Efficiency Tier List?

[Quasar]

I'm not really up for putting Fa on the table again yet but I wouldn't mind continuing Marcus vs. Zealot as it was kind of just dropped.

Marcus (unsupported... for now)

Level HP S/M Skl Spd Lck Def Res

-/3 33.2 9.5 14.4 11.5 10.4 9.3 8.4

Zealot

Level HP S/M Skl Spd Lck Def Res

-/1 35 10 12 13 5 11 7

Rounding Marcus' stats to even numbers for Zealot's join chapter leaves Z with:

+2 HP 0 STR -2 SKL +1 SPD -5 LCK +2 DEF -1 RES

Now a quick look at growths tells us this, again in Zealot's point of view:

+15% HP 0 STR 0 SKL -5% SPD -5% LCK +15% DEF -5% RES

At Ch7 Zealot can double cavaliers that Marcus can't but otherwise they're equal. Marcus will start to gain Zealot on speed and their offense will stay pretty much equal for long enough, leaving defense the only sector where Zealot is a clear winner from a purely statistical point of view. Marcus' weapon ranks should at this point be A lances with exp towards S, C or at least close to C with swords and probably still E with axes, maybe with a little exp towards D. Zealot has less lance exp than Marcus, slightly more or equal sword exp and half a rank to one win with axes.

Before going to supports and performance later on I'd like to clarify something. I noticed with Wendy and Fa that my own vision of efficiency was quite a bit different from several others'. It's not my tier list, I'm of course willing to adjust my arguments accordingly but I need to know the rules to play the game if you know what I mean.

So what is efficiency? I see at least two differing paths with this.

Extreme. Lowest turns to complete chapters as possible. Never using sub-par units if they slow you down even slightly. Supports and equipment always given to the most optimal and best characters. Promotions given to the unit that gives the greatest benefit to the team, ie. the one who will be fielded and needs it the most. Stat boosters should be considered, but only for those who it makes a difference for. Basically Mid-Tier guys and especially lower will rarely, if ever, be fielded and end up having no supports at all.

Fair for all. Every character will be fielded in every map as soon as they're available. Everyone has equal rights to equipment they can use and supports they can be assumed to get in a reasonable amount of time. Everyone has the right to promote upon reaching 20, however the amount of promotion items should still be taken to consideration. Equal rights to stat boosters. No loitering around but chapters could be completed faster with a better roster characters too.

Something in-between? Something completely different?

In any case my personal opinion, as insignificant as it may be, is that equal resources for all whenever possible is the most accurate option to base a tier list on.

[grandjackal]

Yes... but I mean the Dancers > Both of them. I don't care if Echinda > Percival, I'm wondering why the Dancers are above both of them.

Because A. Percival is just not around for much while Echidna actually requires one as a support to not fall behind so badly, B. They're essentially giving everyone 5 extra move and an extra action.

About Fa-Here's the thing, it requires leveling Fa up to not be useless by the time Juno joins, and Juno joins with an anima affinity and flight, making her an emergency rescue and a support battery. Fa on the other hand still needs to be fed kills ot have some sort of offense, as it is all she can do.

To Quasar: Uhhh....If you're arguing for Zealot, He's kinda already above his own cavalry.

Edited June 15, 2009 by Kuja

[Martelé]

Juno joins with an anima affinity

It's actually light affinity.

[Colonel M]

Because A. Percival is just not around for much while Echidna actually requires one as a support to not fall behind so badly

I don't care if Echinda > Percival, I'm wondering why the Dancers are above both of them.

In other words the question is why Echinda and Percival are below them when before both were above them.

B. They're essentially giving everyone 5 extra move and an extra action.

...That's it? Percival is killing things, and Echinda is nearly killing things and will later on. How does that make them worse than the Dancers?

[grandjackal]

In other words the question is why Echinda and Percival are below them when before both were above them.

...That's it? Percival is killing things, and Echinda is nearly killing things and will later on. How does that make them worse than the Dancers?

The dancers let them kill more in one turn, move more on one turn, rescue and drop on one turn, they make these characters more utilizable than they could be alone.

[Colonel M]

The dancers let them kill more in one turn, move more on one turn, rescue and drop on one turn, they make these characters more utilizable than they could be alone.

*Grumble*. I'd rather not push my luck since it's been terrible anyway.

[Mekkah]

Shin joins one and a half map before the dancers, attacks once per turn, with not even your best offense. The dancers can re-animate your best offensive unit always, and also give them more movement while they're at it. And their supports are better. Echidna + Geese/Roy/Percival/Douglas (Lalum) / Percival/Cecilia/Klein (Elphin) > Fir/Zeis/...Dayan? for Shin. And neither have an enemy phase until Shin promotes and gets his E swords.

Chad/Ashtol are just judgement calls for any tier position. But considering you can buy Door Keys at Ch5 and Chest Keys at Ch7, their utility is reduced to something like removing Fog of War, and whatever value you assign to using a unit dedicated to lockpicking rather than buying all those keys. I suppose the inventory slots are worth something, seeing as Merlinus isn't autofielded in this game. I think Ashtol should drop for sure. Chad gets you Halberd and some earlygame gold which is slightly better, but then again his combat is also worse. Definitely both below the dancers.

Unless there's something spectacular I'm missing about Ray in the tail of Ch12, or in Ch12x (ass accuracy here btw)/Ch13, why is he above Cecilia? He doesn't even convincingly beat her at stats or supports, never mind staves and horse.

Edited June 15, 2009 by Mekkah

[grandjackal]

Chad/Ashtol are just judgement calls for any tier position. But considering you can buy Door Keys at Ch5 and Chest Keys at Ch7, their utility is reduced to something like removing Fog of War, and whatever value you assign to using a unit dedicated to lockpicking rather than buying all those keys. I suppose the inventory slots are worth something, seeing as Merlinus isn't autofielded in this game. I think Ashtol should drop for sure. Chad gets you Halberd and some earlygame gold which is slightly better, but then again his combat is also worse. Definitely both below the dancers.

So Chad to around upper mid and Ashtor to lower mid? We had this figured out eons ago, but the damn time warp x.x

Unless there's something spectacular I'm missing about Ray in the tail of Ch12, or in Ch12x (ass accuracy here btw)/Ch13, why is he above Cecilia? He doesn't even convincingly beat her at stats or supports, never mind staves and horse.

Nosferatu allowing him to do something Cecilia can't do, survive a hero assault? The fact he can eventually do something that can be considered combat? Earlier join time?

Please feel free to go more in-depth.

[dondon151]

Marcus (unsupported... for now)

Marcus is unsupported by chapter 7? How are we playing this game?

If you want numbers and stats to line up correctly, use code tags, by the way.

So what is efficiency? I see at least two differing paths with this.

The problem with your perception of the two "paths" is how the units are fielded. We have to decide which units will be fielded first, and then let them determine how efficiently we can play through the game, not the other way around (the tier list would be pointless then).

Say we decide to use Bors. There's a high chance that we will use mounted units, so the bottom line is that Bors's low movement hinders efficiency if we want to wait for him.

About Fa-Here's the thing, it requires leveling Fa up to not be useless by the time Juno joins, and Juno joins with an anima affinity and flight, making her an emergency rescue and a support battery. Fa on the other hand still needs to be fed kills ot have some sort of offense, as it is all she can do.

About Rutger - here's the thing, it requires leveling Rutger up to not be useless by the time Juno joins, and Juno joins with a light affinity and flight, making her an emergency rescue and a support battery. Rutger on the other hand still needs to be fed kills to have some sort of offense, as it is all he can do.

Juno > Rutger.

See how dumb this is? Of course Fa needs levels, and they're not hard to get because 1) she starts at level 1, 2) she's not ORKO'd by everything on the map, and 3) her damage output is rather good.

By the way, offense is all Rutger can do, so...

Edited June 15, 2009 by dondon151

[grandjackal]

About Rutger - here's the thing, it requires leveling Rutger up to not be useless by the time Juno joins, and Juno joins with a light affinity and flight, making her an emergency rescue and a support battery. Rutger on the other hand still needs to be fed kills to have some sort of offense, as it is all he can do.

Juno > Rutger.

See how dumb this is? Of course Fa needs levels, and they're not hard to get because 1) she starts at level 1, 2) she's not ORKO'd by everything on the map, and 3) her damage output is rather good.

By the way, offense is all Rutger can do, so...

Yes, compare him to someone who already has supports built up and can actually kill shit on his own, which is NOT feeding him kills. Feeding kills is the act of weakening an enemy to give the kill to another unit. No way in hell Fa can just do that on her own. This is Fa vs. Junno, not Juno vs. People she can't possibly oututilize to make up for how bad she sucks.

Rescuing+Flight>Sucking

[Mekkah]

Please, stop sandbagging Fa, it hurts my eyes.

For my own reference:

16.0 2.0 2.0 3.0 2.0 6.0 7.0

Str +12, Skl +12, Def +15, Res +20

Might 16, Hit 100, Critical 15

1/0 Fa - 16 hp, 14 str, 14 skl, 3 spd, 26 res, 7 luk

Divinestone: 30 atk, ~132 hit, 3 AS -- 16 hp, 17 def, 27 res

First things first. See that atk/hit? You know who it's on par with?

20/1 Alan - A Lance, B Roy

Iron Lance: 29.5 atk, 119.3 hit

That's right, she's doing better at this than Alan. At base level. What this means is that anything Alan can finish off without taking a counter, Fa can too, except more reliably due to having more hit. You can't tell me scouring enemies that are finished off by 30 atk is hard, especially since Alan himself has doubling issues at this point (16-17 AS fails to double things like Snipers and Mercs). Oh, and Fa's 27 res is the highest in the game. She gets chinked by long-range tomes.

And giving just ~10 kills to Fa, we get:

10/0 Fa

40.1 atk, 8.8 AS, 153.2 hit, 25.6 crit - - 38.1 avo, 27.7 hp, 19.7 def, 30.5 res

A 23 atk Steel Sword Merc does 2x3.3 damage to her. A 9HKO, or a 5RKO.

A 24 atk Killer Lance Pegasus does 4.3 damage to her, a 7HKO, because he doesn't double. Yes, he has 18% chance to crit her, but that would still only do ~13 damage, so even two crits wouldn't kill her.

A 30 atk Silver Lance Falco does 2x10.3 damage to her, a 3HKO, or a 2RKO.

A 25 atk Flux Shaman does 0 damage to her, because 30.5 res is just that good.

We gave Fa 10 kills through Ch16/Ch16x, a neglibile 5 kills per map, and this is the result in Ilia. How is that Graveyard tier? How is Sophia doing better? Hell, how can the fuckton of negative contribution units be above her? Sue? Karel? Wolt? Lilina? Barth? Hugh? Zeis? Those people are nothing but detriments, and have much more trouble catching up than Fa does, or in Karel's case, he simply doesn't have time to do anything positive.

Fa should be around here imo:

Ward

Fa

Hue

Zeis

Garret

Niime

Rescuing+Flight>Sucking

What's flight helping you do in Ch21+ besides allowing Juno to hide from enemies? One Knight Crest village? Or rescue, for that matter?

Edited June 15, 2009 by Mekkah

[Colonel M]

I thought Niime > Garret now that I think about it. I remember going through that because I argued her Staff utility and possible Apocalypse use is more necessary than Garret's normal chip damage and AS issues. I think Niime > Zeis too, but one could argue Zeis's early promotion.

[Mekkah]

Before the board schwoop Nosferatu Niime was brought up, which is a much better gimmick than Nosferatu Ray because it doesn't require any painful training to work - just an Angelic Robe from the Ch16 Secret Shop to stop her from getting one shotted. Which she can easily afford, being a prepromote and all.

--/18 Niime

Nosferatu: 31 atk, 117 hit, 14 AS -- 32 hp, 5 def, 18 res

Looking at Ch20, there's not a single enemy that one-shots her anymore (highest atk is the boss with 35). There's some things that double her, though, but those also all have 1-range except two Light Brand Mercs/Heroes, so it's easy to stop her from facing those. Ballistae can stop her from keeping up forever, but she also has massive range and accuracy (enough to have 100 hit on them from far out of their range) with Sleep Staff, so that counters that perfectly, since it also stops those things from shooting others.

20x has more enemies that can kill her, like Brave Sword SM, Brave Axe Warrior, 37-38 atk Hammer Warriors, KE SM. But then again, it also has Druids with status staves, which she helps against. Oh, and Eclipse does 99/100 damage to walls, whereas someone like Alan takes 3 rounds to break through those. Not like Eclipse is good for anything else.

21 has 40 atk Wyvern Lords that kill her unless you give her another robe, and even then she is losing out on HP after the exchange, so she probably shouldn't be fielded there. Then in 22 and 23 there's status again and very little long-range she cares about (ohno Purge Bishops), though it also has some things that ORKO her like Berserkers, Heroes and Mamkutes.

Note that Apocalypse can only be used if Niime regularly attacked, otherwise she's stuck with A.

I'd say Niime can easily move up along with Fa. Should probably be right above her.

[Colonel M]

All I'll say as a note with Apocalypse use is it shouldn't be too far out of reach. Since she's using Nosferatu from time to time, it means she's at least gaining WEXP, then she can use Eclipse / Flux for whatever reason. She's realistically got until Endgame, so I wouldn't put it totally out of the question.

[Mekkah]

Also, for what it's worth, Apocalypse's +5 mag extends to staff use, giving her more range with Physic/Warp/status, and more healing power (though Mend/Recover is sufficient).

[Reikken]

I can't see Clarine in top tier without the existence of exp rank. Nor with Ellen and Saul as low as they are, exp rank or not.

[Florete]

I can't see Clarine in top tier without the existence of exp rank. Nor with Ellen and Saul as low as they are, exp rank or not.

I'd say Clarine definitely deserves Top regardless, but looking at the list, I agree Saul and Ellen should rise. Seriously, why is Saul in Lower Mid? Ellen could probably make it to High for being very helpful early game.

[Quasar]

To Quasar: Uhhh....If you're arguing for Zealot, He's kinda already above his own cavalry.

I'm actually with Marcus. I'm trying to show Zealot's defensive lead doesn't kick in early enough.

Marcus is unsupported by chapter 7? How are we playing this game?

That's what I'd like to know too. Earlier I recall Marcus being denied Roy/Lance/Alan for them being better off by themselves, Wolt for sucking and Lilina for being bad and slow (true).

If you want numbers and stats to line up correctly, use code tags, by the way.

Thanks. Didn't know that.

The problem with your perception of the two "paths" is how the units are fielded. We have to decide which units will be fielded first, and then let them determine how efficiently we can play through the game, not the other way around (the tier list would be pointless then).

Say we decide to use Bors. There's a high chance that we will use mounted units, so the bottom line is that Bors's low movement hinders efficiency if we want to wait for him.

This is how I actually thought with both of them but I can see why it wouldn't be obvious. Even with all being fielded you can't expect for the whole team to move at the rate of 4/turn. You'll be on the map but you won't necessarily reach anyone to make a difference.

I can't see Clarine in top tier without the existence of exp rank. Nor with Ellen and Saul as low as they are, exp rank or not.

Unless staff utility is considered remarkably less useful than attacking early on I don't see Clarine's problem except being frail before her avoid kicks in with levels and Dieck-Rutger supports.

[Reikken]

Unless staff utility is considered remarkably less useful than attacking early on I don't see Clarine's problem except being frail before her avoid kicks in with levels and Dieck-Rutger supports.

then Ellen and Saul should be much higher than they are

[grandjackal]

Urrf, suddenly there's a burst of activity here and I seem to have drawn the wrath of Reikken. To consider things...

Ray and Niime- Sounds fine to me, suggest they should switch places? Feel free to go in-depth there, but I'm more or less convinced. No one has really argued about Ray as of yet.

Marcus and Zealot-Zealot already starts more durable, has a better axe rank (lance is nigh negligeable as he has it high enough, swords are good enough to get him through western isles), while Zealot has support options that are actually possible, while Marcus is stuck with lolWolt and Lillina.

Fa-Geez, it's not the stats I necessarily overblew, but rather the weapon issue...Very well then Mekkah, good point. Below Ward it is, for now anyways.

Staff users- Feel free to get a bit more depthful with our staffers, but Clarine is staying in high. There is no magic user in hte game that can claim invincibility except maybe Niime, and she needs certain supplies to pull that off, not to mention joining late. Clarine also helps benefit plenty of awesome characters, so she is cerainly not lacking in supports (best support options in the game).

[dondon151]

I completely agree with Reikken that staff users need to be higher. I believe I asked the same thing in the previous topic...

[grandjackal]

I think they actually might have been higher before the time warp, but a nice reminder would be nice...

[Dr. Tarrasque]

I dunno if Ellen was higher but Saul sure as hell was closer to her.

Edited June 16, 2009 by Sirius

[grandjackal]

I do remember that. Just exactly where the hell were they then?...

[Dr. Tarrasque]

I dunno, for now just put him above or below her.

Wait... What the fuck is Shin doing up that high?