Ranking each game by class: Lords

[Samu_77]

3 minutes ago, Whisky said:

In regards to Roy’s survivability, I’m sorry but that’s kind of a skill issue. In most maps it’s really not hard at all to keep Roy safe. Just lead with your strongest units and have Roy trail along behind them. Dancers are usually very frail but are always considered very good. Keeping units alive isn’t hard to do. Roy is not a liability, he is an asset. He can help finish off an enemy that a stronger unit failed to kill even in the mid game when he’s at his weakest. In the early and late game he’s actually pretty decent.

I agree that it isn't hard to keep Roy safe, especially when you factor in his faster support building and potentially the usage of items like the Angelic Robe, but poor survivability by means of not taking hits is still always a point against you by limiting your position of where you can be on the battlefield.

[Whisky]

3 minutes ago, Samu_77 said:

I agree that it isn't hard to keep Roy safe, especially when you factor in his faster support building and potentially the usage of items like the Angelic Robe, but poor survivability by means of not taking hits is still always a point against you by limiting your position of where you can be on the battlefield.

That’s true, and you do need to be mindful of what you have him fight. Roy is not a particularly strong unit for most of the game, but a liability he is not, as some people like to call him. I don’t think Roy is a great unit but he does have some advantages that allow him to shine in some situations.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Whisky said:

In regards to Roy’s survivability, I’m sorry but that’s kind of a skill issue. In most maps it’s really not hard at all to keep Roy safe. Just lead with your strongest units and have Roy trail along behind them. Dancers are usually very frail but are always considered very good. Keeping units alive isn’t hard to do. Roy is not a liability, he is an asset. He can help finish off an enemy that a stronger unit failed to kill even in the mid game when he’s at his weakest. In the early and late game he’s actually pretty decent.

Indeed. Binding Blade is a fair and well designed game and if Roy ends up dying it's probably more the players fault. Nevertheless...people are mortal and you absolutely can accidentally put him in range of a powerful bolting sage. All in all it's obviously easier to keep Sigurd alive.

[ping]

FE1 - Mars is a 9/10 character, as far as my one playthrough lets me have an informed opinion about him. How much of that is his class depends on what you associate with the class instead of the character - the Rapier and Mercurius are helpful, for example, but his most important feat is his innate, reliable Provoke ability. If we assume that these are tied to Mars being Mars, not Mars being the Lord, the class itself is mid tier. Swordlock is a good thing overall, 7 Move is good, but the lack of a promotion would really hurt a hypothetical Lord that isn't Mars and doesn't attract all enemy attacks.

Gaiden - with the note that I'm only in Act 4 of my first full playthrough. Alm's class is quite good - 5 Move when other unpromoted (and some promoted) infantry classes only have 4, and a very substential promotion, granting him very solid base stats and access to bows (which also means 1-5 range, I believe). If you didn't train Python or an Archer!Villager, the Holy Bow seems like a really strong alternative to his personal sword.

Celica's class is probably a bit weaker overall, but still has its advantages. The biggest blow, in my opinion, is the complete lack of promotion bonuses, unless we count the pity price of +1 HP. But the ability to use both swords and magic is quite good, especially with Celica's strong spell list (although that one I would attach to Celica personally and not her class). Overall, I think that Gaiden's Lord *classes* are better than FE1's, even though the *characters* are worse than Mars.

BinBla - Roy bad, yadda yadda. I feel obliged to mention that I don't think that Roy is his own tier of terribleness, but (as OP mentions) you have to consider specific set-ups (Eliwood in Eli-mode; No-Lyn-Mode-Lyn) or tiering principles (not counting FE11!Marth receiving tribute from all the villages) to avoid putting him at the bottom of a character tier list.

I'd say that the class's late promotion is responsible for about 2 points on a 1-10 scale, or one letter in a S-F tier list. Roy wouldn't suddenly be top tier if he was able to promote with a Hero Crest, or before ch.13 - his bases are still weak and his growths middling in the most important stats; he'd still be a Swordmaster without the awesome crit bonus since the Binding Blade would still be a lategame thing. But he'd be better. Passable, even.

BlaBla - Hector is a good unit in a relatively bad class. Like Roy (assuming Hector Mode), he suffers from late promotion, and not gaining +1 Move upon promotion in addition to his being too fat to be rescued by many mounted character (and most promoted mounted characters) is a problem. I still hold him in pretty high regard because he's quite good in the earlygame, thanks to his bulk and personal axe, but he's in the same camp as Roy in that he's held back by his class.

Eliwood is a lower-mid unit in a relatively good class. Sure, swordlock sucks, but Eliwood can get out of that mess at an acceptable point of the game (assuming Hector Mode, again). An Eliwood with better base stats (like, +2 Str/Spd), making it more likely for him to one-round stuff, would be a pretty solid character, I think, despite the swordlock for what's still a significant portion of the game. 

Lyn combines the worse ratings of her co-lords, in my opinion: Lower-mid unit in a relatively bad class. Same swordlock as Eliwood's class, but with a much worse promotion. I find that Sword+Bow is still worse than having *only* axes or only lances, since 1-2 range is so good, with BlaBla's enemies being so wimpy. Rath sorta makes it work because he at least gets a horse (and really good aid, too), but Lyn doesn't get that. She really should've had a bow before promotion and/or a horse after, but alas.

SacSto - Once again a fairly late story-based promotion, but it's not as bad as Roy's or BlaBla's main lord's. Both twins also get a horse, which I gave Eliwood much credit for. Eirika's class is worse, of course, because swords bad, but overall, this is still easily the best showing of the Lord class in GBAFE, I think. 

PoR - Decently timed promotion, but swordlock without a horse might be worse in PoR than in any other game of the series. Ike is a decent unit, between good growths, a few earlygame maps with very few (if any) XP targets besides himself, and eventually Ragnell, but he'd be better in almost every class.

RD - Swordlock infantry isn't as much of a death sentence for a character's viability anymore, so Ike's class isn't as bad anymore. He has very good caps for the endgame, too (37 Spd, among other thing). I'd file it under "solid", maybe similarly to SacSto.

Miccy's class I'm not entirely sure about. It's probably a net positive? Micaiah's main issue is her frailty and lack of Spd, neither of which is really tied to the class. What kinda hold her back is that she promotes later than other DB characters that you're investing into, but even then - you have to commit pretty hard to get Micaiah to hit the level cap before the end of part 1. And on the plus side, Micaiah's staff utility is much appreciated in the tower, so her class is overall probably a boon for her..?

FE11 - Marth doesn't have great stats to begin with, but I think he's once again a Lord held back by his class. Swordlock, no stat bonuses through promotion, a Spd cap too low to avoid getting doubled by Medeus on the highest difficulty - yeah, not a good look for the class. Unless you count getting villages and chests (although I generally avoid doing the latter with Marth) as class features, I guess.

FE12 - Still not the greatest, but less severe than in the previous games, I think? Marth is better overall, and one factor is that swordlock isn't as punishing anymore, so that's one aspect of the class that's not as bad. I never finished this game on the highest difficulty, but I think a capped Marth also fares better against Medeus, no? So I'd say the class isn't as much of a millstone for him as it was in FE11, or as it is for Roy, Ike, or Hector.

TL;DR:
Good class(es) - Gaiden, SacSto, Eliwood, Radiant Dawn
Still OK - FE1, FE12
Detriment to the characters - BinBla, Hector and Lyn, PoR, FE11
 

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

On 10/22/2023 at 11:52 PM, Jotari said:

If asked what the most important piece on a chess board is an amateur will say it's a queen. Someone who thinks themselves a philosopher will say it's the pawns. But most seasoned chess players will unhesitatingly say it's the king. Because that's where victory and defeat truly lie.

...idk it's a genuine set of conversations I had that felt relevant.

The only people saying "Pawns", are the ones trying to get you to "google en passant".

But yeah, broadly agree that the King is the most important, even if the Queen is the most powerful.

On 10/23/2023 at 12:30 AM, Samu_77 said:

There's a difference between important and good, Roy is unquestionably the most important unit in the game but does that make him good when every boss except for like Yahn and Idunn are going to destroy him without effort, which is as necessary as everything else is to getting through the game as getting Roy to that seize point. Importance can't equal good because these are nuanced games to a certain extent every deployment is equally important because we are facing an army that on average outnumbers us like 1-3 or 1-5, so everything counts here. 

I agree that "important" and "good" aren't one-and-the-same, but they do go together to some extent, IMO. One word I thought of, that I think highlights the matter, is "centralizing". A game's best units are often its most centralizing, and vice-versa. Take Radiant Dawn, for example. Most chapters where you have Haar, he's the most important unit, because what you do with him dictates what everyone else can get away with. Likewise with Sothe, whenever he's around. This gets muddled a bit in Part IV, admittedly, but these units still spend a good part of the game being quite "centralizing".

Now, let's graft this onto some other titles. In Shadow Dragon, Marth is vital for clearing the chapter, as well as visiting any desires villages - and adds chest and convoy utility on top of it. Hence why I consider him the most "centralizing" unit. Situationally, you could argue that your Warper or Bosskill are more important than him - and I would say that Lena and Shiida are  better units than Marth - but even their work revolves around "get Marth to the right place, at the right time". Roy, meanwhile, fares worse than Marth in the combat department, and lacks his utility options. Due to all this, he's low on my ladder. Even so, the Seize-centric nature of the game is a centralizing factor upon him. Hence why he goes above the FE7 Lords (IMO) - he's not much worse than them at fighting, but he is much more important than them in his own game experience.

[Dark Holy Elf]

On 10/22/2023 at 7:07 PM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

I find myself half-agreeing, half-disagreeing. I follow your logic, but it leads me to the opposite conclusion. Picture this: every map is "Defeat Boss", but Roy is still a forced deploy. Even if Dieck, or Fir, or Ogier would be better, you're stuck fielding... Roy. In my opinion, that'd be an even worse scenario for him. You're forced to bring him, but he's contributing nothing unique. Why force deploy him, if you don't need him to complete the chapter? It's a wasted slot. At least in the vanilla FE6, he's doing something important.

The issue I have with seizing in this conversation is that I can only really see two logical positions:

1. Seizing is an essential action. You could argue Rutger is "better", but even on hard mode a skilled player can easily beat the game without ever having Rutger take an action (or even recruiting him). Roy's Seize actions, meanwhile, are absolutely essential to clearing the game. They are his contribution and they are unquestionably more valuable than anyone else's. Therefore Roy is the best unit in Binding Blade.

2. Seizing is essential, certainly, but the argument that Roy is automatically the best due to Seize is not very informative/useful. Usually if a player asks "is Roy or Rutger better", they probably are thinking in terms of non-essential contributions (i.e. primarily combat in their case, but also supports and rescue utility, etc.) because the essential nature of seizing is already understood. In this case it makes most sense to just ignore seizing entirely for unit rating/ranking purposes.

(If it's not obvious: I take position 2 because I feel it is more useful, but I think position 1 is logically consistent as well.)

Something in the middle, where Roy gets some finite value assigned to his seizing, just feels unsatisfying to me. How do you decide how much to weight seizing? If someone hacked Binding Blade so anyone could seize (similar to Fates), but Roy got +1 to all stats, would you consider that Roy to be better or worse than the current one, and why?

[Jotari]

58 minutes ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

The issue I have with seizing in this conversation is that I can only really see two logical positions:

1. Seizing is an essential action. You could argue Rutger is "better", but even on hard mode a skilled player can easily beat the game without ever having Rutger take an action (or even recruiting him). Roy's Seize actions, meanwhile, are absolutely essential to clearing the game. They are his contribution and they are unquestionably more valuable than anyone else's. Therefore Roy is the best unit in Binding Blade.

2. Seizing is essential, certainly, but the argument that Roy is automatically the best due to Seize is not very informative/useful. Usually if a player asks "is Roy or Rutger better", they probably are thinking in terms of non-essential contributions (i.e. primarily combat in their case, but also supports and rescue utility, etc.) because the essential nature of seizing is already understood. In this case it makes most sense to just ignore seizing entirely for unit rating/ranking purposes.

(If it's not obvious: I take position 2 because I feel it is more useful, but I think position 1 is logically consistent as well.)

Something in the middle, where Roy gets some finite value assigned to his seizing, just feels unsatisfying to me. How do you decide how much to weight seizing? If someone hacked Binding Blade so anyone could seize (similar to Fates), but Roy got +1 to all stats, would you consider that Roy to be better or worse than the current one, and why?

To stay on the classes topic, rather than hacking the game so anyone could seize, what if the game were hacked so characters could class change to lord. Would Lord Rutger be better than Myrmidon Rutger if it meant Rutger now had the ability to seize in addition to Roy (and any other characters you choose to make a lord)?

[Samu_77]

6 hours ago, Jotari said:

To stay on the classes topic, rather than hacking the game so anyone could seize, what if the game were hacked so characters could class change to lord. Would Lord Rutger be better than Myrmidon Rutger if it meant Rutger now had the ability to seize in addition to Roy (and any other characters you choose to make a lord)?

Nobody in their right mind would give up Rutger being the best Boss-Killer (even though this niche can be replicated by others later) for the ability to seize because Seizing isn't very hard to do in this game. Roy's best utility out of seizing the throne is usually limited to picking up a kill or providing supports to somebody else because he sure ain't going on the frontlines, so as mentioned by others, seizing's importance is already known so the player knows that Roy's gotta get to the end of the map already. If Seizing had a tactical benefit like Genealogy Seizing did outside of punching the time clock at the end of your shift on the map then this ability might be worth something, but it doesn't. 

Edited October 25, 2023 by Samu_77

[Jotari]

20 minutes ago, Samu_77 said:

Nobody in their right mind would give up Rutger being the best Boss-Killer (even though this niche can be replicated by others later) for the ability to seize because Seizing isn't very hard to do in this game. Roy's best utility out of seizing the throne is usually limited to picking up a kill or providing supports to somebody else because he sure ain't going on the frontlines, so as mentioned by others, seizing's importance is already known so the player knows that Roy's gotta get to the end of the map already. If Seizing had a tactical benefit like Genealogy Seizing did outside of punching the time clock at the end of your shift on the map then this ability might be worth something, but it doesn't. 

Would changing Rutger to a lord make him any worse if a boss killer though (well at least prepromotion when the crit boost becomes more relevant)? Rutger is a great boss killer because of his stats, not his class. If Myrmidon was super amazing then Fir would be considered an amazing unit too, when by most reckonings she's average at best.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

8 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

The issue I have with seizing in this conversation is that I can only really see two logical positions:

So, if I'm rating units within the context of FE6, I would broadly side with position 2. As you say, Seizing is essential. I do think there's some wight to give it, say in deciding stat boosters - Roy is a good candidate for defensive boosters and the Boots, because he Seizes, but also because his death is a "Game Over" condition.

However, in this thread, we're specifically ranking the classes between their apppearances in various games. In that light, I'm ranking "Lords who always Seize" against "Lords who sometimes Seize" against "Lords who never Seize". In that light, I feel compelled to acknowledge that the first is contributing something more than the second, who is contributing more than the third, in at least this one axis. Likewise, visiting Villages is usually to the player's benefit; so, in a game (SD) where the ability to Visit is concentrated into one unit, that unit (Marth) will have an advantage over Lords who don't uniquely possess this power.

At least, that's the logic I was going with for my own ratings.

50 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Would changing Rutger to a lord make him any worse if a boss killer though (well at least prepromotion when the crit boost becomes more relevant)? Rutger is a great boss killer because of his stats, not his class. If Myrmidon was super amazing then Fir would be considered an amazing unit too, when by most reckonings she's average at best.

If Rutger were a Lord, he'd probably have worse stats. Particularly, lower Skill and Speed. Of course, if he's still getting Hard Mode bonuses, then his stats will be good in either class.

7 hours ago, Jotari said:

To stay on the classes topic, rather than hacking the game so anyone could seize, what if the game were hacked so characters could class change to lord. Would Lord Rutger be better than Myrmidon Rutger if it meant Rutger now had the ability to seize in addition to Roy (and any other characters you choose to make a lord)?

As a practical matter, re: my experiences with randomizers, if I recall, the ability to Seize is character-linked. So, Mage Roy will be able to Seize, whereas Lord Lugh would not. At least, this is based on randomizers that change the class, while leaving the recruitment time intact. If youchange recruitment, so that Lugh takes Roy's slot, then I imagine he'd be able to Seize, regardless of his class.

As for the raw question though, I do think adding the ability to Seize would make a unit better (and, moreso, make the previous Seize-exclusive unit worse). Of course, having a separate "bosskill" and "Seizer" may be most desirable. That way, one can kill the boss on player phase, whereas the other steps on the throne. If a unit has both traits, then they can only do one a turn, notwithstanding Dancer support.

[Whisky]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

Would changing Rutger to a lord make him any worse if a boss killer though (well at least prepromotion when the crit boost becomes more relevant)? Rutger is a great boss killer because of his stats, not his class. If Myrmidon was super amazing then Fir would be considered an amazing unit too, when by most reckonings she's average at best.

I think Fir’s class is part of the reason she’s considered average despite joining under leveled. It’s probably not the best class in the game, but Myrmidon/Swordmaster is a solid class line in FE6.

If Rutger were a Lord I think he would have lower Skl and Spd but slightly better durability. I think he’d be good either way in the early game, but losing the option to promote early and gain a 30% Crit boost among other bonuses would be a huge hit to him. I think he’d definitely be worse overall. 

[Samu_77]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

Would changing Rutger to a lord make him any worse if a boss killer though (well at least prepromotion when the crit boost becomes more relevant)? Rutger is a great boss killer because of his stats, not his class. If Myrmidon was super amazing then Fir would be considered an amazing unit too, when by most reckonings she's average at best.

I was going to draft something up but Whisky basically said what I was going to. 

Anyways this image shows you that if Rutger were to be a lord he loses on a whopping 5 speed and 6 skill. These are VERY in demand stats in the Binding Blade and if he were to suddenly become this awful Lord Class, that it barely gives anything to compensate for those lost stats. Rutger's raw stats are doing a lot of heavy lifting, especially on hard mode, but I think the disparity between the Myrmidon and Lord class bases here are pretty telling for how bad Lord is in this game. By all means if somebody were to romhack and give Rutger to the player as a Lord and make ROY the Myrmidon in chapter 4 I'm all game for that but even still you'll notice that even Rutger can't salvage how bad this class is.

[Jotari]

22 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

As a practical matter, re: my experiences with randomizers, if I recall, the ability to Seize is character-linked. So, Mage Roy will be able to Seize, whereas Lord Lugh would not. At least, this is based on randomizers that change the class, while leaving the recruitment time intact. If youchange recruitment, so that Lugh takes Roy's slot, then I imagine he'd be able to Seize, regardless of his class.

Well, yes, that is physically how the game functions, but I see that as pretty immaterial for a discussion, as there's no way for a general comparison to know whether Roy or Lord has the seize ability. From a practical coding perspective, since you're never meant to have any lords other than Roy, it could just as well be the other way. In fact, I think it actually is assigned to the class in Genealogy of the Holy War.

It would be interesting, however, if we did get a game where Lord is a class anyone can access that has the seize ability, and your protagonist doesn't have to be the lord, but you do need to bring at least one lord to each map in order to seize.

9 minutes ago, Samu_77 said:

I was going to draft something up but Whisky basically said what I was going to. 

Anyways this image shows you that if Rutger were to be a lord he loses on a whopping 5 speed and 6 skill. These are VERY in demand stats in the Binding Blade and if he were to suddenly become this awful Lord Class, that it barely gives anything to compensate for those lost stats. Rutger's raw stats are doing a lot of heavy lifting, especially on hard mode, but I think the disparity between the Myrmidon and Lord class bases here are pretty telling for how bad Lord is in this game. By all means if somebody were to romhack and give Rutger to the player as a Lord and make ROY the Myrmidon in chapter 4 I'm all game for that but even still you'll notice that even Rutger can't salvage how bad this class is.

And yeah, that's an answer. I'm not sure how clear it was that my questions were genuine. Those two points of con would probably end up hurting Rutger as well, in conjunction with lower speed.

Edited October 25, 2023 by Jotari

[Samu_77]

For the record I want to clarify real quick that I don't mean any malice or disrespect to the people in the conversation here, I feel as if I've been coming off too cold with my response and want to make sure there's no ill will between any of what I'm saying and the people involved.

[Whisky]

13 minutes ago, Samu_77 said:

I was going to draft something up but Whisky basically said what I was going to. 

Anyways this image shows you that if Rutger were to be a lord he loses on a whopping 5 speed and 6 skill. These are VERY in demand stats in the Binding Blade and if he were to suddenly become this awful Lord Class, that it barely gives anything to compensate for those lost stats. Rutger's raw stats are doing a lot of heavy lifting, especially on hard mode, but I think the disparity between the Myrmidon and Lord class bases here are pretty telling for how bad Lord is in this game. By all means if somebody were to romhack and give Rutger to the player as a Lord and make ROY the Myrmidon in chapter 4 I'm all game for that but even still you'll notice that even Rutger can't salvage how bad this class is.

Oh I didn’t realize the Skl/Spd difference was that big. Yeah that would be a huge hit to Rutger. The extra durability would make him pretty tanky, but that’s a big loss in Skl and Spd. 

[Eltosian Kadath]

10 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

 

Something in the middle, where Roy gets some finite value assigned to his seizing, just feels unsatisfying to me. How do you decide how much to weight seizing? If someone hacked Binding Blade so anyone could seize (similar to Fates), but Roy got +1 to all stats, would you consider that Roy to be better or worse than the current one, and why?

The way I build up to that middle position is to recognize that combat is an essential action just like seizing, as killing the boss sitting on the seize point is just as required. People regularly laud the value of Rutger specifically for his ability to accomplish this specific required task. As for finding a way to assign a weight to it, I find the value the ability to seize adds to a unit to be fairly minor, because seizing generally isn't the hard part of the map, and when it is, the lord isn't the one doing the heavy lifting in the task, as its usually the need for dances, rescue-dropping, and/or movements staff that are, and none of those are the work of the one who is seizing.

 

3 hours ago, Samu_77 said:

. If Seizing had a tactical benefit like Genealogy Seizing did outside of punching the time clock at the end of your shift on the map then this ability might be worth something, but it doesn't. 

I will point out that seizing does have a small tactical benefit, as when you seize it ends the map before the enemy can act, so on the turn you plan to seize it gives you the tactical advantage of not having to plan for enemy phase. This lets you be suicidally reckless on that player phase, attacking formations you have no way of really dealing with to get some exp on a squishy, or sneakily nabbing some loot otherwise too well protected before, without having to face the consequences of those acts.

[Cysx]

I actually never payed much attention to FE6's class bases, but it's pretty interesting to see that Roy's personal bases... aren't actually bad at all. 2 Str 2 Skl 3 Spd 7 Lck for a level 1 unit (no HP, Def or Res though, granted).

If he was reclassed to cavalier, he'd be better than both Alan(1 HP 2 Str 2 Skl 1 Spd 3 Lck) and Lance(0 Str 4 Skl 3 Spd 2 Lck) at base. Somehow I never knew that.

 

 

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Cysx said:

I actually never payed much attention to FE6's class bases, but it's pretty interesting to see that Roy's personal bases... aren't actually bad at all. 2 Str 2 Skl 3 Spd 7 Lck for a level 1 unit (no HP, Def or Res though, granted).

If he was reclassed to cavalier, he'd be better than both Alan(1 HP 2 Str 2 Skl 1 Spd 3 Lck) and Lance(0 Str 4 Skl 3 Spd 2 Lck) at base. Somehow I never knew that.

 

 

Well class and unit bases as separate elements are kind of irrelevant for games where you can't reclass or branch promote (or where promotion doesn't knock you up to bases minimum). They mainly play a role in how strong generic enemies are. For all it's worth Roy's personal bases could have been all 0s and lord could have had all the stats or vice versa.

[Cysx]

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

Well class and unit bases as separate elements are kind of irrelevant for games where you can't reclass or branch promote (or where promotion doesn't knock you up to bases minimum). They mainly play a role in how strong generic enemies are. For all it's worth Roy's personal bases could have been all 0s and lord could have had all the stats or vice versa.

Yeah, I know. That's why I never looked at them separately before. It's just interesting considering he's known for having bad bases and this tidbit makes that marginally inaccurate.

It may be relevant in a future remake though, depending on how they go about it.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I agree with @Jotari. The weird thing about class bases in games with no reclass possibilities is... well, they're invisible and undetctable. Like, if I hack the game and up Lord and Master Lord's stats by 2, but lower Roy's personal stats by 2, the game is unchanged from an end user perspective. So I'm a bit uncomfortable with ranking classes based on their stats in such games, for all that I can see the case to do so.

In fact this is largely why I basically just didn't comment on the lord classes in this very thread. Because lords can't reclass in most games (outside Awakning/Fates, and 3H kinda), and they have a sample size of 1 per class (unlike e.g. cavalier vs. myrmidon, where you can compare an aggregate and infer some statistical trends about the class), it feels like there's not much to discuss when talking about the class itself, in a way which distinguishes it from the individual lords as units.

On 10/25/2023 at 5:05 AM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

So, if I'm rating units within the context of FE6, I would broadly side with position 2. As you say, Seizing is essential. I do think there's some wight to give it, say in deciding stat boosters - Roy is a good candidate for defensive boosters and the Boots, because he Seizes, but also because his death is a "Game Over" condition.

Oh, I definitely agree Roy / other seize lords are a good candidate for boots. Notably, though, I think "is a good candidate for Boots / other resources" is an entirely unrelated conversation to how good I think a unit is. (Though, to be fair, I've noticed not everyone feels similarly... different opinions on Seliph are pretty revealing here, for instance.)

This is easiest to illustrate with a thought experiment: what if we made Roy untargetable by Rescue (as well as repositioning staves such as Warp)? What if we lowered his move? Both of these changes make Roy an unquestionably worse unit: you would never trade the Roy we have for this new one, given a choice. But they also make him a better candidate for the boots.

On 10/25/2023 at 5:05 AM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

However, in this thread, we're specifically ranking the classes between their apppearances in various games. In that light, I'm ranking "Lords who always Seize" against "Lords who sometimes Seize" against "Lords who never Seize". In that light, I feel compelled to acknowledge that the first is contributing something more than the second, who is contributing more than the third, in at least this one axis. Likewise, visiting Villages is usually to the player's benefit; so, in a game (SD) where the ability to Visit is concentrated into one unit, that unit (Marth) will have an advantage over Lords who don't uniquely possess this power.

Villages are slightly different because they're not essential, so arguably Marth is similar to thieves in other games and deserves a score boost because he is providing material goods you couldn't get without him (much like how Matthew can provide the Silver Card and hence insane amounts of effective gold). This is still hard to score (as discussions of Matthew have proven in the past), but at least I can see scoring it in some way.

Seizing just feels impossible to score. I'm definitely curious how much you weight it (and I mean this non-judgementally to be clear, I'm not trying to use this as a gotcha), e.g. if you consider a hacked version of Binding Blade where anyone can seize (but the game is otherwise unchanged, i.e. Roy is still force-deployed and story-promoted), how much better would Hacked Roy's stats have to be than Current Roy's in order for him to be equally valuable in both versions of the game, in your estimation?

[Jotari]

52 minutes ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

I agree with @Jotari. The weird thing about class bases in games with no reclass possibilities is... well, they're invisible and undetctable. Like, if I hack the game and up Lord and Master Lord's stats by 2, but lower Roy's personal stats by 2, the game is unchanged from an end user perspective. So I'm a bit uncomfortable with ranking classes based on their stats in such games, for all that I can see the case to do so.

In fact this is largely why I basically just didn't comment on the lord classes in this very thread. Because lords can't reclass in most games (outside Awakning/Fates, and 3H kinda), and they have a sample size of 1 per class (unlike e.g. cavalier vs. myrmidon, where you can compare an aggregate and infer some statistical trends about the class), it feels like there's not much to discuss when talking about the class itself, in a way which distinguishes it from the individual lords as units.

Oh, I definitely agree Roy / other seize lords are a good candidate for boots. Notably, though, I think "is a good candidate for Boots / other resources" is an entirely unrelated conversation to how good I think a unit is. (Though, to be fair, I've noticed not everyone feels similarly... different opinions on Seliph are pretty revealing here, for instance.)

This is easiest to illustrate with a thought experiment: what if we made Roy untargetable by Rescue (as well as repositioning staves such as Warp)? What if we lowered his move? Both of these changes make Roy an unquestionably worse unit: you would never trade the Roy we have for this new one, given a choice. But they also make him a better candidate for the boots.

Villages are slightly different because they're not essential, so arguably Marth is similar to thieves in other games and deserves a score boost because he is providing material goods you couldn't get without him (much like how Matthew can provide the Silver Card and hence insane amounts of effective gold). This is still hard to score (as discussions of Matthew have proven in the past), but at least I can see scoring it in some way.

Seizing just feels impossible to score. I'm definitely curious how much you weight it (and I mean this non-judgementally to be clear, I'm not trying to use this as a gotcha), e.g. if you consider a hacked version of Binding Blade where anyone can seize (but the game is otherwise unchanged, i.e. Roy is still force-deployed and story-promoted), how much better would Hacked Roy's stats have to be than Current Roy's in order for him to be equally valuable in both versions of the game, in your estimation?

Yeah, "good candidate for stat booster" is really saying "this character/class is lacking in key stats", which is actually a bad thing.

[samthedigital]

Just now, Jotari said:

Yeah, "good candidate for stat booster" is really saying "this character/class is lacking in key stats", which is actually a bad thing.

That's not exactly true. Miledy for example is a good candidate for the first pair of boots, but she isn't lacking in movement. Giving her that stat booster creates new strategies that wouldn't be possible without it; and that's the key to being a good candidate for a stat booster.

[ping]

3 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

I agree with @Jotari. The weird thing about class bases in games with no reclass possibilities is... well, they're invisible and undetctable. Like, if I hack the game and up Lord and Master Lord's stats by 2, but lower Roy's personal stats by 2, the game is unchanged from an end user perspective.

Adding another +1 to that. It's especially true for the Lord class(es), since those numbers aren't even used to generate enemies like the other class bases presumably do.

3 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Villages are slightly different because they're not essential, so arguably Marth is similar to thieves in other games and deserves a score boost because he is providing material goods you couldn't get without him (much like how Matthew can provide the Silver Card and hence insane amounts of effective gold). This is still hard to score (as discussions of Matthew have proven in the past), but at least I can see scoring it in some way.

 

Also +1 to that. Even though it's to Roy's , and thus my argument that he isn't as bad as everybody says, detriment, I think that if we credit thieves with thieving, we have to credit Marth for getting villages, too. 

3 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Oh, I definitely agree Roy / other seize lords are a good candidate for boots. Notably, though, I think "is a good candidate for Boots / other resources" is an entirely unrelated conversation to how good I think a unit is. (Though, to be fair, I've noticed not everyone feels similarly... different opinions on Seliph are pretty revealing here, for instance.)

 

I don't fully agree here, though - I think a character can be credited if they're especially good at using a particular stat booster, or boosters in general, like FE1!Mars with his Provoke ability, FE10!Jill with her mobility, or FE6!Milady being able to double Mercenaries with an insta-promotion and a Speedwing. I do think that it's a bit silly to just assume that these units get these stat boosters, and just be compared as such vs. other characters without this kind of help. "Can use stat boosters well" is just another of those unit qualities that are hard to quantify, like "staff utility", "rescue utility", "thief utilty" and all that. 

[Cysx]

I guess I expressed myself poorly; Jotari and I are in agreement here, I was just commenting on something.

4 minutes ago, gnip said:

Also +1 to that. Even though it's to Roy's , and thus my argument that he isn't as bad as everybody says, detriment, I think that if we credit thieves with thieving, we have to credit Marth for getting villages, too. 

The other side of that coin, which is also true for Roy, is that their additional utility limits how much combat they get to see. FE11 Marth struggles to gain levels and justify a forged Rapier because he's so often away from the action. In other words, him being the only unit that can visit villages and seize significantly hurts his combat.

As for Roy, well he tends to spend his time rescued, which obviously poses the same issue, though of course his combat has a pretty low ceiling for most of the game regardless.

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

Yeah, "good candidate for stat booster" is really saying "this character/class is lacking in key stats", which is actually a bad thing.

That's simplifying things a fair bit. Oftentimes, the best characters for stat boosters are the already great ones. In fact that's the primary problem of stat boosters, instead of equalizing the roster, when used practically they just make things worse.
 

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

4 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Seizing just feels impossible to score. I'm definitely curious how much you weight it (and I mean this non-judgementally to be clear, I'm not trying to use this as a gotcha), e.g. if you consider a hacked version of Binding Blade where anyone can seize (but the game is otherwise unchanged, i.e. Roy is still force-deployed and story-promoted), how much better would Hacked Roy's stats have to be than Current Roy's in order for him to be equally valuable in both versions of the game, in your estimation?

Ooh, fun thought experiment. So, in FE6, Roy joins with the following stats:

Spoiler

HP: 18

Str: 5

Skl: 5

Spd: 7

Lck: 7

Def: 5

Res: 0

Con: 6

Mov: 5

As a result, on Normal Mode, he deals 9 damage (3HKO) to generic enemy Fighters using the Rapier, and takes 7 damage (3HKO) from their Iron Axes. A single point of Str and Spd would make Roy one-round them. However, I acrually think that would make Roy too powerful. Conversely, an extra point in each of Def and HP will take him into getting 4HKO'd, which seems reasonable. One more thing: a little more Con would make heavier Swords more forgiving, without meaningfully changing who can Rescue-Carry him. So, let's do the following buffs:

Spoiler

HP: 18 + 1 = 19

Str: 5 + 2 = 7

Skl: 5 + 2 = 7

Spd: 7 + 0 = 7

Lck: 7 + 0 = 7

Def: 5 + 1 = 6

Res: 0 + 2 = 2

Con: 6 + 2 = 8

Mov: 5 + 0 = 5

There - I think that 10 points, distributed this way, would make a not-the-only-Seizer Roy about equivalent in value to "vanilla Roy". I evalyated based on NM, since that's the one I know best (and the one with more consistent enemy stats), but such a boost would obviously improve his HM performance as well. This is all very "touchy-feely", and I acknowledge that playing the game with said changes applied might cause me to "tweak" the dial a bit.

4 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

This is easiest to illustrate with a thought experiment: what if we made Roy untargetable by Rescue (as well as repositioning staves such as Warp)? What if we lowered his move? Both of these changes make Roy an unquestionably worse unit: you would never trade the Roy we have for this new one, given a choice. But they also make him a better candidate for the boots.

Well, this is another question of one's point of view. Is an "unrescuable" Roy a substantially worse unit than vanilla Roy? Or, is it the "Rescuers", who lose some of their functionality, all becoming slightly worse? I think there's a case to be made either way. Anyway, I do agree that such a change would make Roy a better Boots candidate.

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

Yeah, "good candidate for stat booster" is really saying "this character/class is lacking in key stats", which is actually a bad thing.

Reflecting on it, I think the Boots ought to be considered separately from all other stat boosters, since they function so differently. The other stat boosters affect how a unit does in combat, whereas the Boots affect how a unit gets to Combat (or the point of Dancing, or Seizing, or Rescuing, or Rallying). There's a reason that IS dropped "buy infinite Boots" after FE6, whereas "buy unlimited Boosters" was retained.

Anyway, you have a point, yes, that of course the unit who starts with "X + 2" in a given stat, is better than the one who starts with "X" in the stat, and needs the Booster to get to "X + 2". But as @gnip said, it's not always a unit who is "bad" in a certain stat who uses the Booster best. If I have a unit who's 4 damage away from one-rounding every foe on the next Rout map with a Hand Axe, then they're probably the best candidate for an Energy Drop - even if they currently have the highest Strength of any of my units. On the opposite end, if my 20-HP Dancer takes 30 damage from the Ballista, then neither a Seraph Robe nor a Dracoshield is going to save them. It's possible to be so far lacking that a few extra points makes no appreciable difference.