Ice Dragon

Translation notes, I guess: The banner name, "Engage", is "エンゲージ" (engēji), "Engage". Alfred's epithet, "Floral Protector", is "笑み護る花" (emi mamoru hana), "Flower Protecting Smiles" or "Smile-Protecting Flower". Hyphens are important. Arcane Qiang is "魔器・鍛錬の花槍" (maki: tanren no kasō), "Arcane Weapon: Training Flower Lance". "Qiāng" (枪 | 槍) means "spear" in Chinese. I have no idea why they decided this weapon should be Chinese because everything on this banner is clearly French. As usual, "魔器" (maki), "magic weapon", is the term for both Arcane weapons and Rearmed Heroes. Self-Improver is "自己研鑽" (jiko kensan), "Self-Improvement". Flow N Trace is "怒涛・近影" (dotō: kin'ei), "Surging Waves: Near Trace". As usual, "影" (ei), here meaning "trace", refers to signs that something was here and no longer is. Celine's epithet, "Joyous Royal", is "幸福の女王" (kōfuku no joō), "Queen of Joy". Joyous Tome is "幸福の良書" (kōfuku no ryōsho), "Good Tome of Joy". Spd/Res Ideal is "速さ魔防の万全" (hayasa mabō no banzen), "Spd/Res Perfection". Chloe's epithet, "Fairy-Tale Flier", is "空想を舞う翼" (kūsō o mau tsubasa), "Wings Dancing in a Daydream". Dreaming Spear is "夢想の翼槍" (musō no yokusō), "Wing Lance of Dreams". Pegasus Flight is "天馬行空" (tenba kōkū), "Pegasus Flight". Alear's epithet, "Dragon Child", is "神竜の王女" (shinryū no ōjo), "Divine Dragon Princess". Libération is "リベラシオン" (riberashion), "Libération". This is French. Close Call is "回避・一撃離脱" (kaihi: ichigeki ridatsu), "Evasion: Hit and Run". Etie's epithet, "Fitness Fighter", is "剛腕の令嬢" (gōwan no reijō), "Strong-Armed Young Lady". Protection Bow is "守護の弓" (shugo no yumi), "Protection Bow". Lumera's epithet, "Dragon Monarch", is "神竜王" (shinryūō), "Divine Dragon King". This epithet is identical to Naga's, which was localized as "Dragon Divinity". Monarch Blade is "神竜王の剣" (shinryūō no ken), "Divine Dragon King's Sword".

Or, more likely, they have sales data that says that male characters don't make them as much money.

Yeah, that seems to be accurate. I was skimming the announcement and didn't pay attention to which was intended to be correct. Will edit. Same reason every other skill also does that.

It looks like they gave up on Arcane weapons being evil pretty quickly. Two sparks is nice. Probably will grab Alear and Alfred with them. Not sure who I'm actually going to be pulling for. Might go with blue just because of the double focus rate. According to the announcements, there is currently an error with Joyous Tome's effect: The start-of-turn healing currently applies even when there are no allies in range. This will be fixed in version 7.2 in February, so don't get attached to it. None of the characters or skills are particularly groundbreaking, so it's nice that I don't feel compelled to pull for merges.

Why? Even though Duo Chrom has a Duel skill for a 195 stat total, Desert Byleth with a 180 stat total will score higher with only 2 more merges, and even if Desert Byleth is only running Reposition instead of a higher-scoring Assist skill, Desert Byleth will score just as high as Duo Chrom with only 3 more merges. Unless you have the resources to pull for unit with high stat totals, it's better for your score to focus on units that you can easily merge, like 4-star units and Grail units. Currently, the best F2P axe infantry units are Ninja Shamir, Atlas, Shez, and Hans. I believe Young Innes is still the gold standard for F2P infantry bow, though Kiragi has better stats. Summer Elincia is not infantry, but is also at the head of the pack. As far as red units go, Yen'fay and Holst are the best you can get from the Grail shop right now. I you have the resources to pull for a 4-star Special Hero, New Year Panne is also a solid unit.

Infantry Spd Tactic pretty situational, but can be useful if you're using Dodge tanks, though Dodge tanks are a bit iffy if they aren't running Godlike Reflexes since Deadeye and Lethality ignore Dodge. I'd personally lean towards Odd Recovery. It's less situational and is harder to get, as it's currently still only available from Special Heroes (Saul and Sephiran).

Are you prioritizing score or performance? If you're prioritizing score, merges and blessings are more important than stat totals. Every individual merge boosts your score by the same amount as 10 points of stat totals or 200 SP, and every blessing is worth 1 merge multiplied by the number of matching Legendary Heroes on the team. In general, most of the recent 4-star Special Heroes are good picks for scoring as they are relatively cheap to merge and generally still have good performance if you can give them a proper build. If you're prioritizing performance, Duo Chrom and any recent unit with Canto (or Galeforce in a non-Special slot) are generally good picks. Ranged Brave units, like Harmonized Lysithea, Duo Female Corrin, Duo Laegjarn, and Legendary Leaf are also pretty solid picks. I don't know how common Ninja Camilla is in your score range, but if she appears often enough, it's a good idea to put Hardy Bearing on a unit that can kill her before she can counterattack or run a unit that can Sweep her. For that matter, units with Sweep effects are generally pretty good, too.

If I remember correctly, Provoke didn't really make a noticeable difference and ended up being a pretty useless skill, especially in Path of Radiance where all skills cost skill capacity points. It's possible that with better implementation, they can make it actually useful, but it's a balancing act between drawing too much attention and getting the unit killed too easily and drawing too little attention and being functionally useless.

This banner once again highlights how annoying it is that you are forced to pick your spark at 40 pulls and can't let it sit there to pick later. After pulling my tenth Linde, I pulled 5 copies of Nino, 3 copies of Ursula (while sniping red), and 2 pity breakers before finally pulling my eleventh Linde. If I were allowed to wait to pick my spark until the end, I could have avoided all of that bullshit at the end. 494 pulls, sniping red: 11 Linde 16 Nino 4 Ursula (+1 spark) 3 4-star Byleth 13 pity breakers Say'ri Midori 2 Constance Echoes Palla Fallen Male Morgan Hugh Ascended Tiki Lysithea Brave Seliph Azel Fallen Ike Brave Edelgard 2.2% Linde rate is below average. 3.2% Nino rate is slightly above average if you account for forced off-color pulls. 6.3% focus rate is about average. 2.6% off-focus 5-star rate is below average by about 3 pulls. Three of the 4 copies of Ursula have an HP Asset. What the actual fuck. I'm overall slightly over budget on this banner, which means I'm probably going to cut some pulls from the Mythic Hero banner at the end of the month. I might also lower my goals for the AHR banner, too, but we'll see if I have to or not. I wasn't planning on pulling past the spark on the upcoming New Heroes banner, and I don't see myself changing those plans unless the banner has multiple sparks. I have a good number of leftover orbs from the last orb pack and will probably go and farm free orbs to spark the Forging Bonds rerun banner. This week's Arena ticket got me Flying Olivia. I got a Male Byleth out of the SR pool on the Khadein banner, which means that both of my regular Byleths are now at +10. I'll probably be prioritizing red instead of colorless on the Arena tickets for a while to see if I can start getting spare copies of Ruptured Sky now that both Byleths will be turned into manuals instead of merge fodder.

I understand your arguments. You're just making bad arguments. Safety in a modern urban setting does not automatically translate to safety on a medieval fantasy battlefield. You're asserting that it does while providing nothing to justify your assertion. If it didn't distract people, there wouldn't be the common joke of a guy driving down the street, seeing a pretty girl walking on the opposite sidewalk, rolling down his window to whistle at her, and then crashing his car. Distraction and attracting are not mutually exclusive. But that aside and continuing from the above response: Female playable characters that wield physical weapons in Fire Emblem typically have more than the equivalent of rudimentary military training, as they are typically nobility or mercenaries or come from a warrior culture. In contrast, the majority of enemy units have at best rudimentary military training, as they are typically common foot soldiers or bandits. The playable characters are typically at an advantage against the opponents in terms of training and are equal to the opponents in terms of equipment. In contrast, modern women walking down the street are typically not trained in self defense, much less military-grade training in the use of a weapon. Furthermore, muggings are typically intended to be surprise attacks against a lone person, not a battle between two armies. Modern safety recommendations are tailored to a modern setting. What works here can't automatically be expected to work in a different setting or a different situation. The trope itself extends well outside of Fire Emblem, and if drawing aggro is being mentioned as a detriment, then I'll appeal to games where drawing aggro is an actual mechanic since there are plenty of games that contain both an aggro mechanic and even skimpier female clothing. The main point, though, was that drawing aggro isn't really a thing in real life, or at least, not in the same way that it typically works in video games where enemies simply forget about the existence of everything else.

Pretending for a moment that that's how aggro works in real life, anyone fixating on you is no longer looking at any of your allies' weapons, either. Or at the weapons their allies are swinging. Also, the entire point of drawing aggro in video games is to get the opponent to not pay attention to the party members that deal damage so that the party members that deal damage can deal damage without being attacked. The only reason tanks have to be able to take hits is because enemies in video games typically can't be incapacitated before they reach the tank. Also, going back to the original issue, we're arguing about the defensive difference between bare skin and cloth pants. Cloth. Pants. The point of cloth pants is to protect your legs from being scratched by brush while traveling and from the weather. Cloth pants don't protect you from swords. Yes, loose cloth that bunches up easily (like modern hoodies) can provide some protection against draw cuts, but that's clearly not how these pants are constructed. Male Corrin's pants are skin-tight and therefore cannot be of much help unless they're made of some fictional material that cannot be cut and/or diffuses impacts. Male Byleth's coat is probably more effective at deflecting blows to his legs than his pants are because at least the skirt of his coat can be made out of thicker material since it doesn't need to flex as much as his pants do. Not going to help against an axe, but I suppose that's what the weapon triangle is for. The bigger issue is the fact that female Byleth is wearing heels. Male Shez's pants are also relatively tight and are not much help. He's wearing a few extra panels of armor around his waist, which is strange because female Shez could wear the exact same armor and still show off just as much skin.

Anything that keeps your opponent's eyes away from where your weapon is is an advantage.

Because men make stupid decisions when they think with their dick and not with their brain.

Have a cute werewolf Grima this week:

Fallen Ninian prefers either Spd or HP depending on whether you're using her with debuffs that rely on HP comparisons. Her Atk is largely unsalvageable for combat use, and she should be used as a dedicated support unit. Fast combat units like Fallen Dimitri and Shannan should always run Spd unless they absolutely need a different stat to function due to a conditional effect. Harmonized Azura is a dancer with passable combat ability, and as a fast unit, should run Spd. Fallen Hardin depends on what you're using him for. For general use, he should go with Atk. Res is an option for Far Save builds, but he doesn't really have the skill effects needed to pull off the build as well as others can. Fallen Female Morgan wants Atk, but if you can't get that, Def is more valuable than Res for melee units that are intended to fight melee units. I'm on the fence for what to do with my own Ascended Fjorm. Spd is the most important stat for her. Afterwards, there's an argument for any of Atk, Def, or Res, though I'm currently leaning towards Res. I wouldn't call it "synergy", but yes Clash works with teleportation because the stat boost is based on the number of spaces between the unit's starting position and the unit's ending position regardless of how the unit got there. Which of the three skills you pick should be based on how often you think you'll be able to activate their effects. in general, Clash is the least reliable of the three and should only be used if you can guarantee that the unit will move at least 2 spaces on player phase when attacking. If you cannot guarantee that the unit will move at least 2 spaces, pick a different option. Unless you absolutely need the additional +2 Spd from activating both stacks of Ideal, Finish is typically better as long as you can guarantee that your Special activates and aren't having the unit run off on their own. For units that aren't being built for Spd, there is usually no reason to run Ideal over Finish (other than skill availability) as long as you can guarantee that your Special activates since the extra damage and healing from Finish is always enough to make up for losing 2 points in two non-Spd stats..

Rearmed Grima is next in line for a colorless rerun in the Legendary/Mythic lineup, and there is guaranteed to be space for her on the next one, so her next rerun should land right around when Corrin's Resplendent outfit is released.

This still comes out to just +6/6/6/6 from her weapon, which is a lot of setup for only 1 point better than Arcane Grima in each stat with none of the additional skill effects or refine stats.

Because I can, here's an analysis of the awfulness of her stats. Her stats are actually not that bad, and you can make an argument to actually use her, but she's still behind. With max Dragonflowers, Resplendent Female Corrin has 48-/34+/41/41/28. Now, obviously, Halloween Female Corrin is way better, so we'll go with the second best fast blue dragon infantry, which happens to be Fallen Male Corrin, who also has a very similar stat spread at 46/42+/42+/37/30-. Female Corrin's Atk stat is actually not so unsalvageable with the Resplendent boost that she is forced to run an Atk Asset, so I can give her a Spd Asset for the initial comparison. Female Corrin's weapon grants her +6/6/0/0 if the opponent has been hit with Atk/Spd Menace. The -7 debuffs from her weapon are applied with Threaten and Smoke conditions, which make them extremely unreliable, so I'm not going to consider them. But since +6/6/0/0 is pretty underwhelming, I'll give her Arcane Grima [Spd] instead. Fallen Male Corrin's weapon grants a maximum of +5/8/5/5 plus Guard. That's underwhelming, so he also gets Arcane Grima [Spd], which makes the comparison pretty straightforward. In the end, Female Corrin ends up having +2/-8/-2/+4/-2 compared to Fallen Male Corrin. But since I'm using Arcane Grima on both of them for the comparison, Female Corrin can swap over to an Atk Asset and Arcane Grima [Atk] and instead have +2/-2/-8/+4/-2, relying on Arcane Grima for her follow-up and almost catching up in Atk, with the extra damage from Bonfire almost making up for the difference. Alternatively, you can swap her over to Arcane Grima [Def] and leverage the fact that Female Corrin has a really high Def stat, equal to that of Halloween Rhea, to just sit there and hope to tank physical hits. Now, because not everyone is going to have enough merges to get Fallen Male Corrin to be better than Female Corrin (because a +10 Female Corrin is quite a bit better than a +0 Fallen Male Corrin) or even have Fallen Male Corrin at all, the best fast free-to-play dragon (extending to all movement types and colors) is Halloween Nils. Halloween Nils has 45/36/42+/22/36. He has no exclusive weapon, so he also gets Arcane Grima [Spd]. With both running Spd builds, Corrin ends up with +3/-2/-2/+19/-8 compared to Nils, which is kind of sad considering Nils has dancer stats. And Corrin's Bonfire damage doesn't quite make up for the difference since her Def is only 5 points higher than Nils's Res powering his Iceberg. That said, Corrin does have a good Def stat and doesn't really need defensive skills for sustain against physical opponents, which make up the bulk of melee units.

Updated the lists for 2023 Resplendent #2, Dokkalfheimr Female Corrin.

The next Resplendent Hero is (finally) Dokkalfheimr Female Corrin: She's really cute. It's a pity her stats are so awful.

Soren's Spd is really depressing because Marianne has literally the exact same offensive stat spread (before accounting for superboons). His only real saving grace is the fact that he's slightly better than Ilyana as a free-to-play unit. With max Dragonflowers, Soren has +0/+0/+0/-1/+4 over Marianne and -3/+3/+0/-1/+3 over Ilyana. Are they trying to turn blue infantry tomes into the new lance fliers? While we're at it, Byleth also has the same offensive stat spread as Ascended Ishtar and really only differs by having even defenses instead of being extremely lopsided towards Res. On the other hand, I'm amused that Spd growths are now high enough to jump the threshold that 3 of the 4 fast units on the banner have a superbane instead of a superboon in it. All that said, Soren having depressing Spd is nothing new. Both of his other alts also have similar stat spreads, with Valentine Soren having 41/39/37/18/29 with max Dragonflowers and Young Soren having 38/44/36/18/45, which is nearly identical to this Soren's 39/44/35/19/46. The problem is that this Soren doesn't get a guaranteed follow-up In other news, the discussion in the refinery thread reminded me that Time's Pulse 4 is the last piece of the puzzle to make regular Sothis actually good despite her weapon refine being underwhelming on release. She can now run Time's Pulse 4 to get Sirius+ to reliably activate Finish 4's full effects. Now if only they'd actually put these skills in the standard summoning pool. To be entirely fair, staff units don't need the damage reduction from Remote Sparrow when they have access to Ideal/Catch + Dazzling Staff. A bit late on the reply, but yes. There is definitely a possibility that it would let you instantly recharge a 3-cooldown Special. I think the fact that Byleth has Sublime Heaven made it easier to make the decision to make him the demote. Unlike Ruptured Sky, Sublime Heaven is not inheritable, so it lets them add a character that players with tighter wallets could want to merge to +10 without devaluing a premium skill. (The fact that Legendary Male Byleth has Sublime Heaven instead of Ruptured Sky means that extra copies of him are of pretty much zero value. Meanwhile, even if Legendary Female Byleth didn't have Atk/Spd Ideal and only had Ruptured Sky, extra copies of her are always worth something because there's always someone that can make use of Ruptured Sky.) Kind of like how they could get away with giving Fallen Star to Summer Claude.

The Canto (1) on Harmonized Leaf was there specifically to reference Noba's Zeal, as it provides the same 1 movement, but without the ability to attack again. The only thing that giving Far Trace to Legendary Leaf does is allow him to choose whether to attack then move or to move then attack with the 1 movement he has after Galeforce activates, which is a really minor benefit given that it costs him half of a skill slot.

As a Near Save tank, Winter Sothis is very solid. Valentine Lucina has 43/62/56/44/38 with a Spd Asset, max Dragonflowers, and only her weapon equipped. Additionally, she gets 40% damage reduction on the opponent's first attack and bonus nullification. Winter Sothis has 51/64/60/43/46 with a Spd Asset, max Dragonflowers, and only her weapon equipped. Additionally, she gets 30% damage reduction on the opponent's first attack, penalty nullification, and the defensive half of Null Follow-Up. Sothis can run the exact same build as Lucina and probably do slightly better with it. Sothis has slightly less damage reduction, but higher overall stats. However, Sothis has fewer alternative options for A skills, as she's unable to use Unity's additional effect. However, they're clearly trying to get players to keep Special Fighter on her by not giving her a different means of activating Sirius on her first counterattack as well as giving her the defensive half of Null Follow-Up, which overlaps with part of Savvy Fighter's effect. Unless you're up against an opponent that can inflict Deep Wounds, though, I think Savvy Fighter is probably still the better option. As a Far Save tank, I'm not entirely convinced of her performance on paper. On the one hand, she nullifies Legendary Shez's gimmick and also has weapon triangle advantage against her. On the other hand, she's countered by Duo Chrom and ends up needing to give up her A skill to run Svalinn Shield against him, which leaves her vulnerable to Legendary Veronica. It also doesn't help that ranged units have an easier time using Triangle Attack and Dual Strike, which renders damage reduction on the opponent's first attack less valuable, and Sothis isn't able to run Deflect skills at the same time as Distant Counter (D). For comparison, Valentine Female Robin has 44/62/18/46/52 with a Res Asset, max Dragonflowers, and only her weapon equipped. Additionally, she gets 30% damage reduction on the opponent's first attack and 5 HP regeneration per attack. Sothis's stats are actually not significantly worse than Robin's defensively. It's just that Sothis is forced to give up more stat-boosting skills than Robin does, while at the same time, Sothis can't really afford to pass up on Spd to run other skills. For a more analogous comparison, Ascended Idunn has 47/66/33/53/49 with Def and Res Assets, max Dragonflowers, and only her weapon equipped. Additionally, she gets nullifies her penalties and has follow-up prevention. Idunn shuts down Duo Chrom entirely and also doesn't need to run Svalinn Shield at all, which opens up her A slot for better skills, like Distant Def 4. She can also run Distant Stance or Distant Reversal with a Deflect skill if necessary. I'll have to actually see how Sothis performs in practice (or in simulations) before making any judgments. If she can reliably survive until her counterattack and land a Special Fighter-boosted Sirius to heal back most of her HP, then I think she can manage, but I'm not convinced she can actually do that. The refine is clearly trying to get players to run Vantage, though I think Lull */Def is probably fine. Personally, I'd go with Lull Spd/Def instead of Lull Atk/Def due to the fact that his weapon's additional damage is based on the opponent's Atk, but the difference is pretty negligible. At most, Lull Atk/Def will cost you 1 point of additional damage (unless the opponent has Bonus Doubler or something similar). That said, as long as the opponent can't nullify their penalties, the best B skill is Seal Def 4. (If the opponent can nullify their penalties, then it's still Lull.) In the A slot, he can run anything that boosts Atk. Any Atk Catch is probably going to be the optimal option (outside of Vantage builds), though Death Blow 4 is fine if that's what you have available. If you're running Vantage in the B slot, he probably wants to run a Push skill instead so that he can safely rack up damage, though unless they release Vantage 4 with a more lenient HP threshold, he needs 3 rounds of combat to take enough damage if he is +1 merge or higher.

I don't recommend Far Trace on Legendary Leaf. Galeforce activating will prevent Canto from activating at the same time, meaning Canto will end up activating on the second round of combat. However, the self-inflicted Gravity will cause Canto (Rem.) to be mostly worthless because it will count his movement range as 1 instead of the usual 3.

Refines are out: Altina: Ragnell-Alondite Harmonized Altina: Ragnell-Alondite Base effect is unchanged: Meister effect, -5 Spd Distant Counter Refine effect is: With Stance condition or if opponent's HP is 75% or higher at start of combat: +5 Atk/Res in combat +1 Special charge rate Nullifies opponent's bonuses to Atk/Def For reference, Ashera's Chosen+ is: Iote's Shield If there is no non-dragon, non-beast unit within 1 space of unit (unchanged) or if opponent's HP is 75% or higher at start of combat (new): +9 Atk/Def/Res (previously +6 Atk/Def) If Res is greater than opponent's Res (new): Additional damage in combat equal to 70% of difference in Res, maximum 7 (new) Dragon Wall 3 (new) Rather tame, but this is a Distant Counter Meister weapon, after all. The Special charge rate boost allows her to activate Twin Blades more consistently, though it can be countered by both Tempo and Guard, which is unfortunate. It would have been better to give her the Slaying effect and the offensive half of Tempo. Most of what Altina got ended up being with her A skill, which is not surprising. This leaves Duo Altina in a pretty underwhelming position since she was already a relatively weak unit, though at the very least she has access to infantry inheritable skills, which somewhat makes up for it. I honestly don't expect her to get a second refine, given that refined Ragnell-Alondite is already on par with both Distant Counter weapons and Meister weapons without taking penalties for being both at the same time. She's also capable of using the newly released Time's Pulse 4 to get around opponents running Tempo or Guard, unlike regular Altina. Sirius: Sable Lance Base effect is updated: Slaying effect With a Blow-or-Solo condition (previously only Solo condition): +4 to all stats in combat Null Follow-Up 3 (new) Refine effect is: If HP is 25% or higher at start of combat: +4 to all stats in combat +2 to all stats in combat for each space the attacking unit moved, maximum +6 30% damage reduction on opponent's first attack Gets both halves of Null Follow-Up, damage reduction on the opponent's first attack, and Cynthia's variant of Clash for all stats, though only to a maximum of 6 instead of 8. Sirius is basically just a giant pile of stats, getting +8 to all stats with trivial conditions and a maximum of +14 to all stats, though his Res is still underwhelming even with the boost. Both halves of Null Follow-Up and damage reduction on the opponent's first attack allows him to be run on both phases, and opens up his B slot to run something other than Flow without the opportunity cost. Good, but nothing groundbreaking. Death Knight: Scythe of Sariel Base effect is updated: Slaying effect If the opponent has a Bonus (previously only stat bonuses or +1 Movement) or opponent's HP is 75% or higher at start of combat (new): +4 to all stats in combat Follow-up prevention Refine effect is: If HP is 25% or higher at start of combat: +4 to all stats in combat Guaranteed follow-up Slaying effect, Omnibreaker, and +8 to all stats. The guaranteed follow-up was all he really needed, and he got it. Winter Sothis: Snow's Grace Base effect is updated: Nullifies effective damage against dragons Permanent +3 Spd Dragonstone common effect If HP is 25% or higher at start of combat (previously 50%): +5 to all stats in combat Nullifies penalties to all stats (new) Refine effect is: With a Stance condition or if opponent's HP is 75% or higher: +4 to all stats The defensive half of Null Follow-Up 30% damage reduction on opponent's first attack I'm not sure how I feel about this refine. I'll add my response to it in a separate post. Legendary Leaf: Meisterbogen Base effect is unchanged: Bow common effect Meister effect, -5 Spd If unit is under player control and with a Blow condition: Follow-up prevention Refine effect is: With a Blow-or-Unity condition: +4 to all stats Additional damage equal to 10% of opponent's Atk (includes AoE Specials) The offensive half of Tempo For reference, Noba's Zeal II is: 3 cooldown Quickened Pulse (new) Galeforce After activation: Inflicts Gravity on unit and Pair Up partner Leaf indeed gets a Unity condition on his refine effect to pair with getting Joint Drive Atk from his remix. It looks like they really want him to be a dual-phase unit, especially since adding Quickened Pulse to Noba's Zeal frees up his B skill for Vantage. Tempo guarantees that he'll activate Noba's Zeal as long as the opponent doesn't die in one hit. The extra damage is pretty nice, as it comes out to around 7-8 damage against most opponents. Claude: Cunning Bow Base effect is updated: Permanent +3 Spd Bow common effect If unit has a Bonus or opponent has a Penalty (previously required sum of unit's bonuses and opponent's penalties to be 10 or higher): -5 to all opponent's stats in combat With a Blow condition (new): Reduces damage of opponent's first attack by [sum of unit's bonuses and opponent's penalties] × 3%, maximum 60% (new) If sum of unit's bonuses and opponent's penalties is 10 or higher: The offensive half of Null Follow-Up (new) Refine effect is: If there is at least 1 enemy within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on unit at start of turn: -7 Def to all enemies within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on unit as a Penalty +6 Atk to self as a Bonus If HP is 25% or higher at start of combat: +5 Atk/Spd in combat Bonus Doubler on Atk Penalty Doubler on opponent's Def Claude finds himself with Fallen-Star-at-home. As long as the opponent doesn't nullify his bonuses or their own penalties, he can fully activate all of his weapon's effects except for Fallen-Star-at-home, which requires an additional 7 points of bonuses or penalties to reach its maximum value. More specifically, with just the effects from his weapon, he gets +36/13/5/5, the offensive half of Null Follow-Up, and 39% damage reduction on the opponent's first attack. Due to his combination of stat bonuses and penalties, if he runs a Menace skill, the one he wants ends up being Arthur's Spd/Res Menace to maximize the number of stats he gets as bonuses and inflicts as penalties.