Integ's gon' rank the characters!

[Integrity]

Possibly? He is better than Ike and Hector, he's already great from the start, his performance is much better than both of those guys.

mmm. Aether is a wrench in that works, especially in FE9. Ephraim can't heal himself reliably on the Enemy Phase. Hector has the advantage of promoting slightly earlier on Eliwood's route, thus not being locked at 20 for as long as Ephraim is. I think he's the best, but I see the arguments.

There is just no good downside to it, he is dodging Warriors, Bersekers and Cyclops reliably, and he's 1RKO'ing most enemies with an average lance, an Iron Lance.

Anyway, great review.

Downside's a downside. WTD is WTD, even if he's taking 5% chances to be hit. I had to think of SOMETHING, man. :P

[Junkhead]

Aether is overrated, and why would Ephraim want to heal himself of? Magic users? That's just about it, he's pretty damn durable he would barely even need it. Ephraim's great from the start, Ike actually needs to be fed more kills at times.

It's always assumed to go with HHM, so he's promoting pretty late actually, Hector's problem lie in his Spd issues, he's not doubling many enemies, but neither are they doubling him, and even if they do, they TINK him.

[Integrity]

You know, Tink! actually makes me sad ever since I discovered that FE6 had Spang! instead. :(

EDIT: Oh, content. There's also availability to consider here - Ephraim on Eirika's route is only available for roughly a third of the game. Ephraim's route this is bumped to more like two-thirds, but that's my final argument.

Edited May 4, 2010 by Integrity

[Junkhead]

Spang! sucks, it looks pretty unrealistic on magic users, much like Tink! on magic users also....

But okay, the score was great and deserved, I won't complain about it.

[Integrity]

Man, Spang! was AWESOME. It'd be like "Bors and shit, yo" and they'd be like "attacking!" and he'd be like SPANG!

Nothing says "No Damage!" quite like a comical frying pan noise.

[Junkhead]

Okay, okay...it was cool...just seemed a bit primitive for me. =|

I nominate Swordmaster!Rennac Um- Orson, if not him, let it be Vanessa.

[Integrity]

Nominate? The fuck do you think this thread is, democratic?

Get the fuck over to Fuery's thread if you want your opinions to matter.

[Junkhead]

Well, excuuuse me. I thought most were like that. :(

[Integrity]

:P

Seriously, were you actually nominating a character to rate next? I set forth my criteria for what character goes next at the very beginning. It's Joshua next.

[Anouleth]

Downside's a downside. WTD is WTD, even if he's taking 5% chances to be hit. I had to think of SOMETHING, man. :P

Axereavers? The only real competition are the Wyvern Knights, since the Cavs all have swords for axe-carrying enemies.

In any case, Ephraim is probably better than Hector and FE9 Ike:

-More timely promotion.

-Has 1-2 range, Ike doesn't.

-Is on a route with a high proportion of cavs/armours he can easily kill. Hector has Wolf Beil, but Hector fights less enemies that it's effective against. Ike has Regal Sword, but it has just 12 effective mt with WTD to Reginleif's 24-27 effective mt and Wolf Beil's 27-33 effective mt.

-Best raw stats. Ike is prone to STR-screwage and Hector is prone to SPD-screwage, and never has good skill. Ephraim is perfectly balanced, on the other hand.

-His super-weapon comes the earliest, and is better than Armads. Siegmund has 34 effective mt and gives +5 strength, Armads has 36 effective mt but no strength boost, and is only effective for one enemy, while Siegmund is effective against half the remaining enemies in the game. Ragnell is probably better than Siegmund, but is only around for two chapters.

[Junkhead]

Reason why Ike overrated at times, because the excuses they bring up is usually Aether or Ragnell and call him "broken", when in all reality, he just has nice growths and isn't doing much better than some others early to midgame, not to mention he's constantly suffering WTD after Chapter 3.

I can assure you Ephraim's dodging against axe users is pretty reliable, so is his Hit, so I guess that's his only downside, like Integrity said.

Edited May 4, 2010 by Soul

[Narga_Rocks]

Axereavers? The only real competition are the Wyvern Knights, since the Cavs all have swords for axe-carrying enemies.

In any case, Ephraim is probably better than Hector and FE9 Ike:

-More timely promotion.

-Has 1-2 range, Ike doesn't.

-Is on a route with a high proportion of cavs/armours he can easily kill. Hector has Wolf Beil, but Hector fights less enemies that it's effective against. Ike has Regal Sword, but it has just 12 effective mt with WTD to Reginleif's 24-27 effective mt and Wolf Beil's 27-33 effective mt.

-Best raw stats. Ike is prone to STR-screwage and Hector is prone to SPD-screwage, and never has good skill. Ephraim is perfectly balanced, on the other hand.

-His super-weapon comes the earliest, and is better than Armads. Siegmund has 34 effective mt and gives +5 strength, Armads has 36 effective mt but no strength boost, and is only effective for one enemy, while Siegmund is effective against half the remaining enemies in the game. Ragnell is probably better than Siegmund, but is only around for two chapters.

50% growths (fe9 Ike's str) are only slightly more prone to screwage than 45% growths (Ephraim's spd). 50% will create the biggest standard deviation, and granted that means they can be the most easily screwed. However, they can also be the most easily blessed. Besides, the difference in potential screwage between 45 and 50 isn't all that big anyway.

And what about fe10 Ike (T)? Or even fe10 Ike?

I don't really think any non-mounted unit can compete with fe10 Ike (T).

Reason why Ike overrated at times, because the excuses they bring up is usually Aether or Ragnell and call him "broken", when in all reality, he just has nice growths and isn't doing much better than some others early to midgame, not to mention he's constantly suffering WTD after Chapter 3.

I can assure you Ephraim's dodging against axe users is pretty reliable, so is his Hit, so I guess that's his only downside, like Integrity said.

A lot of people seem to value the performance at the end of the game rather than the performance throughout. It's not really surprising they'd think Ike is amazing due to Aether and Ragnell and forget the first 80+% of the game where he lacked Ragnell and the first 60% of the game where he lacked Aether. But I thought that most people at this site were able to see past endgame statistics.

[Junkhead]

I don't think a unit's endgame performance should make them broken or great, such as Canas' Luna for example, it's great because he can take down Valkyries with ease while some others will be having difficulty. Ike's case, he's sorrounded by great units who are already reliable by themselves (Titania, Oscar, Kieran, Soren, etc)

[dondon151]

Axereavers? The only real competition are the Wyvern Knights, since the Cavs all have swords for axe-carrying enemies.

In any case, Ephraim is probably better than Hector and FE9 Ike:

-More timely promotion.

-Has 1-2 range, Ike doesn't.

-Is on a route with a high proportion of cavs/armours he can easily kill. Hector has Wolf Beil, but Hector fights less enemies that it's effective against. Ike has Regal Sword, but it has just 12 effective mt with WTD to Reginleif's 24-27 effective mt and Wolf Beil's 27-33 effective mt.

-Best raw stats. Ike is prone to STR-screwage and Hector is prone to SPD-screwage, and never has good skill. Ephraim is perfectly balanced, on the other hand.

-His super-weapon comes the earliest, and is better than Armads. Siegmund has 34 effective mt and gives +5 strength, Armads has 36 effective mt but no strength boost, and is only effective for one enemy, while Siegmund is effective against half the remaining enemies in the game. Ragnell is probably better than Siegmund, but is only around for two chapters.

Keep in mind that Hector's Wolf Beil only has 2x eff MT in non-JP versions of the game, so he'll only have 18-22 eff MT. Ephraim can basically OHKO cavaliers throughout his entire existence.

Siegmund is amazing, though. It's effectively the strongest weapon in the game (other than the Dragonstone) and 30 uses is enough to last from chapter 17 to the end of the game. Ephraim also has a horse after promotion for rescue canto shenanigans and has movement over Hector and Ike (technically the same as Ike, but Ike loses more other other units in his game).

The biggest weakness of Ephraim is if you don't go on his route. He comes back autoleveled to something stupid (13/0 for me) and is still salvageable, but not nearly as dominating.

[Anouleth]

50% growths (fe9 Ike's str) are only slightly more prone to screwage than 45% growths (Ephraim's spd). 50% will create the biggest standard deviation, and granted that means they can be the most easily screwed. However, they can also be the most easily blessed. Besides, the difference in potential screwage between 45 and 50 isn't all that big anyway.

On the other hand, Ike getting screwed in strength also screws his AS because weight is compared against strength rather than constitution. Ephraim gets spd screwed, boo hoo, his speed is generally high enough he doesn't care and he always has cav-blicking with the Reginleif.

And what about fe10 Ike (T)? Or even fe10 Ike?

Ephraim obviously gets his ass handed to him by FE10 Ike.

A lot of people seem to value the performance at the end of the game rather than the performance throughout. It's not really surprising they'd think Ike is amazing due to Aether and Ragnell and forget the first 80+% of the game where he lacked Ragnell and the first 60% of the game where he lacked Aether. But I thought that most people at this site were able to see past endgame statistics.

Aether isn't even that great.

Keep in mind that Hector's Wolf Beil only has 2x eff MT in non-JP versions of the game, so he'll only have 18-22 eff MT. Ephraim can basically OHKO cavaliers throughout his entire existence.

lol, I forgot.

Siegmund is amazing, though. It's effectively the strongest weapon in the game (other than the Dragonstone) and 30 uses is enough to last from chapter 17 to the end of the game. Ephraim also has a horse after promotion for rescue canto shenanigans and has movement over Hector and Ike (technically the same as Ike, but Ike loses more other other units in his game).

Yep, pretty much. 22mt against regular enemies, 39mt against monsters, only downside is the -2AS to Ephraim.

As if Ephraim didn't have enough going for him with the 30 effective mt Reginleif. Hey, he gets the strongest weapon in the game all for himself and the strongest non-Sacred Twin weapon as well, also all for himself!

The hilarious part is that Ephraim isn't even the best character in the game

The biggest weakness of Ephraim is if you don't go on his route. He comes back autoleveled to something stupid (13/0 for me) and is still salvageable, but not nearly as dominating.

Yeah, he loses a lot of usefulness, but he can eat all the cavaliers on his side of the map and the reinforcements in C16, so he's still good. Better than Eirika's spawning next to a ton of Pegasus Knights and Mages, almost all with 2-range so she can't counter them

Edited May 4, 2010 by Anouleth

[Parrhesia]

Nominate? The fuck do you think this thread is, democratic?

Get the fuck over to Fuery's thread if you want your opinions to matter.

1: Yo.

2: Spang?

Also, your Eph review is probably going to be better than mine.

Edited May 5, 2010 by Trompe le Monde

[Integrity]

1: Yo.

2: Spang?

Spang. It was Tink! before Tink! was implemented. Didn't you pay attention in class?

Anyway, it's Tomorrow Morning, and you all know what Tomorrow Morning means when it becomes Today Morning.

JOSHUA

Or, possibly, JHOSUA. I'm not picky.

So JHOSUA is our first Myrman, and *technically* our only one. Marisa is too bad to count, but JHOSUA is not *really* our only Myrman because Colm is a badass and counts for the job. Anyway, this is actually a bad thing, because Mr. Integ is biased quite spectacularly against Myrmen as a whole. I've been getting over it with some hefty introduction to sm!Guy, the Lady of Blades herself and - you guessed it - JHOSUA.

What constitutes JHOSUA? Why is he a good unit? It's the hat, bro. He has a sweet-ass hat and don't you dare make the moved hyphen joke because I'm watching you. I mean you. So, anyway, JHOSUA shows up very early in the game - C5 - as an enemy with a Killing Edge. This means that JHOSUA is probably going to rape the first unit you put into his range, and then you'll /raeg and reset and get angry at the game. After being exposed to a little nice Natasha ass, though, he promptly switches sides and gives you his Killing Edge and an Armorslayer that lives in a house right next to him. This means that JHOSUA has all of the tools of his trade either on his person or in a house right next to him, and is therefore a complete unit right off the bat. Compounding this is the fact that JHOSUA's chapter is also our introduction to the Arena, and JHOSUA is a prime target for tossing in there right off the bat for a couple levels while Seth cleans house and molests Amelia for her Torch and village-saving credit.

So he has a strong introduction, as you can see. JHOSUA, from there, honestly declines. He's always a solid unit, but always highly dependent on the R-N-G for his usefulness, and therefore if he weren't so good he'd be dead to me. He's got good stats (though, laughably, lower growths ACROSS THE BOARD than Eirika except in HP and RES), but not enough to consistently 1RKO without Killing Edges or Silver Swords late in the game. Getting him there isn't so hard, but he misses Brigand Land which would have been stupid easy XP for him and that makes me sad. It's actually not a terrible idea to compare him to Eirika before the split; the two of them essentially run neck-and-neck until you pick Ephraim's route - when JHOSUA pulls ahead - or until JHOSUA promotes before she does. This comparison is favorable towards him in the early-game, as it were. He starts with the bases to be a great (great > solid) unit for the first half of the game before petering off, and then once he promotes (if you promote him early enough) he gets another short spurt of usefulness before tapering off again.

JHOSUA's supports actually bear mentioning here - he's Wind affinity, which means he comes packaged with his own CRIT affinity. Unfortunately, he lacks the table to really take use of it - four of his six slow supports are Ice, which doesn't reciprocate the CRIT. If you want the full crit, he has to build a mega-slow L'Arachel (5+2) or his fastest-but-still-slow support Gerik (15+3) which is his best-and-only-viable option bar Natasha. So JHOSUA's supports are all slow, and he has terrible synergy - but he can build full-CRIT supports as a Swordmaster/Assassin, which is kinda cool.

So what's to be said about JHOSUA, in the end? He's always a solid unit, but he's rarely ever more than just a solid unit. He's not going to do anything a Cavalier can't do better and without Sword-lockage - except assassin!JHOSUA can Lockpick, which...means...something. Assassin!JHOSUA can Silence, but so can Colm and Colm has a fucking FAST full-CRIT support negating JHOSUA's skill lead.

He does have a sweet hat, though, and I think the Japanese spelling of his name is ridiculous if you couldn't tell.

7.0

(but this is up for debate, moreso than my other scores)

Edited May 5, 2010 by Integrity

[dondon151]

Joshua won't attack Natasha if she's in his range (at least, he prioritized Seth over her). Natasha can survive a round of combat; if you pick off all but one of the other enemies near Joshua, you can recruit him fairly safely.

[Junkhead]

After being exposed to a little nice Natasha ass

Seth cleans house and molests Amelia for her Torch and village-saving credit.

Ewww, pervert....[Angry Face]

It's actually not a terrible idea to compare him to Eirika before the split.

Despite Eirika having better growths, it's not like they're much higher than his', Joshua's doing pretty much better, his bases are just great, he starts with twice Eirika's Str and +2 Def despite having -10 Def growth. Other than that, his base Spd is ridiculously high, so he's easily capping it faster than she will, he's doubling much more enemies, not to mention he is able to wield Steel Swords for only 2 AS loss, so Joshua will be winning in offense and durability before she promotes.

[Integrity]

Joshua won't attack Natasha if she's in his range (at least, he prioritized Seth over her). Natasha can survive a round of combat; if you pick off all but one of the other enemies near Joshua, you can recruit him fairly safely.

Joshua will never attack Natasha, this is true. I'm just /raeging over the first time I played the game ("oh, he doesn't like to fight women. lute front! crit kill /raeg reset").

-

<3 Soul. I said the comparison was favorable to JHOSUA, didn't I?

My problem now is I don't see JHOSUA as better than a 7.0, but I see JHOSUA as slightly better than Eirika and Eirika as better than a 7.0. That totally doesn't balance out.

Edited May 5, 2010 by Integrity

[Anouleth]

Despite Eirika having better growths, it's not like they're much higher than his', Joshua's doing pretty much better, his bases are just great, he starts with twice Eirika's Str and +2 Def despite having -10 Def growth. Other than that, his base Spd is ridiculously high, so he's easily capping it faster than she will, he's doubling much more enemies, not to mention he is able to wield Steel Swords for only 2 AS loss, so Joshua will be winning in offense and durability before she promotes.

Eirika has Rapier, though, and better supports, and after promotion she curbstomps him due to Sieglinde. She's also one of your better people to fight banditos because she's dodgy and can double them.

[dondon151]

I wouldn't say any of those supports are actually viable. Joshua is doing better than Eirika against most enemies all the way up until her promotion, and even if she does get Sieglinde, she has them for chapters 17-F, most of which can be partially warp-skipped.

[Rewjeo]

And her having Sieglinde to help take out the monster bosses isn't helping with warp-skipping at all. /sarcasm

Mainly, though, Eirika doesn't have to have a higher gross value than him, because she has no negative. She's maybe a 6.5/10 over the course of the game, but there's no negative. Joshua's more like a 8.0/10, but he's kicking someone off, easily dropping him to more like 6.0/10. And he gets his 7.0 thanks to being a 6.0 for a long time. BTW, those are pretty rough numbers I came up with on the spot, so...

[dondon151]

First, the only monster bosses that exist after Eirika obtains Sieglinde are the ch18 gorgon and Morva. The ch18 gorgon is far away and will be killed by 8 move units before Eirika. Eirika has no chance at surviving Morva, and if she is the lord, having her kill the boss adds 1 turn to your turncount anyway because then she can't seize.

Second, the overall contributions that Eirika can claim throughout the game are severely limited. And I disagree with your numbers anyway. Joshua is easily optimal deployment for a substantial period of time; if he's preventing Colm from being deployed (whose combat sucks beyond belief), the player doesn't give a shit.

[Rewjeo]

Wait, so we're warpskipping, but having more move matters?

But she's deployed with no negative, so doing a little bit still adds up. Joshua still has negatives, and those might make him worse. Especially with the number of turns she can save in chapters P-4. Quite frankly, he probably joins right around the time her best period ends.