HeoandReo

Aside from Lutz/Hisame as mentioned earlier, Soleil is alright with her, though it's mostly for a little bit more strength and Luna access. The only issue is that Soleil can potentially get Cav by herself with A+ Sophie, so the logic goes why would you give her Pieri if you could give her a mother with better stats/better classes and just let her get Cav via Sophie. (Unless you have Soleil A+ with Mitama or Ophelia, though somehow I doubt that Pieri!Soleil would care for either.) Nishiki could work, if you want a much more extreme version of Kinu. Pieri's mods compliment Nishiki's a little too much, in that Kinu does get more strength, speed and res, but suffers much worse in skill and defense. But yeah, there's not too many kids who Pieri would benefit who wouldn't work as well with another parent. Her A+s are very solid(Ninja and Fighter stand out) but they don't hold a candle to others. She does have one of the better personal skills though, so it might be worth trying to optimize a pairing for her own sake. I'm thinking of placing her with Hinata for Samurai access, so that she can pick up a faire, Astra as another proc, and a few other useful skills to boost her offense with Killer Instinct.

Orochi could work, since she seems to be free. There's a mod clash with magic, but +2 mag isn't terrible, and it means he comes with 3 strength and 5 skill. Deere also gets access to Breaking Sky as a result, which is very useful to him as a more reliable proc than Luna. Felicia and Rinkah both have more severe mod clashes, and Orochi passes down an arguably better class. Access to Tomefaire helps if he wants to go Strategist, and Orochi can pass down a useful Herb Merchant skill - perhaps Extravagance or Household Cure, depending on if you want to grind for the former. This could lead to something like Felicia/Tsukuyomi and I guess Rinkah alone, mostly because Felicia compliments Tsukuyomi's mods better, and both have more to gain from each other with Marriage Seals. Rinkah like mod clashes with everybody. It's annoying to pair her sometimes because of that.

Nyx could pass down Raven Strike from A+ Mozume, (or Shara could marry Kisaragi) but the low skill mostly comes from the class itself having a low cap. If you want to have a good debuffing Sophie, consider giving her Oboro. Lance Fighter gives a bunch of useful seals, along with Breaking Sky/Flamboyant and Lancefaire, if she wants to continue in Cavalier. Oboro can also A+ with Belka in Invisible Kingdom, so Deadly Breath is a possible inheritance from Wyvern. Her mods are actually fairly equal to Camilla's, so you wouldn't be missing too much statwise. Sophie should marry Gurei to get Ninja, or failing that, Deere/Foleo to get Maid so that she gets a class to actually use Kunaifaire in. If you want to abuse Lethality + Flamboyant, definitely have her marry Gurei, since Elite Ninja has the high skill cap to take full advantage of it.

Aside from Ophelia, Matoi is another very good A+ option for Shara, particularly if you end up giving Orochi to her. Swallow Strike can be used to fill the speed gap and give Shara better doubling ability. If Matoi doesn't have Breaking Sky access, it's an A+ that's mutually beneficial. I do agree that Nyx is a bit better overall from the two in a vacuum, though. +5 magic/speed is seriously no joke - only Nyx!Eponine is really comparable on that front.

For Shara, I quite like both Sakura and Nyx. She has really high speed which is good to take advantage of. Orochi hurts speed a ton, which isn't good since it weakens Shara's strongest point. Between Sakura and Nyx, Sakura has better availability, though for the most part Nyx's stats are superior since she wins in both magic and speed. For competition, Gurei likes Sakura, Eponine likes Nyx, and Foleo likes both of them. Eponine!Nyx is basically a slightly faster Shara, so you could do Sakura!Shara and Eponine!Nyx to get two fairly similar units in terms of their functions. For Shinonome, I prefer Camilla since she boosts his speed and compliments most of his other stats. Wyvern is also a pretty good class for Shinonome to work in. Kagerou isn't bad either though. Speed is worse with her, but Shinonome hits a lot harder with that +5 strength mod. --- Also, since it looks like Matoi is super popular now, I might just put down a few ideas for builds that I haven't seen but might work out well. Just picking out a few possible mothers, here's what I can come up with. Oboro!Matoi Classes: Pegasus, Samurai, Lance Fighter Mods: 1/0/4/0/-1/5/-1 Growth total 46, 35, 10, 43, 33, 36, 40, 10 Sakura!Matoi Classes: Pegasus, Samurai, Priestess Mods: 0/3/2/0/0/3/0 Growths: 51, 31, 28, 46, 33, 41, 36, 15 Mozume!Matoi Classes: Pegasus, Samurai, Villager Mods: 0/1/4/0/1/4/-2 Growths: 46, 35, 13, 46, 38, 38, 38, 18 Setsuna!Matoi Classes: Pegasus, Samurai, Bowman Mods: 0/1/4/2/-1/3/-1 Growths: 46, 28, 11, 40, 40, 33, 31, 21 Nyx!Matoi Classes: Pegasus, Samurai, Dark Mage Mods: 0/4/1/1/-1/2/1 Growths: 46, 23, 28, 41, 36, 33, 36, 21 Sakura!Matoi actually looks really good. She has great growths to make up for Tsubaki's bad ones and nearly equal strength/magic base growths - she's pretty easily your best shot to making a good magical or mixed Matoi. That HP growth and her overall bulk is actually pretty good, considering that mother's a healer. (also, she technically has red hair. This could be good if you want that.) The only thing she's missing is a good proc, and that can be saved by a marriage or an A+ with Shara. Mozume!Matoi could be good too, especially if you're passing Aptitude. Extravagance is nice to have with Line of Death and a faire. Oboro!Matoi is a bit better skill-wise, though her growths look a bit worse than the prior two. Setsuna and Nyx are surprisingly underwhelming growth-wise. Their mods are good, but that's their main selling point. I would dare say that Nyx!Matoi is by and large outclassed by Sakura!Matoi in this situation. While she does have the best class for growing magic in, Exorcist is just 5 points behind for the growth. (and Sakura!Matoi would hit 48% in Exorcist. Yeah, it's not an Awakening-style growth, but we aren't in Awakening territory anymore. Blame Tsubaki for holding her back.) tl;dr everyone loves Sakura

Nishiki is actually more physical. He does have high res, but his base magic growth is 10%, which is better than others but not great. His modifiers also lean towards physical or mixed offense, and his main niche as a result is a mage-killer. He starts with Spellcaster, so in any case he's mostly covered for magic and already has a great proc in Breaking Sky. A few options come to mind for additional classes, though. Pegasus helps him capitalize on his speed with Swallow Strike. Knight/Cavalier gives him an additional proc in Luna and a few other utility skills such as Diamond Strike to help his lower defense. For Kanna mothered by Anna, she would want either a +Speed or +Magic asset. Anna actually has a negative modifier in speed, so an asset to patch it up would be appreciated. -Luck would be my recommendation for a flaw, since it doesn't reduce skill nor does it reduce defenses, and Anna's mods have enough Luck to take the hit.

OK, that leaves Hinata (already covered), Silas, Kaze and Tsukuyomi. Midoriko is another one that could work. With Oboro she's functionally similar to Oboro!Eponine in terms of stat spread only with much higher skill. Breaking Sky is always nice to her to get, and Flamboyant works well with Lethality, and seals work well with certain kunais. Actually, Lance Fighter tends to synergize pretty nicely with Ninja, so this is a good choice. Sophie picks up a relevant faire if she ends as a Paladin/Great Knight, as well as a useful proc. Depending on who she marries, inherited Extravagance can come in handy as well, or for a lower-end Herb Merchant skill, Household Cure might be good, or just pass Breaking Sky to save a bit of time. Shara... I think she can pull off some mixed sets and has balanced mods with 4 speed, but her own strength growth isn't conducive to it. She also already has Breaking Sky/Flamboyant, so she would mostly just be concerned with the seals. Personally, I'm leaning either towards Midoriko or Hisame for Oboro.

The Joker/Pieri. Even barring the Batman jokes I thought the support was funny. Lazward/Pieri is a great one too. Xander/Charlotte is good too. Charlotte has awesome supports and that was one of her better ones. I do like Odin/Luna, too, if only because I thought it was handled better than Lazward/Luna lore-wise. I'm also very excited to see what Asama/Belka is going to look like. Brooding young assassin lady paired up with a happy priest? Sounds like a sitcom to me.

No problem. It's kind of what the topic is about anyway, just answering questions. Who do you have who's relatively free? Hinata might work as a possibility, and both of them are Takumi's retainers so it's still thematic. Strength and defense are high (3 and 4) but skill and speed are a bit underwhelming. (1 and 0. It's Hinata's mods though so whatcha gonna do) Lance Fighter is also good for him to pick up, since he's the only Hoshidan male who cannot get it through an A+ with Shinonome. Deere can't get A+ Shinonome either, but he's on both routes so dunno if it counts. This sounds like a good plan to me if she's ending as a Hero. Since your Avatar's going Dark Knight, I am aware that Hero pairup bonuses don't hinder magic one way or the other. It also lets her capitalize on getting a relevant faire, which should still work well if she's A+ with Shara for Breaking Sky. If you are intending to give Line of Death to her, I would recommend Breaking Sky if only to help increase damage and to offer a little bit of protection if she finds herself at low health.

In Invisible Kingdom Eponine is a great candidate to be mothered by Oboro. Mods are pretty balanced - she gets good bulk, 5 speed and 0/0 offenses, but Eponine gets a ton from Oboro skillwise. Breaking Sky is awesome, Holy Lancer is a good ending class, and the seals are great to have too. She can inherit Extravagance for high offense or Copycat for utility. Eponine can also marry Gurei, Foleo or Deere to get a kunai class to take advantage of some of the seals, as well as her high speed. Speed Seal is particularly useful with Oboro (the S rank shuriken, not the mother) since iirc it doesn't target speed as a debuff. Ignis isn't a bad candidate either - his speed hole is kind of bad, but he's capable of a few things. Lancefaire would be useful if he's ending as a General, and like Eponine he can nab Ninja from A+ Gurei or Rod Knight from A+ Foleo. Ignis isn't magic oriented at all, though, so Ninja would be the better class for him to pick up. Sophie is another candidate who likes getting Lance Fighter access, and I imagine Deere would like her too. It's actually a bit tougher to pair her with a Hoshido husband imo, since she gives a ton of benefits to all of them, so it's mostly a matter of trying to figure out who would benefit the most. Mitama might be the best bet, since she really would like a good offensive class and a good proc to work with her physical stats, and Oboro delivers on both, in addition to giving great stats. Lance Fighter distribution is actually really poor, so it's a matter of trying to find which kids would benefit the most from Oboro's skillset, since with Breaking Sky/Flamboyant/Lancefaire/Seals/Extravagance/Copycat combined with good mods, her kid is going to get a lot of mileage out of her as a mother.

Azura!Midoriko (and Setsuna!Midoriko I suppose) occupies an excellent niche as a high speed debuffer if she goes Elite Ninja. As Elite Ninja, she gets 39 skill and 42 speed, which is one of the highest possible for a non-Kanna child. 42 speed is actually a really good threshold to hit, especially as a Shuriken user who will get 2 speed just for equipping one. She cannot be doubled by the fastest Kannas barring ones mothered by Kinu, she functionally has a doubling range of 39-44 depending on if she equips Swallow Strike with a Shuriken. High speed helps both offensively and defensively, since she can double just about any unit naturally while only very specific builds can double her in return. Pair her with Shinonome for Breaking Sky and Defense/Speed Seals and you have a unit that is very good at softening enemies up, with good killing potential thanks to her speed too. I'd recommend Kaze as a father for Shigure as well, mostly because he gives a lot of useful skills for a potential supporter, namely Copycat, Snake Venom, and Kunaifaire if he opts to go Butler or another Elite Ninja.

Looking at Invisible Kingdom recruitment, Tsukuyomi -> Shara seems like the quickest one to start with to get the kid to have an A+ with Matoi, since all of the other fathers for her other options (Silas, Asama and Zero) all come pretty late. If you have him marry Sakura Shara will turn out pretty nice statwise. Breaking Sky is a really nice and reliable proc, and make up for what Luna!Matoi will be missing otherwise. (which is a reliable proc) Grinding for it won't be too much of a hassle either, since it uses Matoi's previous lance rank and can allow her to build up a tome rank if she desires, since she'll be getting Dark Mage from the marriage. Luna can build up an A+ with Camilla to pick up Wyvern - Level 20/5 in Revenant Knight will pick up Deadly Breath, which is useful. Tsubaki can also pick up Snake Venom in relatively little time from Saizou. I'm not sure if Snake Venom/Deadly Breath stack, but those are both good skills for Matoi to potentially take advantage of if you're not grinding. Luna comes at Level 10, so you could just use a Master Seal and a Buddy Seal after she gets an A+ with Camilla to get Deadly Breath fast. Tsubaki can also potentially pass Lethality(20/5 Ninja) from A+ Saizou, which synergizes well with Flamboyant in addition to stuff like Astra from Samurai and Sol from Merc. Copycat is way too far off if you're playing efficiently, since I'm assuming that Matoi will be picked up around midgame (Chapters 16-19) given recruitment times. You might follow a path like this: *Luna passes Deadly Breath (A+ Camilla), Tsubaki can pass Snake Venom/Lethality if he wants (A+ Saizou) *Matoi gets an A+ with Sakura!Shara. Sakura can pass Swallow Strike from a reclass to Pegasus, Tsukuyomi doesn't care since his A+s are so far away. Matoi goes Pegasus -> Falcoknight -> Basara (pick up Breaking Sky and maybe Flamboyant) -> Exorcist/Samurai (for a relevant faire) -> End as Dark Flier/Dark Knight. Getting magic might be a little tough, but if she needs to, she could pick up a few levels as a Sorcerer, since it has a natural 25% magic growth before any unit growths are added.

Xander is not too bad of a Lodestar candidate. The high luck mod and its 10 avoid bonus gives him dodging capabilities similar to Trueblades. Mods are 31/25/34/32/42/31(35)/27, giving him 79 avo counting the class bonus. There are a few skills he can pick up which could help. Lucky 7 is a flat +20 but requires him to marry an Outlaw Avatar. Soar can also be obtained by marrying Hinoka and Azura. With those two together, he can potentially pick up +50 depending on the enemy type. Tome users carrying Raven Strike are really going to hurt, though.

Aqua will also get Breaking Sky from Lance Fighter. And a bunch of seals for debuffing, giving her further utility if you decide to make her attack things. Shigure also gets access to these same skills, which he can't otherwise unless he marries certain children, or in the case of Lancefaire and the seals, skills he can't get at all without being sired by Avatar/My Castle/Logbook. Lance Fighter is probably the most useful Hoshidan class imo for Avatar to take, barring some particular builds.

That is actually... very good for Lutz. Modifiers are decent (1 str/mag, 6 skill, 4 def, -1 spe/res) and access to Sun God pairs nicely with Lucky Soul. Both Golden-Kite and Wyvern Lord yield 39 skill, meaning 58% Breaking Sky and 19% Lethality. Swallow Strike can sorta fix the speed for player phase, while he can also A+ with Ignis for Defensive Formation if he wants to. This can also give him a good case to marry Shara in Invisible Kingdom for Breaking Sky/Flamboyant access, which can potentially free up Belka to pass Lancefaire from A+ Oboro.

Izana just creeps me out. I get what they were going for, some sort of person who is so beautiful as to be ephemeral, but I think they did a bit too good of a job doing that. I'll abstain from least favourite shared female, since there's not too much of a choice. I'm not big on Hinata but mostly because I don't like him as a unit. Takumi and Zero are kind of annoying to me in their own ways. Rinkah... is extremely underwhelming to me and completely failed to meet my expectations, both as a unit and as a character, so while she's not quite my least favourite, she deserves a mention as the most disappointing. Camilla takes the title of my least favourite woman of all of them though. They took a workable concept (seductive vamp) and didn't bother to make it work. In her supports and interactions with Avatar she consistently comes across to me as creepy instead of sexy. It reeks of 'trying too hard' and ends up having the opposite effect. For kids, Soleil is a character whose design I like but whose supports I hate. The Hoshidan kids all bore me to tears - their designs just feel so uninspired compared to their Nohr counterparts. Inserts from Awakening don't have any excuse to be there, Hisame and Kisaragi aren't interesting and Mitama just weirds me out. The only ones who I really like are Kinu and maybe Shinonome. And I guess Matoidelia's design still holds up alright.

Those that come to mind are: Mozume is Donnel done right. Still seems like a hassle to train, but gameplay-wise she has a better class selection, and is actually a good parent for most of the kids. Her supports and character were also completely unexpected from her design - in a very good way. Totally waifuing her in my runs, along with Crimson Kaze also seems like a pretty cool and collected guy. The kind of person you would like as a friend irl. Out of all the royal siblings, I like Xander the best, with Hinoka coming close. Xander has the whole gallant thing going on with him, while Hinoka's personality is refreshing compared to other royals. I'm surprised to see few people in this topic admitting to liking Arthur/Harold/The All-American Gaston. I just really love his design and how different he is from pretty much every other FE character ever. His bad luck gimmick, while not great for his character, is good for a lot of cheap laughs at his expense. (His support with Azura/Aqua is really good though, and has nothing to do with his bad luck.) It helps that I tend to have a soft spot for hyper-manly-macho memelord style characters. Benoit is pretty cool for similar reasons, except he can also talk with bears. Charlotte gives me some serious Maribelle/Virion vibes as a character who seemed insufferable at first but won me over completely with how consistently good her supports are. Nyx, Orochi and Asama are similarly characters who I wrote off early but who have started to impress me recently. Pieri has a great design too. I really like her hair. Favourite kids are probably Ophelia, Velour, Shigure, Sophie, Lutz and Foleo roughly in order. Shigure is quite literally a Fire Emblem Disney Princess. (Hoshido gets little love from me. Sorry but your kids all blend together in my eyes. Kinu is cool though.) There are a few characters who I don't like personality-wise, but I really like their designs. (Tsubaki, Eponine, Soleil) Time will tell if I end up liking their characters too.

In Invisible Kingdom Flannel can A+ with Nishiki for Breaking Sky and possibly Flamboyant if you desire it, so that's an easy answer for who to A+ with. In Nohr he wants Benoit for Luna, and because Arthur overlaps and Lazward gives nothing of note. His Hoshido marriage choices are Rinkah and Hana. Ogre Strike could come in handy and Rinkah likes Fighter, although he has good choices from the neutral and Nohr path wives. Azura is good for Swallow Strike to increase his doubling threshold, though she doesn't benefit as much from Flannel's Fighter herself. Mozume is also someone to consider for Prescient Strike to increase his offense - she's another unit who quite likes getting Fighter, too. From My Castle you can potentially get any skills though, so I'd usually try to pair based on who would benefit the most from their marriage partner's class, as well as mods for the children if you're considering them. Skills that are coming to mind are Swallow Strike, Breaking Sky, Luna, Extravagance, Copycat, and Deadly Breath, though there are probably others he can use well. For Odin he's like Ophelia in that he can work well in a crit-focused build. He lacks access to Awakening for 30 crit since the Great Lord DLC is apparently female only, but he can pick up a few things. Roundhouse (Charlotte) and Ogre Strike (Avatar - Oni Savage) are two that could be obtained from the Logbook/My Castle. Getting increases for both magic and skill(for crits) is tough, though. Dark Blood is the only pairup that increases both, while Orochi is the only wife whose support bonuses target both. (And in either case it only increases Skill by 1, so if he's a Sorcerer it's not enough to matter) You could bring Arthur as a support unit, since his personal skill decreases critical evade by 15.

The more I think about it, the more I think that Maids and Butlers, of all units, are going to be somewhat dominant. They can use all staves, as well as most shurikens that are worth using. Elite Ninjas have a better speed cap and access to the powerful Oboro shuriken and the Mighty Kunai, but Maids/Butlers have better defensive caps and still have really good speed. Silver Shurikens/Kunais and Kaze's Gale-Dart have good debuffs for Maids/Butlers to take advantage of. Brigand Kunai, Prayer Candle and Hunting Knife also look worth considering, based on their effects. (Though I'm no sure if stripping an enemy gives any status debuffs to them)

I'm debating whether or not if it is a good idea to bother optimizing for Dragon's Vein, mostly because I'm redoing some of my pairings and Dragon's Vein is one of the sticking points. At the moment I'm thinking not, since there are like 10 first gens and up to 11 children who can get it, so I'm not sure if losing one would be a big deal. Specifically I'm debating Orochi!Ophelia + Elise!Soleil vs. Elise!Ophelia + Orochi!Soleil. So far I'm collecting pros and cons for both. Orochi!Ophelia/Elise!Soleil (original) *Ophelia has 4 skl, -2 spe mods, A+ with Midoriko *Soleil gets Dragon's Vein. Her magic growth is also functional regardless of who her mother is. (Growth of 21) *Ophelia's mother is a great pairup partner (Exorcist gives +4 mag/spe, Orochi gives 2 mag, 1 skl/res) +Ophelia has a marginally better ability to critical(2%) and better Breaking Sky proc rate. (about 9% if both are Witches paired up with their mothers) +Lazward has slightly better class synergy to pull a support set with Azure Dance -Worse doubling threshold for Ophelia (Witch + Exorcist Orochi can double from 31-36) Elise!Ophelia/Orochi!Soleil (proposed) *Ophelia has 0 skl, 1 spe mods, A+ with Shara *Ophelia gets Dragon's Vein (I like Ophelia more as a unit so I will probably use her more) *Ophelia's mother is a great pairup partner assuming she gets an A+ with Sakura for Exorcist. (this lets her match Orochi for the most part) +Ophelia gets much better growths (Elise's growths are amaaazing) +Better doubling threshold for Ophelia (As a Witch paired with Maid Elise, she can double from 33-38. 34-39 if Elise goes Exorcist.) Basically it's a debate between doubling ability compared to skill activation. Having written it down, it is probably better to go for Elise!Ophelia for more reliable offense, but I'd like to hear some input from others to see if there's merit to this.

+Speed is a given for both imo. Both Takumi and Leon give unfortunate -2 speed mods to their kids from the start. A +speed asset combined with a flaw that doesn't reduce it (Luck or Defense) would give Kisaragi/Foleo and Kanna a speed mod of 3, which isn't too bad, all things considered. Assuming a Luck flaw, the stats will look like this: Takumi: 1/0/6/3/1/1/-1 Leon: -2/2/3/3/0/1/3 Alternatively, if you have a way to get around the low speed (Defensive Formation usually) you could opt to capitalize on each character's better stats. You could so +Str for Takumi and +Mag for Foleo. +Mag is particularly useful since it also cancels Leon's negative modifier. Here's what their stats would look like, this time with -Defense flaw. Takumi: 6/1/6/-1/1/-2/-2 Leon: -1/7/1/1/0/-2/2

Ah, I didn't know that Villager couldn't be passed down to kids either. (I knew it couldn't be Buddied or Marriage Sealed) That does make Mozume even more special since she's the only one who can take full advantage of its options, though it kind of sucks that now only certain kids can do the whole Extravagance/Line of Death that I was theorycrafting. Back to the drawing board again, I suppose.

Apparently, Zero/Nyx gives Spellcaster as a third class to Nyx. No idea on Arthur/Belka though.

I like it on Matoi, but I like all of her possible hair colors except Rinkah's. Kinu looks pretty good with it too.

I'm pretty sure that can be done through the Logbook too. I don't think the Mozume example will work since I don't think Villager can be obtained from a Marriage Seal, but you can do some playthroughs or go to other castles where they have characters with the skills you want. Personally, I'm just thinking to optimize skills to save a bit of time, but stats + classes should be the main focus.