OMG it's a tier list

[Narga_Rocks]

About the Olivi Grass, stuff, there's also a hidden one in 2-E that Heather can pick up. You can't use any laguz yet, but it still helps to spread the growth.

EDIT: I mean in 3-2 there are no laguz to use.

The top one can be picked up on turn 2 and helps Mordy stay transformed. The other one I'll give you though. It isn't difficult to get if you know what you are doing, but is likely too late for much use in 2-E so it ends up helping in part 3. Probably get around 10 or so uses left after part 2 between all 3 grasses, it depends on how much you use the laguz in part 2, really. I'm sure some people could manage 16 or more, and I think I kept 5/6 stone uses, too.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[Progenitus]

I'm sure there are others, too, there is just no point in mentioning them all. The effect is that Gareth almost OHKOing spirits while needing a lot of planning to keep him alive just seems more trouble than it is worth.

The problem is that several of the people who can are mediocre units like Edward and Rolf who aren't played very often. Hell, most of the units that can one round spirits at 1-2 range are growth units in general who start off crappy (like Calill and Marcia) and we might not be arsed to raise them all the time, not to mention some of these units fight for the same weapons (such as Neph and Marcia who both fight for the wishblade).

This leaves us with like 10 beorcs or so that can actually manage to one round spirits at 1-2 range and might be played often enough to worry Gareth, which is pretty low when you remember that Gareth is a lower mid unit.

[Narga_Rocks]

The problem is that several of the people who can are mediocre units like Edward and Rolf who aren't played very often. Hell, most of the units that can one round spirits at 1-2 range are growth units in general who start off crappy (like Calill and Marcia) and we might not be arsed to raise them all the time, not to mention some of these units fight for the same weapons (such as Neph and Marcia who both fight for the wishblade).

This leaves us with like 10 beorcs or so that can actually manage to one round spirits at 1-2 range and might be played often enough to worry Gareth, which is pretty low when you remember that Gareth is a lower mid unit.

Yeah, I know Marcia and Neph can't both use it. And I would never recommend raising Edward on anything but EM. He might be passable on NM, but I took him to sword master level 1 and stopped. On HM he never made level 10. Raising Rolf might be less painful than Edward, but he would have to park on a wardwood tile and that is just as restrictive as Gareth.

Since even a speed blessed/forced/bexp abused Micaiah will only ever be able to ORKO thunder spirits, and only if you position her somewhere from which they can't stand on wardwood and attack, we likely won't be able to stack our entire team with guys that can ORKO. We would need 8 people to stand in a diamond around her and they each somehow need 52 might to ORKO fire spirits on cover tiles (though again I question the def numbers the site says). I don't think we can get that many.

To be honest I think you were being generous with saying 10. Aside from Alondite and Ragnell and Wishblade and Double Bow, I don't see any other weapons that can do it. A mage needs 61 mt to take down a spirit on a wardwood tile, and doubling, and that ain't happening, even with Nasir. Nolan/Boyd could do it with a 14 mt hand axe, but without coins or an atk support Nolan needs 38 str (or 37 with a crappy coin), which is hard for him to get. Boyd can easily get that kind of str, but spd takes him a lot of levels.

We are basically looking at Ike, Marcia/Nephenee, Mia w/ atk support (stupid idea when she'd lose Ike support), Edward (bad idea) w/ atk support, Shinon/Rolf, and maybe Nolan and Boyd.

Basically, because of lack of weapons, we have 3 people that are good ideas to set up that way and will actually ORKO all of them. Mia w/ non-atk support (better idea) can ORKO all but fire, though, so we really have 3 and two thirds units, or 5 and two thirds units if we have two forged hand axes and they actually pulled off the str and spd requirements.

I think there is only one way to make sure everyone ORKOs, and it is very restrictive and probably doesn't really hurt Gareth. Basically we would need to only use those 3 people mentioned earlier (Ike, Marcia, Shinon) and have one of them with Saviour to grab Micaiah. It is doable, but I'd never do it.

I still don't see what Gareth brings that others don't, but I think we've done as much as we can discussing this. I'm not saying Gareth is a negative, because if we are careful he isn't a detriment and doesn't do any worse than most other people we can deploy. I'm just saying he takes more thought to keep alive than others so a bit more damage on his first hit when most people can clean up after almost anyone anyway just makes me think "neutral".

Anyway, I don't think anyone else seems to care, and you aren't signed in right now so I think I'm done with this Gareth thing for now.

edit: Oh yeah, now you are signed in.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[Hexmaster44]

Ashera staff isn't locked to Lehran, and his utility has to be more impressive than "well he's useful if we don't have another SS rank staff user and Fortify is broken." Danved and Makalov are useful in every turn of 3-9 (lack of PC units) and I'm not clear on Renning's offensive ability in 4-E but I think it's passable.

Renning does fine with an Energy Drop and a Brave Axe. Trust me, it's been done. He might not need the Energy Drop, as it's such a valuable resource. I might have given him an extra Ashera Icon as well.

[Zkirsche]

Renning does fine with an Energy Drop and a Brave Axe. Trust me, it's been done. He might not need the Energy Drop, as it's such a valuable resource. I might have given him an extra Ashera Icon as well.

List of units that can use the brave axe well:

• Gatrie
  
• Brom
  
• Haar
  
• Boyd
  
• Titania
  
• Kieran
  

Needing to be good with such a valuable resource is not good.

You'd argue Shinon to top of High if you thought you could get away with it, facts be damned.

I believe you have me and smash mistaken for each other.

Edited July 7, 2009 by kirsche

[charmander6000]

I think we need to get back to the original topic of Leanne being too high. The characters around her have about twice the availability than she does; that's a big gap that she has to fill.

[Narga_Rocks]

I think we need to get back to the original topic of Leanne being too high. The characters around her have about twice the availability than she does; that's a big gap that she has to fill.

Well, that was Red Fox of Fire's question after she dropped Rafiel, but smash wanted his proposals discussed. Some of his proposals aren't really so bad. Some are. Because some are, the rest are mostly getting ignored. Or maybe because he is smash, I'm not sure. Either way there is enough passable ideas in his suggestion that it warrants discussion.

Before Red Fox asked, I think the only people commenting on Leanne were you, me, and dondon151. I'm not sure if that is enough for it to be "the original topic". A lot more people have been weighing in on Gatrie > Hawks than the Leanne thing. Sure, you brought up Leanne before Colonel M brought up Gatrie and the Hawks, but the Leanne thing was ignored by most even more than Smash's first shot at his changes. Given how the board seems more interested in Gatrie and the Hawks than dropping Leanne, I'd say it seems logical to settle that first.

I believe you have me and smash mistaken for each other.

Int was talking to smash, so unless you are saying that you would argue Shinon to top of high if you thought you could get away with it, then Int doesn't have anyone mistaken for anyone else.

Renning does fine with an Energy Drop and a Brave Axe. Trust me, it's been done. He might not need the Energy Drop, as it's such a valuable resource. I might have given him an extra Ashera Icon as well.

Needing the Brave Axe is not good. The main point though here is that he won't be better than Titania and Oscar, who are pretty good in part 3 and will likely enter 4-E-1 much better than Renning. Titania would like a brave Axe too and if you were using them they could easily have more than Renning's 29 speed. People like Bastian and Oliver don't have that type of thing going against them. Their competition (Soren, Ilyana, Calill for Bastian's offense, Laura and Rhys for comparing healing) are generally seen as not so great units in their parts and so it is a pain to raise them. Well, Laura is seen as good for her healing in her parts, but you can't get her to a good enough level for endgame on healing alone, or I don't think you can. Basically you need to struggle with them all the way to make them better than Bastian and Oliver. As a result, Bastian + Oliver > Renning. Well, Bastian is already > Renning, so whatever.

Aside from Oliver, smash is only pushing Gareth and Lehran above Renning. Gareth gives us an excuse to dump Sanaki and Sothe, so that's good, and Lehran isn't competing with anyone for his slot and gets to use his staff in turn 1 uncontested because of how the game set it up. Renning either means 3 Gold/Silver Knights in endgame or kicking out 2 units that were probably raised decently. Well, I never use Oscar, but given his spot it seems a lot do. Regardless, in order to be good he is either taking the Vague Katti away from Mia or the Alondite away from someone or the Brave Axe away from someone, all of those someones are likely far far better than he is. Gareth and Lehran give us something we can't get elsewhere. So while maybe it could go either way, it at least seems reasonable to put Lehran>Gareth>Renning.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[Interceptor]

It's just icing on the cake about how terrible Sothe is in part 4.

The cake is a lie. This disadvantage does not amount to a cherry on top, never mind frosting. Sothe is bad in Part 4, but it's quite easy to prove it without bringing up a non-point such as Sothe's SS rank prospects. In the realm of easily-solved problems that barely have any footprint at all on the rest of the army, this one is a classic. It has all of the traction of complaining about some Part 4 laguz getting a Satori Sign.

It's nice to know that someone will take off a part of their day just so they can troll me. I almost feel like a celebrity.

You're as narcissistic as a celebrity, so I'd say that you're well on your way.

But no, I just threw a comment in there because you mentioned me by name WRT Mia > Sothe, and I already had a post open to shine a light on one of your more ridiculous arugments. It was low-cost, so my mental bean-counter signed off on it.

I believe you have me and smash mistaken for each other.

No, I was definitely referring to smash, although you both have a simliar defect in your logic when it comes to Shinon. While you repeatedly bring up things like crossbows and Adept and whatnot in order to prove that Shinon's Enemy Phase is not worthless, smash takes it from a different angle and tries to make it seems OK that Shinon is not doing anything useful except killing things on Player Phase (generally to justify the absurd ranking difference between Shinon and Boyd in his ranking topic).

Both of you ignore borderline scenarios, ignore points that are fatal to your logical construct, and misrepresent the arguments of people who disagree. For you, it's ignoring that units get DEF higher than those you meet in 3-1, ignoring Generals, ignoring that the Crossbow has 35 uses, etc. For smash, it's ignoring the things that Shinon does not cleanly kill, ignoring that Shinon's durability goes to waste whenever he hides him behind something, ignoring various Upper Mid units that can threaten Shinon's overall offense just by taking a hit on Enemy Phase, etc.

Hopefully that's all cleared up, now. I don't want anyone to be confused.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Interceptor

[Narga_Rocks]

I'd have to say that these two were my favourites:

You're as narcissistic as a celebrity, so I'd say that you're well on your way.

It was low-cost, so my mental bean-counter signed off on it.

I give the first a 7/10, and the second an 8/10.

The math in its death throws thing will always be the benchmark 10/10.

[Zkirsche]

Any reasoning behind Boyd > Aran? Boyd isn't bad in part 3 and is quite good in part 4. I don't think Aran is ever quite that good.

[-Cynthia-]

Any reasoning behind Boyd > Aran? Boyd isn't bad in part 3 and is quite good in part 4. I don't think Aran is ever quite that good.

Not to get into this again, but I think Aran is in general overrated. For reference, Aran at base has the same HP as Jill, but 2 less Def, and Jill isn't considered very durable Part 1. Aran also runs the risk of getting doubled, cats and myrms definitely do it, and even things like warriors have a good chance if Aran is slightly speed screwed.

Aran really isn't very durable to begin with, 1-4 enemies all 2RKO him for instance. He's losing durability to people like Edward, since Edward isn't getting doubled by cats, has at least a marginal chance to dodge, and isn't getting critted. This mediocre starting durability combined with poor offense (never doubling anything, only 10 base Str) means that his good Def and Str growths won't kick in for quite some time.

Aran does become better as Part 1 goes on, but so does his competition. He's inferior to Sothe, Volug, Nolan, Jill, Zihark, Tauroneo, Muarim, Tormod, Vika, Nailah, and the BK. He's just generally inferior offensively due to never doubling and he really is only barely beating Nolan/Jill in durability and they have other things to make up for it.

Then 3-6 rolls around and guess what? Aran is 2RKOd by almost every enemy on the map, it's 1-4 all over again. Now like a 20/3 Aran with a Seraph can start surviving, but Aran even reaching promotion is questionable due to his poor offense, and many other DB members also avoid 2HKOs with some favoritism (Jill, Nolan, Sothe, Zihark/Eddie with Resolve). Most people are much more durable than Aran is against cats, since Aran is getting doubled by them still.

Then Aran is just a waste of a space part 4, he's severely underleveled and we don't really want to bother raising a unit with a 33 speed cap he'll never reach. I don't really see how Aran is above people like Tauroneo, Tauroneo beats Aran handily in every area on all maps they share, and Aran really isn't that useful when Taur isn't around.

Edited July 7, 2009 by -Cynthia-

[charmander6000]

Let's see, for the first two chapters Boyd 3RKOs most enemies unless he gets a crit with his killer axe and he literally does not double anything while getting doubled by swordmasters. In return he can be 4RKO, borderline 3RKO by enemies thanks to his massive HP and faces about 60% display hit. Once you are able to buy items Boyd can now 2RKO enemies. By around 3-4/5 Boyd will stop being doubled by swordmasters, but he won't double regularly until after promotion which happens at around 3-11. A speedwing isn't really helpful, all it does is stop Boyd from getting doubled by swordmasters earlier and give him the ability to double about a chapter earlier. With the promotion Boyd can now 1RKO many things while gets 4RKO by most things

Aran is 3RKO by most things in 1-3 and can 2RKO/3RKO enemies. His hit-rate isn't the greatest, but his growths tend to fix that. By 1-E he still 2RKO/3RKOs most enemies while he can borderline last four rounds against enemies. In part 3 Tigers can 2RKO while Cats 3RKO because they can double. The rest of the team isn't faring too much better either, but at least they can double tigers making this chapter end faster.

Since this is hard mode and Aran won't get a boatload of bexp and double I would give Boyd's part 4 the edge over Aran.

[Interceptor]

Add to all of that, Boyd has a non-silly chance to ORKO even when he's 2RKOing, because of things like a forge, or a Killer, or his Bond supports. His 1-2 is also pretty respectable, particularly once you're able to forge Hand Axes.

[Narga_Rocks]

Let's see, for the first two chapters Boyd 3RKOs most enemies unless he gets a crit with his killer axe and he literally does not double anything while getting doubled by swordmasters.

...

Since this is hard mode and Aran won't get a boatload of bexp and double I would give Boyd's part 4 the edge over Aran.

Sounds like at least 4 people so far (Kirshe, -Cynthia-, and charmander6000, Intercepter) say Boyd>Aran.

If it matters to anyone, technically Boyd can steal Titania's Steel Poleaxe in 3-P and 2RKO everything not a general in 3-P and 3-1 if we wanted. If Titania takes Boyd's Steel Axe in return, she still 2RKOs things not generals in 3-P and 3-1 and now has a higher hit rate, and she never 2HKO'd the generals with her Steel Poleaxe anyway. I don't know what -15 hit would do to Boyd's chances of hitting, though.

Just saying it seems like Boyd and Titania could trade those weapons, aside from how Titania has 10 better Hit with the steel poleaxe than Boyd does so Boyd might need the Steel Axe's 75 hit rate enough that the 60 from the Steel Poleaxe becomes a bad idea.

But Boyd does need to stay away from the steel blade swordmasters considering one crit in its two tries means a dead Boyd (the guy needs his other whack to connect though if Boyd is on a thicket). The killing edge swordmaster in 3-1 needs two crits and for boyd to not be on a thicket to kill him, and the steel sword swordmaster in 3-P leaves Boyd with 5 hp if he gets one crit and hits both times, 9 hp if Boyd is on a thicket, dead in the unlikely event of 2 crits. Still, though, keeping him away from 4 guys seems rather minor. (2 sm in 3-P, 1 in 3-1 at the start and one reinforcement)

@Int, doesn't Aran get a shot at a crit kill? Boyd gets a better chance though, I suppose, given he can actually take a killer axe and we can have 3 if we want in 3-2, and Aran has no bonds. I'm just saying Aran will likely have over 10 if we forge him a max crit weapon, which is probably a non-silly chance. The sad thing for Aran is that he can't reasonably touch a forged javelin until part 4, so until then he loses 2 range to most. (Stealing from Kieran in 3-12 or Ike/Soren in 3-13 is not reasonable)

The last two paragraphs were just being thorough in the hope that I can't be accused of ignoring those minor points.

[Florete]

I'm about 99.9% sure smash fanatic will oppose Boyd > Aran, so I'll wait for him for fun.

[Narga_Rocks]

I'm about 99.9% sure smash fanatic will oppose Boyd > Aran, so I'll wait for him for fun.

Only 99.9%? If smash doesn't it would be funny given the 2.5 point difference he has them at in his rating topic.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[Interceptor]

@Int, doesn't Aran get a shot at a crit kill? Boyd gets a better chance though, I suppose, given he can actually take a killer axe and we can have 3 if we want in 3-2, and Aran has no bonds. I'm just saying Aran will likely have over 10 if we forge him a max crit weapon, which is probably a non-silly chance. The sad thing for Aran is that he can't reasonably touch a forged javelin until part 4, so until then he loses 2 range to most. (Stealing from Kieran in 3-12 or Ike/Soren in 3-13 is not reasonable)

Sure, Aran can get a shot at a crit kill. He's just limited to the +15 from a forge, and you have to decide whether it's really a good idea that he randomly blicks something and clears a spot on Enemy Phase (probably in Part 3 you don't want him doing that).

[Narga_Rocks]

Sure, Aran can get a shot at a crit kill. He's just limited to the +15 from a forge, and you have to decide whether it's really a good idea that he randomly blicks something and clears a spot on Enemy Phase (probably in Part 3 you don't want him doing that).

Never said it was a good idea. Just didn't want smash to be able to say "Aran can crit things too" as if I never thought of it. For part 3, if I could I'd be tempted to forge negative crit to get people to 0 against the cats and tigers. For part 1, I can forge something for everyone, sure, but I don't think I can give them all +15 crit. And since he is still 2RKOd by a lot of part 1 enemies, it isn't even a good idea there cause of the spot clearing thing you mentioned.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[grandjackal]

Uhhh...I know Leo failde to go above Eddie, but...Doesn't under him seem ok? I mean, he was pretty damn comparable, and I think he has more time to be of good use than Lucia. I mean he needs no training to be of epic use 3-13 (ballistae shooting down hawks). If you bothered to train him, he's practically a god there. That has to count for something...ya? ;;>>

Come on, surely he's better than Mak...

Edited July 7, 2009 by Pretty Boi Wolf

[Narga_Rocks]

Uhhh...I know Leo failde to go above Eddie, but...Doesn't under him seem ok? I mean, he was pretty damn comparable, and I think he has more time to be of good use than Lucia. I mean he needs no training to be of epic use 3-13 (ballistae shooting down hawks). If you bothered to train him, he's practically a god there. That has to count for something...ya? ;;>>

Come on, surely he's better than Mak...

I think a lot of people want Eddie to go down. Still, though, if you give Leo a B Meg support he is better on the ballistas than the NPCs since he will have a 100% hit rate against the hawks. I don't think most people count it for much, though. (That's like a level 11 tier 1 Leo, by the way.)

Lucia comes down to how passable her part 4 is, because 7 turns in one chapter of being really good might not be better than Nealuchi's many more turns of being pretty good in part 2, for example.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Narga_Rocks

[Florete]

Closed the gap between Ed and Leo, let me know how it looks.

[grandjackal]

I think a lot of people want Eddie to go down. Still, though, if you give Leo a B Meg support he is better on the ballistas than the NPCs since he will have a 100% hit rate against the hawks. I don't think most people count it for much, though.

Lucia comes down to how passable her part 4 is, because 7 turns in one chapter of being really good might not be better than Nealuchi's many more turns of being pretty good in part 2, for example.

Yeah, weren't Lucia, Volke and Tormod (and I'd say in association, Stefan) gonna rise to mid? Forgot about that...

As for how passable she is part 4? Well give her hte talisman back in part 2, and by the time she shows up in part 4 you got plenty of BEXP. Dump it in her to promotion (or crown her at 20), she'll basically be better than Zihark. Granted when it comes to those she's moving up with, she'll probably be the lowest (Volke being hte highest) as she takes more resources (well technically Tormod takes more, but pre part 4? 3 chapters>1).

If he's to fall? To above Leo, and Mak should fall below them.

...In fact, how the fuck did Mak get that high? When is he EVER good?

As for how it looks, there is no reason for Rolf to be above Leo. At all. Other than that, looks good.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Pretty Boi Wolf

[_____]

So, wait, we're dumping a shitload of resources on Lucia just so she can not suck as hard in Part 4? We're saving the Talisman all the way from Part 2 for Lucia when we could have easily sold it to pay for a few more weapons in Part 2, forges in Part 3, etc., and then spending a bunch of BEXP on her when we could have spent it on, say, someone worthwhile from the DB so they can be awesome in part 4, unlike Lucia? We could even spend it on the Hawks or Volug or some other Laguz.

Seems to me that you're just bullshitting at this point.

Edited July 7, 2009 by Ninji

[charmander6000]

I agree that Makalov needs to drop to at least below Nealuchi. Nealuchi is pretty awesome in part 2 and while Makalov has an impressive speed growth he won't double much until he promotes or is given an early crown. Until then he 3RKO enemies in 3-9 and 3RKO/4RKO enemies in 3-11 and beyond.

[charmander6000]

So, wait, we're dumping a shitload of resources on Lucia just so she can not suck as hard in Part 4? We're saving the Talisman all the way from Part 2 for Lucia when we could have easily sold it to pay for a few more weapons in Part 2, forges in Part 3, etc., and then spending a bunch of BEXP on her when we could have spent it on, say, someone worthwhile from the DB so they can be awesome in part 4, unlike Lucia? We could even spend it on the Hawks or Volug or some other Laguz.

Seems to me that you're just bullshitting at this point.

Lucia doesn't need all of that favouritism; as long as she can double (which she borderlines in 4-2) she can 2RKO the enemies at base level and since she's at a low level she'll gain a lot of experience and as her speed goes up so does the percent of units she can double. She also has high crit and a bond with Elincia.