Barren

Yea I can see where you're coming from. I mean everyone having certain CAs makes them unique to an extent (budding talent included). And I do like how the game gives you these options to explore. Makes you want to experiment around with them. What also bugs me is that the end game sword classes I've mentioned are just outclassed and not bad (at least for the most part). I mean sure Swordmasters can do crit builds with their innate sword crit +10 but they have their 5 move to worry about. Hero has a cute gimmick in having innate vantage and defiant strength but unless you're the high risk kind of player, you don't want to be on low health especially on maddening unless you have a well crafted plan. Assassin by proxy is the most useful since they have no terrain penalty to worry about and 6 move isn't terrible but they lack not only a punch like other classes. Not to mention that assassinate and lethality are very unreliable. Though fun fact, I did manage to get Lethality to trigger a few times on my golden deer run with Leonie and Yuri when using bows and that caught me by surprise. I was on normal mode at the time and my chances had to have been around 8-10% since the formula is Dex/4. And Mortal Savant.....yea. One thing I will mention about it however is that Yuri does make a good Mortal Savant candidate and has a easier time getting there compared to Manuela. But again, losing the speed growth sucks even though he can afford it.

Just a question for those who played this game through and through (and played the series' games in general). Are swords really awful in three houses? Reason why I ask is because I noticed that some people tend to say that Lances, Axes are better because of better Combat Arts and that Falcon Knights and Wyvern Lords take full advantage of them. 8 move , flight, weaponfaire and avoid +10 are all strong abilities and optimal for physical attackers. I know also that Snipers and Grapplers are worthy mentions too because of the class exclusive combat arts, but Swordmasters, Assassins and even the Hero Class gets glossed over for I'm guessing because either their growths aren't that great and their mobility is out classed compared to other classes. I mean the sword combat art lists aren't bad IMO. Soul Blade is a nice magic based combat art that can target Res which is generally low to below average for most physical classes. And Windsweep being able to prevent counter attacks is useful for you getting in a free hit. Sublime Creator Sword hits hard in general and has a safe 2 range attack and forged Levin Swords can be combined nicely with fiendish blow and swordfaire. Accuracy Ring helps with that too. But all in all, are swords really bad in this game or in the series in general?

I made Ferdinand the dancer in my Blue Lions playthrough and he was a really good dodge tank since he has confidence. I even tried him out as a swordsmaster and he was pretty good as well. I know that SM pales in comparison to Paladin or Wyvern Lord for him but as for trying something different, he made it work

That makes sense. My very first playthrough I didn't recruit her until chapter 7 on Back Eagles. That was when I as going into it blind for the first time. Nowadays I just recruit her around chapter 3 or 4 since I can spend more time on developing her. This now helps me broaden my horizons on who and when to recruit units from other houses

Thank you @Rengor1997 and @Fraven Poothfor the responses. I guess I wasn't sure if it was possible to have her still be able to get her into Wyvern Rider then Falcon Knight/Wyvern Lord because of when she gets recruited. I suppose that assuming maddening mode could mean that as long as you're determined to get her onto that wyvern route leveling up in lances + axes with a bit of authority would be achievable. And I can understand why Wyvern Rider pretty much outshines swordmaster in terms of strength growths and better movement. I was just a little worried about her speed not catching up as fast. Her 60% speed growth though I know won't take a hit regardless, I was just a bit worried about her growths because whether or not she gets blessed or cursed is all due to RNG. Nonetheless I will take that into consideration when I eventually try out maddening mode. Thanks again

Plus even as EO you can just get Byleth's Faith Rank up to C Rank just for Recover so you can at least have a emergency back up heal in case things get hairy. So yea Swordfaire + Death Blow works really well together. Plus Byleth gets WIndsweep which is one of the better sword combat arts to use. And EO even has a ranged option with Swordfaire using a forged Levin Sword as well

I concur with that as well because eventually you'll want him to equip higher rank battalions which offer way better stat buffs. Maybe it's fine to not give him a battalion early on for that 5 extra damage since low rank battalions barely offer anything better at the moment. But again, raising his authority while it is a bane, will be worth it for him in the long term. I'd say once you get him to Authority rank D or C you'll start to notice the difference already. Also @ChaosStar0 if you're going for end game classes like War Master or Wyvern Lord, you got to make sure you're being realistic about the class progressions and that you're not getting side tracked too much. Even on normal mode where you can abuse free battles that can take forever. So we'll assume for a minute that you're doing hard/maddening where there are no free battles. If you want Felix for example to reach Warmaster/Grappler, then the best progress is to work on axes and gauntlets. You could go for a vantage/wrath build for him if you want to temporarily tutor him in swords for a bit (assuming you're picking Blue Lions off the bat) up to rank D+ at minimum to certify him as a mercenary. Then from there go for Death Blow then upgrade him to Warrior and then get Wrath and then Warmaster for Quick Riposte. Or if you want him to be a Grappler whose more of a player phase focused class, then ignore the vantage + wrath combo and just get him Death Blow (maybe brawl avoid +20 if you're willing to train his faith up to C rank at minimum while getting his brawling to B+ and simply leaving axes at rank D+ at minimum for Brigand), and then get Tomebreaker and Fierce Iron Fist which allows you to attack three times. So my (and everyone else's) point in all of this, plan out your class progression a little more thoroughly so that way you'll reach your end game class quicker

True. Being footlocked isn't always a good thing but I do agree that 6 move isn't too bad and being able to ignore terrain penalty can be more helpful than people think. I always like to keep him as a sword/bow attacking unit as opposed to just sword myself so he has ranged options. Losing Bowfaire sucks but I guess there are worse things for him to lose. Bernadetta can pull off the vantage/wrath combo better than Ashe because of Persecution Complex. She doesn't even need to go to Warrior because she also gets Battalion Wrath which does combo with Vantage. Sure she has a weakness in swords but that is still manageable getting to rank D+ at minimum. She can easily go into Bow Knight with a forged Killer's Bow and get Bow Prowess, Bow Crit/Close Counter, Hit +20, Vantage and Battalion Wrath and as long as she has the retribution gambit applied to her, gets hit once or twice with a guard adjutant with her, she will absolutely mop the floor with the entire enemy opposition with this set up. And others have said that Dimitri is the best with that combo but the battalion versions and I completely agree with that. I don't think Ashe is a shit character by any means, and I know I'm repeating what others are saying but he really does have some stiff competition.

Hmm, I suppose that would be worth testing at some point.

I never tried Falcon Knight Shamir. How was much damage was she doing with Lance Jab? Does Darting Blow increase the damage done with it? Or does it just affect attack speed for regular attacks? I know that Lance Jab does more damage based off your speed as well as Death Blow of course

Was his stats not good because of RNG or was it still good for maddening but not quite the damage out that you were looking for? I did try him out as a Assassin and I did like it since he'll be fast as hell and his 55% strength growth would still help him hit hard as he goes

Ahh good to note. At least regular attacks still works with it in case Hunter's Volley isn't needed for some reason. His crest is also very good with gauntlets so I know people also tend to make him a grappler or war master

I agree. If I had to pick a sniper candidate out of the blue lions house I would choose Felix since his growths are better by comparison. He has a strength growth of 55% (60 if sniper), his dex growth greatly benefits from jumping up from 45% to 65% (which is pretty good), his speed would remain at 55% which is fine and his luck growth would go up from 40% to 50%. Basically he can do what Ashe can do but far better. Not to mention his lone wolf ability allowing him to gain an additional attack +5 is nice (I know that later on there are battalions that out performs this ability, but early on it's fine), and his crest of Fraldarius allowing him to do extra damage is really good.

I think the problem with Ashe is not necessary his growth rates. Ignatz and Bernadetta have similar growths. However, the problems lies with the fact that he doesn't really having anything that makes him stand out. His personal ability lockpick while nice for not needing to buy a door/chest/master key, they cost next to nothing anyways. Ignatz has an innate hit +20 ability which is great for hitting enemies in general and can be used for a number of roles as a mid line attacker/debuffer. Bernadetta can be a great boss killer with vengeance while capitalizing on lancefaire, persecution complex, among others. Plus you could get them from those purple spirits online. I also agree with @Shanty Pete's 1st Mate about his strengths and weaknesses, he can be usable on any team. But he just doesn't add enough to the table for me. Even if he could do warrior or wyvern lord, his defenses are still pretty low. Definitely certifying him as a armored knight on hard/maddening will help him take a hit or two better but that's about it for him

Hapi wouldn't benefit from Dark Flier because she only has Dark Magic. The class has Black Tomefaire

I picked the classes that makes the most sense to me Yuri as a Mortal Savant can make it work. Yes I know that Mortal Savant is one of the more disliked classes because of it being a hybrid class and has that -10% speed penalty. But he makes it work because he can afford the speed drop. Granted it still sucks when you lose that speed. But he can at least still use Levin Sword+ very effectively. Excalibur is the lightest heavy tome in the game so he could feasibly double attack a number of enemies pending on the RNG. Balthus as a Warmaster makes perfect sense. He gets a crit + 20. Fist/Axefaire are always nice. Not to mention that if you master mercenary and warrior for vantage + wrath respectively, he can make his king of grappling ability work so well. +6 attack/defense in addition to vantage + wrath and crit +20 and more crit from killer knuckles+? Yes please!. You can even achieve overkill power with defiant strength from the Hero class. But that may or may not be necessary pending on your persective. Constance being a gremory is as good as making lysithea a gremory. But she's slower than lysithea so that can be a challenge unless you pump everything into her magic to go for the one shot. Though no black tomefaire, the +5 magic modifier compensates for it and 2x uses of bolting is really attractive. Though no physic which makes anyone a bit sad. Hapi as a Dark Knight also makes perfect sense. Dark Tomefaire and having her ride around is nice. Uncanny Blow from Valkyrie will help her out alot. Something that Constance could also use for bolting and fimbulvetr.

I would second that for Lysithea as well. Though Dark Knight has better overall stat growths than Valkyrie, at least with Valkyrie you have the extra range in your spells. Though in fairness, DKs having 7 move and regular range is equal to 6 move and 1 extra spell range. Uncanny Blow is super useful and Valkyrie can be for some people, a bridging class to get to Dark Knight in case you would rather get the extra damage. Though just beware that not all maps are kind to horseback units as you may have to dismount at times and it pretty much undo the work you put into riding. It may or may not be a deal breaker but something to keep in mind

Question about recruiting Ingrid at chapter 6. I know that you mentioned that she'll be auto leveled to be similar or equal to the enemy's stats so she'll be easier to level up. But with having E in authority and in axes, would you still be able to get her to learn Death Blow and get her authority to at least rank D in a reasonable amount of time? Because I know that from there she'll easily be able to pick up Falcon Knight and have her go on her marry way. The thing however is that fliers are only limited to flying battalions. Based on the idea of waiting until chapter 6 to recruit her, the most logical path without stretching her development too thin would probably be keep tutoring her in authority and have her suggested goals be lances/authority and swords for a good while since her first flying battalion is at Rank D. So in other words it would somehow look like Pegasus Knight > Swordmaster > Falcon Knight since it will keep her speed growth high and swordmaster should help her strength growth issues. Plus you can keep tutoring her in authority/lance and flying along the way. So she should able to get something like lance prowess, swordbreaker/authority level 5 (since she has lady knight as her personal ability), alert stance, defiant avoid and maybe something like sword prowess in case of cursed ashiya sword+ for extra high crit chances. Of course I could be wrong but that would be something that seems feasible no?

You'll also get Catherine, Cyril and Seteth as well. Anyways best of luck!

I can agree to the idea that Marianne can go in other classes other than dancer. My reasoning was that she had a boon in riding and swords so I felt that it was worth trying out. Plus I had Linhardt recruited at that point and even though his growths aren't that great (nothing he has are over 50%), he at least can pull off 2x of physic and warp. So he was a decent enough choice to replace her as a healer for me. I never tried Lorenz as a dancer so I can't really comment on how he'll do. Though if I did go with it, I'd probably just give him the standard dancer build of sword prowess, sword avoid, special dance, axebreaker and movement +1.

Agreed. Having 5 move while not terrible, pales in comparison to having 7 to 8 move when flying/riding.

Black Eagles I like Ferdinand as a front line attacker because he can assume a number of physical roles like Paladin, or Wyvern Lord. Paladin for Swift Strikes, Wyvern Lord for extra avoid in conjunction with Confidence. He can also go Swordmaster with Sword Avoid along with Confidence as well. Or if you want him to go into a tanking role, there is Fortress Knight or Great Knight. I know the latter two classes aren't great on maddening but he can be a useful guard adjutant that can grant you a nice hit bonus. Bernadetta is someone to me what makes Fire Emblem fun. A weird unit that may have shaky growths but can certainly dish out massive damage with Vengeance. Persecution Complex is actually better than people think. Paladin or Bow Knight Bernie is simple to get into and both are incredibly effective. Even Encloser can be super useful for freezing enemies in place and to keep things from getting too overwhelming. Dorothea I think gets slept on at times since her growths aren't as high as other mages. In some cases Dancer can be a good option for her since she can not only buff her allies quite nicely but linked attacks with meteor makes her quite valuable. Though I can understand why people would rather have another dancer instead of her. I consider Marianne to be more suited. Gremory Dorothea brings out the best out of her kit. 2x uses of Thoron, Physic and Meteor all good traits. Petra I feel like Ferdie she can go in a number of physical roles. Assassin, Swordmaster, Sniper all good options for her. But of course her two best classes in my opinion are Falcon Knight for the speed or Wyvern Lord for more power. She honestly benefits from Wyvern Lord more because she needed the added HP, Strength and Defense. Sure her Resistance stats won't get the boost that she would from Falcon Knight and Falcon Knight has a higher dex stat modifier. But I think the positives outweighs the negatives with her in Wyvern Lord. Blue Lions Felix hits like truck early on. His crest makes him hit even harder at times. The game pushes him to be a Swordmaster. But I like to think of him as a Assassin to help with his Dex growth since 55% strength is still pretty high. Sniper or Warmaster/Grappler are better options though because either his crest can trigger with range attacks or quad hitting someone with gauntlets. His bane in authority is a problem though. He could really use the higher ranked battalions for those extra stats. Sylvain, like Ferdinand can assume a number of physical roles. Like Paladin and Wyvern Lord. Similar to Ferdinand minus the extra hit/avoid. His dex growth is not that great though, 35% is pretty low. Might not be a bad idea to get him to learn hit +20 along the way I feel. Still, philanderer can be helpful when wanting him to deal extra damage. He can even try Dark Knight as his reason and faith spell list is not too bad. Though you would have to train him in the mage route throughout the whole game to make it a somewhat viable option for him. Annette fills the support rally bot role quite nicely as a flier since fliers don't care about terrain. Perseverance being rally strength gives her an immediate edge as a support unit over Mercedes in my opinion since it can be combined with other rallies she has. Dark Flier or Wyvern Lord or good options for her pending on your taste. Regardless, always make sure she has rally speed. That can be the difference maker for at least early on in the game. I can understand if for some people rallies may not be needed latter on anymore, but it's still great to have on board. Golden Deer Ignatz having an innate hit +20 is really useful throughout the entire game because on hard or maddening mode their avoid can be really high. Obviously his growths aren't particulary impressive to begin with but he can be patched up to a damage dealer with Death Blow + Hunter's Volley. In addition to another hit +20 makes sure he'd not going to be missing any shots any time soon. He could go Assassin as well for the extra speed and dex growth if you want for Lethality, but I can understand why people find it to be unreliable. Dex/4 is not a formula I'm comfortable with banking on either Lysithea is a walking nuke but with paper thin defenses and lop sided stat growths. That said, giving her the Thyrsus staff helps out her spell range issues. She is amazing as a gremory. Dark Knight for her is an okay option but terrain may be an issue at times where you'll be forced to dismount so you may not get the benefit from all that riding training in the first place. Not much else to say about her honestly. Marianne I've grown to be fond of since she has so many options. Falcon Knight if you want to use frozen lance, Gremory, Swordmaster, Dark Flier, etc. So many options for her to take advantage of her magic stat and/or her boon in swords with Levin Sword+ and Blutgang. Physic, Silence,Thoron, Fimbulvetr and Aura having double uses as a gremory is a pretty big deal. Leonie is great, I really like her. No banes to worry about and can do well in any physical role. Paladin, Falcon Knight, Bow Knight. All of them are good class options for her. I know that Wyvern Lord (I know I know, that stupid good class) is another great option for her. Rivalry is also useful for the similar reasons Sylvain's is useful

Ahh that's right. Good to note. Yuri could go either Assassin, Trickster, or even Mortal Savant believe it or not since he'll benefit from sword avoid regardless. Other decent options for him could be Sniper if you would rather have him use dead eye or hunter's volley or grappler to improve his strength even further

Wouldn't sword avoid Lysithea be better for her as a mortal savant? Of course Mortal Savant isn't really a great choice for her anyways since it decreases her speed. Plus if you're going for Lysithea as a gremory, I wouldn't even bother making her a dancer. If you're looking for other dancer candidates, I personally like Marianne. Other good candidates are Ingrid (if you're not making her a flier), Ferdinand since confidence is backed up by sword avoid. Yuri is another good candidate since he has the Fetters of Dromi

I think that would be okay. At least with Born Fighter adjacent enemies will suffer a -10 avoid. Of course if you have him and Mercedes recruited for Silver Snow, he can at least take a hit from the Death Knight pending on how well leveled he is at this point. His HP and defense would need all the help he can get if you were to do that quest battle