dragontamer

Hollywood does this a lot too. Marni Nixon sang the lead roles of many big Hollywood movies, most noticeably My Fair Lady (1964: See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Fair_Lady_(film)#Dubbing). Directors liked how Marni Nixon sang, but wanted other actresses to be in various roles. Less commonly known is Lea Salonga (Singing voice of Princess Jasmine (1992)) vs Linda Larkin (Speaking voice of Princess Jasmine (1992)). I'm pretty sure Aladdin himself was also voiced by two different people (singing voice vs speaking voice yet again). Its surprisingly common. The voice actors + directors usually do a good job at making it sound like they're the same person. I mean, after all, "singing voices" always sound a little bit different than a person's actual voice, so its believable when the singing voice is a completely different person.

The biggest fault of Mortal Savant is the low class bonus for speed. Swordmaster and Assassin are somewhere around +5 speed, but Mortal Savant was somewhere around +1 speed. So you basically lose 4 speed just switching over to MS, on top of the -10% speed growth (so another 1-ish speed lost by endgame). In contrast, you could turn into a Wyvern Lord (+4 speed) or FalcoKnight (+5 speed), which is part of the reason why those flying classes are considered overpowered in this game.

I'm pretty sure that Hilda can't be cross-recruited.

Its still a long long time since the absolutely awful PoR (FE9) animations.

Koei Tecmo showing off their animation skills here 🙂 This is standard "Dynasty Warriors" style animation, just keep the same poses even for grossly different weapons. Oh, and copy maps all over the place too. If I really didn't like this, I probably wouldn't have bought so many Dynasty Warriors games 🙂 (4, 4 Empires, 5, 6, 7, and 8). The main issue with Fire Emblem is that the voice actors are all really good, its hard to make fun of things. But there's still some Koei / Tecmo stuff going on here and there that long-time fans can catch.

I remember two Knowledge Gems: is the Sothis Paralogue the only knowledge gem pre-timeskip? Either way: Knowledge Gems are rare. The Knowledge Gem may help your first recruit, but your 2nd recruit (and onwards) is now competing for the gem. IIRC, Silly was advocating for route-specific tier lists to account for this... using the units associated with your house has a lot fewer resource constraints than using units from outside your house.

Across story, gameplay, and map design... Three Houses is above average in story and gameplay, but below average in map design for sure. Honestly, a lot of the map balance issues (ie: fliers being overpowered) is mostly due to unrestricted flying and a general lack of enemy archers. Monsters are nice however: their multiple lives prevent OHKO or ORKO strategies, and force the player to think around various issues (barriers, wide-aoe attacks, etc. etc.). Three House's story is certainly better than Fate and Radiant Dawn. But gameplay is worse than Fates (and also Radiant Dawn). Fates had intelligent enemies who knew how to use skills (swap ninjas of great annoyance). Radiant Dawn has a similarly "dumb AI" which runs into you, but the addition of Cliffs had an element of true defensive gameplay that few other FE games have had. Tactically, Three Houses is pretty bad (and the lack of weapon-triangle really hurts this game), only Monsters really provide a difference in tactics. And with a rewind-button + future-sight (the red-lines that automatically show you the computer's next turn...), there is almost no brain power of mine going into prediction or tactics in this game. Strategically: with the skill ranks, classes, level ups, etc. etc... Three Houses is pretty damn good. Three Houses has the deepest "strategy level" Fire Emblem in a while, althogh the system is easily optimized. I think with a bit more balance to map design, Three Houses could have been even better, but I'm not disappointed with what we got.

+10 Crit is available on Swordmaster and Warrior. +20 Crit is available on War Master. You need to master Warrior for (Non-battalion) Wraith anyway. If the strat is anywhere as good as you claim it to be, the goal of optimization is to make it relevant sooner. Warrior still has Axefaire and Killer Axe+ is reasonable, since it can be crafted from the Eastern Merchant. I'm assuming your Dimitri build uses Battalion Vantage / Battalion Wrath? Normal Vantage / Normal Wrath requires Hero mastery and Warrior mastery respectively, but would be applicable to more characters.

The units I posted earlier have Proficiency 5 weapons (-10 Crit). EDIT: I see you already factored in Luck. I'll have to double-check to see if anything was missed. EDIT2: I don't really like the idea of relying on S-Rank Crit+. Not only does this come online super-late, but it requires a lot of investment to get to S-rank, investment I'd rather spend in other stuff (Ex: Authority ranks or anything else really). War Master gets +20 Crit however, although there's no axe with the same +100 Hit that the Scythe can do. I'll pretend your numbers are on a War Master candidate (Caspar, Alois, Cyril), but your point otherwise stands, albeit with a slight +Hit deficiency compared to the Scythe. Worst case scenario, +20 Hit isn't too hard to grab (just dip a few dozen combats + Knowledge Gem on Archer somewhere in the training path)

Okay, that's where I was messing up. Because it was coming in way easier and I didn't want to give you "freebie points" unless I knew for certain the math was right. Cool. That matches my math and is easier than what I was saying earlier. +10 Atk from a battalion really helps and +5 from Lancefaire is also very relevant. Note that this is only with a Crit-proc, so its somewhat unreliable, but Dimitri only needs to kill "enough" enemies to survive enemy phases for it to be an effective strategy.

I was rereading your post (and the post that previously was here), and noticed my numbers don't match up. I'll come back once I study the damage formulas again.

Armors are easy to one-shot. They have low speed, low RES, and specialized weapons that deal incredible damage to them. And yes, I'm thinking 80% of enemies can't be one shot in Church Mode Endgame unless you have 48+ Str: https://imgur.com/a/YBRhYnc I mean, take a look at this Gremory for goodness sake. You need 33 STR + Silver Lance+ x3 Critical to one-shot it (lets ignore Miracle). And Gremories have the lowest defense of all of the enemies. Upgrade to a Sniper, and you need 43 Str to one-shot with Wrath+Vantage + Silver Bow. And apparently everyone has Miracle in this route's endgame.

Dancer Ferdinand being immune to these units means that he's dancing on the front lines (or Gambit-ing), contributing to Player Phase. Alert-stance builds lose their player phase, which means no gambits, no rallies, no player phase attacks. Alert Stance is useful only for the "draw enemies in maneuver", which is helpful but there are many more situations where the high-avoid is needed. Second: as soon as you need to deal with more than 1 weapon type (ex: Sword Hero + Gauntlet War Master), your "breaker" skills become useless. I think there's plenty of good opportunity to use "breaker" skills, but they simply aren't as reliable as a catch-all +20 avoid when holding a sword. At a minimum, Dancer Ferdinand can be dancing on the frontlines, unafraid of any foe that comes near to him. In weird cases, he may even serve as primary lure as you can send him in deep with lots of avoid. Dancer gives +20 Sword Avoid skill, the only skill that you can "slap" onto any unit in the game. This is by far the most limited "avoid" resource in the game. Your dancer should become a dodge-tank to take advantage of this incredibly rare resource. The only other "unconditional" avoid skill in the game is White Magic +20 avoid from Byleth and Dorthea's white magic. Dorthea seems like a bad idea, but I've been arguing for Holy Knight Byleth dodge-tank (useful for front-line Byleth healing duties). All other resources are common. All fliers have +10 natural avoid and a natural path for Alert Stance. Evasion Rings can be bought from Anna's shop by endgame, and stolen from multiple enemies in the early game (pre-timeskip). +Evasion battalions are a dime-a-dozen: Brigid Hunters, Jeralt's Mercinaries, Aegir Astral Knights, Opera Co. Volunteers, Gautier Knights, and more have +15% or +20% avoid Battalions. Immortal Corps is also a 15-avoid flying battalion, with Galatea Pegasus Co. okay at 10 Avoid (but flying) Hmm... I'll give you this point for sure. I guess "Poking" enemies and then delivering the final blow with Wrath + Vantage is turn efficient.

Cross Vantage+Wrath off your list of strategies in Maddening. If you need to tank a hit, you can't rely on Vantage + Wrath one-shotting enemies anymore. In any case, enemies tend to come at you in groups. You probably will need to have a consistent enemy-phase plan when the aggro group charges together into your units. I mean, sure, Dodge-tanks aren't "necessary". But... its nice to have someone who is literally immune to these kinds of enemies. 115 Avoid Ferdinand is again, literally immune. So Ferdinand is a braindead easy way of handling that kind of enemy.

Felix has +10% speed growth over Byleth and +1 speed. Pre-battalions (which happen to be unusually more difficult than later maps...), Felix gets +5 from his personal (up against Jeralt's Mercinaries which starts at +1 might and caps off at +3 Might IIRC), so I'm going to give the overall win to Felix frankly. Byleth gets better in the midgame as better battalions come online, but then Felix's superior STR and Speed growths just take over from there on out. Extrapolating over the Blue Lions: Dimitri, Felix, and Catherine (with a bit of abusive early-recruitment) will likely be physically stronger than Byleth. Byleth is certainly "good", but I wouldn't call him "best" or even "great". Whatever the #1, #2, or #3 enemy threats are, I've got the 3 characters who will probably deal with them better than Byleth. Speaking from experience: even normal mode enemies will out-damage the healing of Physic, especially Gremory Physic (lacking the +10 boost). You really want Healing Staff + Bishop + Physic to minimize the turns healing, and maximizing your killing. You're one-shotting this guy with Wrath + Vantage? Even WITH a 3x Critical, you need 61-might (12 Silver Bow + 49 Strength) to one-shot him. And even then, that Miracle may cause an issue. Your Bow Knight also needs 34 AS or greater to not get quadruple-hit (that's a 55 Attack x4 Brave Sword) (EDIT: woops, I was reading speed stat. 34 AS, not 43 as initially reported) Lol at 114 Hit though. Dancer Ferdinand is literally immune to him. 4x Attacks with 0% chance of hit is 0 hits.

Byleth has 45 STR growth and 45 Speed growth. Yes, this is "above average" but not "great" by my eyes. Dimitri, Ferdinand, Felix, Hilda, Caspar, Sylvain, Cyril, Catherine, and Seteth tie both stats (or better). While Edelgard, Claude, Petra, Ingrid, Leonie are side-grades. (Better in one stat, slightly weaker in the 2nd stat). Byleth is really good when using the Sword of Creator. But otherwise, Byleth is kind of just average in the scope of other powerhouse physical units. I mean, if you find a bush (+10% avoid), raising Ferdinand up to 125 Avoid on that build... full HP Thicket on that build is literally untouchable against a large number of endgame maddening units. Literally untouchable: there are some 115 hit great knights, 110-hit or 120-hit War Masters that literally cannot hit 125 Avoid. 140 Hit is relegated to the occasional assassin, and swordbreaker units (like Falcoknights). Full-HP Dancer Ferdinand is literally immune to damage with just +10% bonus. That's a thicket, or player-phase +1 Linked Attack. Get +30% from 3x A-Support and Ferdinand avoid Skyrockets all the way to 145 and you're now talking about (player-phase) literal immunity to assassins and endgame bosses while procing Seal Speed. Dancer Ferdinand stacks a lot of avoid. I mean, you're practically making my argument for me. By your count, there are 4 characters (3 of whom are available on all routes) who can do the job of Swift-strikes or otherwise "player-phase forced 2x-attack +2 damage while wielding a Silver Weapon + **Faire bonus". But there is literally only one character (Ferdinand) who can reach 115 unconditional avoid while still having an effective player-phase (aka dancing: which is a poor mix with Alert Stance). Furthermore, Ferdinand's avoid-dance starts as soon as the White Heron Cup qualifies. He's doing this strategy pre-timeskip, while Alert-stance builds not only lose their player-phase, but need to wait all the way until A+ flying rank (which is probably post-timeskip). EDIT: Pre-timeskip you're probably pushing +20 Sword Avoid, +13 (Swords C+ Proficiency), +15 Jeralt's Mercenaries (E-Authority), +10 Evasion Ring (steal rings from the 2nd mock battle), 15 Personal ability and maybe 15 Speed for 88 natural Avoid. It gets better as you get more resources later on, but this is a relevant avoid-strategy throughout the game.

I appreciate your detailed response. 1. I will admit that "staff juggling" was a technique I wasn't aware of. But even then, Heal Staff ups Physic healing to 8+10, far away from Holy Knight Byleth's Restore + Canto (30 base). I don't know the magic healing formula, but it is less than 1-to-1 (maybe Mag/2 or Mag/3). Either way, Byleth's magic is respectable, so its unlikely that any Gremory can ever beat Byleth's Recover, even with +10 healing from equipment. After all, Restore is basically +22 healing. A dedicated healer, such as Physic + Heal Staff + Bishop class == 28 base healing, but 4 movement is extremely bad. 2. Aside from your Bishop, I'd expect everyone you take to endgame to be a decent "powerhouse". "The Dancer" isn't supposed to be some weak character, there are enough good characters in the game that the dancer is going to be a downgrade. The question is therefore: not "is Dancer the best for this character", but "which of the endgame-worthy characters is best as dancer" ?? If you really want to be using Swift Strike still as Dancer Ferdinand: guess what? He still has it. He loses the 25 avoid while using Swift Strikes (-20 from losing Sword Avoid, and -5 from using Lance Proficiency instead of Sword Proficiency), but if you really need the Silver Lance + 2 might x2 hits on some speedy enemy, he's still got that (missing Lancefaire though). 3. Otherwise, the +20 Avoid from Dancer Ferdinand, +15 Personal, +20 Brigid Hunters, +10 Evasion Ring, +20 Sword Proficiency + 30 speed == 115 avoid (and totally available on a Brave Sword). Which means Ferdinand can playerphase (aka: Dance), and still dodge-tank on enemy phase. And why not, get 135 situation avoid with Axebreaker. Which means Ferdinand can be dancing on the front-lines, without having to worry about him being a liability: enemies still won't be able to hit him. Even 140 Hit assassins and 120 Hit + Swordbreaker Falcoknights only have 25 Hit (12.5% hit chance), let alone the typical 130-hit or 120-hit enemies. I don't think any other dancer candidate has such high avoid potential (especially if you expect to be using the Dance ability: so no Alert Stance is available). 4. Seal Speed should work as an enemy-phase tactic. Heck, it probably works better as enemy-phase: debuffing large groups of enemies before the rest of your team comes in and wreaks face. Ferdinand's biggest liability is leveling up for +1 HP, losing his confidence. Otherwise, he's by far the best avoid-stacking candidate in the game, and therefore is likely the best enemy-phase dancer in the game.

I stand corrected. I forgot that. They need a little icon on the list to help me remember these things when I'm going through the list. Right, that was Claude's Battalion. Still, that gives you Immortal Corps, Galatea Pegasus Co, Cichol, and Golden Deer Wyvern Co. as good endgame battalions. So we're up to four endgame flying battalions in Claude's route, only one of which is C-authority. In either case, Serios Flying Co is hardly optimal and Alliance Pegasus Co. / Alliance Wyvern Co are also quite weak. I'll give you four endgame-worthy flying battalions on Claude's route. Maybe five if I missed another one. Certainly not enough to make all your units flyers. Recover from Byleth has more HP (30 base) than Gremory Dorthea's Physic (8 base), or even Bishop Lindheart (8 base + 10 class bonus) Physic. And Recover gets much, much better when you have Canto and 7 movement. Recover makes a big difference over Heal and Physic. Its why a Bishop is still a relevant strategy (+10 heal and x2 white magic) is relevant for endgame, despite their pathetic 4 movement (so Bishop Lindheart probably will never contribute in combat: he's too slow to keep up with everyone). Here are your two options. 1. Have endgame powerhouse mages (aka: Dorthea or Lysithea) heal you with Physic. This only heals maybe ~25 HP in my experience, I dunno the healing formula, but Physic has waaaayyyy less healing than Recover. 2. Realize that Byleth is perfectly acceptable Recovery user, albeit locked to 1 range. Heal ~38 HP in one turn, which is way more turn efficient, and remember that White Magic Avoid (+20) + Faith 5 (+20) + Jeralt's Mercinaries (+15) + Evasion Ring (+10) + 30 Speed == 95 Avoid, so Byleth can do this from the front lines and actually avoid-tank some hits on Enemy phase. White Magic Avoid +20 (Byleth primarily) and Sword Avoid +20 (Dancer Ferdinand)

While stats do inflate in Maddening, the Hit-rates of enemies mostly stays the same. The +Dex inflation isn't as big of a deal as the +Str or +Speed inflation. While Normal Mode and Hard Mode it was possible to defense-tank some hits, that becomes far less likely with 60-attack / 50 speed endgame enemies in Maddening. These enemies only have 120 to 130 hit however, which means dodge-tank builds will consistently put the enemy at 20ish to-hit (unless they get a "Breaker" skill on you, which gives them another +20 or +30 hit). Stacking avoid is probably the only relevant "tank" strategy in Maddening. Not necessarily Alert Stance, but also "Breaker" skills of your own, +10 Avoid ring, and terrain (for grounded units).

Lol, woops. That's a foot in mouth situation. EDIT: Also, Fradalus Soldiers is B-ranked, not C. So Hilda probably isn't getting there either. Immortal Corps is +9 Attack, +16 Avoid, +5 Protect, and +10 Charm at C-authority however. So Paladin Hilda (or whatever) is going to be way stronger than FalcoKnight / Wyvern Lord Hilda thanks to Immortal Corps. EDIT: I looked through the list, and Alliance Wyvern Co. (C-rank Authority) is +5 Attack / +10 Crit / +3 Protect / +5 Charm. Far inferior to Immortal Corps. So flying Hilda is -4 Attack, -6 avoid (innate +10 avoid from fliers), -2 Protect and -5 charm compared to grounded Hilda. Alliance Wyvern Co. is probably the best C-rank flying battalion, but I'm welcome for ideas if you think there's something better out there. In either case, Hilda is a fun theory craft as a flying unit. But when you get to battalion selection, good luck finding something good for her. Keeping her grounded gives her so many more options.

1. Supreme Armored Co: +8 Atk, +7 Magic, +7 Protect, +6 Res. Black Eagles only, but BL also has Gloucester Knights for mixed-units. C-authority 2. Gautier Knights: +8 Atk, +20 Avoid, +7 Protect, Stride. Blue Lions only. C-authority 3. Brigid Hunters: +5 Atk, +7 Crit, +20 Avoid. B-authority 4. Fraldarius Soldiers: +8 Atk, +20 Crit, +7 Protect B-authority 5. "House Cavalry" (Black eagle cavalry): +8 Attack / +7 Protect. 6. King of Lions Corps: +10 str, +15 crit, +6 Defense. Blue Lions only, C-authority Aside from "House Cavalry" (Black Eagle Cavalry), all of the above are B-rank or C-rank battalions. Sure, Cichol and Galatea kind-of / sort-of compete, but Seiros Pegasus Co is just blown away by the competition. Erm... +4 Attack and +6 avoid with Assembly gambit is not endgame worthy (although the +5 charm is relevant). I frankly discount Seiros Pegasus Co, and frankly all early battalions aside from Jeralt's Mercenaries (very good for those grounded units who have bad authority). Pretty much any other battalion in the game is better, especially when you consider that C-authority battalions include crazy stats like King of Lion Corps. EDIT: Empire Pegasus Co. and Empire Wyvern Co are also 4-attack, but they do offer some +protect. I don't recall seeing any outstanding C or D-ranked flying battalions. Cichol, Galatea, and "House Elite Wyvern Co" (Black Eagle Wyvern Co, Blue Lions Wyvern Co, Golden Deer Wyvern Co) are the endgame battalions worth using. The other flying battalions are extremely weak, not worth using. Paladin Byleth can go forth with a C-authority battalion at like, level 20 with minimal investment. On the other hand, we're looking at A Authority (to use good battalions) + A+ Flying (Alert Stance+), LanceA (or AxeA for Wyvern Lord Byleth)... thats a lot of wexp investment. Even if it is possible to qualify for all of these things, it will only happen very late in the game. --------- Lets take someone like... Hilda or Caspar. Both have -Authority (and probably is only getting to C-authority best). They can enter endgame as a +4 Attack Wyvern Lord (Seiros Pegasus Co), or she can enter endgame as a +8 Attack / +20 Crit / +7 Defense / +7 Charm Warmaster with Fraldarius Soldiers.

Hmm... yeah. Tempest lance chews through weapons, but training lances / iron lances are dirt cheap. Maybe Paladin Byleth really is the way to go for endgame. I still argue that Holy Knight is a stronger option than FalcoKnight / Wyvern Lord, if only because of the battalion issue (you have other fliers, and they want the good battalions). There are so many good grounded battalions + adjutants, but fliers lose many good options for various builds.

I think 6. Its more than 3, but less than 9. I need to restart my game to know for sure, but I'm pretty sure its only 6x facilities training / advanced drills for Byleth's budding talent.

Just to be clear on what you are proposing. It takes 960 Wexp for Byleth to get B+ Faith, and he gets either +6 wexp per heal / Nosferatsu (1 + 3 Enlightened one x1.5), or +9 if you got the statue (x2 with knowledge gem, but everyone wants the knowledge gem so lets ignore it for the purposes of this post). If you do this through drills, its 32 activity points into +Faith. And you consider this to be "more" opportunity cost than going for 1280 Wexp for Bow-proficiency, when Byleth doesn't even have skill bonuses in Bows. You're saying "12 activity points" is a lot for unlocking White Magic Avoid +20, but its 64 activity points to reach proper Bow-proficiency to get into Bow Knight. BTW: You need those 64 activity points to qualify for A-riding as well. Its not exactly easy to qualify for endgame riding classes. Your bow-knight route is going to take a lot more activity points than my proposal. --------- EDIT: Holy Knight Byleth requires 64 Activity Points (Riding A), 32-Faith activity points, and 15 Activity points (C Lances). A grand total of 111 activity points of advanced drills to fully qualify for Holy Knight. Bow Knight Byleth requires 64 Activity Points (Riding), 64 Activity Points (Bow), 15 Activity Points (lances). 143 activity points. Ditto for Wyvern Lord Byleth. Paladin Byleth requires 48 (Riding) + 48 (Lances), 96 activity points. Which seems like the best option. FalcoKnight Byleth needs 48 Flying + 64 Lances, but probably automatically qualifies for C Swords. ----- Restore is actually good on Byleth, because he doesn't have the magic to heal you all the way back up with Physic or Heal. Restore + Canto + 7 movement mitigates the weakness severely by endgame. ------ I forgot Paladin was B Lance / B Riding. That suggests that Paladin is actually a good endgame class for Byleth. No need to promote to master rank honestly if you want to be locked to physical only. That's 48 activity points into Riding, 48 activity points into Lance, which is doable for sure. Honestly, sticking with Paladin through endgame is the best option if you don't plan to use magic. Honestly, I don't see what the Lance gets me... Byleth has access to Ruptured Heaven / Sublime Heaven for +7/+10 might and 1-2 range... and that's locked to a particular Sword. So Byleth should be using Swords IMO in any case where the +damage matters. Byleth only wants Lance to qualify for his endgame horse (or flier) class.

Holy Knight Byleth is probably better than Paladin Byleth. You're still going to be using swords in most cases, and Holy Knight Byleth only needs to get C-lances to get there. Byleth also has +Proficiency in Faith magic, so C Lance / B+ Faith / A Riding sounds easier to me than A Lance / A Riding. I think Holy Knight is Byleth's most natural riding class. Consider the endgame riding classes: * Falcoknight requires Sword C, Lance A, Flying B+ * Wyvern Lord requires C Lance / A Axe / A Flying * Bow Knight requires C Lance / A Bow / A Riding * Dark Knight requires C Lance / B+ Reason / A Riding. * Holy Knight requires C Lance / B+ Faith / A Riding * Paladin requires A Lance / A Riding * Great Knight requires lol B+ Axe / A Armor / B+ Riding. ----------- Byleth has access to Heal and Restore. Its actually very easy for Byleth to get +Faith ranks. All other endgame riding classes require you to pump two non-proficient skills for Byleth. Yes, Wyvern lord can be done, but none of Lance / Axe / Flying are Byleth proficiencies. If you want to talk opportunity cost: lets talk about 20-wexp per Adv. Drill instead of +30 wexp each time you get +Faith training from Rhea. Holy knight Byleth is Byleth's easiest riding class by far. Enlightened One Byleth is cool because you get Swordfaire without having to take an exam, so Enlightened One is a very solid mid-game option. The "Breaker" abilities become incredibly common on Hard mode and Maddening. Swordmasters with Axebreaker+ will wreak your Wyverns. Falcos with Lancefaire + Swordbreaker will wreak your dancer. Wyvern Lords with Lancebreaker+ will wreak your Falcoknights. True, Grapplers and Warmasters have Tomebreaker. But that's par for the course. Welcome to hard mode or maddening mode. I answered this earlier: Byleth: White Magic Avoid +20, Faith Proficiency, Sword Proficiency, Weight -3 +1 spare skill (maybe +1 Mov or maybe Axebreaker). Still room for Death Blow too. 5 abilities is a lot to play with. I guess it could be Alert Stance+ at endgame, but once again, White Magic Avoid +20 comes into play after your 6th +Faith discussion with Rhea, its an incredibly early ability. You can get +Faith before you get +2 Speed from Myrmidon mastery even. Even if you think that Alert Stance or Alert Stance+ is worthwhile on Byleth, it still brings up the question "why not both" ?? Alert Stance + White Magic Avoid +20 will give Byleth more than enough avoid to dodge pretty much everything, but he probably has to stay in Enlightened One status for that to happen.