OMG it's a tier list

[Narga_Rocks]

Cards don't allow for counters, period. If they did Ena's offence wouldn't have that advantage over Kurth.

As for finishing chapters that aren't the last chapter in 3 turns, I recomment finishing the last chapter in as few turns as possible because there is no long term advantage to killing dozens of spirits while looking at Ashera with no Auras around her and saying hi. Plus Ashera is very annoying on these turns. Finishing all chapters in the number of turns for bexp (except 3-8) is good, and for chapters without requirements it is mostly just don't waste time, and if there is one enemy left standing and you can kill it, kill it (which also applies to 3-8). It may seem like a double standard but I don't think so.

As for fighting healers, Micaiah is forced so immortality vs. dragons is irrelevant (and needs 40mag/40res vs. whites and enough hp+def to survive the reds, though cover tiles help with that, so since you take issue with the levels the rest of us can get her to I should probably drop that).

Mostly it is Laura or Mist that fight better or survive better. The former is likely Oliver's equal in healing and the latter is likely not, but she is pretty close anyway cause for her physic range is less relevant and everyone's caps at 15 for some stupid reason anyway. Healing an extra few points requires getting your units to take more than 35 damage in the first place.

Edited June 25, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[dondon151]

Getting her to 20 in first tier is easy without Paragon. Thani-bombing, Sacrifice, 1-9, there are lots of ways and plenty of time to do it. Second tier is a bit tougher, but 20/12/1 (and possibly the newly minted 18/16/1) is simply sandbagging her level.

There are only so many armors in part 1 that Micaiah can kill once per turn, and Thani is usually used to weaken enemies, not to kill them, as doing so the other way around involves making inefficient use of ranged attacking. Sacrifice is 10 EXP per turn, worse than what Laura gets. 1-9 is not a reliable source of EXP at all, as Micaiah cannot OHKO enemies and is instantly defeated on average by pretty much every enemy in the chapter. 18/16/1 is still a rather generous estimate of her level.

She can heal on most turns, that's her primary source of experience. Plus, she'll likely get one of the two/three Paragons we have once 3-11 comes around for at least one map, giving her a signficant boost, and Physics and Recover become available.

Why would Micaiah take Paragon from other units that would actually see improvement with CEXP input?

[Narga_Rocks]

If she isn't at 30 mag she certainly has improvement. Even her res helps against white dragons. And in part 4 units that are already level 5 tier 3 don't generally need paragon to be good and so she is only competing with people who should be getting paragon in their first part 4 chapter anyway.

Oh, and Micaiah doesn't weaken with Thani in part 1. She kills with it. If she is getting appropriate levels, it is always a OHKO, even against most bosses. The one in 1-7 has range anyway and so someone else can weaken him for her. She gets so many bosses for whom she is the best for killing them that she gets lots of boss exp. As for 1-9, well, she is pretty useless without a Seraph Robe. She is OHKO'd by almost all so even having ~50% hit against her doesn't help much.

[Vykan12]

Let’s give this whole 4-5 dragon deal some more perspective. According to the site, there are 54 starting laguz, only 6 of which are dragons. That makes for a measly 11% of all enemies.

Let’s locate those 6 dragons:

Notice the top dragon has to pass through water before accessing the isle your party starts on.

This dragon also has to bypass some water and is going to take several turns just to reach one of your units.

The other 3 dragons are so far from your party that I couldn’t even find them in the video I watched.

I forgot to mention the prospect of using Tibarn as a dragon killer. Having him attack anything else on player phase is a bit pointless unless there’s an emergency situation since he 1RKOes cats/tigers/ravens naturally. He can canto after the kill, so the process isn’t slowing him down, and if he doesn’t activate tear, the dragon is still weakened enough for someone else to land an easy kill, possibly a 1HKO. The fact that he can reach dragons before they ever reach other team members is what makes this especially effective.

Last thing: unless you’re babying tons of units here to be used in 4-E (at which point Pelleas’ ranged attacking is just hogging kills other people want), you’re going to be deploying units that have enough durability to not be bothered by dragons.

Ideally, I’d say this either constitutes as a unit with enough def to take less than 15 damage from a tiger hit or who has 120+ avo. Assuming the former (~50 hp/ 30 def), dragons only pull off a 3HKO, so a dragon hit and 2 tiger hits would be needed to kill that unit. For the latter, the dragon will have less than 15 true hit. As an example, I calculated earlier that a --/20/1 Tanith (B wind/thunder/dark) would only face ~7 true hit against them.

[Narga_Rocks]

Well, I know he doesn't get much credit for them, but I still think he should get something. Since we don't need all 12 slots anyway it at least means Tibarn can do whatever he wants on all turns instead of all turns - 3. I don't know how much that's worth but I think it should at least be worth something.

Now, in your first pic the middle dragon can be avoided if we just swing right, and the dragon in the second pick can be avoided iff we can get past by turn 3. If we only have fliers and people unaffected by terrain, sure, that's easy. But he in the thickets we use to get by on enemy phase 3 or 4, so anything left behind faces him if we are trying to bring it, too, and if we are bringing an armor and want to bring him along he'll meet the dragon, or we need to bring Haar or Jill to combine with Tibarn for a take drop since they might be the only ones that can. (Pegs are like mid 20s weight and so are marshals, I don't know exact numbers). Granted, though, with doubling any trained armor should be able to take the dragon. The dragon in the middle island (top of first pic) probably isn't an issue if we just let tibarn and Elincia kill the boss quickly, but otherwise it might be if the boss doesn't move first. It should be noted, though, if the boss moves there are other dragons that might be near where he ends up. I'm not sure how much any of that is worth to Pelleas, but if Oliver doesn't go to endgame then it is more than he gets.

The numbers on Tanith are pretty cool though, and many other units should be able to achieve stuff like that so Pelleas might not matter much. (I don't know if Tanith can get to B in 3 chapters with anyone but Sigrun, and Sigrun is locked to Micaiah, but again I'm sure many other units can do similar things.) I still think having something cool he can do is better than Oliver. Thus, I think the main question is how endgame worthy is Oliver.

[Vykan12]

I guess we're just going to respectfully have different opinions on that matter. IMO, you guys are too readily assuming Oliver in 4-E is a negative just because he's not necessarily the best healer option you can take.

You don't need to be part of an optimal team choice to have positive utility. You simply need to be more helpful when deployed than if you weren't. Oliver's not slowing the team down by needing protection when he's physic-ing, nor is he hurting other units' E. phase production, the kinds of things that make a unit more of a detriment than anything.

Edited June 25, 2009 by Vykan12

[Narga_Rocks]

Well, I guess it's up to rage fox. I don't really know what got Pelleas so many people above Oliver in the first place. If it is his endgame "potential" then I think that would be underestimating the pain of growing him to respectable levels for it. Oliver clearly heals better than Pelleas in 4-E, so anything that involves endgame as the reason Pelleas is above Oliver relies on his fighting. So, we can't crown him until he caps magic and speed around level 17 if we want him to fight well, and then for his fighting skills to matter he can't heal enough to get to S staves without armscrolls. And if we don't care about S rank staffs, then it only takes 5 heals and 4 mends with discipline equipped to get a mage to use physic staves in an emergency so he isn't very special (but I guess all the other mages with staves are higher than him anyway). Now, as I said, I don't see why he is so many people above Oliver. For example I think that Ena helping to kill Deg and Ashera is worth more than Pelleas blicking dragons from afar in 4-5, and it is too much of a pain to raise Pelleas for him to do anything useful in endgame. Although I still technically disagree with Oliver>Pelleas, I think Ena at least could go above Pelleas.

Oh, and if Pelleas>Oliver then I don't see why not Sanaki>Oliver. In the desert she can attack really safely because the enemies won't be able to attack her on enemy phase if we place her right. In case we are worried about her two or three turns in the future, well, with 6 move versus everything else's 2 (except mages who don't hurt her much and dragonmasters we can see coming anyway) she can get away easily if there is no safe spot from which to attack. Unless you are only using people who can ORKO everything she is helping a lot cause she hits hard. I won't give her credit for 4-P or 4-E-1 or 4-E-2 because she needs to be held back until she can kill things without being in range of other enemies or we have to wall, so there are enough negatives for our other units protecting her that she isn't a positive, but in 4-E-3 if Pelleas blicking dragons was good enough to be > Oliver there then if we have a blessed bolting she and other mages can pass it around and have a good time. x+1 mages spamming bolting > x mages spamming bolting. Plus she can bless it herself so your other mages can bless an SS tome and not worry about it breaking. In 4-E-4 she can stand on wardwood tiles and either not get attacked by spirits or have thunder and fire spirits ping off her and wind spirits do 1x2 damage. Even if she never gets a point of res. She only takes off around half their health or so, but since most of our people only ORKO spirits because of doubling anyway, at least she spares them from a counter. This might matter if Sephiran decides to use his range move that comes out of nowhere on someone with low res and we didn't heal the person because we weren't expecting it. In 4-E-5, well, she and sothe have given their spots to Gareth and Nasir so whatever. She has some negative utility, I guess, but a fair amount of positives, too. Plus she can hide in the starting area of 4-P and only have to run when the swordmaster appears.

About 4-E-4, does Sephiran have a well defined pattern like Ashera so I can predict when he will use range, or no? This matters for Sanaki, and even Ena and Kurth who can also hurt spirits enough so others avoid counters.

Edited June 25, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[Vykan12]

*checks current list*

I can't say I agree with Pelleas being > any of those characters, even Gareth. I also agree that if Pelleas > Oliver, then Sanaki > Oliver because of 4-3.

[Progenitus]

Pelleas is a strong contender for one of the worst five units in the game, and is very easily in the bottom 10.

Pelleas is awful at fighting, and to have him spam physics we either have to level him up 9 times or throw a crown on him, which are both horrible ideas, considering we have several other staff users who don't need a crown to spam physics, or could take a crown and do the same thing as him (they'll just require one chapter of discipline, oh noes).

Compared to someone like Gareth, who can actually OHKO most spirits in 4-E-4 and can survive easily with a pure water, and then gives +5 str and skl for enemies who have a crapton of HP/def/avoid, and he doesn't take up one of our ten slots for 4-E.

Or someone like Lehran who might actually make 4-E-5 go by 1 turn faster, which is still better than what Pelleas can do (i.e. nothing).

btw, wtfux @ Astrid > Meg. At least Meg is sorta usable once she stops getting doubled (and she has a 65% spd growth and gains exp like a madman so that happens relatively quickly) or gets a stat booster or two. Astrid is awful at fighting the entire game no matter what you do.

For reference, a 20/4 Meg has comparable stats to a 20/20 Astrid.

35 HP, 19 str, 6 mag, 16 skl, 22 spd, 23 lck, 19 def, 13.5 res

vs

40 HP, 20.2 str, 11.6 mag, 24.1 skl, 22.2 spd, 29.6 lck, 15.4 def, 20 res

Meg has similar str/spd, actually wins def. Astrid has more HP, and then wins useless stats like mag and lck. Even the skl is entirely useless since Meg has heaven and has no hit issues.

This is frickin bad since Meg should actually be about the same level as Astrid when part 4 comes around (you'd be surprised what being 20/2 and having a grand total of 4.5 chapters before part 4 fighting underleveled pieces of crap half the time does for you).

So doing more realistic levels.

Meg 20/10

38.6 HP, 21.1 str, 6.9 mag, 18.4 skl, 22 spd, 27.5 lck, 21.1 def, 16.5 res

Astrid 20/10

37.4 HP, 16.2 str, 9.6 mag, 19.6 skl, 18.2 spd, 22.6 lck, 12.4 def, 18 res

lawl @ the gaps. 5 str, 4 spd, 9 def.

Astrid gets doubled by nearly every single enemy in 4-1, including generals. Even throwing a crown on Astrid isn't going to help because the halbs and warriors have 24-25 spd. Meg only gets doubled by the lone SM, and the three falcoknights, who 2-round even with doubling, which is pretty bad since those 4 enemies leave Astrid with 0.2 HP after one round.

Meg on the other hand is generally 3HKO'd. Some generals can 2HKO, as well as druids, though it doesn't matter because Astrid gets one rounded by them anyway. And Meg wins avoid.

Meg can also actually dent the enemies because her str isn't lolcrap.

Astrid with a silencer 5HKOs halbs, 4-5HKOs warriors, 7-12HKOs generals (lawl), OHKOs falcos. She also 3-4HKOs snipers and 3HKOs sages/druids, but since they one round her in return that doesn't matter.

Meg with a silver blade 3HKOs halbs, 3HKOs warriors, 3HKOs snipers, 4-6HKOs generals, 3HKOs falcos, 2HKOs sages/druids/priests.

If this isn't assrape I don't know what is.

"but Astrid has canto"

No one really cares if Astrid with an uber weapon can 3HKO the weakest enemies in the map and run behind your frontline afterwards, especially since if you have any hole in your line Astrid dies.

And meg has actual 1-range.

Even after Astrid promotes and gets lances, it's not like it does anything for her. She starts with C lances. Oh wow Astrid can use a steel lance, and then gets doubled and one rounded on the counter because her spd is crap and her def makes my mages cry.

Considering their growth spreads differ by 0 or 5 points in every stat other than spd (where Meg wins by 25), this doesn't get any better for Astrid, at all, especially since stuff like dracoshields and angelic robes help Meg a lot more than Astrid (Meg with a shield now generally gets 4HKO'd in 4-1. Astrid still gets one rounded because the enemies still double her), or a crown so she can escape her 22 spd cap. Of course that kind of stuff is favoritism, but this is frickin bottom tiers, of course they're crap without favoritism. The difference is that Meg with favoritism is somewhat usable. Astrid would need half the resources in the game to be usable.

Speaking of which, Astrid/Fiona/Lyre are so bad they should be in their own tier below bottom. The unholy trinity tier or something.

[Jaybee]

There's already an Est tier. They can all go there.

[Florete]

I'd argue Astrid > Meg, but I'm not exactly up to it at the moment, so if no one else opposes smash on this one I'll make the change.

[Interceptor]

I find it hard to beleive that Astrid making potshots and re-using the same wall that you use to protect your heron isn't > that what Meg is able to do. It's not like keeping Astrid alive is some kind of bridge too far, she has 9MV and Canto for chrissakes.

"but Astrid has canto"

No one really cares if Astrid with an uber weapon can 3HKO the weakest enemies in the map and run behind your frontline afterwards, especially since if you have any hole in your line Astrid dies.

Why would nobody care about that? Worst case scenario, Astrid just has a Turn where she doesn't do anything. Best case scenario, she weakens a unit, uncountered, and guarantees a kill for someone who doesn't suck as bad as she does. Silencer is barely favoritism at all, and if you're sandbagging Astrid by deploying everyone who knows how to use a bow, she can still use a steel forge. If you crown her, she will occasionally pop a miracle Sol and do triple damage, which is still an epic failure to kill but at least activates at 2-range.

Meg is clanking all over the place with 6 MV and can't do any of this. She is slightly easier to shove than Nolan, which is weird for a General, but I'm have a real difficult time seeing that as an advantage.

Hell, Astrid can run forward, rescue someone, and escape to safety. She can even pick up fatass Gatrie, which is more or less the highest bar to clear. That's actually occasionally useful.

[Zkirsche]

Why are you assuming that Micaiah is going to be at level 13+ at promotion? Micaiah only has 5 maps until Endgame (One of which she's locked to a ledge where she can't do anything more than Purge things and heal), and I can't imagine her gaining more than 4 levels in those maps. It's safe to say that Micaiah's somewhere around level 7 by promo, maybe not even that much. Laura I can give you, but Laura coming to endgame is lulzy.

She gets tonnes of exp from laguz in part 3 and being a tier 2 unti she gets tonnes of exp from any kills in part 4 too. Level 13 is not ridiculous.

Oliver at least has (nearly) auto-Fortify, possibly the highest magic on the team (Micaiah for reasona already explained, lolArchSage, Rhys has problems later on, Laura is way too underleveled, Mist and Elincia I'll give you), and possible Nosferatu and Valaura for some increased offense and durability (In Nosferatu's case). He also has reasons that Vykan explained already.

There are tonnes of arms scrolls for use in endgame and tonnes of gold to buy them with.

Silencer is barely favoritism at all

So what are we giving Shinon?

There's already an Est tier. They can all go there.

Lyre is easily a tier better than Fiona.

Which is why the Worst than Est tier needs to be made with Fiona in it.

Edited June 25, 2009 by kirsche

[Interceptor]

So what are we giving Shinon?

Uhh, the other Silencer? You get two. I'm assuming here that you bought him the one in 3-4. Astrid can use the free one from 3-E Base, since she needs to get to A Bows before she can use it anyway.

[Zkirsche]

Uhh, the other Silencer? You get two. I'm assuming here that you bought him the one in 3-4. Astrid can use the free one from 3-E Base, since she needs to get to A Bows before she can use it anyway.

That would be broken by 3-E though, Shinon only needs 25 player phrases for it to break, slightly more if he attacks an SM and adept didn't activate or he critkilled some.

Does he have ~35 player phrase turns? Very likely yes. Chapters usally last 10 turns. So that's quite a bit of non-usage for it to not have broken.

It's not like keeping Astrid alive is some kind of bridge too far, she has 9MV and Canto for chrissakes.

All the other untis in her part 2 and 3-9 have that, though, but they're not cantoing back as much as her. That means she'll be left behind and unable to keep up and attack.

[Interceptor]

That would be broken by 3-E though, Shinon only needs 25 player phrases for it to break, slightly more if he attacks an SM and adept didn't activate or he critkilled some.

Does he have ~35 player phrase turns? Very likely yes. Chapters usally last 10 turns. So that's quite a bit of non-usage for it to not have broken.

Well, considering that Shinon is also probably going to have a forged bow (something to use in 3-2 and 3-3), and he's not using Silencer to kill everything, and, by the way, Shinon is not always being used, I'm not sure I see a problem. Worst case, we forge Astrid a Steel Bow that's -1 mt. It's not like it makes her any worse.

All the other untis in her part 2 and 3-9 have that, though, but they're not cantoing back as much as her. That means she'll be left behind and unable to keep up and attack.

So what you're saying is... Astrid sucks? Can't say I disagree. Like I said, worst case she just burns a Turn doing nothing. In the situation where she gets left behind, she spends a turn catching up. Whoop-dee-doo, says this poster.

[Narga_Rocks]

How is Shinon breaking the Silencer? Even though his offence isn't good with a crossbow, he uses that on enemy phase sometimes. Anything he attacks with that can now likely be killed with a steel bow. Plus Shinon is not always the only thing attacking an enemy. There are lots of times you can let him use a steel bow. Even if the silencer is close to breaking, he's about to get a silver forge soon anyway. If he goes Tibarn's route he doesn't even need to make his silencer last because he won't break the second one in 3-E and can start using a forge in 4-2. If he doesn't go with Tibarn he needs to make his silencer last until 4-P/1 ends but still, it isn't hard. Even if Shinon leaves a couple of things weakened instead of dead, you are likely raising some units that don't ORKO stuff anyway, and Shinon starts at a higher level than most of them anyway, so it likely helps the army more to let someone else kill something (they level faster and the overall stats of your army go up quicker). With good management I don't really see the first silencer breaking too early.

[Zkirsche]

Well, considering that Shinon is also probably going to have a forged bow (something to use in 3-2 and 3-3), and he's not using Silencer to kill everything, and, by the way, Shinon is not always being used, I'm not sure I see a problem. Worst case, we forge Astrid a Steel Bow that's -1 mt. It's not like it makes her any worse.

Shinon's likely to be used, though. High tier = likely to be used.

So what you're saying is... Astrid sucks? Can't say I disagree. Like I said, worst case she just burns a Turn doing nothing. In the situation where she gets left behind, she spends a turn catching up. Whoop-dee-doo, says this poster.

That using her full move and canto means that she sometimes doesn't hve any sort of action whatsoever. That's worse than Having action. Action > No action.

[Dat Nick]

and, by the way, Shinon is not always being used, I'm not sure I see a problem.

Shinon is at the bottom of high tier, which is certainly quite good. I'd say he's far more likely to be used than not.

[Colonel M]

Chances are Shinon only needs the Silencer in rare situations (it's a difference of 2 Atk), so he can always use the forged Steel Bow if it's more practical. Other times he can use the Silencer when the Steel Bow barely misses a ORKO or something.

[charmander6000]

Wow this really flew by, some quick comments.

- Pelleas/Oliver pretty much comes down to whether two chapters of healing and weak shots is worth a Master Crown and maybe a Spirit Dust which no one, but Calill wants.

- Oliver won't get the fortify staff; Micaiah is forced, will have higher magic and is considered the primary healer in any given PT. You could call this PE, but I've never had a PT where I needed to use Fortify twice in one turn. Of course using Physic is fine, but for at least the first few chapters of endgame my secondary healer isn't going to do much which is why someone like Elincia would be better for the job.

- Micaiah shouldn't have a problem reaching her magic cap at 20/13. She has no problem hitting level 20 in part 1 with either the ability to get paragon which doesn't have much competition or having 1-9 to herself. 3-6 and 3-12 doesn't have a turn limit and while I like to stall and get as much experience as I can I'll give those chapters a 10 turn limit each. With Micaiah using Physic and heal that puts her at about 20/4, 3-13 she uses the sleep staff and Physic and reaches about 20/7. This is all done with strict staff use. The part 4 chapters require less healing since the enemies are weaker than the ones in 3-6 and 3-13 and your allies are stronger. In the first chapter she can Thani bomb many of the enemies which gives her a lot of experience, Thani also does a lot of damage in the second chapter. This is all without paragon, which she makes a great claim for since it's benefical for the player to get her as close to level 20 as possible.

- Meg/Astrid. Meg becomes okay after some effort while Astrid requires full-out favouritism to be okay. Of course with the way this topic is heading making random potshots is probably worth more than actually trying to training the unit.

Edited June 25, 2009 by charmander6000

[Interceptor]

That using her full move and canto means that she sometimes doesn't hve any sort of action whatsoever. That's worse than Having action. Action > No action.

It depends what action it's being compared against. Meg can't really do anything significant without being on the front lines, and she so awful that she actually slows you down if she sees too much Enemy Phase action, which suggests that you'd want ot keep her from being targetted even when she survives. It's not like she has dangerous damage output to counter-balance her awful durability.

Shinon is at the bottom of high tier, which is certainly quite good. I'd say he's far more likely to be used than not.

So what you're saying is, he's not deployed all of the time, which is exactly what I said myself.

*slow clap*

[CT075]

- Pelleas/Oliver pretty much comes down to whether two chapters of healing and weak shots is worth a Master Crown and maybe a Spirit Dust which no one, but Calill wants.

Thing is, Pelleas isn't a very good contender for Endgame. Oliver can be. And Master Crown+Spirit Dust is just favoritism.

- Oliver won't get the fortify staff; Micaiah is forced, will have higher magic and is considered the primary healer in any given PT. You could call this PE, but I've never had a PT where I needed to use Fortify twice in one turn. Of course using Physic is fine, but for at least the first few chapters of endgame my secondary healer isn't going to do much which is why someone like Elincia would be better for the job.

Micaiah and Oliver most likely have the two highest magics in the game. Oliver can easily get a chance to use the Fortify staff if Micaiah is Physic-ing or something. Heck, we could even have him Valaura so he can provide some pseudo

-chip damage.

- Micaiah shouldn't have a problem reaching her magic cap at 20/13. She has no problem hitting level 20 in part 1 with either the ability to get paragon which doesn't have much competition or having 1-9 to herself. 3-6 and 3-12 doesn't have a turn limit and while I like to stall and get as much experience as I can I'll give those chapters a 10 turn limit each. With Micaiah using Physic and heal that puts her at about 20/4, 3-13 she uses the sleep staff and Physic and reaches about 20/7. This is all done with strict staff use. The part 4 chapters require less healing since the enemies are weaker than the ones in 3-6 and 3-13 and your allies are stronger. In the first chapter she can Thani bomb many of the enemies which gives her a lot of experience, Thani also does a lot of damage in the second chapter. This is all without paragon, which she makes a great claim for since it's benefical for the player to get her as close to level 20 as possible.

The only real time that Micaiah needs to Physic enough for more than 2 levels is 3-6. 3-12 is just lolbeorc and you have T-Block and Volug. 3-13 Sleep staff only has 3 uses and what's to say that you even need it? As for physic-ing, you have Tauroneo the silver wall who can chug a Crown that no-one else really wants to use to be 6RKO'd by Tigers, you have Volug, you have Zihark and Sothe the dodgier units, you have Chuck Nolan and Tarvos, you have chokepoints galore, etc. I'd put her at level 20/5 by now, including Thanibombs and healing. As for her P4 chapters, she's a defensive liability because several units can insta-blick her IIRC and if you need Thani to destroy Pallys you haven't been training your team very well.

As for Paragon, there's Volug, Nolan, Zihark, heck even Sothe who wouldn't mind it.

- Meg/Astrid. Meg becomes okay after some effort while Astrid requires full-out favouritism to be okay. Of course with the way this topic is heading making random potshots is probably worth more than actually trying to training the unit.

Fair enough.

[Progenitus]

BTW, that comparison I had at 4-1 was assuming we babied Astrid (aka lolsuck). And she was already getting pwned up the ass.

Since people here have the ingenious idea that she's making stupid potshots and not getting any kills, I think we have to redo the comparison with Astrid at base level (not like giving her 1 level would do anything, or 10 for that matter).

Oh look, now she has 29 att with silencer instead of 32. As if it didn't suck enough dick already, now it's even worse.

In 4-1, she now 7HKOs halbs, 5-6HKOs warriors, 13-47HKOs generals. There's falcos she can still OHKO, but considering these are the only falcos Astrid could ever face, that doesn't matter, and there's only three of them anyway, and this is a FoW chapter so if she's anywhere near the frontlines they fly around and one round her. At least our heron doesn't actually have to be near the frontlines all the time to do anything in case you think a falco is nearby (they can chant a staff user sitting in the back spamming physics).

At this point she may as well not even fucking attack. Doing 5-10 damage to an enemy and not doubling (and only to certain enemies, since generals have a crapton of def, and snipers and sages counterattack and one round her, in addition to the normal enemies like halbs and warriors using 2-range) and then requiring protection is not helping ANYONE. No one gives a shit if she can do 10-20% HP damage to specific enemies, since my units who are 2-rounding (which makes up a huge majority of our units) are still giving her the finger because they need another unit who can 2-round to attack with them anyway. For Astrid to actually be useful, you're saying she's always attacking with a unit who does 80-90% of an enemy's HP, which is limited to like str-screwed Ike or something retardedly uncommon.

The gold I save from not having to throw the silencer on her already counteracts ANY positive performance she could get.

At least with Meg some people actually care that she's doing ~33% HP damage to an enemy, and Meg actually doesn't die on us because she doesn't get one rounded by the entire map, and Meg actually has POTENTIAL to be good. Early seal + crown on her means she might actually double, and given that she'll have ~20% chance to Luna per attack, that's frickin good for a BOTTOM TIER.

"hur dur meg has 6 move", well at least she can do SOMETHING out of the times she sees combat in the chapter. Astrid is useless for the entire chapter.

Fuck we don't even need to train meg if we're talking about a unit's performance at base level. She could just follow our heron and shove and she'd STILL be more useful than Astrid burning through a silencer doing 5-10 damage to a few enemies or rescuing units that shouldn't need to be rescued in the first place.

Basically it boils down to this.

We don't train either. Meg can do stuff like shove our heron. Astrid attacks for like 5-10 damage and gets one rounded by everything.

We train both. Meg is now actually semi-competent. Astrid attacks for 10-15 damage and still gets one rounded by everything.

I honestly can't believe people are actually trying to defend Astrid. I know we all hate Meg because she's ugly, but come on, let's use logic here.

Edited June 25, 2009 by smash fanatic

[Interceptor]

requiring protection is not helping ANYONE.

You're already protecting your heron, Astrid can use the same wall. If it's not safe to do anything, no harm, she can just pop a Torch or something.

No one gives a shit if she can do 10-20% HP damage to specific enemies, since my units who are 2-rounding (which makes up a huge majority of our units) are still giving her the finger because they need another unit who can 2-round to attack with them anyway. For Astrid to actually be useful, you're saying she's always attacking with a unit who does 80-90% of an enemy's HP, which is limited to like str-screwed Ike or something retardedly uncommon.

She can hang out with Oscar, as an example of a unit with low STR that's probably on this route. 44-45mt to clean 2HKO some stuff for him, good luck. BTW, Astrid can support Danved for +ATK if you have the deployment space for him.

And hey, uncommon != does not happen.

The gold I save from not having to throw the silencer on her already counteracts ANY positive performance she could get.

Only if the gold could have gone to something more useful than her contribution, and there's a crapload of gold in Part 4. Eventually, in order to spend gold, you have to start using it only really piddly little things. Note that she might just be using a hand-me-down weapon from Shinon, which would otherwise be going to waste or sold for a pittiance.

At least with Meg some people actually care that she's doing ~33% HP damage to an enemy, and Meg actually doesn't die on us because she doesn't get one rounded by the entire map, and Meg actually has POTENTIAL to be good. Early seal + crown on her means she might actually double, and given that she'll have ~20% chance to Luna per attack, that's frickin good for a BOTTOM TIER.

Meg needs to be protected from attacks, otherwise her ridiculously low XX% damage on Enemy Phase is actually slowing your army down, since pretty much everyone is beating her offensively and she's an enemy magnet.

"hur dur meg has 6 move", well at least she can do SOMETHING out of the times she sees combat in the chapter. Astrid is useless for the entire chapter.

Astrid can potshot and/or Rescue people. I reject your claim that Rescue is never useful, ever, as an obviously exaggerated "no u".

Fuck we don't even need to train meg if we're talking about a unit's performance at base level. She could just follow our heron and shove and she'd STILL be more useful than Astrid burning through a silencer doing 5-10 damage to a few enemies or rescuing units that shouldn't need to be rescued in the first place.

Interesting point: Meg sucks at shoving. Her Con is only 6, meaning anything with WT > 8 is untouchable for her. Shoving a heron out of danger implies that she'd be in danger, which doesn't work. Shoving a heron for speed clearing only works for one turn, since she only has 5MV, aka she's so slow that one shove of Rafiel and he's already impossible for her to catch. rofl.

What's she shoving a heron for, again? There must be a third option that I am missing.

We train both. Meg is now actually semi-competent. Astrid attacks for 10-15 damage and still gets one rounded by everything.

It's a lot harder to train Meg (takes more resources), and she can't contribute anything substantial without doing something like boning your Enemy Phase.

I honestly can't believe people are actually trying to defend Astrid. I know we all hate Meg because she's ugly, but come on, let's use logic here.

The logic used above in this post is your own logic of negative utility. Just as a reminder, since I don't subscribe to it.