FE9 Tier list v3

[Anouleth]

It's a fair assessment of what Ninian can do, but not of what it's worth. Sending some 9-MV unit to kill a unit 14 squares away is worth... what, exactly? There are situations where this is useful (Rout? Seize for Ike?), but also situations where it's dubious with respect to efficiency, and Raisin can't even enable someone to move that far on the first turn without taking a primo deployment slot himself (opportunity cost of deployment slots, oh noes, I went there). At the very least, you just took someone's support partner for a turn. This is not a situation with nothing but gravy, here.

I hate herons. It's Seize shenanigans through the back door, because they are necessarily unique because of what they do. Raisin doesn't even show up until Ch18.

It's not guaranteed we'll be fielding 12 combat units anyway. If we don't and we have a free deployment slot, Reyson's 'cost' is actually non-existent. You couldn't even argue for fielding a filler healer or something, since Reyson can just Vigor whatever healer you're using. Even if Reyson is taking the place of your 12th best combat unit, it's not a big issue. 11 units that occasionally get to move twice >>> 12 slightly less powerful units. I don't know if his contribution is a tier greater than Ike's. While he's obviously the best character in the game by far for the time he's around, he's still not around very long.

[Narga_Rocks]

It's not guaranteed we'll be fielding 12 combat units anyway. If we don't and we have a free deployment slot, Reyson's 'cost' is actually non-existent. You couldn't even argue for fielding a filler healer or something, since Reyson can just Vigor whatever healer you're using. Even if Reyson is taking the place of your 12th best combat unit, it's not a big issue. 11 units that occasionally get to move twice >>> 12 slightly less powerful units. I don't know if his contribution is a tier greater than Ike's. While he's obviously the best character in the game by far for the time he's around, he's still not around very long.

Pretty sure the opportunity cost for deployment slots he was talking about was in what position you give him out of your available blue squares, rather than deploying him at all.

"Raisin can't even enable someone to move that far on the first turn without taking a primo deployment slot himself"

Basically, if you have him well in the back then if he vigors someone they won't get a big increase in their move. If you start him near the front, they get a bigger boost to move, but Reyson just took up a very nice slot.

[Interceptor]

If we don't and we have a free deployment slot

Issue is not number of deployment slots, it's placement of them. Consider that getting a 9MV unit 14 spaces ahead of everyone else means that Raisin also need a forward position, otherwise you're either not getting 14 spaces, or your 9MV unit started further behind to begin with.

While he's obviously the best character in the game by far for the time he's around, he's still not around very long.

Bull shit he's the best character in the game. Here's my favorite heron fallacy:

Fanboy: Raisin is awesome! He's as good as your best unit!

Int: No he isn't, he just gives your best unit another turn.

Fanboy: But that's the same thing!

Int: It's just a Player Phase. Raisin doesn't give you the unit's Enemy Phase, which is a big part of what the awesome combat units get credit for.

Fanboy: FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF-

OK, he can give someone a further forward position, or catch up a slower unit to your van, or any number of other little things. Sometimes we can even conclusively state that he saved you X turns. Sometimes we can even say that nobody else could have possibly done that. How do you tier all of that accurately? Nobody else does what he does, you can't compare him to anyone with a similar ability.

Herons for IRRITATING TIER.

EDIT: punked by Moriarty, again...

Edited February 12, 2010 by Interceptor

[Dr. Tarrasque]

Basically, if you have him well in the back then if he vigors someone they won't get a big increase in their move. If you start him near the front, they get a bigger boost to move, but Reyson just took up a very nice slot.

It pays off (in terms of turn count) if you have no problem with 1 unit soloing the map.

Edited February 12, 2010 by Speedwagon

[Florete]

Int: It's just a Player Phase. Raisin doesn't give you the unit's Enemy Phase, which is a big part of what the awesome combat units get credit for.

I cannot believe someone like you is still using this outdated argument.

[Interceptor]

I cannot believe someone like you is still using this outdated argument.

I'm not sure why you can't believe it, since I've used this argument repeatedly to try to convince you to lower Raisin on the FE10 tier list, to no useful effect. This means you haven't paid attention to the arguments, so my feelings are hurt now.

Yes, I know that you argue that Raisin can set up superior Enemy Phase positioning. Move past my hypothetical scenario, and tell me how to tier herons without a divide by zero error.

[Life]

Why not? Even if a intelligent player who is going for an efficient playthrough isn't using Tau or Janaff, both units still exist, and can still be ranked and rated. And there can still be a large gap between their performances.

And it's a bit strange to assume that certain characters won't be used. It's certainly not helpful to a tier list effort - it's one thing to claim that Brom might not be played when ranking Zihark, but what you're suggesting is more like assuming that Brom won't be played when ranking Brom! If you're going into this with that kind of mentality, I don't see how you could build a tier list that way.

(I mean, obviously Janaff=Tauroneo if you're not using either of them! What we want to do is measure how good they are when they are being used!)

That's not what I'm saying.

I'm saying Tau > Janaff if they get used but Tau > Tier seperation > Janaff is just silly because chances are that they don't get used (like 9/10 times). Why not just mash those two tiers together? You're only adding four more units to it.

And I'm STILL looking for the specific quote. I've already gone through one 500 post tier list on GameFAQs...

EDIT: I found it and it's not what I wanted. I have to run though because I have a Chem midterm in 40 minutes.

Edited February 12, 2010 by Life Admiral

[Interceptor]

I'm saying Tau > Janaff if they get used but Tau > Tier seperation > Janaff is just silly because chances are that they don't get used (like 9/10 times).

And you've been answered twice, by different people. Tauroneo's ranking is not based on when he's not deployed, it's based on when he's used, AKA it's his army. This tier list does not rank units by their likelihood to be in play.

[Life]

And you've been answered twice, by different people. Tauroneo's ranking is not based on when he's not deployed, it's based on when he's used, AKA it's his army. This tier list does not rank units by their likelihood to be in play.

Ok, so why the tier seperation? What's so great about Tau that it deserves a full tier above Janaff? Resolve is nice but rather stupid when it's put on the guy who starts out with the best base Def in the game, with the exception of Nasir (lol) and Tibarn/Giffca. Tau also finishes with 50+ HP (not guaranteed to hit ?/20 but still) and loses out on move because Janaff promotes on Turn 1 and gains 2+ Move.

[Dat Nick]

its your 4 best units

Not just your best unit

4 unit refresh is pretty goddamn ridiculous and I'm afraid you'll have to enlighten me on how making 4 paladins or 3 and Jill move again isn't going to shave a bunch of turns off.

[Anouleth]

Issue is not number of deployment slots, it's placement of them. Consider that getting a 9MV unit 14 spaces ahead of everyone else means that Raisin also need a forward position, otherwise you're either not getting 14 spaces, or your 9MV unit started further behind to begin with.

Oh, I didn't understand that. :/ My bad.

Bull shit he's the best character in the game. Here's my favorite heron fallacy:

Fanboy: Raisin is awesome! He's as good as your best unit!

Int: No he isn't, he just gives your best unit another turn.

Fanboy: But that's the same thing!

Int: It's just a Player Phase. Raisin doesn't give you the unit's Enemy Phase, which is a big part of what the awesome combat units get credit for.

Fanboy: FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF-

OK, he can give someone a further forward position, or catch up a slower unit to your van, or any number of other little things. Sometimes we can even conclusively state that he saved you X turns. Sometimes we can even say that nobody else could have possibly done that. How do you tier all of that accurately? Nobody else does what he does, you can't compare him to anyone with a similar ability.

Herons for IRRITATING TIER.

EDIT: punked by Moriarty, again...

Reyson is helpful because he makes the enemy phase better. Say you have a team of 11 combat units - what would make them better, another combat unit who isn't quite as good, or Reyson, who lets you heal more and move further and take out enemies who don't permit enemy phase action (ballistae, siege tome holders, healers, Sleepers)? The combat unit is taking away EXP, which could potentially hurt your original 11, and since FE9 maps aren't very large, it's very rare that he's dealing damage on the enemy phase that one of your 11 couldn't. Reyson is allowing your units to move further, kill troublesome units, and survive better. It's hard to say that this combat unit is contributing anything, while the utility unit is obviously contributing a great deal.

(Although, I kind of agree with you. It's not easy to compare Reyson's contribution to the team to Ike's, at least, not as easy at it is when comparing Ike to some other combat unit. I admitted myself that I didn't know if Reyson >>> Ike - it's a very subjective thing, like the value of healing in comparison to combat, or the value of concrete durability in comparison to avoid-based durability.)

Edited February 12, 2010 by Anouleth

[Inui]

Hmm. I wonder if I should link CATS to this topic...

[Interceptor]

its your 4 best units

Not just your best unit

4 unit refresh is pretty goddamn ridiculous and I'm afraid you'll have to enlighten me on how making 4 paladins or 3 and Jill move again isn't going to shave a bunch of turns off.

Besides the fact that Raisin can't actually refresh 4 units until he transforms (not grass in FE9, limited stones, can't use demi, etc), it doesn't really change my point. He's still aggravating to tier, and now it's just more complicated because a four-man refresh gives you that many more Player Phase turns and flexibility on heals/Enemy Phase/whatever.

Oh, I didn't understand that. :/ My bad.

Well, it was vague enough to go either way.

Reyson is helpful because he makes the enemy phase better. Say you have a team of 11 combat units - what would make them better, another combat unit who isn't quite as good, or Reyson, who lets you heal more and move further and take out enemies who don't permit enemy phase action (ballistae, siege tome holders, healers, Sleepers)? The combat unit is taking away EXP, which could potentially hurt your original 11, and since FE9 maps aren't very large, it's very rare that he's dealing damage on the enemy phase that one of your 11 couldn't. Reyson is allowing your units to move further, kill troublesome units, and survive better. It's hard to say that this combat unit is contributing anything, while the utility unit is obviously contributing a great deal.

(Although, I kind of agree with you. It's not easy to compare Reyson's contribution to the team to Ike's, at least, not as easy at it is when comparing Ike to some other combat unit. I admitted myself that I didn't know if Reyson >>> Ike - it's a very subjective thing, like the value of healing in comparison to combat, or the value of concrete durability in comparison to avoid-based durability.)

Your attempt to compare Raisin to a combat unit shows how futile this exercise really is. Can you really say that Raisin is worse than your 11th string combatant, or whomever? It's a fool's errand. He's certainly better than an empty slot, and he's certainly not as good as Titania, but how on earth do you adjudicate where he goes in the middle? To be perfectly honest, I could craft an argument to put him almost anywhere on the list.

I mean, if he lets Boyd run ahead and get a bunch of enemy phase action that would have normaly taken until next turn, who gets the credit for this? Boyd? Raisin? The Muffin Man?

Hmm. I wonder if I should link CATS to this topic...

What? Are you asking for advice from everyone reading the thread? Should we perhaps talk about the opportunity cost of CATS coming to the thread, the worth of his time? Maybe this tangent about herons is only worth calling for reinforcements if it escalates further?

[Narga_Rocks]

Well, it was vague enough to go either way.

Charitable. The line I quoted is in no way vague, even if the sentences surrounding it were.

What? Are you asking for advice from everyone reading the thread? Should we perhaps talk about the opportunity cost of CATS coming to the thread, the worth of his time? Maybe this tangent about herons is only worth calling for reinforcements if it escalates further?

A bigger issue is that I thought CATS has played neither fe9 nor fe10. I think he has said so elsewhere.

[-Cynthia-]

WRT tiering herons, yes it's pretty tricky. I'm currently content with Reyson's current position. He arrives around the same time as Tanith, a good unit, and is a few spaces above her, because he has the ability to give us one Tanith or a few Tanith-equivalent units for a few turns per map.

On Taur vs. Janaff, no I guess there isn't a single factor that makes Taur exactly a tier above Janaff. The tier seperations are relatively arbitrary designations overall. Still, it should make sense that Taur and Janaff are pretty close in performace since there only one space apart. I don't see that as a reason to eliminate the tiers altogether, as Haar is definitely a tier above Bastian IMO.

Edited February 13, 2010 by -Cynthia-

[Fayt Zelpher]

When I get back, I'm going to comprehensively explain why Gatrie is better than Calill, Sothe, or Geoffrey, and therefore needs to go at least to the top of Mid. Nonetheless, that'll be an hour or so, since I have stuff to do in the meantime.

Alright, it's time. Stay tuned this could take a little bit:

So, I'm going to start with Geoffrey. Logically, if he's better than Geoff and Geoff is better than Calill, then Gatrie must jump Calill as well. I'll do Sothe later since that's a hard comparison.

Let's start with Geoffrey. He joins at the start of 25. That gives him 3 chapters + Endgame. But in chapter 25 itself, he suffers huge movement cost and won't be able to move more than 3 squares anyway. That leaves him with 3 chapters (and no, we can't count his Ch 24, just as we can't count Gatrie's Ch 13 pre-recruitment). At this point, I'd like to go ahead and say that Gatrie is going to rush right through chapters 3,4,5, and the second half of 7 and will be far better in those chapters than Geoff is in his and declare it a victory. Nonetheless, it almost is already.

Let's look at what Gatrie does before then though. He's not going to take much damage from any non-mage character for more or less the entire game. He's your tank and your chokepoint guard. In chapter 3, he can just rush right through to the boss, as his 14 defense means he's not going to take anything but chip damage. Not only that, but due to most enemies being weighed down by their weapons, he's doubling them with his 5 base speed, and more than likely killing them with his steel lance.

Chapter 4 comes and we've got to watch Soren and Rhys. Obviously, Shinon and Ike don't have the concrete durability, and Titania can't be everywhere. That leaves Gatrie to save the day. Only the steel lance soldiers (and boss) can even scratch him, and Gatrie ORKO's them in return.

By chapter 5, he's gained 2 levels (you are conserving his levels since he'll be gone for a few chapters and other units need the EXP in the meantime.) Now he's got 15 defense and, well, the enemies aren't doing much better than that.

Chapter 7 arrives next and, while Gatrie isn't seeing as much action as before, he's still got the HP/Def to tank basically forever.

Moving to Chapter 13, we find that now Gatrie is getting the really cool KW item. Why? Because a) he gets the best use of the added speed growth and B) the extra defense really helps him more than most since he can't avoid as much as your other units. Now, he'll also start to gain more EXP since he's now on level instead of overleveled. He is great for blocking a chokepoint and can still pick off enemies with a forged lance.

Chapter 14 his him doing much the same thing, except that he's actually better since in FoW, he's one of the few units that can take several enemy attacks without dying. He'll hit 13 by this chapter if you are using him, and with 2 levels of KW, that's up to 6.6 speed on average as well. He's not going to 15 for the desert, but will get 1 level of BEXP here (he's gotten none yet), and will be 14 for Ch 16. Again, more him kicking butt and taking scratch damage from everything that's not a mage.

Chapter 17 is more of the same, except he's got swamps to worry about. Level 17 by the end here. Chapter 18 presents no problems, and he has no problem baiting the ballastae either since he's not going to get hurt by them. He promotes here and gets a lot better from here on out:

Gatrie: 20/1 (KW from 11-20)

42.8 21.05 2.55 14.05 12.45 7.75 21 6.3

In other words, he's going to do 35 Mt with a forge and he's not taking damage either. I'm going to skip ahead to where Geoff shows up, since it's more of the same for a few more chapters.

Gatrie 20/10 (KW from 11/--)

50 26 3 19 17.4 10 26.4 9

Yeah, let's see base Geoffrey:

43 18 9 17 19 12 21 9

Okay, well, Gatrie's got a convincing lead in stats. The only things going for Geoff are a horse, 9 move, and a bit of speed and luck. And honestly, given that Gatrie has had... 15 more maps and isn't going to be doing that much worse for the last 4 maps means that Gatrie is clearly > Geoffrey. But lets discuss supports a little bit as well.

Geoffrey has fire affinity, Calill (Dark) and Elincia (Heaven). The Elincia support is meaningless, since Elincia isn't that great, won't be in support range anyway, and doesn't even provide the bonus that he wants. Calill has more or less the same problem, except the attack bonus is helpful. Still, even more problems with support range, and Calill can't even heal, being locked to knives.

Gatrie has Light. In other words, even MORE defense. Remember how he was taking chip damage before? Now he's simply absorbing the hits for nothing. Not only that, he's got Shinon, Marcia, and Ilyana, all viable support partners. Shinon and Ilyana both also add MORE defense, meaning that Gatrie can absorb anything that doesn't deal ~35 damage. In other words, nothing but bosses, mages, and red dragons are even hurting him, let alone putting him in any danger.

End result: I think that you've put too much emphasis on paladins being great. Yeah, they ARE, but Geoffrey isn't better than Gatrie just 'cause he's got a horse. And no, I didn't forget about paragon: it's just too little, too late for him on HM. The prosecution stands down. Defense, state your case.

Edited February 13, 2010 by Randomly Predictable

[Narga_Rocks]

Gatrie 20/10 (KW from 11/--)
50	26	3	19	17.4	10	26.4	9
Yeah, let's see base Geoffrey:
43	18	9	17	19	12	21	9

Just as a note: I think it's unreasonable to assume that he'd have the KW glued to him. Obviously any bexp levels in the base should see the KW on him, but if he ever levels up during a map you have to accept the possibility that the KW will be on someone else at the time. There is no way you wouldn't want to be passing around the KW during the map and trying to get as many units leveling while they have it equipped as possible, and that means that if (for example) only 3 out of 5 potential KW users level with the thing and the other 2 don't have the KW while leveling, sometimes Gatrie will be among those 2.

I'd argue for 70% of his levels with the KW, maybe. Not sure what percentage other people might argue for.

Edited February 13, 2010 by Narga_Rocks

[-Cynthia-]

Geoffrey is too late to save? We can just hand him the KW and start BEXPing him (which costs 1/2 as much as it would with any non-Astrid character). He then doubles, hits hard enough to kill anything except dragons, and has plenty of durability.

Also agreeing with Narga on the KW point. I don't think anyone can have 100% KW assumed, unless they're gaining all their levels through BEXP, which Gatrie isn't.

Still, I can definitely see the argument, especially because Gatrie has almost as many earlygame maps as Geoffrey does good lategame maps. 9 vs. 6 Mov is a big deal in PoR though.

Edited February 13, 2010 by -Cynthia-

[Anouleth]

Let's start with Geoffrey. He joins at the start of 25. That gives him 3 chapters + Endgame. But in chapter 25 itself, he suffers huge movement cost and won't be able to move more than 3 squares anyway. That leaves him with 3 chapters (and no, we can't count his Ch 24, just as we can't count Gatrie's Ch 13 pre-recruitment). At this point, I'd like to go ahead and say that Gatrie is going to rush right through chapters 3,4,5, and the second half of 7 and will be far better in those chapters than Geoff is in his and declare it a victory. Nonetheless, it almost is already.

I'd like to see you show that Gatrie's performance in 3-7 is that great. Gatrie's slow, he's taking away experience from characters that aren't going to disappear for 6 chapters, and Titania exists and is absurdly stronger than him.

Let's look at what Gatrie does before then though. He's not going to take much damage from any non-mage character for more or less the entire game. He's your tank and your chokepoint guard. In chapter 3, he can just rush right through to the boss, as his 14 defense means he's not going to take anything but chip damage. Not only that, but due to most enemies being weighed down by their weapons, he's doubling them with his 5 base speed, and more than likely killing them with his steel lance.

Why would we want Gatrie to be killing here? This isn't a rout map, and we want to be feeding Ike as much EXP as possible. Gatrie is getting like 15 exp per kill. If we cared so little for EXP, we could just have Titania solo the map.

Chapter 4 comes and we've got to watch Soren and Rhys. Obviously, Shinon and Ike don't have the concrete durability, and Titania can't be everywhere. That leaves Gatrie to save the day. Only the steel lance soldiers (and boss) can even scratch him, and Gatrie ORKO's them in return.

He is more useful here, but that's because of his durability rather than anything else. He's no longer doubling anything aside from lolSteel Lance Soldiers, and Titania is still more useful due to 2-range and better everything.

By chapter 5, he's gained 2 levels (you are conserving his levels since he'll be gone for a few chapters and other units need the EXP in the meantime.) Now he's got 15 defense and, well, the enemies aren't doing much better than that.

If by 'conserving his levels' you mean 'give him half the kills in Chapter 3 and a third in Chapter 4'. Chapter 5 is a cinch to chokepoint anyway - 3 characters are necessary.

Chapter 7 arrives next and, while Gatrie isn't seeing as much action as before, he's still got the HP/Def to tank basically forever.

He does nothing. He fights one or two other Knights, at a point where you may already be halfway through the map. Being able to 'tank forever' is worthless when you don't want to tank. Not everything is a Defend chapter.

Moving to Chapter 13, we find that now Gatrie is getting the really cool KW item. Why? Because a) he gets the best use of the added speed growth and B) the extra defense really helps him more than most since he can't avoid as much as your other units. Now, he'll also start to gain more EXP since he's now on level instead of overleveled. He is great for blocking a chokepoint and can still pick off enemies with a forged lance.

Chokepoints aren't very common, and with a good team, you don't care about them since later in the game, you never ever need to defend. And I assume he needs the forge to OHKO, because I can't imagine Gatrie needing a forge to 2HKO, or for that matter, doubling reliably.

Chapter 14 his him doing much the same thing, except that he's actually better since in FoW, he's one of the few units that can take several enemy attacks without dying. He'll hit 13 by this chapter if you are using him, and with 2 levels of KW, that's up to 6.6 speed on average as well. He's not going to 15 for the desert, but will get 1 level of BEXP here (he's gotten none yet), and will be 14 for Ch 16. Again, more him kicking butt and taking scratch damage from everything that's not a mage.

Chapter 16 is a loooooooooong, fairly empty corridor, then some rooms. Gatrie will quickly fall behind faster team members. If he got 3 levels with the KW so far, he can get 7 AS... which doubles nothing. As for Gatrie's durability 'lead', he has 35HP/17DEF - enemies have around 17-23ATK, so he's largely in the clear, although the mages are a bit troubling - if he gets hit twice, he's left on like 1 or 2 HP, which is a dangerous place to be, and some of the mages actually double him, meaning he could get killed if he does ever actually catch up, and Thunder users have crit on him, so he could be critblicked and force a reset. So he's still one of your worst characters.

Chapter 17 is more of the same, except he's got swamps to worry about. Level 17 by the end here. Chapter 18 presents no problems, and he has no problem baiting the ballastae either since he's not going to get hurt by them. He promotes here and gets a lot better from here on out:

Gatrie: 20/1 (KW from 11-20)

42.8 21.05 2.55 14.05 12.45 7.75 21 6.3

In other words, he's going to do 35 Mt with a forge and he's not taking damage either. I'm going to skip ahead to where Geoff shows up, since it's more of the same for a few more chapters.

Yes, chapter 17 is another large chapter which involves lots of pushing forwards as quickly as possible, so it is more of the same. Same for Chapter 18. 17-3 is mage-heavy, too, and there's a Sage in 17-3 that ORKOes a level 15 Gatrie, or a level 16 Gatrie that missed a point of HP. One of the Fighters has a Hammer that can easily knock off 16-20 HP too. 17-4 is more friendly to him, except for the Meteor Mage, and the Mage that doubles him, he can just sit on the right hand side and fight the reinforcements.

Oh, and oh wow, he's doing 35 Mt with a forge. OHKOes only a couple of super-weak unpromoted enemies, and his AS is still shaky, so the tougher promoted enemies are beyond him. What a great use of a +4MT Steel forge that he will largely never use.

Gatrie 20/10 (KW from 11/--)

50 26 3 19 17.4 10 26.4 9

Yeah, let's see base Geoffrey:

43 18 9 17 19 12 21 9

Okay, well, Gatrie's got a convincing lead in stats. The only things going for Geoff are a horse, 9 move, and a bit of speed and luck. And honestly, given that Gatrie has had... 15 more maps and isn't going to be doing that much worse for the last 4 maps means that Gatrie is clearly > Geoffrey. But lets discuss supports a little bit as well.

20/10 seems a bit high for this point of the game, when you consider that Gatrie may have joined a little bit underlevelled. And he won't have gotten that much KW use. 16AS seems more appropiate.

Geoffrey has fire affinity, Calill (Dark) and Elincia (Heaven). The Elincia support is meaningless, since Elincia isn't that great, won't be in support range anyway, and doesn't even provide the bonus that he wants. Calill has more or less the same problem, except the attack bonus is helpful. Still, even more problems with support range, and Calill can't even heal, being locked to knives.

Gatrie has Light. In other words, even MORE defense. Remember how he was taking chip damage before? Now he's simply absorbing the hits for nothing. Not only that, he's got Shinon, Marcia, and Ilyana, all viable support partners. Shinon and Ilyana both also add MORE defense, meaning that Gatrie can absorb anything that doesn't deal ~35 damage. In other words, nothing but bosses, mages, and red dragons are even hurting him, let alone putting him in any danger.

Elincia is forced for one chapter, can easily be fielded in the other two due to being your most mobile healer, and B Elincia still gives him +1MT, which isn't 'meaningless'. And OH NOES, Calill can't heal! (I guess that since Titania isn't healing either, we should probably bin her.) Even without healing, she's waaaaay more likely to be fielded than lolShinon or Failyana, just so that Gatrie can have even more overkilled durability.

End result: I think that you've put too much emphasis on paladins being great. Yeah, they ARE, but Geoffrey isn't better than Gatrie just 'cause he's got a horse. And no, I didn't forget about paragon: it's just too little, too late for him on HM. The prosecution stands down. Defense, state your case.

Oh, is Paragon too little? You forget how absurdly good Paragon is - on HM, you have a pool of 1250 BEXP from C24 and C25. Since many of your units are around level 10 promoted, that BEXP is only going to give 6 level-ups - unless we give a chunk of it to Geoffrey. Since Geoffrey has Paragon, KW access, and some ridiculously good growths, he's by far the best user of it. If Geoffrey takes 380 BEXP and uses the KW for those 3 levels:

45HP 19.5STR 10MAG 18SKL 22SPD 12.6LUK 22DEF 10RES

(I'm aware that I rounded up an average of 21.55 to get 22SPD - the average is misleading, since Geoffrey has a 61% chance of hitting 22SPD this way)

He doubles every enemy except for a Cat and a handful of Swordmasters. With a forged Silver, or alternatively, the Laguz Bow or the Killer Bow, which almost nobody else is likely to use anyway, he 1 rounds everything except the Generals. Whereas your Gatrie (I'd actually put him as having 16AS instead of 17AS, since he may not always get the KW) is struggling to double everything except other Generals. Calill helps, once their support gets going, since he's borderline on many things.

As for durability, even the strongest enemy in C26, a Wyvern Lord, would only deal 12 damage to Geoffrey - a 4HKO, at about 56 display hit. Even the enemies with anti-Paladin weapons don't deal better - only 6 enemies on the map can deal more than single-digit damage to him, and one of them is the boss. You might say that Gatrie's durability is even better, but when he's lumbering along behind all the other units, who cares? Geoffrey is only at risk of death if he charges into a massive group of enemies, which he's not going to do, and even if we did, we could let him carry the KW so he'll survive. Gatrie's luck is also low enough that he's at risk of getting blicked by a Bolting Sage, or the Thoron Sage. While this can be fixed with a Goddess Icon, it's 4000 gold that we need to save from earlygame, when we want it more. And even with both Icons, Gatrie still faces significant crit from Heddwyn. Endgame, Gatrie is a bit better, since he can wall off a chokepoint around the fountain, but when Geoffrey can do it, or alternatively, attack and canto behind a defender, it's still not great.

It's a choice between 'mediocre for a while' and 'good for a little bit' here. I go with good.

[Junkhead]

Why is Jill on top? She gets easily doubled' by every crow in her starting chapter and doesn't have extreamly reliablt Hit against them...she is a bit hard to train unless you give her a forge and feed her kills because she will barely be doubling. And that's also in Normal Mode.

And how is Makalov in high tier? He is basically the same...probably slightly worse due to coming two chapters later.

[Fayt Zelpher]

Why is Jill on top? She gets easily doubled' by every crow in her starting chapter and doesn't have extreamly reliablt Hit against them...she is a bit hard to train unless you give her a forge and feed her kills because she will barely be doubling. And that's also in Normal Mode.

And how is Makalov in high tier? He is basically the same...probably slightly worse due to coming two chapters later.

Well, Jill gets really good, really quickly with a forge and has tons of Str/Def. When she's taking 2x2 damage due to her laguzguard, I don't consider that particularly fragile. And while I don't like Makalov, the fact remains that having a horse basically makes you god in PoR. I do agree that Jill is one of the best characters in the game. And while I don't much care for Makalov on any mode, I don't think that any argument I make is going to change these people's minds.

[Colonel M]

Jill's biggest advantage is flight. That alone gets you access to a lot of area in Chapter 12 to maneuver with. Also, yeah the Laguzguard is what makes her good in that aspect. She's also got Chapter 15 where she can lazily fly around and do more than the rest of the team that's struggling in the sand would. With Marcia she can carry Ike towards Maurim and seize faster at least or recruit Stefan faster.

Really, the biggest sell out point isn't exactly Jill's stats (admittedly they aren't bad, she does lose offense a bit to Kieran the Rambo); however, it's flight that separates her far above the rest. Vykan showed me a lot of instances where Tanith's flight is a huge boon in the later maps of the game, and that's what makes Jill a great unit.

I guess I don't really see her going down unless you penalize her for needing a forge, but to be honest many units need it too.

[Fayt Zelpher]

I guess I don't really see her going down unless you penalize her for needing a forge, but to be honest many units need it too.

Flight is a big deal though, and I don't penalize her much for needing a forge. Especially since she has one of the best benefit ratios of any character for getting a Max Mt, Max Hit, -1 Wt steel forge before chapter 13. And there is a lot of terrain in this game, and Jill is also probably the best candidate for the full guard too, because she's basically invincible with it. Not only that, but she can immediately take a maxed steel axe the second she promotes and go god mode on everything. If she had access to the KW for some speed boosts, I could make an argument for her being the best character in the game.

[Interceptor]

And, let's not forget the egad amounts of BEXP that you have even in Hard Mode. That doesn't help in her joining chapter, but you can instantly make her a good fighter for Ch. 13. If you were to, say, BEXP her to level 15 or so, she's doubling plenty of stuff and able to use Steel without getting weighed down. It's all gravy after that, because she can go anywhere she wants.

[Fayt Zelpher]

And, let's not forget the egad amounts of BEXP that you have even in Hard Mode. That doesn't help in her joining chapter, but you can instantly make her a good fighter for Ch. 13. If you were to, say, BEXP her to level 15 or so, she's doubling plenty of stuff and able to use Steel without getting weighed down. It's all gravy after that, because she can go anywhere she wants.

Of course. I'm just saying that she doesn't even need BEXP to be good with a forge. And you've got more money than you could possibly spend, so why not give her the forge? The only thing you're giving up is the ability for another character to use a forge, and she gets a lot more good out of it than just about anyone. Plus, you've already got up to 5 more forges by this point in the game as well, so I'm not seeing sufficient costs which justify her not getting a forge, seeing as how much she benefits from the hit and Mt.