S Rank Tier List for FE7

[Florete]

That's just not going to happen. People are competitive because they don't like having their ideas rejected, and they like to reject the ideas of others.

And let's just think about this for a minute. Person A and person B are debating Eliwood and Lyn, respectively. A firmly believes Eliwood > Lyn and B firmly believes the opposite. Neither A nor B are going to yield anything substantial to the other. Even if we stated that the objective was to "compromise on some sort of truth," that does not discourage A or B from bending the truth.

And what if that was not the problem between two debaters? I think Jaffar and myself are a bit more open-minded than that and would be able to see the other side of things if pointed out correctly. Even I wouldn't say I completely believe Lyn > Eliwood without a doubt; most of the reason I'm pushing it is actually to get them closer. At the same time, I think, given the right evidence and convincing, Jaffar could come to see a case for Lyn > Eliwood, even if he didn't quite believe it. This is precisely why I mentioned a "high enough level of competence" in my original post; obviously we aren't going to take the conclusion at face value when one debater is clearly more experienced than the other, nor would we if both were incompetent.

Of course participants in a tier list argue to win, I never denied that. The difference between a tier list discussion and a mano a mano debate is that there are a lot more people around to call out questionable statements. 2 opposing debaters probably can't cover all of the same insights that 10 different people have.

Again, take our actual current situation. Who has decided to chime in on Lyn vs Eliwood at all? Yeah, I haven't made a big 1,000 word post on it yet, but even if I did, who other than Life or Jaffar do you think would be joining in anyway if they haven't already decided to comment? What do we do when we can't get insights from 10 different people? In the end it may turn into the same thing as a formal debate anyway, except less "formal" and more like me vs GJ in the FE6 list with Fir vs Klein going at it for 10 pages with hardly an outside word. Is that somehow better?

And then there is still judging. Others can eventually make comments on it and determine if one person was blowing smoke or what have you. If it turns out the debate would need to be "invalid" as far as tiers go, so be it. But who's to say it has no chance of being valid?

Edited February 10, 2011 by Red Fox of Fire

[RNG Princess]

I like tier lists, for their accurracy but I think they need their complement. I'm not sure what I'm suggesting belongs but I'd like to see tier lists have some sort of organized guide tips/suggestions for characters. For example what type of weapons a certain character works best with, the perfect supports, stat boosts distributions, etc.

[Paperblade]

That's just not going to happen. People are competitive because they don't like having their ideas rejected, and they like to reject the ideas of others.

And let's just think about this for a minute. Person A and person B are debating Eliwood and Lyn, respectively. A firmly believes Eliwood > Lyn and B firmly believes the opposite. Neither A nor B are going to yield anything substantial to the other. Even if we stated that the objective was to "compromise on some sort of truth," that does not discourage A or B from bending the truth.

This is why I quit debating tiers.

[Geriba]

That's just not going to happen. People are competitive because they don't like having their ideas rejected, and they like to reject the ideas of others.

And let's just think about this for a minute. Person A and person B are debating Eliwood and Lyn, respectively. A firmly believes Eliwood > Lyn and B firmly believes the opposite. Neither A nor B are going to yield anything substantial to the other. Even if we stated that the objective was to "compromise on some sort of truth," that does not discourage A or B from bending the truth.

Needlessly pessimistic. I do care about being right, but I care more about framing a tier list that best corresponds to the objective quality of each character. There's certainly a case to be made that any kind of debate is going to have bias seep in from each opponent, but that's why we have (relatively) impartial observers on the outside come in and point out flaws in reasoning or missed evidence. It's not a perfect system, but we have nothing better; let's just roll with it. I'll take Red's word for impartiality if she'll take mine!

[Tangerine]

Are you guys really debating about debating :P?

[Anouleth]

Are you guys really debating about debating :P?

Don't make this any more meta than it has to be.

[Florete]

Are you guys really debating about debating :P?

Remember when that's what tier lists were all about?

EDIT: Anyway, whether it "counts" or not, how does Geitz (me) vs Eliwood (you) sound, Jaffar?

Edited February 10, 2011 by Red Fox of Fire

[Geriba]

Geitz/Eliwood sounds fine, but you implied a desire to do a straight-up Lyn/Eliwood earlier. I'd probably prefer the latter, but am down with either.

[Viceroy]

I still say Eliwood is trash. If nothing else he should not be purported better than Lyn is. I said it before and I think one or two agreed with me here: Eliwood has NOTHING going for him. He has a terrible, risky enemy phase, not enough str OR spd to kill anything in the player phase, low bases and average growths. The only stat he has is Luck, which is useless unless you're an AVO-stacking dodge king like Guy, Raven or Serra.

Put him in low-mid with the rest of the junk.

[Geriba]

I still say Eliwood is trash. If nothing else he should not be purported better than Lyn is. I said it before and I think one or two agreed with me here: Eliwood has NOTHING going for him. He has a terrible, risky enemy phase, not enough str OR spd to kill anything in the player phase, low bases and average growths. The only stat he has is Luck, which is useless unless you're an AVO-stacking dodge king like Guy, Raven or Serra.

Put him in low-mid with the rest of the junk.

Wait for the debate between me and Red: coming this weekend!!

[Rodykitty]

I still say Eliwood is trash. If nothing else he should not be purported better than Lyn is. I said it before and I think one or two agreed with me here: Eliwood has NOTHING going for him. He has a terrible, risky enemy phase, not enough str OR spd to kill anything in the player phase, low bases and average growths. The only stat he has is Luck, which is useless unless you're an AVO-stacking dodge king like Guy, Raven or Serra.

Put him in low-mid with the rest of the junk.

I'm probably not the most qualified to talk about FE7 efficiency, especially with ranks involved, but Jaffar7's "an actual response: coming this weekend!" post kinda ticked me off so I want to fill in a lost void.

In my ignorant opinion, Eliwood vs. Lyn will pretty much boil down to "Eliwood has durability but then enemies all line up and clog the drain in front of him" vs. "Lyn only kills one enemy at a time". I predict that Lyn is going to end up winning out on the tier list over him for being better at creating opportunities for other characters to perform tasks.

EDIT: Oh, Geitz vs. Eliwood. My bad. This is one of those huge opportunity cost arguments that heavily hinges on how important it is to give Lords EXP. Since having to train Eliwood and actually getting Geitz are so intertwined, I would say Eliwood = Geitz. Yes, with an equal sign, taking up one space on the tier list.

Edited February 12, 2011 by Super FE3 Player

[Geriba]

I'm probably not the most qualified to talk about FE7 efficiency, especially with ranks involved, but Jaffar7's "an actual response: coming this weekend!" post kinda ticked me off so I want to fill in a lost void.

In my ignorant opinion, Eliwood vs. Lyn will pretty much boil down to "Eliwood has durability but then enemies all line up and clog the drain in front of him" vs. "Lyn only kills one enemy at a time". I predict that Lyn is going to end up winning out on the tier list over him for being better at creating opportunities for other characters to perform tasks.

!!!!!!!

Revenge: coming this weekend.

[Florete]

EDIT: Oh, Geitz vs. Eliwood. My bad. This is one of those huge opportunity cost arguments that heavily hinges on how important it is to give Lords EXP. Since having to train Eliwood and actually getting Geitz are so intertwined, I would say Eliwood = Geitz. Yes, with an equal sign, taking up one space on the tier list.

We PM'd about it and we actually are going with Lyn vs Eliwood. Even so, a Geitz vs Eliwood debate wouldn't go like that. Geitz is more of a bonus, since you still want to hit Linus's FFO for the extra 11 turns on Tactics. Plus, in a ranked run where you're feeding weak units already, getting to Linus's FFO is extremely easy.

[dondon151]

Lyn > Eliwood holds water from a turncount standpoint due to the scarcity of EXP, but I don't think it makes much sense in ranked. Our basic assumption is that Eliwood is going to be around 15/0 or slightly higher by chapter 24 just to meet the map requirement.

15/0 Eliwood is pretty good. He's still pretty below average offensively, but an average of 12.6 AS is more than sufficient at that point in the game to double most unpromoted enemy types. His physical durability is about the same as a similarly leveled Kent or Sain. His atk is actually about the same as that of a similarly leveled Lyn if each is using his/her prf weapon.

Eliwood's only real problem is getting to that point, but it's difficult to contest that when most of us assume that he's going to get to that point already. And when we remove the turncount restriction (330+ turns for 5 star tactics is much longer than the <200 turns required for max efficiency), it's really easy to justify feeding Eliwood EXP in his earlygame chapters because it is beneficial to give it to him anyway just for the purpose of going to chapter 24. He also has 5 earlygame maps, one of which he actually does fairly well in (chapter 13) and two of which are defense maps.

[Life]

Lyn > Eliwood holds water from a turncount standpoint due to the scarcity of EXP, but I don't think it makes much sense in ranked. Our basic assumption is that Eliwood is going to be around 15/0 or slightly higher by chapter 24 just to meet the map requirement.

15/0 Eliwood is pretty good. He's still pretty below average offensively, but an average of 12.6 AS is more than sufficient at that point in the game to double most unpromoted enemy types. His physical durability is about the same as a similarly leveled Kent or Sain. His atk is actually about the same as that of a similarly leveled Lyn if each is using his/her prf weapon.

Eliwood's only real problem is getting to that point, but it's difficult to contest that when most of us assume that he's going to get to that point already. And when we remove the turncount restriction (330+ turns for 5 star tactics is much longer than the <200 turns required for max efficiency), it's really easy to justify feeding Eliwood EXP in his earlygame chapters because it is beneficial to give it to him anyway just for the purpose of going to chapter 24. He also has 5 earlygame maps, one of which he actually does fairly well in (chapter 13) and two of which are defense maps.

Thank you.

Donny here is exactly right. It takes a bit of effort to get Eliwood leveled but when you consider how long that we have to do on top of not having strict turn count requirements (read this as more than 8 turns in Whereabouts Unknown), it's really not that hard. Lyn's a pure glass cannon and her avoid isn't good enough that we can plop her down and not worry about anything.

Lyn needs to go up, Eliwood needs to go down but don't start assuming that Eliwood is better than Lyn since his start is mediocre. Last I checked, promoting Eliwood gets you much better stuff than promoting Lyn.

[Florete]

Thank you.

Donny here is exactly right. It takes a bit of effort to get Eliwood leveled but when you consider how long that we have to do on top of not having strict turn count requirements (read this as more than 8 turns in Whereabouts Unknown), it's really not that hard. Lyn's a pure glass cannon and her avoid isn't good enough that we can plop her down and not worry about anything.

Lyn needs to go up, Eliwood needs to go down but don't start assuming that Eliwood is better than Lyn since his start is mediocre. Last I checked, promoting Eliwood gets you much better stuff than promoting Lyn.

I'll be sure to double check for you. And just because you're using him anyway doesn't mean the period until then where Lyn clearly beats him is nothing.

[Rodykitty]

And just because you're using him anyway doesn't mean the period until then where Lyn clearly beats him is nothing.

Nothing or something, the above posts seem to imply that Eliwood's functionality once he gets to a certain level outweighs the time Lyn is better.

[dondon151]

And just because you're using him anyway doesn't mean the period until then where Lyn clearly beats him is nothing.

You're indeed correct, but that only means that Lyn contributes something more than just levels towards meeting the chapter 24 requirement while Eliwood does not. The magnitude of what Lyn contributes is fairly small, and that has to be weighed against Eliwood's availability and generally superior performance after around 15/0.

[Florete]

You're indeed correct, but that only means that Lyn contributes something more than just levels towards meeting the chapter 24 requirement while Eliwood does not. The magnitude of what Lyn contributes is fairly small, and that has to be weighed against Eliwood's availability and generally superior performance after around 15/0.

As much as I don't like to admit it, that may actually be what kills me on this...though I'll still go through with the debate with Jaffar, if only just to be absolutely sure.

[dondon151]

so how bout that debate

we be gettin things done here

[Florete]

Are you anticipating this?

Jaffar is opening. I assume something has caused him to delay.

[dondon151]

I'm not particularly anticipating it. I think it will accomplish nothing of value that we can't do in this thread, and I think that Jaffar7 is greatly overhyping the relevancy of debates to the tier list. In fact, I think I summarized Lyn vs. Eliwood pretty accurately in three succinct paragraphs.

Edited February 14, 2011 by dondon151

[Florete]

I'm not particularly anticipating it. I think it will accomplish nothing of value that we can't do in this thread, and I think that Jaffar7 is greatly overhyping the relevancy of debates to the tier list. In fact, I think I summarized Lyn vs. Eliwood pretty accurately in three succinct paragraphs.

Maybe not technically, but I do feel like I should "try harder" in a formal debate, so I think it has the potential to bring to light a clearer comparison than would otherwise be happening. Even if I can't prove Lyn > Eliwood (which I am no longer as sure of) I'd still like to get it out there and see just how they really do compare when you dig deep.

[Anouleth]

I doubt you will find out anything of much significance by 'digging'. Eliwood wins initially by existing. Then Lyn shows up and wins. Then Eliwood promotes and wins. Then the game ends.

[Florete]

I doubt you will find out anything of much significance by 'digging'. Eliwood wins initially by existing. Then Lyn shows up and wins. Then Eliwood promotes and wins. Then the game ends.

And how about developing the accuracy and magnitude of those statements? I noticed you didn't mention who wins overall.