for his spells and he does a fairly decent job for your additional deployment slots later in the game.
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The big 3 prepromotes (Catherine, Shamir, Seteth) are great to have because they are the only units that realistically outdo the enemies by the time they join and two of them have great ranks.
- Catherine is imo a bit suspect though. I would say I recruited her early (start of Ch.6) and even then it took a long time before she was on a Pegasus. Working from E all the way to C Lances sucks.
- Seteth and Shamir in comparision have low Spd but that's easier to fix with Speed Carrots and Brave weapons.
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BL has easily the best starting roster
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33 minutes ago, Firebolt said:
As for Proofgatory, I'm more than happy to give you my surplus of 500+ Proofs!
Someone needs to get punished I see.
Also everybody is lying about being Dust addicts anyway. Worse than coke I say.
1 hour ago, JSND Alter Dragon Boner said:QP Blackhole
tbf there are plenty of opportunities to farm for QP. Lottos and 1/2 Dailies are pretty common events by now. Not to mention usually Lores are the bottleneck that keep you from maxing out stuff.
In comparision if you want an easy way to farm mats you are either lucky with the shop or you have found your past-time during dead weeks. Any Bronze Mats are the worst offender, 20-30 is not enough. -
2 hours ago, MrSmokestack said:
Haven't seen you post in this thread for a while. Good to see you're back!
Don't worry I'll be dead in 3 weeks anyway.You wanna hear something cursed?
SpoilerDuring Dead Heat I actually tried for Edison. Spent all my saved tickets (~50) and 3 10-rolls. Didn't get him.
I got Xuanzang instead.
Wat.I tried for Nero. Spent all the tickets from the event and, what else, didn't get her.
But Brynhildr will do, right? And 2 copies of Battle Olympia because why not.
Wat.Oh and Anniversary?
Holmes. 2 Tickets.With that in mind 389 SQ + 18 tickets probably won't be enough to net myself Musashi and NP2+ Tomoe.
WRYYYYYYYYY.2 hours ago, MrSmokestack said:I have a Lancer Saberface Alter already. Taking Jailter off support list puts me in a situation I can't win.
On the other hand you won't have the FBI on your doorstep.2 hours ago, MrSmokestack said:I still use her for farming despite NP1 because I still don't have any AOE Saber that reliably hits harder than her. She's at 26,728 assuming no grails or fous so the difference is even bigger in practice.
I could have sworn that you have either Artoria or Void Shiki. Was that on your JP account?
Oh, I'm definetly picking Edison now. Why?
Just checked my inventory after max. ascending Arthur. I can't believe I'm saying this but I'm out of Saber Pieces and Monuments. Can't even get past the 1st Ascension.
Guess that was bound to happen after I managed to finish my backlog. At the very least I have now everyone max. ascended, max. leveled and at 4/4/4 minimum. Now only I need to farm for my targets. -
1 hour ago, JSND Alter Dragon Boner said:
Hey you didnt specific the server :v
inb4 JP now gives away a SSR ... or nothing at all.
16 minutes ago, MrSmokestack said:People thinking Fionn is bad in the year of our Lord 2019. Why?
Bad rep sticks harder on you than chewing gum.
Or you know people just dislike him in general? Every time he shows up he is a douche.
2 hours ago, MrSmokestack said:Waffling between Wu, Alice, Saber Alter, and Emiya. Wu is the clear winner for gameplay while the other three are flavor.
Emiya could be a choice if you care about bonus drop for future events. CCC rerun and all GudaGuda events list him as a bonus Servant and Christmas Rerun is also coming up.
Otherwise pick Wu I would say. Saber Alter depends on if you are actually using her all that much.
Not that S!Alter is your waifu anymore, you betrayed her after all. Also where is the Lancer Alter pick? I knew you tasted like a liar.------
Might just have to roll the dice for my pick. It's between:
- Nero
- Edison
- Gorgon
Most of my go-to SRs are already at NP2+ and while NP2 Tristan was tempting with his upcoming Interlude I would prefer something new. Li will be benched in favor of Kagetora so that's another off from the list.
So that leaves me with Story-locked stuff. I don't have any EoR SR but none of them are priority either.
Tried to get Nero now 2 times and failed both times (CCC and Nero Fest). Gameplay-wise not that great since she is severely lacking in damage (IP doesn't really count) but aside from Void Shiki and Jason (pfffffff) we don't have another AoE Arts Saber yet. On the other hand she technically has a rate-up with Skadi next year.
Edison is a funky option. Exceedingly rare too. I don't think he is great but he certainly looks like to be fun to mess around with.
Gorgon is probably a pass. JP screwed up her Strengthening really bad and considering I will gun for NP5 Salieri not really appealing. -
9 minutes ago, Sire said:
The main thing I want to know is how relevant are the Black Eagle students? Do they still chime in on story events as a class or as individual characters, or are they just forgotten about completely and the Church members take over? I was looking forward to more BE interactions on the Church Route, but it looks like that may not be the case...
You see some outcomes which you wouldn't get on the other route due to its circumstances.
SpoilerThe most major difference here is Ferdinand. He and his retainers actually attempted a rebellion against Edelgard but (unsurprisingly) failed. He pledges his remaining soldiers to Byleth during their reunion. Otherwise it's not all too different.
Also your "Lord" are now Seteth and Flayn.
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It's a bit funky how Three Houses has a small roster but they decided to not include some more route-specific, non-student units. Somehow only BL gets this privilege in form of Gilbert who is technically not even affiliated with the Kingdom anymore (as he is a Knight of Seiros). They could have done more with that.
GD has 2 obvious choices in Judith and Nader. It's very weird how Judith is not playable considering she joins your army and only hangs around the monastery. Nader is a bit of underbaked character considering his title as "the Undefeated" as you don't see much of him beyond the Alliance part on the True BE route and one chapter in GD.
Also he is jacked-up Wyvern Rider, I need to break this game even more.
Another unsung hero of the Alliance is Holst. He is apparently one of the best generals in the Alliance and everyone strokes his shaft, only for him to get his butt handed to him by Nemesis and poisoned mushrooms.BE really should have made Randolph and Ladislava playable. You don't get any perspective on their characters, even on BE, and they come off as cannon fodder at best (no joke, that's how they die on all routes). Especially Ladislava doesn't have anything beyond "I owe Edelgard for some unnamed reason" and that's pretty sad.
I guess they ran out of resources to make more support convos?
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Just going to confirm the obvious (since it's still on the main page) but Gilbert is a BL-only unit. He will not join on the True BE, Church BE or GD routes.
A very easy proof (aside from playing all the routes) is looking at supports. Only on the BL path you can support with him in Part 1, all the other routes do not allow that (akin to the other Lords, Hubert and Dedue). -
Formatting guys.
You are free to copy my flawless 1 min work, kek.SpoilerS tier:
- Byleth (F>M)
- Claude
- Edelgard
- Dimitri
- Lysithea
A Tier:
- Dancer
- Hilda
- Petra
- Leonie
- Ingrid
- Linhardt
A- Tier:
- Felix
- Ferdinand
- Sylvain
B Tier:
- Shamir
- Catherine
- Seteth
- Dorothea
- Marianne
- Mercedes
B- tier:
- Manuela
- Flayn
- Bernie
- Ashe
- Raphael
- Ignatz
- Caspar
C tier:
- Cyril
- Dedue
- Lorenz
- Hubert
- Annette
D+ tier:
- Hanneman
D tier:
- Gilbert
- Alois
For my comments I will just combine the - tiers with the lower tier (B- and C becoming C and so on, I just find too many tiers unnecessary, especially with a small cast as this).
SpoilerA Tier:
- Dancer
- Hilda
- Petra
- Ingrid
- Leonie
- Seteth
- Linhardt
Ingrid is better than Leonie because she excels in Flying. That means she has more leeway to train in Axes (Wyvern) or Authority (better Battalions), something that Flying Leonie won't have. She has an easier time as a Bow Knight, sure, but Fliers are undoubtely better in this game (especially in terms of being available the entire game opposed to peaking only once you reach Lv.30). Statistically they aren't even that different.
Seteth really needs to be A. He joins relatively late, yes, but not only does he have an ideal class but also high Authority out of the box. None of the other recruitables have that and that makes his base stats that much higher. He has no real weakness and arguably he is better than either of the 3 female Fliers by the the time he joins.
He is heck a lot of better than Catherine at least who barely scrapes by with her nonexistent ranks.C Tier:
- Manuela
- Flayn
- Annette
- Bernie
- Ashe
- Ignatz
- Cyril
- Raphael
- Caspar
- Dedue
- Lorenz
- Hubert
A bad start affects snowballing. Both Raphael and Caspar have the worst start of all the sudents (especially Caspar) and have a lot of trouble killing things consistently. Considering that they should be much lower and most other Students achieve what they can do but better. Even Cyril does better despite joining late since he has a lot of key affinities to access the better classes faster, freeing up points for battalion access.
I said this on the other thread but Annette being an unconditional +4/+4 very early on (as early as Chapter 3) shouldn't be taken lightly. It helps your units to snowball faster and allows you to reach stat benchmarks for killing bosses more comfortably (less relying on Gardening boosters, good level ups etc.). This holds especially true in LTC where EXP gain is the most limited.
90% of this game consists of "Kill Boss" that means Annette will be able to contribute for that, regardless of her subpar combat performance. In that regard she is much better to have around than any of the other mediocre combat units that require a lot more investment over time where as Annette only requires a mere C+ rank in Authority and becomes relevant throughout the game.
Considering that she should be below Flayn and Manuela.D Tier:
- Hanneman
- Alois
- Gilbert
To give Alois some credit, he joins a chapter earlier and has existent Spd. Not good but it's there. Weak in Flying hurts but getting him a Wyvern this late wouldn't have worked out anyway.
Gilbert's prospect of ever doubling doesn't really exist because of his class smiting his Spd to the ground and considering he comes post-timeskip fixing him is almost impossible. Even Great Knight seems a bit of a stretch tbh.
Recruitment Tier List
in Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Posted · Edited by Shiki
Just saying but movement-reducing terrain doesn't negate a +2 Mov advantage. The maps where terrain is delibitating for them are far in-between. In contrast most maps in 3H are pretty open and vast where a Cavalier is absolutely going to be ahead.
That WEXP gain is not that low. By the time you have Intermediate classes you can very much expect your units to be in multiple battles and these points adds up, especially with classes giving additional skill Exp. Compared to LTC you will get a lot more out of combat which in turn enables faster weapon ranks.
I'm not sure how this is conflicting. I assume that all these resources are readily available for every unit. So I rate every magical unit's (not only Lysithea's) performance with Thyrsus in mind.
I just don't let the acquirement of these items flow into a unit's placement because it doesn't tell you how good a unit is. This is something that is generally assumed on tier lists. e.g. in FE6 Sophia getting a Guiding Ring for free doesn't flow into her unit assessment.
Considering Maddening mode changes very little to the Monastery routine this doesn't mattter? Like it has nothing to do with the efficiency criteria.
Recruiting everyone doesn't require you to take extra turns or negatively impacts you in a significant way. To legimately recruit them you need to have certain skill ranks on Byleth but until the deadline you have so much AP to spend (if you optimized Professor rank which is a given) that you will have more than enough to cover Byleth's needs for Wyvern Rider access while having plenty to spare to level other skills. B rank support only requires Gold which is abundant in 3H.
If only Paralogue access is relevant then you don't even have to recruit every student. Annette doesn't get hers on the other routes while some of the pre-war ones only require 1 student to unlock it (e.g. Ingrid-Dorothea).
PEMN but out of 5 Maddening runs (1 for each of BL, GD and SS, 1 GD "LTC", 1 CF in progress) I managed full recruitment while getting Byleth to Wyvern Rider (F!Byleth on SS went from PK to WR) with no difficulty at all.
No tier list worth its salt takes it for granted to skip optional chapters. It is generally assumed that you actually play them and, more importantly, clear them with the same efficienty/LTC criteria in mind.
I find it baffling that so many basic criteria are questioned. I would have assumed that SF had experience to make tier lists like these and aside from the unique criteria of 3H recruitment all of this is pretty standard stuff, almost carbon copies from tier lists of older games.
BE will also miss Ch.5 Warp so I was already taking it into account for this list. Only GD gets that delicious turn shave on Maddening.
DotG is first available post-timeskip though and that's about the time the other Warp users get access (a bit earlier I guess). Lysithea will have it Ch.6 onwards and is the sole user of it for the entire pre-war period and assorted paralogues. Plus while Flying+Stride can substitute Warp it doesn't necessarily make it worse.
Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought the final BL map required Warp for the fastest clear. I don't think this changed with Maddening.
Though reviewing your comment I should differentiate some units, especially for the SS path.
Hilda's placement imo doesn't change that much on SS because she still scales very well and has no trouble becoming a Wyvern Rider. The only thing you lose is her availability for Part 1.
Catherine though takes a lot longer to even access an inferior flying class and as a PK her performance is middling until she can reclass into a Falcon Knight. Her stat lead is also lost so that makes SS Catherine a lot worse than on othe rroutes.
Cyril is pretty much unsalvageable. He auto-levels as a Commoner which completely neuters his stats. Auto-leveling Axe and Bow are still nice and he reaches C rank Flying quickly enough but his stats are so bad that I don't think he is worth it.
Is there anything else I would have to account for as significant route differences?
EDIT:
I also changed the tier list a bit.