OMG it's a tier list

[Fenrir]

Zihark is not durable until Part 4, and even then not unless he piggybacks onto an army that has some authority stars (like wtfTibarn and his +20 free avoid). Being an Earth affinity character doesn't help him, largely because he can't even be expected to establish a C rank until 1-7, thus B-rank by 3-6. And in 3-6, facing enemies with 130-140+ HIT, while getting 2HKO'ed, forget about it. Even when he gets A-rank by 3-13, Ike's authority stars completely wipe out the gains.

vantage + B support + seraph robe makes him 3HKO'd by anything but the strongest of tigers, Vantage activates tons and B support makes enemies miss him enough, unless my Zihark is somehow incredibly blessed he's not that bad. he had beastfoe, and was open to two sides of attacks, my first try of that map Sothe died wit 9 enemies to go, next time i completed it flawlessly, miccy stood in corner, ed to her right, sothe above her and Zihark standing above ed and to sothe's right. simple stuff, no durablity problems IMO.

To be honest, I hate Edward with the fury of an angry god. At any rate, this game isn't exactly the place I'd be looking to find truly amazing swordmasters.

eddy is hate-able but SMs are pretty nice, Mia owns everything at like all times, forge + adept and she ORKO's most things. Zihark is ok, requires much resources is his problem.

[RNG Princess]

vantage + B support + seraph robe makes him 3HKO'd by anything but the strongest of tigers, Vantage activates tons and B support makes enemies miss him enough, unless my Zihark is somehow incredibly blessed he's not that bad. he had beastfoe, and was open to two sides of attacks, my first try of that map Sothe died wit 9 enemies to go, next time i completed it flawlessly, miccy stood in corner, ed to her right, sothe above her and Zihark standing above ed and to sothe's right. simple stuff, no durablity problems IMO.

Vantage + Beastfoe on Nolan makes him kill every laguz with 1 hit except birds and dragons ;)

Edited July 2, 2010 by Queen_Elincia

[Narga_Rocks]

To be honest, I hate Edward with the fury of an angry god. At any rate, this game isn't exactly the place I'd be looking to find truly amazing swordmasters.

Um, how good is "truly amazing"? I mean, near the top of high is pretty amazing. Now, sure, it's not like Rutger in top tier or shanan in top tier. But they are higher than any swordmasters in fe9, fe7, fe8. In fe5 we stuck shiva way up there, but in terms of #units from the top it's about the same. seems like only shanan and Rutger count as "truly amazing", then, which is fine I guess.

[Shadow Mir]

I thought Mia was considered an "amazing swordmaster"

That's only 1 out of 5. And I'm arguing that swordmasters were generally better in the past FE games.

[Anouleth]

I thought Mia was considered an "amazing swordmaster"

Oh, she's good, she's just not on the level of wtfRutger, which is what people generally think of when someone says 'amazing Swordmaster'.

vantage + B support + seraph robe makes him 3HKO'd by anything but the strongest of tigers, Vantage activates tons and B support makes enemies miss him enough, unless my Zihark is somehow incredibly blessed he's not that bad. he had beastfoe, and was open to two sides of attacks, my first try of that map Sothe died wit 9 enemies to go, next time i completed it flawlessly, miccy stood in corner, ed to her right, sothe above her and Zihark standing above ed and to sothe's right. simple stuff, no durablity problems IMO.

What? Tigers almost all have 39ATK in HM. Even with a Robe, Level 5 Zihark only has 38HP and 13 or 14DEF, so they 2HKO him. Cats 3HKO him, and a Cat + Tiger kills him. Even a support doesn't save him from this situation. Even with B Volug, he has only 90 avoid, against enemies with 140 hit, so his avoid is not enough to compensate for his terrible concrete durability. Even with a max mt Steel forge and Beastfoe, he only has 60 mt, so he won't OHKO Tigers with Vantage, either. I guess if the forge has crit too, he can get some of them, but it's still not reliable.

I can't imagine how many turns you took to complete the chapter, either.

[RNG Princess]

I thought Mia was considered as good as Rutger, after all she gets Astra.

Joshua, Karla and Edward have been my favorite SMS anyway.

That's only 1 out of 5. And I'm arguing that swordmasters were generally better in the past FE games.

Stefan is still useful, and I recall Marisa being considered a lower tier character along with Karel and Karla.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Queen_Elincia

[Interceptor]

3 anonymous users

Cowards!

vantage + B support + seraph robe makes him 3HKO'd by anything but the strongest of tigers, Vantage activates tons and B support makes enemies miss him enough, unless my Zihark is somehow incredibly blessed he's not that bad. he had beastfoe, and was open to two sides of attacks, my first try of that map Sothe died wit 9 enemies to go, next time i completed it flawlessly, miccy stood in corner, ed to her right, sothe above her and Zihark standing above ed and to sothe's right. simple stuff, no durablity problems IMO.

You must be joking me. The vast majority of tigers have 39mt, which destroy Zihark utterly. Even if you gave him a Robe and somehow managed to him +3 HP during level-ups in Part 1, he is now at its tier 2 cap of 40 HP. In order to survive two hits of a 39mt tiger, he needs a bare minimum of 20 DEF. This is a problem when his base DEF is freaking thirteen, with a 25% growth rate. Even if you got him a +DEF support and put him in a reed, he still need to come up with five more DEF, which is goddamn ridiculous, not even the Dracoshield can plug that gap.

Vantage doesn't do a goddamn thing if Zihark doesn't kill the enemy before it attacks him.

A level 20/7 Zihark with a B Earth from Nolan at neutral bio has about 94 avoid. This means he's looking at 33-53 listed HIT from guys that take him down in two shots. Shit, the 39mt tigers are so goddamn beastly that even a 29mt cat can finish him off.

Your Zihark is not just blessed, he's from another dimension, where male Swordmasters have more than 40 HP, tigers hit like cats, and the air smells like warm rootbeer.

EDIT: Ninja'ed by a guy named "Slowking". I hope that the irony does not break the forum software.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Interceptor

[Anouleth]

Rutger is definitely better than Mia. Rutger has massive amounts of crit, decent strength, doubles everything in a game where doubling is a limited commodity. That puts him on par with Mia (replace crit with Adept). However, what elevates Rutger is being a great choice to take on the psychotic FE6 bosses that sit on +3def/+30avoid thrones. Killing Edge, Durandal, Armorslayer lets him take on many durable bosses, and high avoid makes him a good choice to fight Scott or Gelero, who are otherwise very risky to take on. And high hit, of course.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Slowking

[Shadow Mir]

Stefan is still useful, and I recall Marisa being considered a lower tier character along with Karel and Karla.

Swing and a miss. I was talking about the fact that Rutger's far and away better than pretty much all of the swordmasters in FE7 and beyond.

[RNG Princess]

Swing and a miss. I was talking about the fact that Rutger's far and away better than pretty much all of the swordmasters in FE7 and beyond.

and how exactly does that make other sms outside of RD better in general? When its only Rutger who is the most amazing (according to you)?

To be honest, I hate Edward with the fury of an angry god. At any rate, this game isn't exactly the place I'd be looking to find truly amazing swordmasters.

Anyways is Rutger really the best of all? I heard Aira, her daughter, and her nephew being 100% epic.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Queen_Elincia

[Shadow Mir]

and how exactly does that make other sms outside of RD better in general? When its only Rutger who is the most amazing (according to you)?

Anyways is Rutger really the best of all? I heard Aira, her daughter, and her nephew being 100% epic.

[aside](to himself) *sighs* Oh, great... Engulfed in an argument with her AGAIN. She tends to misunderstand what I'm saying and blow it out of proportion.[/aside]

Relevant:I'm saying that SMs in general have been lacking ever since their glory days in FE4 and FE6 (and maybe FE5 as well).

Edited July 2, 2010 by Ein Lanford

[Interceptor]

You seem to have forgotten the [aside][/aside] tags in your post.

[Narga_Rocks]

(to himself) *sighs* Oh, great... Engulfed in an argument with her AGAIN. She tends to misunderstand what I'm saying and blow it out of propoprtion.

I'm saying that SMs in general have been lacking ever since their glory days in FE4 and FE6 (and maybe FE5 as well).

Um, swordtwins have trouble keeping up. Even shanon does, though epic avo from Balmunk makes it worth it on occasion, I suppose. I don't get the big deal with shiva, but I suppose he got put in top. Rutger is one of only two swordmasters, and both Mia and Zihark eat Fir for breakfast (though I love her all the same).

You are calling two swordmasters (shanon and Rutger) "glory days". I call having both Mia and Zihark be as good as they are here a decent compromise between overpoweredness and uselessness.

Your Zihark is not just blessed, he's from another dimension, where male Swordmasters have more than 40 HP, tigers hit like cats, and the air smells like warm rootbeer.

Aside from your more than 40 HP comment, that other dimension is something I like to call "Normal Mode". Yes, the air in Normal Mode smells like warm rootbeer. I've never been able to figure out why.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Narga_Rocks

[Fenrir]

3 anonymous users

Cowards!

You must be joking me. The vast majority of tigers have 39mt, which destroy Zihark utterly. Even if you gave him a Robe and somehow managed to him +3 HP during level-ups in Part 1, he is now at its tier 2 cap of 40 HP. In order to survive two hits of a 39mt tiger, he needs a bare minimum of 20 DEF. This is a problem when his base DEF is freaking thirteen, with a 25% growth rate. Even if you got him a +DEF support and put him in a reed, he still need to come up with five more DEF, which is goddamn ridiculous, not even the Dracoshield can plug that gap.

Vantage doesn't do a goddamn thing if Zihark doesn't kill the enemy before it attacks him.

A level 20/7 Zihark with a B Earth from Nolan at neutral bio has about 94 avoid. This means he's looking at 33-53 listed HIT from guys that take him down in two shots. Shit, the 39mt tigers are so goddamn beastly that even a 29mt cat can finish him off.

Your Zihark is not just blessed, he's from another dimension, where male Swordmasters have more than 40 HP, tigers hit like cats, and the air smells like warm rootbeer.

EDIT: Ninja'ed by a guy named "Slowking". I hope that the irony does not break the forum software.

bold: i guess adept and crit don't mean anything to you...?

Aside from your more than 40 HP comment, that other dimension is something I like to call "Normal Mode". Yes, the air in Normal Mode smells like warm rootbeer. I've never been able to figure out why.

hmm, well obviously this is a situation where someone probably should've said PEMN and they would be damn right, im not going to argue with people about as open minded as my KOTR game case...this was in HM though, and the chapter took 13 turns, the same as INT's effeciant and 3 more than Queen elincia's, not terribly ineffeciant.

[Shadow Mir]

You are calling two swordmasters (shanon and Rutger) "glory days". I call having both Mia and Zihark be as good as they are here a decent compromise between overpoweredness and uselessness.

Aside from your more than 40 HP comment, that other dimension is something I like to call "Normal Mode". Yes, the air in Normal Mode smells like warm rootbeer. I've never been able to figure out why.

Bold: *laughs nervously* Heh... I guess I am.

The rest: Rootbeer... mmmm... *snaps out of it* What's the air in hard mode smell like?

[Anouleth]

The rest: Rootbeer... mmmm... *snaps out of it* What's the air in hard mode smell like?

The tears of Soren and Edward fanboys. There is no finer scent.

[Interceptor]

bold: i guess adept and crit don't mean anything to you...?

bold: It's a bad idea to guess. Vantage does not do a goddamn thing if Zihark does not kill on the first hit. This includes the times when Adept or crit fail to activate, which is most of the time.

hmm, well obviously this is a situation where someone probably should've said PEMN and they would be damn right, im not going to argue with people about as open minded as my KOTR game case...this was in HM though, and the chapter took 13 turns, the same as INT's effeciant and 3 more than Queen elincia's, not terribly ineffeciant.

Open-minded my ass. The weak tigers in 3-6 have 39mt, this isn't even disputable. Nor is Zihark's 40 HP cap. Thusly, nor is the math that requires Z to get to 20 DEF somehow to get 3HKO'ed by these guys. I gave you the gift of a B support with someone who has +DEF, and fighting in thickets. If you didn't have these things, you have to come up with +7 DEF over his base stats in order to get 3HKO'ed. This is absurd. Even if you gave him a Dracoshield, that's still insane, because of his 25% growth.

Would you like to know how unlikely it is to get +DEF for him for five levels in a row? It's got a decimal point and 8 significant digits.

[Fenrir]

Open-minded my ass.

lol.

i read that like an order...

[Renall]

Shiva is a little overrated in FE5. He's one of the top tier characters who just happen to have everything going for them, and all he really slacks on is mobility. But otherwise he's kind of interchangeable with all the others. He doesn't stand out as godlike the way Rutger does, he's just one of the characters you want to use out of a handful of asskickers.

Rutger is mostly crazy because of supports granting him gobs of crit in FE6. Any potential offensive shortcomings are made up for by hitting like a train. Plus his support partners are so great, a rarity.

I think FE10 Mia is a bit underrated in the general pantheon of Swordmasters. She has a lot of things going for her, and she's an offensive standout in a game full of overpowered characters. I hardly see how being one of Ike's best buds and nearly as good at killing as he is underwhelming.

[Zkirsche]

Swing and a miss. I was talking about the fact that Rutger's far and away better than pretty much all of the swordmasters in FE7 and beyond.

That's only 1 out of X.

replace X with number of swordmasters ever since rutger. Being high alone (Zihark) also shows your pretty damn beast IMO.

On topic, I just noticed Oliver hasn't been moved into bottom. Why?

Edited July 3, 2010 by Kirsche

[Mekkah]

Shiva is a little overrated in FE5. He's one of the top tier characters who just happen to have everything going for them, and all he really slacks on is mobility. But otherwise he's kind of interchangeable with all the others. He doesn't stand out as godlike the way Rutger does, he's just one of the characters you want to use out of a handful of asskickers.

It's not really a big deal to be not mounted in FE5 because of the forced dismount in indoor chapters.

Rutger is mostly crazy because of supports granting him gobs of crit in FE6

For the majority of the game, that's +5 or +10 crt from Clarine. Efficient play shows there's no time for anything else.

[grandjackal]

bold: i guess adept and crit don't mean anything to you...?

You're asking for Zihark to land Adept AND Crit to avoid getting hit? Do note that at best would only avoid a counter from cats. Tigers?

Tiger lvl 15

HP 48, Atk 39, AS 16, Hit 136, Avo 38, DEF 18, RES 6, Crit 10, Ddg 6

17 Str+14 might from a steel forge. The only way this will activate is if he activates Adept, Vantage, AND a crit.

Narga, you're the math master here, what are the odds of that happening? Cause I'm willing to bet the chances are so microscopic that it won't matter.

The tears of Soren and Edward fanboys. There is no finer scent.

Bitch, you know Eddie's underrated.

[Anouleth]

You're asking for Zihark to land Adept AND Crit to avoid getting hit? Do note that at best would only avoid a counter from cats. Tigers?

Tiger lvl 15

HP 48, Atk 39, AS 16, Hit 136, Avo 38, DEF 18, RES 6, Crit 10, Ddg 6

17 Str+14 might from a steel forge. The only way this will activate is if he activates Adept, Vantage, AND a crit.

Narga, you're the math master here, what are the odds of that happening? Cause I'm willing to bet the chances are so microscopic that it won't matter.

He mentioned Beastfoe, so he would only need Adept or Crit for Tigers and OHKOes Cats.

Bitch, you know Eddie's underrated.

Ah, I do not even need to play hard mode for the fine perfume.

[grandjackal]

He mentioned Beastfoe, so he would only need Adept or Crit for Tigers and OHKOes Cats.

Still ineffective when compared to others getting it...Wait a minute, how does this help him avoid enemy phase counters? I thought that was the point of Vantage, he can't fit both on can he?

Regardless, that's still a pretty ineffective use of Beastfoe.

Ah, I do not even need to play hard mode for the fine perfume.

You are just biased to stinky odors that others have recommended to you, you only agree because you heard it from other people.

I much prefer the scent of Aran le'depressione. That's Aran's Depression for those of you who don't speak the Frenchese.

Yes, I'm aware that's nowhere near correct French

[Narga_Rocks]

Still ineffective when compared to others getting it...Wait a minute, how does this help him avoid enemy phase counters? I thought that was the point of Vantage, he can't fit both on can he?

Regardless, that's still a pretty ineffective use of Beastfoe.

Well, he can get up to 42 mt and 17 str, right? 59 atk is enough to 2HKO, so he'd need either Adept or Crit to kick in, and he'd need vantage or it doesn't matter.

(Vantage is 10 capacity, shove is 5, Adept is either 15 or free. Beastfoe is 15. He needs Adept to be free for it to work. Which means you can't move it around at all in part 1, either.)

Let's give him 25 speed since I am feeling generous today. I'll throw in 24 skill as well.

12 + 10 + 15 = 37 crit.

25% adept

25% vantage

6 cev enemies, again to be nice

30% crit

Compare to, say, 18 speed Nolan with Vantage and Beastfoe (and not stealing Adept from other units that could use it, like Neph in the GM's part 3, or Janaff/Ulki)

25% chance of vantage

If he does, then either 25% adept or 30% crit will save him. That's 47.5% chance

Put them together, you get a whole 11.875% chance of him managing to save himself. And that's less than Nolan's 18% by how much? And let me ask this: Is Nolan hoarding Adept during part 1 and denying the GMs access during part 3 in order to accomplish his rate of success? Which, by the way, is higher?