OMG it's a tier list

[grandjackal]

I would respond to Kleine's response to me, but it would feel redundant what with the post dondon gave up above there.

As for Taur vs Aran, I think he could go lower than that. After all, when is it he has use outside of javelin chip in 1-4 and 5 before being binned?

[-Cynthia-]

I guess we are considering Aran "used" by the terms of the tier list, so we're probably not dropping him in 1-6.

If we're shelving all those DB characters that don't immediately help turncount, Nolan and Jill (as a combat unit) should go down. Traning them really doesn't help us in 1-6/1-7/1-8, but it does pay dividends later.

[Junkhead]

But unlike the rest of the DB, Nolan and Jill are actually useful. And they give out most of their potential after Part 1.

[NinjaMonkey]

And in Part 4 they both kinda suck. Tauroneo is only being able to avoid getting doubled and is a little more useful at 4-P.

Isn't Tauroneo forced on Tibarn's route?

[Junkhead]

No, he isn't.

[grandjackal]

Does it even matter if he is or not? Being on Tibarn's route means you automatically fall into the placement of "Not being Tibarn or Elincia". What in the name of holy hell would he even do there?

[Florete]

No, he isn't.

Yes, he is.

[Junkhead]

I could'e sworn he wasn't, as he isn't forced to the maps.

Haha.

[-Cynthia-]

4-2 is a Rout, so it still helps to have non Elincia/Tibarn units there. Tibarn's awesome and all, but he doesn't have 2 range and can't be everywhere at once.

[Fenrir]

6 move and hard to shove is annoying, sure, but ORKOing when everyone else doesn't along with never dying doesn't seem like the stuff of upper mid. Maybe he could go down lower in high tier, like below Nolan or something, but really he's not as bad as some seem to think.

Gatrie is not ORKOing unless he gets the crown, many people think titan/haar are more deserving.

Haar above Ike (N)

Sothe into top tier

Reyson down to high tier

Titania (N) above Mia (N), Titania (T) above Mia (T)

Fiona above Meg (yes, seriously)

Haar above ike for sure.

Sothe should be above Volug, regardless of where volug is, Sothe is > him

I dont care about herons.

i agree with Titan, Mia only wins a couple stages.

What does this even matter??

and since im feeling assertive, here's what i want!

So, Gatrie could go below Nolan for now. Everyone agree on this?

Jill jump to high below or above rafiel, either sounds good to me.

Eddy/Geoff/Tormod in mid.

Aran to mid tier, below Tauroneo.

[Junkhead]

But Sothe's use is mostly on thieving after his combat turns average since, he starts 2RKO'ing by half of 1-2. Volug has superior combat.

[Narga_Rocks]

Why would Mia go anywhere other than the Greil Army? Are you suggesting that we break that A Ike that we so meticulously built up before? Why would we waste her ability on the Hawk Army, where one of the maps is an Elincia - Reyson - Tibarn skip? Why would we put her in the Silver Army and have her deal with desert terrain? In any case, Titania does fine in 4-P. She only needs to be --/--/3 on average to double the halbs, though warriors are a bit out of reach. But hey, you got that Speedwing in 3-9, right? Let's put it to good use. Titania is now ORKO on every enemy on the map except the SMs and FKs. She is even dangerously close to cleanly 2HKOing the generals without a Hammer - if we use the patented Pocket Mist, Titania actually ORKOs generals up to 46 HP, 28 def at --/--/3 with just a +5 MT Silver Axe forge. I guess you can try to go for +MT cards on that forge, in which case she can get up to 46 HP, 27 def without Pocket Mist.

And in 4-4, you can just have her clean up the bottom floor. After all, it's a rout map, generals abound, and Titania has her trusty Hammer handy. She only needs 12 HP residual damage on the toughest 51 HP, 31 def generals for a clean OHKO at --/--/5.

Depending on what happens over the next 48 hours, I may or may not respond properly when I'm no longer at my parent's house (hopefully Interceptor or someone will respond before then, or the points will be so overwhelming that there is no point in responding). I'll just deal with one small technical aspect of this part of your post.

You can't forge silver until 4-2. Titania will not be getting a silver axe forge.

Also, as for hammers, not sure how long you can make 40 hammer uses last, even if every single use is a OHKO by using units like Haar and Titania whenever possible. Well, 2 uses are spent on the BK in 4-E-2, of course, so 38 uses. And do they actually reach the 80 to 84 mt needed to KO 50 hp, 30 def to 52 hp, 32 def Generals in 4-E-1? I think those are all 2 hits. Hammer only has 33 mt, Mist support (even with Boyd) would top out at 82 mt. Haar has a 38 str cap and can't get past 79 mt. Titania can't get past 75 mt.

When you finished part 3, how many hammer uses did you have remaining? I suppose you could hammerne depending on what other weapons you use a lot.

[dondon151]

You can't forge silver until 4-2. Titania will not be getting a silver axe forge.

Oh, right. I keep forgetting that Jorge or Daniel or whoever does the forges decided to be dumb and go with the army that has their map last.

Also, as for hammers, not sure how long you can make 40 hammer uses last, even if every single use is a OHKO by using units like Haar and Titania whenever possible. Well, 2 uses are spent on the BK in 4-E-2, of course, so 38 uses. And do they actually reach the 80 to 84 mt needed to KO 50 hp, 30 def to 52 hp, 32 def Generals in 4-E-1? I think those are all 2 hits. Hammer only has 33 mt, Mist support (even with Boyd) would top out at 82 mt. Haar has a 38 str cap and can't get past 79 mt. Titania can't get past 75 mt.

Generals from 4-4 onwards are pretty much out of the reach of OHKOs.

I had 16 total uses of Hammer left after part 3. I do plan on using a charge of Hammerne on it, as the other choices are basically just the Rescue staff and brave weapons, but I have >20 uses left on all brave weapons and they're too weak to 2HKO most of the time. Rescue is pretty useless outside of 4-5 and 4-E, and even then you might not need it.

[RNG Princess]

I agree with Haar > Ike simply for flying and hand axe forges being helpful for longer time.

As for Meg vs Fiona, Meg can at least chip something and provide a support and has shoving. Fiona can help detransform laguz in 3-6 but Meg can do that as well with a left over wind edge and she can cross the river just to support her partner or burn a torch while Fiona can't move away the first island.

[Fenrir]

But Sothe's use is mostly on thieving after his combat turns average since, he starts 2RKO'ing by half of 1-2. Volug has superior combat.

Forged knives give sothe the up on Volug, as well as better availability. Volug wins P3 but sothe has P1, they should at least be next to each other in the same tier, that could mean volug goes down or sothe goes up.

[nflchamp]

move away the first island.

Hahahaha. That's a good one.

[Shadow Mir]

But Sothe's use is mostly on thieving after his combat turns average since, he starts 2RKO'ing by half of 1-2. Volug has superior combat.

Iron Knives can be forged, for one, and second, Volug has to target ranged fighters on player phase since he can't do jack to them come enemy phase, whereas Sothe can just get in there and TKO them.

[dondon151]

Sothe cleanly ORKOs up to at least 1-6-2 with just 7 MT Iron Knives without a support. He only starts missing KOs in 1-7 (myrms too fast, soldiers too durable).

For their shared part 1 maps, Sothe dominates in 1-5, 1-6-1, and 1-8 while Volug dominates in 1-7 and 1-E. I think we can all agree that Volug does significantly better from there onwards, as there are no 2 range enemies in 3-6 and 3-13 and the entirety of enemies on the RHS of 3-12 have no 2 range.

[Anouleth]

Sothe cleanly ORKOs up to at least 1-6-2 with just 7 MT Iron Knives without a support. He only starts missing KOs in 1-7 (myrms too fast, soldiers too durable).

For their shared part 1 maps, Sothe dominates in 1-5, 1-6-1, and 1-8 while Volug dominates in 1-7 and 1-E. I think we can all agree that Volug does significantly better from there onwards, as there are no 2 range enemies in 3-6 and 3-13 and the entirety of enemies on the RHS of 3-12 have no 2 range.

Plus, Volug will be able to ditch Wildheart and gets access to S Strike. What is that, 36mt? Plus, his durability lead is pretty crazy too.

[Interceptor]

Pardon the selective nature of this reply, there is too much tl;dr for me.

Anyway, last night I told CM on IRC that I want to push forward 4 changes to the tier list (and in the meantime, I thought of another one). They are:

Haar above Ike (N)

Sothe into top tier

Reyson down to high tier

Titania (N) above Mia (N), Titania (T) above Mia (T)

Fiona above Meg (yes, seriously)

*insert boilerplate complaint about dondon's high-risk-of-failure low turns*

I agree with Haar above Ike, and have been advocating for this forever. Haar is too critical in Part 3 for this not to be the case, this argument hardly even needs to be made. I would add though: don't shortchange Haar's Endgame performance. He's not great, but if you don't have Jill, you really can't go wrong with Haar for 4-E-1. I will freely admit that he is bad in all of the other Endgame chapters, but this one is the hardest one, so if you're going to be decent somewhere, it might as well be against the General Bomb.

--

Sothe in Top tier almost made me spit my coffee all over my keyboard. I hate to be a dick and over-simplify your point -- since people do that to me all of the time and it's annoying -- but the general crux of your argument appears to be that Sothe is somewhere around Volug in overall contribution, and thus ditto for tier list position. I will posit the same thing to you that I did to RFoF (she didn't respond then, but has a second bite at the apple if she wants to take it):

Why assume that Volug is tiered properly in the first place? Isn't is possible that he's too high for what we get out of him?

--

I am fine with Raisin moving down to High. It's absurd to rank herons at all, but Top is almost indefensible for his availability. I'll give him props for what he does in 3-8 and 3-10, which is substantial, but Top tier is goddamn ridiculous.

--

As I have said before, I am fine with Titania above Mia in theory. After all, they are close enough to begin with; the important point is that they both sit atop High tier, for their respective performances.

But, I think that your comparison was a bit disingenuous, particularly since you hand-waved Part 4 (for lack of data, I know, not intentionally: but it's like ignoring Sothe's earlygame, you cannot simply sweep this sort of thing under the rug). I don't really want to pick apart the chapter-by-chapter unless I have to, but there you go. I consider it important to not put too much weight on things that have obviously high chances of failure, or assume a style of BEXP usage where nobody is gaining stats.

--

Disagree on Fiona vs. Meg. The fight against the laguz plays out differently when your DB units are actually worth a damn, and you care about CEXP gain. So, while it's nice that Fiona can drain gauge, it's not as vital. Fiona's only advantage over Meg in this department is Canto, anyway.

I personally consider Meg's contributions in her free deployment chapters (1-4, 1-5, 3-6, 3-12, 3-13) to be better than Fiona's as a Rescue bot and roving gauge-drainer. But I guess that's mostly opinion, since they are both really terrible.

(hopefully Interceptor or someone will respond before then, or the points will be so overwhelming that there is no point in responding).

I am really, really, sick of arguing about Mia. I feel like I keep making the same points repeatedly, to be ignored until the next time that someone feels like dragging out the same viewpoint with a different candy-coating.

Also, as for hammers, not sure how long you can make 40 hammer uses last, even if every single use is a OHKO by using units like Haar and Titania whenever possible. [...] When you finished part 3, how many hammer uses did you have remaining? I suppose you could hammerne depending on what other weapons you use a lot.

I am kind of skeptical of how much distance you can get out of the Hammers as well, but my PE is not helpful in this case since I employ them in 3-12 and 2-E, which are non-efficient uses for the most part. I suppose that if you are using Brave Sword Ike to his fullest extent, and relying on Mia crits and standard 2RKOs for the Generals that are not mission-critical, you should be able to milk the Hammers long enough to last you perhaps for all of your important General purposes. The key part here is to make sure that you have enough uses left for Part 4 -- particularly 4-4 and 4-E-1 -- because almost everyone has trouble with Order-class Generals, with their ridiculous stats.

[Florete]

Sothe in Top tier almost made me spit my coffee all over my keyboard. I hate to be a dick and over-simplify your point -- since people do that to me all of the time and it's annoying -- but the general crux of your argument appears to be that Sothe is somewhere around Volug in overall contribution, and thus ditto for tier list position. I will posit the same thing to you that I did to RFoF (she didn't respond then, but has a second bite at the apple if she wants to take it):

Why assume that Volug is tiered properly in the first place? Isn't is possible that he's too high for what we get out of him?

This was considered, and Volug actually dropped back then. For about a day. Then the Pope argued him immediately back up (And I never argued for Sothe in Top, so I'm not sure what you're saying there).

[Interceptor]

This was considered, and Volug actually dropped back then. For about a day. Then the Pope argued him immediately back up (And I never argued for Sothe in Top, so I'm not sure what you're saying there).

I was referring to your Ranking thread, not the tier list. Unfortunately, the Great Black Hole of 2009 ate it.

The point is, I don't buy any argument for Sothe that has anything to do with Volug's position as taken-for-granted. Volug was put in Top a long, long time ago, and the argument for putting him there may not be as strong as it once was in light of things that have happened on the list since. The DB as a whole was doing better back then.

[Florete]

I was referring to your Ranking thread, not the tier list. Unfortunately, the Great Black Hole of 2009 ate it.

The point is, I don't buy any argument for Sothe that has anything to do with Volug's position as taken-for-granted. Volug was put in Top a long, long time ago, and the argument for putting him there may not be as strong as it once was in light of things that have happened on the list since. The DB as a whole was doing better back then.

You do realize that "Volug dropped" event I mentioned in the post you quoted was a mere few months ago, right? Technically speaking, Volug was put into Top somewhat recently.

[grandjackal]

In fact, the entire reason Volug dropped to High is because SOMEONE thought that Sothe wasn't Top worthy, so we figured "well, if Sothe's not top...".

[Interceptor]

You do realize that "Volug dropped" event I mentioned in the post you quoted was a mere few months ago, right? Technically speaking, Volug was put into Top somewhat recently.

As legendary as this thread is, it's only been around since the end of 2008; it is not yet even two years old. A few months is forever ago, and thus I say that Volug has been Top for a long, long time. Not quite "summer of Mia" levels, but you have to go halfway down High tier now before you hit a Dawn Brigade member that's not Volug or Sothe.