Ice Dragon

And other nukes will do the exact same thing, which defeats the purpose. Sure, older units will have more Dragonflower levels to use to boost stats, but the diminishing returns means that unless they already started only slightly behind, they're never actually going to catch up.

Now that I'm back home, it's time to do an analysis because I can. Resplendent Odin with maximum Dragonflowers, +6 to all stats, and only his refined weapon equipped has 50/73/45/38+/38+. Kliff with maximum Dragonflowers, +6 to Atk/Spd (I'm giving Odin 2 more stats because he has Atk/Spd Link on his weapon), and only his refined weapon equipped has 42-/64/57-/42-/42+ plus additional damage equal to 15% of the opponent's Atk, which comes out to at least 10 damage against most units (67 Atk or higher). So a +10 Resplendent Odin is losing in Spd to a +0 Kliff and only barely scrapes by with higher Atk despite the fact that he has Litrblade on his weapon, and only if he doesn't have his Bonuses nullified. And even if all you're going for is a Blarblade user, Miriel has 10 more Atk and 3 more Spd than Resplendent Odin. In that case, let's also move Fallen Edelgard's Dragonflower boosts from HP and Spd to Atk, Def, and Res. Or all of Ophelia's Dragonflower and Resplendent boosts to Atk (that's 35 points, by the way) because, like Reinhardt, she absolutely doesn't need any of her other stats. There's no fair way to distribute these stats. A custom distribution will always be at the whims of the developers as to who to favor and by how much. An even distribution will always favor units that are already good. An uneven distribution calculated based on a unit's stats can have unintended consequences that also favor certain units over others (for example, fast armors have flatter stat distributions than other fast units by virtue of just having more stats, but they favor Spd boosts over all other stats just as much as any other fast unit does). I would prefer that the Dragonflower and Resplendent boosts remain as they are and instead have refines do a second pass over older units, since that's an already existing mechanic that grants favor entirely at the whims of the developers.

The next Resplendent Hero is Hel Odin: His art is amazing, well above average even for Resplendent Heroes. It's a shame his stats are so awful. I'm visiting family for Thanksgiving right now and have no motivation to type out a long post on mobile, so no analysis. But then it's not like Odin actually needs an analysis of how awful he is, even with the stat boost.

I mean, it's a 6% focus banner, so at the very least, the chances of pulling the focus character you want isn't any lower than a normal banner. The only functional differences are that your pity breakers are locked to only a single unit and that the pity breaker fully resets your pity rate, which, statistically speaking, is not significant enough to actually matter. At least it's not like the Legendary/Mythic Heroes banners, which actually have a lower chance per focus unit. It would be nice if they'd boost the focus rate on those to 9% to be in line with other banners and so I can spend less money on them I feel like they probably could have gotten away with Letizia. Or even Charlotte. That said, Astrid isn't actually bad as a unit. Her weapon is quite good. The problem is that, in order to make her not just a copy of Annette, they gave her Rally and Ruse skills that were off-meta in terms of stats (because Annette happens to have both of the versions with on-meta skills). At the very least, they could have given her Rally Atk/Spd+ with Spd/Def Ruse instead to not be an exact copy of Annette while still being on-meta. (They also missed their chance to make her even more attractive with the "Assist Galeforce" that they put on Sain's weapon.)

You did.

Yeah, there are a ton. Here's the entire back catalog (I left the Veronica comic in just to show where it was in between the other missed comics): So, we have: Nina shipping Kiran's gun and Alfonse's sword. If the Byleths hired Sain, they'd only have half as many lost items to deal with. Katsura drawing cute characters. Reyson not having an alt. "Magic". Veronica's comic in the middle of everything showing just how many didn't get posted here. Ash being cute. (Also Yune being cute.) Ash being cute. Katsura drawing cute characters. Katsura drawing floof. Floof! A game mechanic I forget exists. But at least it's not Pair Up, which literally no one remembers. Plumeria being absolutely done with this world.

40 pulls on the remix banner: 2 Eliwood (+1 spark) 1 Ike 7.5% focus rate is above average by about half a pull, but since I got 2 copies of Eliwood, this is a huge success. Eliwood is now +8. 43 pulls on the Ganglot banner: 1 Ganglot (+1 spark) 1 pity breaker Ymir 2.3% focus rate is below average by less than half a pull. 4.7% total 5-star rate is below average by less than a pull. Below average, but not awful. Ganglot is +Res. 47 pulls on the Double Special Heroes banner: 3 Micaiah (+1 spark) 3 5-star Henry 6 4-star Henry 12.8% focus rate is almost double the average, so above average by about 3 pulls. Micaiah is now +6. Henry is now exactly +10, or would be if I actually merged all the copies. Overall a pretty good day of pulls. Meanwhile, in the land of colorless under the moon, we have this gem of a summon session:

Atlas does this because he gets the trainee bonus due to being a Villager, which essentially guarantees that he'll end up being the best slow axe infantry (despite not actually being slow) since no one else will have a higher stat total to distribute across their stats. There has actually been no stat creep as far as stat totals go ever since CYL 3 (mid-August 2019), as long as you take Dragonflowers into account. All stat creep since then has only been in stat distributions, the fact that you need to spend Dragonflowers to let older units catch up, and the fact that new weapons grant more stats. The problem with Ross is that even though he got the trainee bonus, at the time, they gave instant demotes stat totals from the previous generation, which counteracted his trainee bonus. As a result, he ends up with the same stat total as all other post-CYL-3 melee infantry (190-193 with max Dragonflowers) instead of having a boosted stat total, and ends up with a mediocre stat spread that allocated too many points into HP and Res. If he weren't an instant demote, he would likely be in a more similar position as Atlas. Ross is expected to get a refine early next year (he's 4th in line, but they don't always go in order), and the current trend is that 4-star units tend to get a lot of stats in exchange for fewer non-stat skill effects. Python, as the most recent example, gets +29/22 offenses if the opponent has +6 buffs to all stats, though despite the massive stat boost, his viability suffers due to having mediocre defensive stats and no defensive skill effects on his weapon whatsoever. Ross is at least unlikely to get a glass cannon weapon, so his refine should at least be more viable. I mean, the problem with Arcane Downfall isn't the fact that axe units are bad, it's the fact that Arcane Downfall doesn't grant a guaranteed follow-up, which makes it less splashable than Arcane Eljudnir and Arcane Grima. The idea is that you're supposed to also have a slow unit inherit Quick Riposte 4 at the same time as Arcane Downfall, but that doesn't fix the problem that slow units still have no player-phase presence when doing so and still have to give up their B slot just to have a guaranteed follow-up. In the end, it's due to Arcane Downfall's own shortcomings that there's no reason to actually give it to any unit that isn't already fast (aside from favoritism).

I have no idea what color I want to pull for on this Double Special Heroes banner. On red, I already have a +10 Edelgard, and the only skill she has that is worth anything to me is Assault Troop, which is not terribly useful, as the only units I can really see myself giving it to are Legendary Edelgard and Fallen Edelgard. Mia is +4, and I don't really think it's worth pulling for her here when she shares a color with Ike on her original banner, which makes it much more attractive to pull for her there instead. On blue, I already have a +10 Thorr, but she does have decent fodder since she has both Still Water and A/R Far Trace (though most units that want either skill already have it). Lilina is +5, and I do want more copies of her. On green, I already have a +10 Ilyana, and her skills are completely useless to me. Eirika is +0, and I don't particularly care that much about her as a unit since I already have a ton of offensive ranged fliers that don't have to worry about keeping themselves alive, unlike Eirika. On colorless, Micaiah is +2, and Henry is +1. I do want more merges for Micaiah. I don't care about merges for Henry, but at least the extra copies won't be sitting there being completely useless. I think I've talked myself out of pulling red or green, but I'm not sure if I'd rather pull for blue or colorless. I want more copies of Micaiah more than I want more copies of Lilina, but Thorr is a better pity breaker than Henry.

Probably a non-answer, but "as many as you can get". As always, you only need to win 8 out of 15 matches in Aether Raids offense each week before the game penalizes you on a loss, so as long as you can pull that off, you're good. For Far Save, I prefer either [+Atk, +Res] or [+Def, +Res]. A Res Asset is a must for Far Save. There are too many tome units that hit stupidly hard. The Def Asset is there mostly to deal with Ascended Eir right now, as unlike many other Far Save units, Idunn has no trouble with Duo Chrom and Volke. It's technically a safer pick and is more future-proof, but I'm not sure how much mileage you'll actually get with it in practice compared to an Atk Asset.

Spurn is fine with Vital Astra. It doesn't work with Godlike Reflexes because Godlike Reflexes activates on enemy attack (its extra damage is a passive effect).

Hm... um... huh, so yeah, that happened. 72 pulls from the Ninja banner: 8 Laegjarn 1 Camilla 2 pitybreakers: Brave Lysithea Flavia 12.5% focus rate is... just a bit above average. Mhm. 15.3% total 5-star rate is a thing. The pity breaker rate is actually pretty much average, though. Yeah, I'm not sure what happened. I pulled an omikuji in Genshin last night after my previous pulls and got "great luck" (and that lasts until the daily reset in 3 hours since I'm on the Japanese server). Maybe it's because of that? Combined with the previous pulls, that's 197 pulls: 10 Laegjarn (+1 spark) 1 Camilla 1 Cherche 2 4-star Heath 3 pity breakers 6.1% focus rate is less ridiculous, but is still nearly double the average. 7.6% total 5-star rate is only slightly above average and is pretty normal. Only one of my copies of Laegjarn was +Atk (I got so many +Spd, it wouldn't have been funny, but there were so many of them), but I only need one, so all is well. Camilla ended up [+HP, -Res], which is kind of crummy, but Cherche was [+Def, -Spd], which is pretty good. Heath was +Atk. Anyways, I'm quitting this banner while I'm still ahead, having already reached all of my goals. I do want more copies of Camilla, but that can wait until a rerun. Her Vantage effect was terrifying during the story maps, but there's no need to be greedy right now.

Sol for sustain. Bonfire for damage. If you have "Drive Breath" support, then Aether is, of course, fine. Yeah, Atk/Spd Ideal and Atk/Spd Oath are good. Spurn is less preferable to Velocity or Frenzy since it doesn't go with Galeforce, but it's fine if you don't have anything else since you can always switch over to a damaging Special later (even Aether works due to Arcane Downfall's boosted Special charge rate if you can't get a hold of Vital Astra or Ruptured Sky).

Yeah, the only reason why you're running Distant Pressure is because you're prioritizing Distant Counter over stats, and Distant Pressure gives Spd on both phases with little downside. If you're not going specifically for a Distant Counter build, there's no need to run any of the Distant Counter skills. Personally, I don't think it's really worth giving Shamir Distant Stance unless you literally have no other skill worth putting in the fourth inheritance slot. And yeah, Brave Ike can use all three of Distant Stance, Quick Riposte 4, and Joint Distant Guard. I don't think he actually needs Breath unless you need the stronger Special. I think it's more worth running either Null Follow-Up or Def/Res Hold in the Sacred Seal slot.

Godlike Reflexes is currently the best Special for fast dual-phase infantry with Arcane Downfall. Ideally, if you don't need Distant Counter, you want to run it with Atk/Spd Finish 4; otherwise, it should be run with Distant Pressure. Shield Pulse is optional since Godlike Reflexes can be charged by simply initiating combat for the first round of combat, though in game modes where you can't reliably initiate, you probably still want to run Shield Pulse. For Shamir with Galeforce, whether or not you run Distant Counter depends on how you play Galeforce units. If you're not expecting to take rounds of combat on enemy phase or you're only expecting to take combat on enemy phase from melee units, you're better off running Atk/Spd Ideal. If you are expecting to take rounds of combat during enemy phase from ranged units, then Distant Pressure is an option. The current best B skills for a Galeforce build with Arcane Downfall are Velocity and Spd/Def Tempo. Velocity gives a bit more bulk, whereas Spd/Def Tempo gives a bit more damage and Spd, and both make it harder for the opponent to block your Galeforce. Frenzy and Spd/Def Bulwark are both decent options, though. I wouldn't run Spurn unless you have no other choice since its secondary effect cannot activate with Galeforce. Atk/Spd Oath 4 is a good option for the C slot.

53 pulls on the Ascended Idunn rerun banner: 1 Idunn (+1 spark) 2 pitybreakers 1 Selena 1 Monica 1.9% focus rate is garbage. 5.7% 5-star rate is below average. But it doesn't really matter all that much with the small number of total pulls. I didn't realize until afterward that Idunn was already +8 before this banner, so this brings her up to +10 and is now my first +10 Ascended Hero that isn't a Heroes-original character. This is my first +Spd copy of Selena. Yay. I previously did 40 pulls from the Ninja banner back when it first dropped that I didn't post here: 1 Laegjarn (+1 spark) 2 4-star Heath 1 pitybreaker Letizia 2.5% focus rate is below average by less than 1 pull. 5% 5-star rate is below average by less than 1 pull. I did another 85 pulls today: 1 Laegjarn 1 Cherche 0 pitybreakers 2.3% focus rate is below average by more than 1 pull. 2.3% 5-star rate is garbage. No more pulling for today. My luck is clearly trash.

If you're running Shamir with Distant Counter, she'd rather have Distant Pressure over Distant Stance. Distant Pressure is also preferable over Distant Dart because the stat boost is active on both phases, and the recoil damage can be mitigated by Arcane Downfall's passive healing. Galeforce is a bit crummy for Ganglot herself since she doesn't really have the Spd to double on player phase unless you're going up against units with middling or lower Spd. Usable, sure, but of questionable viability. Works fine on any fast unit that inherits Arcane Downfall, though. If you're patient, it might be worth waiting for a copy of Vital Astra. Even if you can't reliably get the damage reduction from it, its damage is more reliable than either of Moonbow or Ruptured Sky when used on fast units, and you'll still occasionally get the damage reduction as a bonus. If you're really patient, there's a decent likelihood that Flame Lyn will show up in A Hero Rises.

For added context, Ganglot has 41/39/36 defenses with maximum Dragonflowers, compared to Valentine Lucina, who has a similar 43/39/33. Except Lucina is a Spd tank and Ganglot is not. Lucina also gets 58% damage reduction on the opponent's first attack, compared to Ganglot's 25%, and has a much more reliable method of preventing follow-ups, having high Spd and Null Follow-Up compared to Ganglot's follow-up prevention effect. Ganglot's mediocrity is then underscored by the fact that Brave Tiki, who has the same color, has 41/38/42 defenses and pretty much all of the same skill effects and more. Finish grants the same 7 HP regeneration per attack as Arcane Downfall on top of more stats than Ganglot's A skill and Sacred Seal can grant combined. New Divinity grants the same follow-up prevention as Arcane Downfall and a superior (up to) 40% damage reduction on all attacks, compared to Quick Riposte 4's 25% on the first attack, on top of an additional flat +5 Atk/Def/Res (that counts towards the Dragon Wall effect). Remote Breath then covers the remaining effects of Arcane Downfall on top of also draining the opponent's Special charge at the start of combat. This could have all been fixed if they had given her an exclusive C skill. Joint Distant Guard is nice as a fodder skill, but I don't think it would've been missed if it weren't there, especially since Ganglot would still have had Arcane Downfall + Distant Counter + Distant Stance + Quick RIposte 4 as a set of 4 skills to inherit together. If you're going to run Ganglot in her likely intended Distant Counter tank role, +Res is probably better than neutral. I still have some time before my life gets swallowed up by Pokémon because I like having physical copies whenever possible, and my copy is still in the mail.

Added translation notes for Matthis's weapon and Embla's epithet and weapon now that they appear in the story maps.

Stats, I guess, since they haven't been posted yet: Superboons/banes: Ganglot: +Atk, +Def, -HP Tiki: +Spd, +Res Hardin: +Atk, -Spd Nyna: +Spd, +Res, -HP Elice: +Atk, -HP, -Def Matthis: +Res, -Atk Ganglot's stats are surprisingly mediocre and are exactly what she had as an enemy unit. She literally has only one good stat and depends on her weapon's follow-up prevention and Quick Riposte 4's percentage damage reduction for bulk because her defenses are otherwise mediocre. Tiki and Hardin are unsurprising with good stats overall. For staff units, Nyna has giant Spd, and Elice has giant Atk. Both are tied for third in their respective stat across all staff units in terms of base stats with maximum Dragonflowers. Nyna is pretty close behind Fluffy Hat Nanna as the best F2P staff unit... if that actually matters to you for whatever reason. Matthis is unsurprisingly underwhelming. He's literally just Vyland with a lance.

There is absolutely no reason that Aum needs to have the exact same effect that it has in the source game, given that literally no other weapon does. Granting Miracle as a Drive effect or as a start-of-turn effect is already sufficiently on-brand for the weapon, and such an effect is not unlikely since we already have Everliving Domain with the same effect.

The sheer bulk that Hardy Fighter + Aegis gives Idunn in combination with the follow-up prevention on her weapon is enough that I don't think Bonus nullification or Guard are entirely necessary. With Aegis, if you can offload the Breath effect to a support effect, I think it's still better to run Deflect Magic before getting Bonus nullification or Guard. Idunn takes twice as much damage with Sacred Cowl compared to Aegis when paired with Hardy Fighter, so I do think it's worth running some kind of Bonus nullification or Guard on that build, especially since you don't need the Breath effect anymore. In this case, I'd probably prioritize one of the two effects, then Deflect Magic, then the other of the two effects. (Note that this is based more on gut feeling from my experience with Ascended Fjorm rather than actual numbers, so take it with a healthy grain of salt.) If you're looking for a more offensive build, it might be possible to run Sacred Cowl with the Quick Riposte Sacred Seal, though I'm not entirely sure how effective that actually will be. Regardless, it doesn't actually change the skill choices for the "permanent" skill slots. You might also be able to get away with running Distant Ferocity over Distant Stance, though that's more expensive.

I'm not really convinced a Spd-based quad build on Luke is really worth it, even with that much Spd stacking. As far as quad builds go, I think it's more worth it to run his default Rowdy Sword with an effect that grants a guaranteed follow-up, like from the upcoming Hardin. You'll have to convince me that the extra 9 Spd from Ninja Katana is worth losing 8 Atk. For a Spd build, I'd rather go with Coral Saber, Rein Sword, or Arcane Eljudnir over Ninja Katana. Luke's Spd isn't great, so even if you're stacking Spd, I think a guaranteed follow-up is still potentially worth giving up a few points of Spd. I assume this is Ascended Idunn. If you're running Hardy Fighter + Aegis, you want Distant Stance + Steady Breath / Warding Breath. If you're running Hardy Fighter + Sacred Cowl, you probably want Distant Def 4 + Distant Counter (D). Bracing Stance 3 is a viable option if you can get Bonus nullification from a support effect, like Gerbera Axe. If you're running Crafty Fighter, you probably want Distant Def 4 + Distant Counter (D). Distant Stance + Def/Res Form is better if you have Bonus nullification from a support effect. If you're running Wily Fighter, you probably want Bracing Stance 3 + Distant Counter (D). Distant Stance + Def/Res Form is better if you have Guard from a support effect. All of the Def/Res skills can be replaced with their corresponding Atk/Res skills if you want something more offensive, though I'm not entirely sure I can recommend that right now since I've been noticing that Ascended Eir is kind of scary, and I don't know if she'll increase in popularity or how well Idunn takes hits from her.

That looks like a copy-paste typo where they pasted in the name of the next Tempest Trials instead of the next Forging Bonds. The name of the next Tempest Trials is "生と死の王女　結" (sei to shi no ōjo: ketsu), "Queens of Life and Death: Finale". The name of the next Forging Bonds is "無明の闇にさす光" (mumyō no yami ni sasu hikari), "The Light That Pierces the Darkness" or "The Light That Illuminates the Darkness". "さす" (sasu) appears to be intentionally ambiguous between "刺す" (sasu), "to pierce", and "差す" (sasu), "to shine", likely because it wants to have both meanings simultaneously. What I'm translating as "darkness" here is "無明の闇" (mumyō no yami), which literally translates as the redundant "darkness without light". "無明" (mumyō), literally "without light", "without clarity", or "without understanding", is also the term in Buddhism "avidya", meaning "ignorance", but I don't think that's the intended meaning here.