LordFrigid

Whoops...didn't mean to come off as being anti-M!Corrin, I was trying to go for "it's not easy to carve a niche for him", my bad. I do see what you mean about the balanced stats. Re. Moonbow...I don't think he needs it. Unless you really care that much about his ability to beat Hinata (and even then...just charge up Dragon Fang a little first?). Flicking through the matchups, only Stahl, Alfonse, Chrom, and Seliph are added to that 2-RKO list from not running Moonbow. Everyone else is ORKO anyway. I wouldn't say that's worthy of using it, especially given SP requirements (and also, if I were to put Swordbreaker on a Sword Lord, it'd probably be one of the slower ones. Which is...all of those 4).

Just had the opportunity to do a pilot run for Team Dragon and...it's really, really fun. As @Ice Dragon mentioned, lots of Triangle Adept is the way to go, though I'm running less Lightning Breath and tossed Ninian into the mix. Team is: +Atk/-Res F!Corrin with Dark Breath+, Triangle Adept 1 (working on it), Swordbreaker 3, Hone Atk 3, Swap, and Draconic Aura +Def/-Atk Fae with Light Breath+, Triangle Adept 2 (I ran out of Roys to offer as tribute), Renewal 3, Threaten Atk 1, Draw Back, and Chilling Wind +Atk/-Spd Tiki (Naga's Voice) with Lightning Breath+, Triangle Adept 3, Quick Riposte 2, Hone Spd 1, Reciprocal Aid, and Bonfire +Res/-Spd Ninian with Light Breath+, [nothing in the A slot], Wings of Mercy 3, Fortify Def 2, Dance (duh), [no proc] I'm kinda regretting my decision to go with Wings of Mercy 3 over Fortify Dragons now. tbh I figured "eh, I'm not going to be able to run a Dragon team anytime soon, riiiight?". Above everything else...I think I'm really enjoying the fact that I can give increased use to F!Corrin, at least for the rest of this season and next. She was my first 5* promotion, but team comp reasons have forced me to leave her off of the "scoring" arena team. tbh...she's still not on it, because as fun as the team is, it's not hitting high 4500 - low 4600 anytime soon, but oh well. As far as actual strategy...it's pretty straightforward. Drop Tiki in front of Takumi, Axes (0 damage from Hector...come at me), and swords not named Falchion for auto-win + full Bonfire charge. Steal someone's HP afterward (preferably Ninian or Fae, the former for obvious reasons and the latter because she has Renewal, so she really doesn't care). Drop Corrin in front of Falchions and lances, if Fae's not around. Have Ninian dance like there's no tomorrow...let's see...what else... Hope there aren't too many mages. Yeah I think that's about it.

It depends on what you're running next to him. tbh, looking at M!Corrin...I just see a sword, as opposed to something that screams "niche". Maybe I'm missing something, but inherent Darting Blow 2 just doesn't seem as comparatively useful as some of the other swords. In any case...that set seems pretty good for what it looks like you're trying to do (turn him into a Sword counter), though you're in trouble when going against other Swordbreaker Sword Lords, and even more so if they're running Fury, or have a Spd boon. But as long as you have a blue unit to cover them that shouldn't be a big deal. In fact...considering full neutral sword units with no inheritance, the matchups actually look pretty promising. Life and Death 2 seems fine, I didn't really see any significant changes when switching it to Death Blow, and changing it to Darting Blow actually worsened the matchups so...yeah, good call =P (also with Swordbreaker Darting Blow is kinda moot against Swords). He doesn't pick up any losing matchups against Axes from running Life and Death either, so it should work out. On his Assist, it depends heavily on what the team needs. With M!Corrin you're probably not running Eirika so a Rally is a good pick to get some buff power, but at the same time I've had many a match where I really wanted just one more positioning option. It's really something where you have to consider whether or not your team can hit the necessary Atk/Spd benchmarks on their own. Edit: How often are people actually seeing Swordbreaker Sword units? Admittedly I've only been keeping track of enemy inherited skills for a few days, but I don't see it that often. It's usually Renewal, Vantage, or Desperation.

I'd prefer Quick Riposte tbh (she becomes red, magical, pseudo-Hector). Assuming whatever attacks her doubles (not many enemies will fail to do this), she'll have Bonfire up. One option I was thinking about was to have her use Reciprocal Aid to take Jakob's HP (giving her a 7 health heal from Breath of Life first if possible). He doesn't mind much as long as he doesn't have to fight a 2-range enemy any time in the near future, and in the long-term he'll just get it all back from Renewal. That would cause Quick Riposte to come back up, but would mess up Vantage. I'd also think about putting Wings of Mercy somewhere on the team, since Tiki's set is based on having her bait someone that will probably bring her HP under half.

You could tie him to Quick Riposte + Reciprocal Aid Adult Tiki and use him as her debuff support. He'd be fine with Renewal, and you could also throw him Breath of Life (that's kinda rare though) to help keep those two active longer. The basic idea behind that is to debuff someone and have any-range-counter Tiki either a) walk up and one-shot it or b) wait for them to come to her on the enemy phase and drop them with Quick Riposte. Come to think of it...that set basically makes him Felicia with less Spd and a Def stat...hm. Alternatively, you could give him Seal Atk or Poison Strike for his B slot and make him even more of a debuff monster. Run Julia (moar Breath of Life!) and Sharena to round out the team. The only thing I'd be worried about then would be his Spd, which limits his ability to deal with ranged enemies. Since you'd be using him mostly as an offensive debuffer, you could run Darting Blow & Hone Spd on Tiki, which would bring him up to 38 on offense. He won't be able to escape being doubled by very fast mages (think +Spd Nino with a Spd buff..or neutral Spd with Fury/Spd buff), but that's what the rest of the team is for. I like the heal proc idea above, I think it'd have to be Sol though, because he doesn't really deal enough damage for Noontime to do much.

lol. Yeah, I didn't notice the thing about Fire Breath+ at first. Good catch. Edit: Cherche (after transformation into pseudo-Narcian), Ninian, Tiki, Subaki should work.

It's not so much Hone Attack as her survivability. I was being stuck in my ways and, since F!Corrin with avg Atk is literally 4 damage short of ORKO-ing the Sword Cav, to mimic what I suggested she'd have to instead retreat and have Olivia eat a hit. If you've got a way that uses Ninian I'd definitely try that because imo she's more worth the training effort. I was kinda thinking about Subaki replacing Corrin afterward, it should be ok, just keep in mind that after the Lance Flier hits him he won't have enough HP to meet the Quick Riposte requirement on the Sword Cav. I kinda liked that sacrifice Arthur to turn Cherche into pseudo-Narcian idea from your unit listings post. With Lancebreaker she'll double the flier, and with the Emerald Axe she only needs 26 Def to take 0 damage, and 33 Atk (including weapon) to ORKO...she meets both thresholds. Tiki (Fire Breath+) still handles Narcian Michalis (edit: I promise I remember the name of the boss), and any combination of Ninian, Subaki, and Tiki should be able to handle the swords (just keep Cherche faaar away), and then just have Cherche laugh off the Lance Fighter at the end. Edit: Wait...I have all of those units. I can try to demo it if you want. I'd be using Narcian though, because it honestly doesn't matter, since they (he & Cherche) both meet similar thresholds.

@Kaden No problem. I ran some numbers afterward to try and account for the different boons & banes...and I think it's still doable with that team, but subbing your units for mine. You'd have to train Olivia though. I'll look over things again and see if there's another way to do it.

Do you have an extra Subaki and Donnel/Matthew/Setsuna lying around? If you can give Tiki Quick Riposte 1 (Subaki) and Reciprocal Aid (the other three), which are pretty good on her anyway, you should be able to handle the map with F!Corrin, Tiki, Olivia, and Frederick. I compromised changed around the skill set on my F!Corrin to put together something of a demo (I think 4* Corrin can do the job, I'll have to look at the numbers). If you don't have spares of those units to sacrifice to Tiki...honestly I'd say just keep the ones you have and look for another solution. Edit: Ugh...4* neutral Atk F!Corrin is 4 damage short of KO'ing the Sword Cav...a 4* Olivia can eat 1 hit from the Sword Cav & KO on the counterattack, but that messes up the HP swap at the end...going to run numbers on that now. Edit 2: 4* neutral Def F!Corrin takes 13 dmg from the Lance Fighter with Frederick's buff on her, and she should have 15 HP after her Lance Flier+Sword Cav experience. Neither doubles, so the Draconic Auras won't charge up from the first engagement. Before the 2nd, have Tiki swap HP with her and she should either kill or bring him low on the next engagement (his hit will fully charge both Draconic Auras, but he doesn't get another attack to use his). Frederick can clean up afterward. So...I think it's possible. You'd need to train Olivia for this particular strategy though. Just double-checked, unfortunately neutral Atk Tiki needs an Atk buff to ORKO Michalis (literally 1 effective Atk short), so Ninian is out...which is a pity, because she'd definitely be the better choice for what you'd be using her for...

Are there any suggestions for the C slot on a +Atk/-Spd Adult Tiki? I've stuck with her default Defiant Atk in the A slot (I mean...she's going to be under 50% after anything hits her. Except Axes), given her Quick Riposte (Red, magical pseudo-Hector, aw yeah), and Reciprocal Aid for her Assist...and I'm now stuck wondering what else she (and her team) would benefit from. I'm thinking probably some flavor of Threaten or Hone...not sure though. ~ Whoa. That's...basically what I run O.o . I have Sharena swapped out for Azura though, because Song power is pretty strong when paired with Nino. Here are the sets I've got: Nino +Atk/-Res: Gronnblade+/Draw Back/[no proc]/Darting Blow (going to change it to Death Blow eventually)/Vantage/Savage Blow Eirika +Atk/-HP: Sieglinde/Pivot/[no proc...yet]/Fury/Renewal/Hone Spd F!Corrin +Atk/-Res: Dark Breath+/Rally Defense/Draconic Aura/Speed +3/Swordbreaker/Hone Atk Azura +Spd/-Res: Sapphire Lance+/Sing (duh)/Moonbow (or...it will be. Eventually)/Speed +3/Wings of Mercy/Fortify Res Unit-by-unit breakdown Corrin Eirika Nino Not going to discuss Azura because you're running Sharena. I agree with the Moonbow choice (that's what I gave mine), and for the B slot...I'd recommend either Swordbreaker, Wings of Mercy, or Escape Route. Warping Lances are pretty nice to have around, especially with Nino on the team, who doesn't really like reds (especially the mage variety).

@Birdy I personally just gave her Wings of Mercy and left her with her default Speed +3/Fortify Res. I'd definitely keep Fortify if you're running Drag Back over a Rally on Eirika, since you're running two -blade tome users. That buff comes in handy sometimes. She can do it if she has Desperation active when initiating against a neutral Def/Spd Catria. An Atk/Spd buff would fix the boon/bane issue, as long as Catria's not buffed. I'd be more worried about M!Robin tbh, because a lot of people stick Triangle Adept on him. As far as general effectiveness of +Spd/-Res Brave Sword/Desperation Hana...I would imagine the matchups are pretty similar to +Atk/-Res Brave Sword/Desperation Caeda (with Hone Fliers buff assumed because...she's really not going to be doing much without that unfortunately), which I've been looking at recently. They're mostly winning, with limited (but extant) ability to go against the Triangle. Maybe more in the "attacking first" than the "attacking second" category, since Hana's defenses aren't as good as Caeda's. It's probably viable. Ardent Sacrifice I think is more situational. It might be better to just get into Desperation range through combat (Hana survives a surprising amount of opponents, from what I saw on my brief look-through of the matchups...you'd need a Def buff for some of the +Atk/Fury enemies though), and then have a Dancer/Singer with Wings of Mercy so she can just dive-bomb the enemy and get out afterward. I'll definitely agree that Swordbreaker ruins it, but Hana's not alone on the team, just send a Lance at Sword+Swordbreaker units. I think the key is not trying to force stuff like this ("this" being high-risk, high-reward builds). If it works...great! Kick back and chuckle to yourself as Hana wrecks the enemy team. If not, as long as you haven't built your team with her as the centerpiece you should be fine. She'll still fill the green-killing role, and I'd say it's better to have the Brave/Desperation option than to not have it.

I don't think -Spd even matters for this battle. Sword Cav has 34 effective Atk against the Sapphire Lance, and the Sword Flier turns out even worse. +Def Subaki has 34 Def at 3* Lv. 40. As far as doubling, I'm all but certain that you can win the battle without having Subaki initiate combat even once. He has Quick Riposte, and doesn't take damage from the two people he should be fighting. He should be fine.

That 3* clear though. I was imagining slightly different positioning, but good to know that neutral Atk Sophia does hit that benchmark I was hoping for. Still going to train her & Subaki up to have the satisfaction of doing it myself.

Totally random question here...does anyone happen to know what Lv. 40 3* Sophia's Atk is (at neutral)?

Demolished with Eirika, F!Corrin (w/ Swap), Nino, Azura. Basically had Nino jump the Lance Flier and used Swap to get Azura in range of Nino (to get him out of Michalis and the Sword Cav's range). Sword Cav died to her on the EP, Nino nuked Michalis and it was basically cleanup from there. Going to train up a Subaki and Sophia. I think Narcian/Olivia/Sophia/Subaki can do this one, I just wanted to cruise through it due the time limit =P .

If you have a Brave Sword user lying around, she has so much speed that she doesn't even care about the -5 drop. I was personally thinking about something like... that. I know that Hinoka, Cordelia, & Camilla aren't necessarily the most common pulls, but it's still a pretty scary set imo.

Finally polished off that all-armor clear of 7-5 Lunatic. Now I have to seriously evaluate whether or not I actually want to try to do the all-armor 10th stratum quest...at least 7-5 didn't have any secret Hammer/Armorslayer/Heavy Spear users...

No problem, and sorry I couldn't bring better news D: .

R.I.P. the dream. While I'm on the subject, might as well say that they also can't get Life and Death, any of the "Blow"s, Poison Strike (looks like you figured out that one), or any of the "Seal"s (which is unfortunate, because double-debuff would be fabulous).

Welp...pulled a 5* Cain. I kiiinda want to pull a neutral/+Spd Caeda now. I'm thinking something like... Caeda: Brave Sword+, Darting Blow, Desperation, Fortify Fliers (or Savage Blow for all the SP-expensiveness), [Pick any Assist], Iceberg. Duct tape her to Hinoka and Palla (maybe tack Goad Fliers on Cordelia instead so I have someone that can actually kill Takumi). Watch 43 Atk, 48/51 Spd, and virtually guaranteed Iceberg proc every combat rip through everything. Then tack on Wings of Mercy/Draw Back [someone...probably Camilla] to get her out after shredding whatever poor soul happened to be in her way. Healers can't get Fury (going in game now to make sure it wasn't just an Elise thing, but I doubt it). Edit: Nope, no Fury for healers.

She might not have the greatest base skill set, but you could probably carve her a niche with a bit of Skill Inheritance magic. For example, give her Swordbreaker and she'll slaughter most sword lords regardless of their boon/bane (there are exceptions, Eirika, Lyn, +Res Marth to name a few). She won't even die to a counterattack (read: Raijinto. Or that one person I went up against that actually had Lv 40 +10 Distant Counter Chrom). Alternatively, she could probably make use of Quick Riposte and use it to bait out ranged threats like Takumi and Julia (ORKO's +Res Takumi, will need an Atk buff for +Res Julia, but still an ORKO). Edit: she'd need a def buff for +Atk Takumi. And after that's all said and done, you've got Dragon Fang fully charged. Defiant (probably Atk) + Threaten (probably Res) would make her pretty good bait, with her high defenses. There's probably more, but long story short...if you really were dead set on making her useful, I'm willing to bet you could do it.

Haven't seen any in the arena, but I was bringing one up for the Training Tower quest (Gunter/Jagen/Cecilia/Ursula, where Cecilia has Gronnblade & Ursula has Blárblade) and Cecilia was absolutely destroying the 10th Stratum (the lowest number I saw with full +6 buffs was a 26 against a Caeda. Most of the damage numbers were 40s-60s). Ursula was too, sorta, but not as effectively. As to why they're not too prominent on defensive Arena teams, in addition to everything that's already been said, there's also availability factors. It's pretty difficult to get a -blade+ tome (especially Blárblade, as Odin has never been available as a natural 5*) in the first place, much less pass it to someone and then have them gather the SP to pick it up. Then there's also that only 3 tome cavs are natural 5*s (and 2 of them would be using Blárblade). That sort of expands on the rating thing in that a full team of cavs would probably not have a very high rating. Also, the natural Gronnblade & Rauðrblade users are pretty good (Odin's good in his own way, I guess, but I'd pick Nino or Tharja over him any day). It'd be pretty hard to justify taking those tomes off of them, imo.

@Tragonight Oh, didn't realize this was to try and optimize defense. Hm...you wouldn't need Draw Back on Tharja in that case. I'm not sure if you'd even want it, because she'd probably be drawing back Effie or Lucius. Since Hector would probably be Pivoting around Effie most of the time, if Tharja used Draw Back on Effie afterward Hector would basically be sitting out awkwardly all alone. Also worth noting that Effie's probably not going to get the Goad Armor effect at all, since with Hector on the front line he's dying first. tbh for a defense strat I'd try to order it in such a way that Tharja gets stuck behind Hector. That way, Tharja can run cleanup after the enemy kills Hector. You might also want to grab that Nino, I can't imagine many people having trouble with AI Lucius. Dancers/Singers mess with people too, but I'm not sure about the pros/cons of running a lower level one in the current rating-based matchup system (which is going to end up changing anyway).

Aw nuts, I tried to swap the points around for better coherence. Guess I was too late. Anyways... I don't think the AI does it like that. In fact, it would almost certainly elect to Swap Tharja to the front line, which is basically the opposite of what you want. On the other hand, it's really easy to deal with AI Hectors and Effies as long as you have the tools so...idk. I'd personally only concern myself with the player-controlled aspects of your skill lineup. However, if it's a sticking point for you, you'll probably want Draw Back. I hate it when a strong mage (or two-range in general) gets stuck behind a one-range enemy myself, and Draw Back should ensure Tharja's always behind something (unless the AI decides to do something nutty like drag the armor from the front...I've never seen that though so I'm not sure if that even happens). I suppose a low movement team focused on armors wouldn't get split up much...but you never know. It all kind of depends on the situation, really. Unless you plan on keeping him in a spot where he'll get hit, you won't get much out of Live to Serve anyway, so I'd say it's nice to have the option. I'm not really in a position to advise on the positioning, admittedly. I don't really have experience running a team like that, sorry =( .

As awesome as Nino is, Lucius might be the better pick here, given that you have two units who have skills that depend on how high their HP is. Since that team has no natural buffs, I'm guessing that it relies pretty heavily on the armors to carry the match (as opposed to -blade tome nuking). Unfortunately switching in Nino for Tharja would mess up the color balance, which is unfortunate since it would let you put a more potent 1-range heal on Lucius, then just use Nino's Draw Back to get him out of range. Along those lines, I'd recommend something like: Positioning skill for Tharja. You could go Lucius Heal → Tharja Swap, or you could run Reposition/Draw Back instead. On one hand, Swap is always usable, whereas Reposition & Draw Back require an open space behind the user. On the other hand, Swap puts you on the line of fire, and blocks Lucius from healing on the next turn. idk about Tharja's B. Desperation wouldn't be bad if you can get her to survive a hit. I'm personally running a Nino with Vantage, but the team is built around her, so she actually does one-shot the two-rangers that I can leave her in the range of without having her die horribly. Spur Res should be fine for Tharja, especially if you go the Swap route (she'll end up next to whatever armor Lucius healed afterward). Stronger 1-range heal for Lucius, unless Physic is enough to get your armors to make the HP thresholds? Maybe also look into Wrys' skills. There are some cooldown issues there, but it's worth checking out. For Lucius' A...you'd have to look at thresholds. Whatever boosts his survivability the most. Lucius' B should be Live to Serve or Wings of Mercy imo. Wings of Mercy is probably more relevant for the team you're running. Hone Atk for Lucius, Hone Spd or Fortify Def/Res for Effie. This will let you take advantage of Tharja's -blade tome. You should totally give Effie a Brave Lance