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OP mentioned that they're pairing off everybody except Leonie though, which means they're most likely gonna keep their couples glued together on the battlefield to build support. In that case, there's no real need to make Dorothea a linked attack bot since nobody will end up fighting alone.

Give Emperor Edelgard the DLC Sacred Galewind Shoes (Mov +2) or the Fetters of Dromi (Mov +1 and Canto iirc). Completely fixes her movement issues, which is what turns a lot of people away from Emperor El even though she's an unstoppable force of nature in every other department. It'll also make pairing her with Byleth easier since they'll be able to stick together more often. Don't, don't, don't make Dorothea your dancer. Trust me as someone who fell into that trap on my first CF run, she's just too damn good for dancer. Access to Thoron and Meteor means she can pull of some ridiculously long-distance magic snipes, especially if you give her the Caduceus Staff. From chapter 8 onward on my Black Eagles run she was effortlessly deleting people (including an important story boss on chapter 17) from farther away than even Lysithea. That said, you definitely want Gremory for her after mastering Mage and Warlock. Twice the amount of Thoron and Meteor just makes her even more dangerous. Dancer in comparison doesn't do that much for Dorothea. The last thing she should be doing is dancing for someone else, and she's not an enemy phase unit so Sword Avoid's kinda meh on her. Tbh there's nobody on that list I'd really recommend as a dancer except Mercedes or maybe Linhardt if you feel like fighting his low charm. Yuri could also make pretty good use of Sword Avoid if you just wanna get him the cert but keep him in Trickster or Assassin. Everything else looks great though! I hope you enjoy Crimson Flower as much as I did! :)

Lin isn't bad, but he's pretty "middle of the road" compared to the other two in-house healers. Mercedes offers overall better healing while Marianne has far more "combat healer" options thanks to Gremory and Dark Flier. Lin does have warp going for him, but so does Lysithea with a higher magic stat. She may need some training up but in the end she's gonna be the best warper in the party. Lin's still a decent healer/warper if you're sticking to in-house students, but there are better options for both when recruiting. As for Petra/Bernie vs Ferdinand, it really depends on whether you prefer specialty or versatility. Petra and Bernadetta have more limitations, yes, but the classes they're geared towards (Wyvern/Falcon/Assassin for Petra and Bow Knight for Bernie) are also the classes they're exceptionally good in. Ferdinand, like Sylvain, is more of a "jack of all trades, master of none" type of unit. No standout stats like you said, but you can turn him into just about anything and have it work. Personally, I find I get better use out of Petra and Bernadetta, but again it really comes down to preference. Also keep in mind this is my experience on CF, not SS. I agree though that the Black Eagles don't really have many standout units compared to the other houses. Playing Blue Lions now and it feels like a whole new experience early game haha

Petra or Bernadetta, maybe? They're "naturally" geared towards Wyvern Lord and Bow Knight respectively, which is a huge plus compared to the other Black Eagles. And there's Bernie's personal skill to consider too. Linhardt's pretty underwhelming imo, even as a healer. Better to just recruit Marianne or Mercedes for healing and Lysithea for warp.

Ah, that's a good point about Lys since it only works if she has the sword equipped. Tbh I was just playing around with some extra stats/skills to give her during White Clouds since NG+ let me get all her required stuff right from the get go. Ingrid sounds like a pretty good candidate for avoid stacking, but I bought back her Falcon Knight requirements so I'm only having her use lances since Falcon's a Lancefaire class anyway.

Sounds like it's best to just stick with dancer/healer Flayn then. Just the fact that I'm also using lances with Dimitri means Sword Avoid's only doing half good for him. It's really too bad I can't cert someone like Catherine who's only using swords and would benefit more from the +20 avoid. Thanks for the advice!

I'm kinda going back and forth right now on who I should get the dancer cert for. I'd started this run thinking I'd make Flayn my dancer and have her do nothing but dance and heal for the others. But now I'm not so sure about this since I've been using Stride and Warp to cover more ground faster, and so it doesn't seem like I'll actually need someone to dance. Maybe it'd be better to cert somebody who would make good use of Sword Avoid +20 and then just continue them on their class path. The first person I thought of for this was Dimitri since I know it's a good idea to boost his evasion for the Wrath/Vantage Great Lord build. But I have him using both sword and lance. So whenever he happens to be holding a lance on the enemy phase, the skill does nothing for him. My other idea was to cert Lysithea. I already bought back Fiendish Blow and her A's in Faith and Reason, so I sent her down the Myrmidon/Thief path with a Levin Sword to boost her evasion a bit before going Bishop/Gremory. I could give her Sword Avoid on top of that, but it's really more of a safety net than anything else since she's not an enemy phase unit. And then finally there's sticking to my Flayn idea but making her a Levin Sword/Magic Bow Assassin so she can be an actual damage dealer instead of just support. Who do you think would be the best person to cert?

Thanks! El and Dimitri are such beautifully written characters it's hard not to love them both. Which makes experiencing the war from both sides all the more impactful, especially when their stories stay so connected even as the two become mirrors of each other. Azure Moon just seems like the perfect route to play alongside my second Crimson Flower. And I like that technically the Blue Lions can still achieve El's dreams for Fódlan (Rhea's removed from power and Sylvain's solo ending puts an end to the crest system). A nice way of honoring El and not letting her death be in vain.

Dancer feels like a waste on Marianne and Ingrid imo since they're both such great units that dancing's the last thing I'd have them do. Ferdie is benched (gave him the butler outfit and everything) and I'm giving the Fetters to Byleth with a crest sign. I don't necessarily need a dancer who dances, so I'm just getting Lys the dancer cert for the Sword Avoid. I already bought back her A's in faith and reason so I decided I'd put her through some other classes to boost her evasion just as a safety net since she's so squishy.

Well to be fair, the original topic is over. I'm already three chapters into Blue Lions.

Ah, perfect! For a second I was afraid I was gonna have to train Dimitri in a fourth skill. Already have him working on lance, sword and authority. Glad I don't have to throw reason into the mix too haha Thanks! :)

I've just hit chapter 3 on my Blue Lions run and so far I'm really enjoying the perks of NG+ (bought back Ingrid's Darting Blow and insta-recruited Lysithea and Marianne lol). But there's still a couple of odd things I've noticed that I can't seem to find an answer to. So all the batallions I had on my first CF run carried over to NG+, even the ones exclusive to CF. Am I gonna lose these batallions at some point because of the route I'm on? Right now I have the Vestra Sorcery Engineers on Lysithea, but I'm a bit concerned Hubert's gonna snatch them back to the Empire's side after chapter 11 and I won't be able to use them anymore. Does the game let you keep batallions even when they shouldn't be on your side story-wise? I also gave Dimitri the Chalice of Beginnings for the permanent Retribution effect, but I noticed something strange in the first month's mission. I assumed that when an enemy archer/mage attacked him from a distance that he'd just run up and smack them with his lance when normally he'd stay put. But instead he summons a random-ass lightning bolt from nowhere like he's using an Arrow of Indra. Why is he countering with a magic-based attack? He's a physical unit and he's got like an E in reason right now. Will this change when I promote him to a class that can't use magic (like Myrmidon)? Or should I be training him up in reason too so his counterattacks aren't doing crap damage late game?

Went with Dorothea on my first run (CF) and I regretted it. She's just too good a spellcaster to be dancing all the time. I promoted her to Gremory first chance I got and never switched back. I'm planning on making Flayn my dancer for AM (dancing and healing only) and Lysithea for my second CF run (not for dancing, just to pick up Sword Avoid on her road to Gremory).

Right, it's the "propaganda route" beacuse it commits the unforgiveable sin of starring your least favorite lord. Every route can be looked at that way depending on who you agree with. Please keep your bias out of this. Thank you! I wasn't even talking about CF Rhea. She pulls enough crap in White Clouds that I don't even need to mention what she does after the timeskip.

Ah, perfect! I can always go Thief for the better growths and just not bother with mastering it since Steal is meh. So I'm thinking I'll take the Soldier* / Myrmidon* > Thief > Swordmaster > High Lord* > Great Lord* route and have him use both lances and swords. Then I'll give him Killer weapons, Fraldaruis Soldiers for the crit bonus and the Chalice of Beginnings (maybe swap it out for the Knowledge Gem occasionally just so time's not an issue like @Shadow Mir said.) Oh! So I can get Lúin without Dorothea, it's just the ring that I can buy from Anna anyway that I'll miss? Maybe what I'll do then is scrap the magic Sylvain idea, make him a Cavalier and give him Lúin so Ingrid can keep the Lance of Ruin. And then I'll just take the Monk > Mage* > Warlock* > Dark Flier path with Marianne and give her a Healing Staff since I don't wanna leave the support role entirely to Flayn. I think I'm all set now! Thanks everybody for your help! 🙂

Ah jeez I'm dumb lol I keep thinking it's beginner for some reason. I'll go back and fix my post. Thanks for catching that. So if I drop Brigand and just go Soldier > Myrmidon > Mercenary (Master) > Swordmaster > High Lord > Great Lord, do you think that'll be enough given the time frame? Will going the pure black magic route hurt her white magic potential though? I still want her to be able to function as a healer. Mainly to get double Warp earlier on than Gremory like @Barren said. I wasn't planning on mastering Bishop, just using it as something to bridge the gap between Mage and Gremory. Damn... so a magic Sylvain really isn't worth it then? I'd hoped to make him into something different since Ingrid and Hilda pretty much do everything he does as a Paladin but with the added bonus of flight. Should I give him his Lance of Ruin back? I was planning on giving it to Ingrid with the matching crest item since she can't get Lúin without Dorothea (I'm not recruiting any Black Eagles). Or would she make better use of it? Okay, so if I'm set on a foot locked path, I should go Soldier* / Myrmidon* > Thief > Swordmaster / Assassin > High Lord* > Great Lord*, with a good batallion to match his skills and a high crit weapon like Killing Edge or Killer Lance. I'd rather use the Chalice of Beginnings though instead of an Accuracy Ring if that's okay. Now I know you're saying Thief > Assassin is the best for dex growths, but how well would Mercenary > Swordmaster work in its place if I don't want to train him in bow for Assassin?

Here's my new plan with some of the changes you all suggested. How does it look? Is there anything else you'd recommend? Byleth - Brigand (Master) > Myrmidon > Mercenary (Master) > Swordmaster Dimitri - Brigand (Master) > Soldier > Myrmidon > Mercenary (Master) > Swordmaster > High Lord > Great Lord This seems like a very long road, especially since Dimitri misses out on a huge chunk of instruction time after the timeskip. Should I maybe skip Soldier and go straight to Myrmidon to speed (heh) things along? I also decided to go Mercenary instead of Thief to pick up Vantage since I don't expect Dimitri to be stealing anything other than kills. Ingrid - Brigand (Master) > Soldier > Pegasus Knight (Master) > Wyvern Rider (Master) > Falcon Knight Ashe - Brigand (Master) > Fighter > Archer (Master) > Sniper > Bow Knight Marianne - Monk > Mage (Master) > Bishop > Dark Flier Do I still need Bishop or can she go straight to Dark Flier from Mage? Hilda - Brigand (Master) > Soldier > Pegasus Knight (Master) > Wyvern Rider (Master) > Falcon Knight Sylvain - Monk > Mage (Master) > Warlock > Dark Knight Lysithea - Monk > Mage (Master) > Bishop > Gremory Catherine - Brigand (Master) > Swordmaster Shamir - Brigand (Master) > Archer (Master) > Assassin Seteth - Brigand (Master) > Wyvern Rider (Master) > Wyvern Lord Flayn - Dancer Flayn for the most part won't be doing much besides dancing and healing so I'm not taking her through Mage.

Why Petra, just out of curiosity?

It's a bit of both with Felix, actually. On my CF run I recruited him early on since I heard he was an excellent unit. I don't really care for "tsundere" type characters, so I was a bit put off by his abrasiveness (I went the B-support route with all my recruits) but I figured he'd warm up sooner or later so I let him join and brought him into every battle. After not too long, he'd definitely become the beast on the battlefield that everyone said he was. But the problem was that he just killed too many enemies. Bernadetta and Lysithea would just end up standing there behind him on every auxiliary battle, not getting a single EXP because all the enemies were too busy committing suicide by Felix. I started to pull Felix back to keep him away from enemies just so the others had a chance to get some kills. But as I'm already wondering if Felix is more of a burden than a help, I start to get more of his supports. So I'm thinking this is where that prickly shell of his will start to melt away. And while his suppprts with Lysithea were genuinely hilarious, just because she's the only one who doesn't back down from him, I couldn't help but feel his character was going nowhere. Even in his B and A-supports, he always snaps right back into his abrasive funk. I felt like Bernadetta put it best in their A-support when she said "Aww... there's that shell again." The shell never goes away, even in the monestary. Even when someone gets him to open up a bit, he always crawls right back in. His C and B-supports with Dorothea I think got me the most because they show just how bitter and angry he is inside that he can be so openly hostile to someone as sweet and good-natured as Dorothea. She wasn't even poking fun at him like Lysithea or freaking out like Bernadetta, she was just being friendly and outgoing like always. I get what the Tragedy of Duscur, as well as his brother's death, did to him emotionally. I get that both those things left wounds deeper than what a nice chat with Dorothea can heal. And I get that the way he acts towards everybody (including his father) is just his way of hiding the constant pain he feels inside. I mean for as much as Felix hates him, he's actually very similar to Dimitri in what he experienced, just not in how he chooses to process his feelings. So I get it, I sympathize with it, but I just can't get behind how he chooses to deal with it. But for the sake of the topic I'll stop here since I've already said a lot haha Sorry for my rudeness before, that was crappy of me. You're absolutely right, I should've given a good reason in my OP. Thanks for the head's up about chapter 13, that does sound hard if you've been using mostly out of house characters up to that point. I was already planning on training Mercedes as a healer adjutant for Dimitri, and I'll definitely make sure Annette's in an advanced class by then too. I just don't wanna use Felix again, if that's alright. Also thanks for the advice about Sylvain. I'll grow up some magic herbs for him, but I'm not so sure about training him in lance with no magic lance available. Perfect! Dimitri's timeskip hair is everything! Oh, I didn't even think of a Dark Flier Marianne! That sounds like exactly what I'm looking for. Faith, Reason, a Levin Sword and a way to get outta dodge easily. And yeah since I'm set on Gremory for Lys I'll go for Bishop instead of training her in riding.

Thanks for the advice on Ingrid. That definitely looks like a strong route for her. Would you recommend mastering all those classes for her? Or just the ones that give useful skills like Brigand? And I should take this path with Hilda too, yes? That first route for Dimitri looks very tempting. I do enjoy my speedy powerhouses who can just nope everything. I'd rather not train him in riding for the Cavalier route since he's gonna be unmounted in the end. Can he stick with lance all the way through? Or should he switch to swords temporarily while he's in the sword-based classes? Also how important is Death Blow for him? Is it a must-have or just something that's good to get if it's not too much trouble? Damn... I was hoping for a good "combat healer" type build for Marianne so she can fight alongside Hilda to build up support (for shipping reasons). I can definitely go Gremory though and just give her a Levin Sword. I'll bridge the gap with Valkyrie since Warlock feels pretty useless on her (no black magic and all), but I still want Gremory for double warp. Maybe I'll grab Vantage for her though just so she doesn't die to a cheap shot. Yeah I've seen people do it but it always felt like "You trained her in all that crap just for some defense?!" to me haha Oh yeah true! I forgot about his Locktouch ability. I'll probably take him down the Bow Knight route and make Shamir my Assassin then. Ah, thanks! I'll give the ring to Dimitri and the boots to Lys so she can still equip Thyrsus. Nope. Like Spirit Dust/Magic Herbs? I'll definitely keep this in mind. Thanks everyone for your feedback!

Byleth - Myrmidon > Mercenary > Swordmaster I went Enlightened One my first time around and I wasn't overall impressed with Byleth's spell list. She got two good healing spells and made Blutgang pretty useful, but I always found that she did her best with just a Silver Sword. So I'm going the pure sword route this time, staying in Swordmaster for Swordfaire and Sword Crit. I'm also giving her a Crest of Charon and Catherine's Thunderbrand. Dimitri - Soldier > ???? > High Lord > Great Lord I like having my lords end up in their unique classes. But what's a good path to make the most out of Great Lord Dimitri? I'm guessing Soldier since that's the go-to beginner class for lance. But I'm not sure where to go from there until he unlocks High Lord. Ingrid - Soldier > Pegasus Knight > Falcon Knight I'm not gonna screw with success here. Took this path with Ingrid on Black Eagles and she was just too damn good for me to make her anything else here. Only thing I'm doing differently this time is handing her a Crest of Gautier and the Lance of Ruin since Sylvain's going the magic route and won't need it. Ashe - Myrmidon > Thief > Assassin I'm not sure if I should make Ashe my Assassin or have him go Bow Knight and make Shamir my Assassin instead. Marianne - Monk > Priest > Bishop > Holy Knight I'm going for more of a mixed Marianne build than the last time where she was a healer and nothing else. She'll have her Faith magic for healing, a Levin Sword for fighting and Canto for not dying. Hilda - Soldier > Pegasus Knight > Falcon Knight Everyone says she makes a great flier, and I really really don't wanna make her a Wyvern Lord. Mainly just for Fashion Emblem (if that's a thing lol) reasons. So Falcon Knight seemed like the next best thing. I'll just give my Wyvern Lord Seteth her crest and relic. Sylvain - Monk > Mage > Warlock > Dark Knight Might as well make use of that budding talent of his since his Reason spell list seems pretty nice. Just gotta give him Caduceus Staff and he's good to go. Lysithea - Monk > Mage > Gremory Pretty self-explanatory. Should I bridge the gap between Mage and Gremory with anything just for stat boosts? I know some people get the Fortress Knight cert just to fix her tissue paper defense, but that seems like an awfully huge investment in otherwise useless skills for her, even on NG+. Do you think I should go for it? Catherine - Swordmaster My goal here is basically a replacement Felix. I want her to crit, I want her to double and I want her to dodge. Makes the most sense to keep her in Swordmaster for this since she has it right from the get-go and it's the best pure sword class from what I've seen. Then if I just hand her a Killing Edge, feed her any speed items I get and throw on a Crit Ring or Evasion Ring she should be set. Shamir - Sniper > Bow Knight Basically the same concern I had with Ashe. Seteth - Wyvern Rider > Wyvern Lord He's a natural Wyvern Lord. Wyvern Lords are OP. Seems like a good plan to me haha Flayn - Dancer Flayn's pretty much considered the best Dancer in the game, and it looks like she's got some pretty useful support spells to go with it. So I figure why not since it's always a good idea to have a Dancer and she seems like the perfect choice. A couple of other questions. Who will be my two most movement-challenged units? I just wanna know who to give the March Ring and Sacred Galewind Shoes to. Also, NG+ means I can freely switch between everyone's timeskip and pre-timeskip looks, even in part 1, yes?

Never thought I'd hear this from Hubert lol Unfortunately though it looks like you'll need to start over unless you have a save from earlier in the month. They really should've made the CF requirements less missable though. Either that or they should've just made CF the default since it's the actual Black Eagles route.

Well to be perfectly fair, all the stuff I mentioned happens before or during White Clouds, regardless of route. I didn't bring up anything specific to CF like her freakout or the burning of Fhirdiad. Some of the things I said are actually revealed in SS if I'm not mistaken. I agree with playing all the routes to get the most complete version of the story, but seeing as I have no interest in actually playing SS isn't it enough that I've read up on the lore it provides about Rhea before forming an opinion of her? It's not like I'm dismissing her based on CF alone. I know about the things Rhea did and that's where my opinion of her comes from. It doesn't matter which route I played first or if I only decide to play three, Rhea's worst actions happen on all four. But like you said, it's not really worth derailing the topic to discuss this further. After all, I'm not trying to convert anyone, just explaining my reasoning. We've both said what we came to say so this looks like a good place to end. Have a nice day :)

I definitely see what you mean about Edelgard and Rhea, but I find that there's one key difference that separates Rhea from Edelgard and Dimitri. And I know that it's very much my opinion. But Edelgard and Dimitri are both good, selfless people deep down. Yes, they both do some morally questionable things over the course of the story. But their intentions are never to do evil. They both feel they must do what needs to be done for the good of Fódlan, even if it means going to war over their ideals. The actions they take are simply "neccesary evils" that can't be avoided no matter what they do. Sadly, not everything can be achieved through clean pretty decision making where there's a clear "right" and "wrong" choice. El and Dimitri need to make some very difficult calls throughout the story. And what I enjoy so much about them is seeing how these decisions weigh on them, showing us that not even they have a rose-tinted view of what they're doing. Neither one of them is clearly right or wrong, even if I agree with El more. They're just human, they're two very similar people on opposite sides. Red and blue, quite literally. Rhea's a villain. I'm sorry, but that's just how I see her. A tragic villain, but still a villain. That's not to say she isn't another interesting character to explore, there are no "flat" characters in this game except Kronya. But I can't put her on equal moral ground with El and Dimitri. She lies about her identity, she lies about Fódlan's history (and erases any bit of it that could threaten her rule) and she lies about the nature of crests and relics all just to keep herself in a seat of absolute power forever. She created a caste system that directly ruins peoples lives and refuses to do anything to stop it even when she has people in her own monastery who've been affected by it (El, Lysithea, Dorothea, Marianne, Sylvain, etc.). She tried to use Byleth as a vessel to revive her mother (which would've erased Byleth's mind and replaced it with Sothis) even after seeing that Byleth is her own person and not just an empty mindless shell. And again, I'm sorry. I'm sure there's many people who enjoy Rhea as a character and I'm not trying to change their minds or hurt their opinions. If there's one thing to say about FETH it's that it did a damn good job creating a fleshed-out world with so many compelling, human (or dragon in Rhea's case haha) characters, Edelgard, Dimitri and Rhea included.

In the other routes though, the lord is the leader of your chosen faction. Edelgard's the Emperor of Adrestia, Dimirti's the King of Faerghus and Claude's the leader of the Leicester Alliance. There's nobody else in your group calling the shots, they're in charge. In SS, the Church is your group. Rhea's the Archbishop of the Church. Seteth and Flayn have no power over her. So even if she's not there in person until the end, SS is still the route where you're directly working for Rhea.