Humanoid

It is a little disappointing that the one new male character added since launch is some sort of weird fire ogre, so I certainly hope to see an ice brother of some sort soon. After all, men are from Mars and women are from Venus. Anyway, barring any extraordinary luck with my first round pull on the New Year's banner, I've decided against trying for Gunnthra this banner. Thinking about it, I only kinda wanted her for what she is (a horse mage) rather than who she is - I'm not sold on her design or presentation at all.

Freebie is 3* Matthew, the only grey orb (with there also being no green ones). Spares me any regret from potentially leaving a focus unit on the table, at least, I'm always tempted to open extras otherwise as regret minimisation. Can't complain, though I never thought I'd see the day where I have more Hone Speed fodder than Hone Attack, four have turned up in a month after a long drought.

Stats could easily be handcrafted per unit as each is added to the game if the devs wanted to do so. Indeed it's not unlikely that the values are just stored as fixed values per level per IV in the game files instead of being calculated on the fly, but this is speculative (at any rate, dataminers don't have access to it). In such a system it'd just be a matter of someone manually changing the value by 1 in a table. At any rate, I think it's reasonable to say that it's not something that's left like that because it's technically difficult in any way, it's simply that the devs see no reason to "fix" it. After all, it's just another thing players will go out of their way to "optimise" by way of spending money, even though the variance is borne of accident rather than intent. It does make me wonder though, about whether the game was originally designed around most teams *not* consisting of full 5-star units, and not balanced around level 40 play. A lot of the mechanics around the stats, particularly the trainee/veteran modifiers, only make sense in a game where the focus is on the mid-levels.

I wonder whether if they had their time again, the devs would just go with boons without banes. That way it'd feel like a nice little bonus on top of the base unit, rather than a penalty, while still retaining the purpose of the system (that is, cynically luring them into "fixing" their unit's IVs via spending). A delta of 3 points is much more palatable than 6, which is huge in terms of effectiveness. Of course, 5 different possibilities makes it easier so technically it's a financial loss, but encouraging people to gamble on a 1-in-21 chance is kind of beyond the pale in the first place. The rest of the game would be tuned around it of course, but the psychological effect would be rather different. It seems crazy to me that people could end up being disappointed at getting the unit they want, but that's how the current setup works. There'd still be degrees of satisfaction with any system that has any variance in stats, but hopefully the net effect is that the feeling would range from "moderately happy" through to "ecstatic". Unfortunately it'd be extremely messy to try to retroactively implement due to the existence of neutral units. Letting people choose their boon would suck for those who settled for the second best boon and ditched a neutral unit. Doing it randomly could potentially suck for people who chose the neutral one. Oh well, something for a sequel.

What the screenshot is showing is correct, you end up with a +4 with the IVs of the former +0 as the base. You can click on the portrait labelled "after" to confirm the stats if you wish. The final result should have +2 HP, Atk and Def, and +1 Spd and Res compared to the one you started with.

I came in with no specific plan, just to keep pulling until I feel I've had enough. Round one: 3* Nino +Res -Atk 4* Cain +Res -Spd (only my second ever, there'll be an appreciative dancer, but who?) 3* Cherche +Spd -Def (4* merge project creeps forward) 3* Draug +Atk -HP (hmm, could be interesting long term I guess) 4* Mathilda +Spd -HP (she's got to be my most pulled 4* unit by now, hone atk for everyone) Well that was passable fodder but disappointing for a supposed legendary banner. No way was I leaving it at that. 4* Lissa +Spd -HP (I have no idea if this is good for her) 3* Florina +Res -HP 4* Gordin +HP -Def 5* Bridelyn +HP -Spd (I wanted her but ouch) 4* Klein +Res -Spd (little did I know he would very shortly come in useful) Still feeling a little disappointed, so once more into the fray. 5* Bridelyn Neutral (phew) 4* Soleil Neutral (just five-starred a better one, luckily that wasn't a mistake) 3* Florina +HP -Spd 4* Reinhardt +Atk -Spd (ooooooh boy) 4* Effie +Def -Res (prefer my +Res -Spd one I just five-starred, no regrets fortunately) Right-o, happy with that haul (if only due to that third round), so I'll have a think about what to do with my remaining 40 orbs. Might depend on whether the new year's banner is two or four weeks long.

Tracking survey participation seems like it'd be more work than its worth, I wouldn't be surprised if they just handed everyone the orbs regardless. As for the new stuff, I have no issue with the seasonal banners but they really shouldn't come at the expense of regular units especially now that three-unit banners are a thing. I'd like to see the releases staggered something like this: month-long seasonal at the start of the month, every month, and new regular units at the end of the first and third weeks. Something for everyone.

Lukewarm about the units on offer, but 8% is 8% so I may go in with all my 80-odd orbs. That's about half the orbs now as I started with last time around, which more or less reflects my relative interest in the banners. As per the common sentiment here, grey seems to be the pick in terms of useful units. For the other colours, I wouldn't refuse any of the seasonal units but neither would I go out of my way to try for them. Amelia and the red horses I already have, which leaves Ryoma and Gunterina as the non-grey units I actively want. And while Cecilia will surely be powercreeped in a one-to-one comparison, it'd likely take a few copies of her to surpass my built Cecilia, so in practice it's not a realistic goal.

Was about to say that Blade Cecilia regularly demolishes BK, but no horse buffs there, so less likely. My favourite part of the FEH survey I completed just now was that I got to basically dismiss every aspect of Arena Assault. Shame there's no "extremely dissatisfied" option.

People who like low turn count runs as a challenge can do so if it entertains them, but I don't think developers should be actively incentivising one playstyle over the other as if there's one "right" way to play Fire Emblem. To veer off topic a little, that kind of design is why I felt absolutely nothing for XCOM 2, despite XCOM Long War being one of my favourite games of all time. Many ways to skin a cat, and all that.

The poor design is that the player is judged on speed at all. Not sure what the design intention is behind that - like a lot of FE mechanics it's something that was designed once upon a time then dogmatically kept forever.

Mid 4800s, in past months I've been doing okay with about 4840 but had to step it up a bit recently. It was 4870-4880ish during Fjorm Fortnight, should have been a little lower this week, but not by much given the high BST seasonal units.

Can't even use Armor March because running both Amelia and Winter Chrom side by side would be suicidal. At least he handles the last map okay by holding the right side all by himself, but he feels like a liability in most maps. As for the other bonus units, Lucina is in the process of being built, Masked Marth and Nowi are maxed on HM, and Frederick is too awkward to use alongside Chrom and without and horse buddies. So after day one I'm still none the wiser as to what my ideal Lunatic 7 team is.

The stat boost is worth several levels in terms of effectiveness, so you can get away with taking him in underlevelled. As an example, I took Joshua at level 23 or so into the level 30 TT, and he came out the other end of it around level 38. He's going to get a level pretty much every kill. Level 30 TT with a 40% bonus unit is 441 points I think? Level 40 TT with a 20% unit instead is a little over 600, or 500ish with no bonus whatsoever. How you decide that depends on how much you value your time vs your stamina potions. EDIT: From memory I took level 1 Josh to the level 8 TT, got him to level 11. Took him to level 20 TT, took him to 23. Then the level 30 TT to 38, and then the level 35 one to finish. So 1-40 over the course of four runs.

My two spare Ikes breathe a sigh of relief. Was thinking of giving Lilina and Ephraim Heavy Blade but it's hard to justify now.

Just glad to see a seal that doesn't require sacred coin investment to shine.

Used Serra instead of Nino to pass Hone Attack 1+2 to Celica (so I could pass Hone Attack 3 and Draconic Aura from FCorrin). Could have gotten Draw Back effectively for no additional cost, instead Celica still has no assist skill even now because I don't want to use up another Nino. Might end up waiting to see if I can't get another 3* Sully.

Navarre? He's useful for ...passing Desperation 2 so that I can inherit both Desperation 3 and Iceberg from Shanna. Beyond that, I've got nothing.

Tried to optimise a bit for AA and 4902 was good for rank 8407. I'm normally in the 9000-11000 range which means I fall out of the top 10000 half the time, but I guess I could secure my spot every week if I put as much effort into it as I did this week. Hard work though, for something I don't enjoy doing at all. 4888 was back in T20 safely (4*+10 Cecilia, unmerged Camus, Bowlyn, WChrom). Just the single defense win too, but it does mean I got the maximum reward my team is capable of this week.

If they did a new unit it'd have to be at the start of a new banner, or else the goodwill would be cancelled out by the justifiable outcry from those who had already spent orbs and/or money to get them.

Can't say I agree, Fates gets plenty cringeworthy moments but the gameplay is fundamentally sound (though Revelations was a bridge too far). Echoes for me was a fundamentally unfun slog nothing maps using poor mechanics. To be fair, it's what you would probably expect out of a faithful remake of a 25 year old game that was never particularly well received. It's a *very* faithful remake and that's the game's greatest issue. There are a few additional gameplay elements added to the side but unfortunately they aren't much chop either. Ultimately, as Mythbusters demonstrated, you can polish a turd - the game looks and sounds great - but ultimately what you end up is just a polished turd.

Took Dragon Emblem out for a spin, first time I've used it for anything serious. Would normally be lazy and take flier/horse team but they want infantry so I figure why not? Tiki takes 0 damage from Poison Dagger and Axe Infantry, and that was pretty much that. Had to do a little dancing around to get Fae to kill their dragon without getting exposed to Navarre but otherwise no issues. Replaced Fae with 4* Alfonse/Navarre for the quests, it worked out easily too. Nowi easily knocks down Navarre low enough for both carries to get the kill.

A somewhat surprising number of 4-star units feature. HP: Arden (60), Seliph (55), Hector/4* Zephiel (52) Atk: Lilina (59), Effie/Winter Chrom (57) Spd: Bow Lyn (43), Eirika (41), 4* Fir (40) Def: Arden (42), 4* Lukas (40), Xander/Adult Tiki/4* Gwendolyn/4* Beruka (39) Res: 4* Felicia (38), Arvis/Julia (36) Total: Winter Chrom (191), Young Tiki (190), Amelia (187) SP: Sigurd/Dorcas (9999), Bow Lyn (9573)

Maybe if the 10k, 20k and 40k rewards were also reward unit re-runs they could salvage this...

A gift of piss, pardon my French.