ITT I Play No Seth FE8

[Integrity]

A Running Tally of Things:

Accidentally booted SNES9x, go me.

Lagdou 7 is almost entirely magic enemies.

20 Deathgoyle: 43|18|13|15| 3|14| 5, 28 ATK - ATK for 1RKO with doubling would be 27, or well within Fire!MK parameters.

No Gwyglis on Lagdou 8. That Deathgoyle was pretty indicative of his misbegotten kind.

20 Centaur: 46|16|11|13| 2|13| 8, 25 ATK - 1RKO at 31 ATK, or barely beyond Fire!MK parameters. He's on the upper end of durability, though.

I would like to respectfully submit a request for the previous level to kindly fuck itself.

No Gwyglis in Lagdou 9. So they're mostly a non-issue, M, unless you run into level 20 enemies in Valni later.

[Colonel M]

So aside from a few things, max Str / Mag is about all you need cap-wise.

I am disappoint.

[Smiley Jim]

Final: Battle of Monstergeddon(part II)

Units Deployed:

Ephraim, Eirika, Gilliam, Ross, Gerik, Joshua, Tana, Cormag, Lute, Artur, Natasha, Tethys

Chapter Summary: The final showdown with Lyon. While the monsters themselves aren't terribly threatening(except the gorgons(40 atk Shadowshot)and dracozombies(negates defense)), Lyon is very dangerous. While his AS is a greater joke than the Detroit Lions, he has massive durability figures, and 55 atk. Proceed with caution and use Puire water/Barrier as needed. As for part 2, just defeat the Demon King. It should only take one turn.

Part 1: I sent Ephraim west with Gil, Hat, Artur, and Cornmug, while Eirika went east with everyone else. I managed to grab the seraph robe out of the E chest, but failed to get the W chest. I took out the dracozombies on turn 3 by luring them out then going at it with my Sacred Twins. After dealing with reinforcements for 2 turns after killing the dracozombies, I killed Lyon on turn 6(Ross delivered the ORKO with a Garm crit.)

As for part 2, I warped Gilliam over to the DK's position(after Ross gave him Garm), and I was able to 1TKO him thanks to Tethys(note that I could've done the same with Ephraim or Ross. Eh.)

6 turns(part 1)

1 turn(part 2)

Total Turns Used: 189

Epilog and Unit Stats to follow.

Edited October 16, 2011 by darkandroid125

[Colonel M]

Come on... I want the opinion of characters before the world ends today. :(

[Integrity]

Oh come now, M. It hasn't even been a week yet. DA is barely behind whatever lackadaisical schedule he "keeps".

[Smiley Jim]

ITP: The Final Reckoning

Since you are all big babies, and I need to do this anyway, here are my unit reviews over the course of the game:

Ephraim:

If I had a few words to describe Eph, it would be completely ridiculous. In an average playthrough, he'd be considered 'simply good', but my Ephraim was severely blessed in crucial stats, hence his brokenness. He was able to one-round consistently and he basically never dies(despite having a loss count of 1. He didn't die at any point in the PT.) Of course, I had to hold him back in the midgame because I didn't want him to cap his level before Chapter 16, but once he promoted, he was like Death on a horse.

Eirika:

In comparison to her brother, Eirika was rather vanilla. Sure, she could double consistently(well, just about anyone can, so that point is moot), but I found her damage to be lacking in spite of her str blessage early on(to be fair, Gil and Ross had more atk in comparison), and her durability was ass until she came back in Chapter 15. After that, she became a lot better at surviving and dealing damage, especially as I used an energy ring on her. Pretty good, but not as useful as Ephraim.

Franz:

Overall, I see him as useful, even though I didn't promote him until Chapter 14. While he was good at killing, his main utility stemmed from taking part in rescue chains. Later on, his low luck and res proved to be a problem as he could get critted fairly easily and he took magic like a little girl(the C18 gorgons could do 35 to his 42HP.), so I ended up not exposing him as much(he was fine against most physical attackers, though.) I ended up not bringing him to endgame because the gorgons up near Lyon as well as the mogall reinforcements were a consistent threat(they could still drop him to almost nothing if he got hit), though again, he'd be fine against skeletons and gargoyles.

Gilliam:

While I won't call him amazing by any means, he's not all that bad a unit(he's still Low due to his issues.) The biggest obstacle Gil had to overcome over the course of this PT was his movement. With only 5 move thanks to my idiotic promo choice for him, he had issues keeping up in some of the bigger maps(and no one except unpromoted Franz/Forde can carry him.) His speed was also an issue, but thanks to my speedwings and the Garm, that issue was quickly alleviated. His biggest draw was that his defense was completely ridiculous to the point that no enemy except magic users and dracozombies could even touch him, much less damage him significantly.

Ross:

Likely the most surprising unit of this playthrough as far as his stats turned out. I really didn't expect him to get exceptional speed or defense, but he blew me away when he has a speed stat over 20 by the main campaign's end. The 18 in def was just frosting on the cake. As far as damage goes, he hits like a truck, but I was slightly worried about his skill in his early stages. And I couldn't forget about his water-walking abilities that allowed him to skip entire portions of Chapter 13 and kill the hordes of archers and cavaliers along the center path.

Hat:

Like Eirika, he was rather vanilla, though he was more useful than her since he has availability and an early promotion going for him. Like Eirika, his durability was kind of lame, but his offense was almost peerless. His strength was also blessed, and thanks to an energy ring, he capped str. His biggest issue, other than his failing durability, was that he had no 1-2 range. This often meant that enemies could get a free hit on him without getting nuked(+15 crit does that for ya.)

Artur:

He's easily the most useful unpromoted magic user due to the fact that he can promote to Bishop(allowing for C staves, unlike Lute), and doesn't take forever to level(unlike Stache/Natasha). I will admit that his durability is balls, but if you are a magic user, that's the way the dog treat crumbles. While his damage was slightly worse than Lute's, he doubled a hell of a lot more, which was always welcome.

Lute:

I can now safely admit that while Lute is usable, there's no appeal to using her other than 'lol I have 65% mag growth'. This is because she suffers from the same issues as Lilina: While her magic is good, her speed isn't all that high and in some cases, it's worse because Lute loses AS from basically everything(Lilina doesn't lose AS from FE6!Thunder/Elfire, while Lute loses 2 AS from Thunder/6 from Elfire as a sage.)and I didn't have any body rings. While I could have solved the con issue by making her a mage knight, I kind of needed the increased mag cap more thanks to Ladgou enemies being dicks.

Tana:

I normally harbor a severe dislike for Pegasus knights, but I needed a flier that doesn't get mauled by mages. Another thing I like about Tana is that her strength is abnormally high for her class(kind of like Paola in FEDS), except that she doesn't trade spd or lck for it. Still, she's a bitch to raise in Ephraim's mode due to being imprisoned in C9 and fleets in C10. She really only took off in C11 when she could easily kill mogalls. Even after that, her role was relegated to things like rescue chains and ferrying units over bad terrain.

Cormag:

Like Tana, he flies. Unlike Tana, he can withstand hits better and does significantly more damage per hit. He's very usable from the start and is one of the best units in Ephraim's route. His only real weakness is that he takes magic hits like a stoned kid on crack, but mages aren't particularly common in this game so he's really not threatened by them. Sort of like Haar in FE10 except that Haar's really weak towards Thunder magic in that game.

Gerik:

For the sake of comparison, he's Hat with more HP/str/def, but notably worse skl/spd. He's hampered on this route thanks to his awful availability, but his bases and growths make him usable enough anyway. Also, he gets axes upon promotion, completely nulling the range issue that Hat has. On a usefulness scale, I'd say Hat wins in Ephraim route because you can get him promoted before Gerik shows up.

Edited October 22, 2011 by darkandroid125

[Dark Sage]

Good to see the color fonts for your character ratings are literally a pain to read as always.

[Smiley Jim]

Good to see the color fonts for your character ratings are literally a pain to read as always.

Then you will be glad to know I'm reverting to the FE6 Character rating font(colored/bolded names, regular black text)next time I do a game.

[Integrity]

Then you will be glad to know I'm reverting to the FE6 Character rating font(colored/bolded names, regular black text)next time I do a game.

YAY

Oh, I could cry. You've seen the light.

Of course, that begs the question of why you're continuing this style for the rest of this log. Consistency?

[zahlman]

The only thing I can think of for that line of reasoning is the -10% MAG growth, but that's a bad reason anyways when that 10% is moved into SPD, a stat that helps power mages more. Hilariously enough, MAG is the only area that Lilina wins in, as she loses every non-HP (tied) stat by 5-10%.

... Maybe it's the personality?

Ok, so I'm dragging up a bit of old discussion, but you guys seem to be missing a few things here. You can't really just compare stats directly between the two games. Yeah, Lute is top tier, but there are a few reasons to give Lilina more credit:

- Lilina supports with the main lord. Some people care about that kind of thing. There's also the part where the game rewards you for keeping her alive in so many ways beyond actually being able to use her, whereas Lute is, in that regard, just another unit. She's not even important in cutscenes.

- FE6 tomes are stupidly light. In 8, Lute's lol con actually matters. Yeah, MK!Lute can offset that, but there's an early game to worry about too.

- Speaking of which, MAG growth certainly does matter for power mages, because there's an early game to worry about too, and it sucks when you double something and still don't ORKO. You want your power mages to actually take units out early on. Lilina's speed has always been adequate for me. Keep in mind that most of the red-team units that are prime targets for magic are also pretty slow.

- IMO/IMX, Res matters a lot more as a stat in 6 than it does in 8, and there are maddeningly few blue-team units in 6 with good res. So even though Lilina turns out (slightly) worse than Lute in general in this regard, it's worth a lot more in an FE6 context than Lute's res is in a FE8 context.

- One huge factor that's nothing to do with the units' stats themselves. In 8, you get Saleh, a solid prepromote anima user, partway through. If you're playing efficiently, Lute may well not have caught up to Saleh's offensive stats by the time you get him, and he'll still have slightly better Def and HP. (higher skill, too, not that it matters, because it's not like it's hard to hit enemies with magic...)

In 6, you get... Cecilia. An all-around terrible unit who can barely even move on the level where you get her. Seriously, having a mounted unit join your team in a desert level (and full desert at that - FE8's "desert" has merciful normal terrain at top and bottom) has got to be one of the best/worst trolls IS has managed. Anyway, the point is that Lute has a reason to fade away from the spotlight, while Lilina is essential to the whole game.

- Speaking of which. Chapter 21. I swear this map was built especially for Lilina to show off. You stick her on a forest tile in advance of everyone else and she wtfpwns legions of wyverns on enemy phase, none of whom have more than about 20% display hit and most of which have more like 2%. Otherwise, they mob your team and there are just too many of them for you to make decent progress. She doesn't even need Aircalibur to do it, either.

Lute, OTOH, will never get an opportunity like this. On the few levels where you can counter a lot of not-overpowering enemies on enemy phase, they're generally either (a) decently-accurate damage dealers in early game, or (b) monsters, which Artur will be much more effective against (literally).

[Parrhesia]

Ok, so I'm dragging up a bit of old discussion, but you guys seem to be missing a few things here. You can't really just compare stats directly between the two games. Yeah, Lute is top tier

Wait what

, but there are a few reasons to give Lilina more credit:

- Lilina supports with the main lord. Some people care about that kind of thing.

That is still (largely) irrelevant to gameplay. Story or aesthetic reasons don't really play a part in what crushes things better.

There's also the part where the game rewards you for keeping her alive in so many ways beyond actually being able to use her, whereas Lute is, in that regard, just another unit. She's not even important in cutscenes.

Again, gameplay/story. Personally, I dislike Lute myself (admittedly, I also dislike Lilina).

- FE6 tomes are stupidly light. In 8, Lute's lol con actually matters.

...Apart from the fact that she can double (going off of guesses based on terrible enemy AS throughout the game) ... at least SOME things, which is more than Lilina can say.

Yeah, MK!Lute can offset that, but there's an early game to worry about too.

This early game where Lilina is apparently flattening. What world is this, exactly? Narnia?

- Speaking of which, MAG growth certainly does matter for power mages, because there's an early game to worry about too

Yes. That is where bases matter even more than usual. And Lute's kind of kick Lilina's royal ass.

and it sucks when you double something and still don't ORKO.

Again, when does Lute suffer this problem when Lilina doesn't?

You want your power mages to actually take units out early on. Lilina's speed has always been adequate for me.

Oh dear.

Keep in mind that most of the red-team units that are prime targets for magic are also pretty slow.

ITT: FE8 enemies are faster than those of FE6.

- IMO/IMX, Res matters a lot more as a stat in 6 than it does in 8, and there are maddeningly few blue-team units in 6 with good res.

Right. So Lute's weaker Res barely matters. Glad we agree.

So even though Lilina turns out (slightly) worse than Lute in general in this regard, it's worth a lot more in an FE6 context than Lute's res is in a FE8 context.

Yes, but Lute isn't in FE6. She is in FE8, where I couldn't honestly care at all.

- One huge factor that's nothing to do with the units' stats themselves. In 8, you get Saleh, a solid prepromote anima user, partway through. If you're playing efficiently, Lute may well not have caught up to Saleh's offensive stats by the time you get him, and he'll still have slightly better Def and HP. (higher skill, too, not that it matters, because it's not like it's hard to hit enemies with magic...)

So use them both. Job done.

In 6, you get... Cecilia. An all-around terrible unit who can

-Staffbot better than Lilina

-Is mounted

-Doesn't need training

barely even move on the level where you get her. Seriously, having a mounted unit join your team in a desert level (and full desert at that - FE8's "desert" has merciful normal terrain at top and bottom) has got to be one of the best/worst trolls IS has managed.

Good thing you shouldn't be dumping her based solely on that level, then.

Anyway, the point is that Lute has a reason to fade away from the spotlight, while Lilina is essential to the whole game.

It's not as if Lugh exists. Hell, even Hugh, although I dunno who wins out of those. And Yodel, Niime...even Saul/Clarine/maybe Ellen. In any event, neither is essential.

- Speaking of which. Chapter 21. I swear this map was built especially for Lilina to show off. You stick her on a forest tile in advance of everyone else and she wtfpwns legions of wyverns on enemy phase, none of whom have more than about 20% display hit and most of which have more like 2%. Otherwise, they mob your team and there are just too many of them for you to make decent progress. She doesn't even need Aircalibur to do it, either.

Leaving aside the part where I don't actually remember which chapter this is, do you actually have any stats to back this up?

Lute, OTOH, will never get an opportunity like this. On the few levels where you can counter a lot of not-overpowering enemies on enemy phase, they're generally either (a) decently-accurate damage dealers in early game, or (b) monsters, which Artur will be much more effective against (literally).

Because using Artur and Saleh rules out Lute.

Right.

I seriously don't understand this vendetta against using multiples of the same class.

[Integrity]

You're massively underestimating Cecilia, if you're basing her performance on just C14. I'm dead serious here, how can you even think that Cecilia is all-around terrible ...oh God, unless...

You're not a DA alt, are you?

You're failing to consider that you cannot simply compare stats across the games without comparing enemy quality. Lute's shitty durability will get her killed against zombies (remember how you were grousing about Cecilia's joining chapter?) far less often than ...everything on Lilina.

Speaking of monsters, you say that Artur will be more effective (I see what you did there) against them, except you forgot your own point that there's an earlygame to consider where Lute's doing more damage.

Also you mention that Lute is "top tier" (which she isn't afaik by a longshot) and forget that Lilina is a solid LOWER-MID over here.

I might be able to do this better, but it's 0539 as of the click so it's too early to care.

[zahlman]

...Apart from the fact that she can double (going off of guesses based on terrible enemy AS throughout the game) ... at least SOME things, which is more than Lilina can say.

Lilina doubled plenty of wyverns for me, the ones that didn't get OHKOd anyway.

This early game where Lilina is apparently flattening. What world is this, exactly? Narnia?

She's not flattening, but she's doing damage in a couple of key places. She gets more opportunities to train because there are more places where you don't really have an option.

ITT: FE8 enemies are faster than those of FE6.

I didn't say that. I said Lilina is fast enough for the things that it makes sense to target Lilina with.

Right. So Lute's weaker Res barely matters. Glad we agree.

The point is that Lilina looks better in the FE6 context because the Res does matter to Lilina.

Yes, but Lute isn't in FE6. She is in FE8, where I couldn't honestly care at all.

Sigh. I think we're talking at cross purposes here. I'm comparing the characters on the basis of their relative usefulness compared to their blue-team companions, each within their own game. Maybe you don't consider that a valid basis for comparison, but I think it's at least as valid as anything else that lets you compare characters from different games. It's certainly more valid than just comparing bases and growths, when the enemies are all completely different.

So use them both. Job done.

Sigh. Of course you can use both Lute and Saleh.

The point is that FE6 puts more pressure on you to do more of the work with Lilina. Thus, she becomes more important in the context of her own game.

-Staffbot better than Lilina

Yeah, fine, having people who can use staves well is important, too. I was talking about the respective units' offensive potential, though.

-Is mounted

-Doesn't need training

- Won't come remotely close to capping any stat

It's not as if Lugh exists. Hell, even Hugh, although I dunno who wins out of those. And Yodel, Niime...even Saul/Clarine/maybe Ellen. In any event, neither is essential.

I didn't consider Lugh/Hugh/Ray because they aren't prepromotes, and I didn't consider the others because they aren't anima users.

Leaving aside the part where I don't actually remember which chapter this is, do you actually have any stats to back this up?

I have my recollection of playing through Hard mode, tearing my hair out a couple times until I got the idea to do this, and marvelling at how much easier things were as a result. (And then tearing my hair out a couple more times figuring out how to deal with the rest of the enemies that didn't fall within her path. I didn't claim to be good at this...)

I seriously don't understand this vendetta against using multiples of the same class.

It's not a vendetta FFS. The point is that Lilina doesn't have the same kind of option to be replaced.

You're massively underestimating Cecilia, if you're basing her performance on just C14. I'm dead serious here, how can you even think that Cecilia is all-around terrible ...oh God, unless...

You're not a DA alt, are you?

Who's DA? Thanks for the reminder to go properly introduce myself here, though.

Cecilia has horrible bases and less-than-stellar growths. (10 speed + 25% strikes me as especially bad.) The arguments being put forward for her being any good are "she's pre-promoted and mounted". Seriously, when that's all you have going for you, how are you not all-around terrible?

You're failing to consider that you cannot simply compare stats across the games without comparing enemy quality. Lute's shitty durability will get her killed against zombies (remember how you were grousing about Cecilia's joining chapter?) far less often than ...everything on Lilina.

I don't really value durability in magic users in the early game, because they aren't supposed to get hit / do serious work on EP. Late-game, they need to survive, but dodging works pretty well. Maybe it's just me, but I didn't find I had to put any particular effort into training Lilina in FE6 Hard mode, beyond, you know, the overall difficulty of everything.

Speaking of monsters, you say that Artur will be more effective (I see what you did there) against them, except you forgot your own point that there's an earlygame to consider where Lute's doing more damage.

Blarg. You are correct that my argument was inconsistent here. If it weren't for the Slayer skill, Light magic would suck even worse in FE8 than normal because WTA/WTD matters so much less.

Also you mention that Lute is "top tier" (which she isn't afaik by a longshot) and forget that Lilina is a solid LOWER-MID over here.

"Lute is top tier" is a meme I picked up somewhere along the way. Presumably it arose out of her self-aggrandizing personality? :/ I don't particularly care much about other people's tier lists (and I'm definitely not trying to make any myself), I just found it odd to see a bunch of bashing on Lilina in the context of a runthrough for another game entirely, when I remembered her being pretty much essential.

ETA: Derp. DA is the OP, right? Yeah, sockpuppeting your own thread to revive an old, irrelevant discussion because you just have to share your own opinions would be pretty terrible. Fortunately that's not what's going on here, but I do suppose I owe DarkAndroid125 an apology for the sidetrack. But then, I guess the original discussion is pretty much done anyway... ?

Edited October 27, 2011 by zahlman

[Integrity]

Don't sweat the last bit too much, it wasn't a slight at you - it's just something I *could* see DA doing in a fit of rage.

Aaaaanyway, let's pick this apart my style because I dislike quote->response:

1: Let's pick FE6 Chapter 13, because it's a map I know has Wyverns. According to the ultra-helpful HM Stats Thread, Wyverns in C13 have between 8 and 10 AS. Lilina isn't doubling the SLOW ones until 20/1. She won't double 10AS for another level, on average. She is not 20/1 by C13, I'm sorry. In C21, the (unpromoted) Wyverns have from 11 to 14 AS - or 20/5 at the low end and 20/15 at the high end. The promoted ones? 14-16 - the latter of which she won't double on average until 20/20, and even then just barely.

In the earlier case, Lilina would need an ATK of ~35 to 1HKO (since she sure as fuck ain't doubling) which means, with Fire, 20/12 when she CAPS MAGIC. She could have Aircalibur, which makes it a much more manageable 11 MAG, which is only level 9. And that's well within the limits of reason! Of course, Lilina is, er, 1HKOd in return until she's level 19, which limits her EP exposure to exactly 0. And that's a pain in the dick. In the latter scenario, she'd need ~43 ATK to 1HKO the unpromoted Wyverns (granted, she's probably doubling now) which means Aircalibur and at least level 20/1. Okay, fair. To do in the Wyvern Lords, which she probably isn't doubling, she'd need a massive 50 ATK to 1HKO the weaker ones, which bumps her level further up to 20/6 or so. And even at 20/6, the Lords are handily 1HKOing HER back. So there's that.

2: You always have an option. I assume you're talking about Knights and Wyverns here, so for the former: Hammers? That's Zealot, Marcus, the Axe Bros, and many more better units (Echidna, to a lesser extent Bartre) later on. Then Dieck when he promotes, any of the Paladins you promote, Percival, and so. Armorslayers? That's almost all of the above, except minus the requirement to promote and plus Rutger. Wyverns? Well, you do have a CADRE of Archers who will do more damage than Lilina around her joining time, even if they're kinda ass overall. Except by the time Lilina and Wyverns co-exist, guess who else does? Shin. There's your option.

Oh yeah, and who's Lugh again? Right, a mage. Who shows earlier than Lilina. Who gets to doubling speed much faster than Lilina. And I don't EVEN want to hear your "yeah but lugh's magic growth is worse than lilina's" that anybody I'd care to argue with seems to spew - if RES is lower, MAG matters less and doubling > not doubling in almost all situations. Hell, it'd let Lugh 1RKO with Fire when Lilina is only 1HKOing with Aircalibur and that's *efficient*.

3: Sure, she's doubling Knights but I just pointed out the flaws in saying she doubles Wyverns above. Of course, Lilina's Speed base is a whopping 4 which means she won't be doubling the Knights in her JOINING CHAPTER until level 7. And they gain Speed, albeit slowly, as you go on. And why did she gain 6 levels as a unit who isn't doubling and isn't putting out great damage, if she won't promise to annihilate the later tough enemies (^) without excessive XP food?

4: Mages aren't exactly a huge threat. Yeah, they hurt. Yeah, your units' RES sucks. But here's another thing: Lilina's not doubling enemy Mages AND they have decent RES to boot, which utterly defeats her damage-dealing potential. Put it in perspective, the Mages in chapter 9 (nine) would require her to be promoted to double them. With 9 RES, she's doing single-digit chip to them until level 13. Status staves/Bolting don't show for a while (the only chapter I can remember with either before my point is 12), and then you get a unit fairly well tailored to tank them for the team: Cecilia whose RES starts right around where Lilina's is when she promotes, didn't need to be promoted, and actually consumed absolutely nothing to be what she is. But more on Cecilia later.

Also, the same Chapter 9 Mages 2HKO Lilina until she's level 8. Did you feed her 7 levels in a chapter and a half?

5: While you made an admirable attempt to show why Lute comes up short against Artur or Saleh, you failed to talk at all about Lilina versus Lugh or Ray or Cecilia beyond a blanket "cecilia is terrible" without reason. You also didn't provide any factual evidence for Lilina trashing Lute besides a little anecdote at the beginning. But I'll help you out here, nonetheless, by providing the same dissertation I did above for Lute.

We all remember Lilina's performance against the FE6 C8 Knights, in her joining chapter. What about Lute versus the FE8 C8 Knights, four levels after her recruitment? Kudos to GJ here.

These motherfuckers have an attack speed of 0. That's not the 4 of Lilina's Knights. Lute has to be at least level ONE to double them, handily knocking off 90% of their health. To 1RKO the worst of them, Lute would need to be level 8, granting her the 7 levels instead of 6 in three and a half chapters instead of, uh, none. And unlike the FE6 C8 Knights, none of these have Javelins to return fire on poor Lute. Oh yeah, and the same worst of the FE8 C8 Knights 2HKO a level 8 Lute, as compared to the FE6 C8 Knights who, unless they have Javelins, 1HKO Lilina. I'm not even going to insult you and bring up the FE8 C4 enemy stats because they're *revenants* and exist as FREE XP for anybody. Like, say, Lute. Who joins right next to a level's worth of them she can solo while other people do interesting stuff like finish the map.

I can do more examples if you want. Really, I'm happy to.

6: Sigh. Of course you can use both Lilina and Lugh.

Wait, what?

ITT: Erk is more useful than Lilina because he's helpful in C15/16, except he's useless because Pent.

7: Staves are incredibly useful. What Furet missed is Cecilia's whopping C Rank join, which is middling but nothing to GUSH over.

Of course, Lilina DOES promote to exactly E and is unlikely to get much further, so there's that.

And why are we talking about Cecilia's offensive potential like it's her main shtick? She shows up attacking worse than Lilina, yes. She shows up healing worse than Saul, yes. But she shows up doing both of them, with no investment required. And if you're giving her Aircalibur, she's still whipping 35 MT on flying targets (incidentally, not enough to 1HKO unpromoted fliers in C15 but enough to take them to single-digit HP) and she still has C Staves and a horse for all SORTS of goodness and 8 MOV for even more.

I think that was all about Cecilia for now. We'll see.

8: It's a good thing caps are meaningless without context, which you so helpfully provided. Wait, no, you didn't. I did. My bad.

And as a pre-emptive strike - please, don't take this personally if you're intelligent enough not to think this - have a hypothetical scenario. Isaac the Soldier rams all of his caps at 25, RARING TO GO. Integ the Soldier never hits his lofty caps of 30, but ends up with stats in the ~28s range. Who's the better unit, the one with higher stats or the one with capped stats? Point well granted, this isn't entirely applicable here, but the moral of the story is to educate you that caps mean fuck-all except to handicap units with high growths - like Lilina, oddly.

9: I explained to him which chapter it was, and helpfully included the probability of Lilina 1HKOing or doubling Wyverns back in point 1.

10: Lugh again. Also Ray shortly later or, if you're really jonesing for Wyvern kills, Shin or even - God blast it! - Cecilia.

And do forgive Furetchen, there ARE a lot of people who use One Of Each Class for some obscene reason.

EXCELSIOR, TO RESPONDING TO THE RESPONSES TO MY OWN RESPONSE

11: I already went over Cecilia. She's fairly mediocre in everything, for zero investment. You can look a little bit up if you forgot.

12: There's a huge difference between "durability doesn't matter" and "she's bloody 1hkod by the bloody things she's supposed to counter" or "can't do much ep work; just a unit or two" and "frucking 1rkod all the everywhere so has 0 ep at all". A HUGE one.

And dodging works AWESOMELY! when your SPD is shit like Lilina's. How doesn't Lute get the same "durability doesn't matter" pass again with blanket better defensive parameters?

13: A TIP FOR PROFESSIONALS: WTA/WTD is +/- 1 MT and 10 HIT in FE6, and 1 MT and 15 HIT in FE8. Where does it matter more, again?

Unless you were referencing the shittiness of all the hit rates in FE6, in which case I may have to cede the point because everybody's hit rate is pretty shitty in FE6 with a few exceptions.

14: The bashing on Lilina is because DA is a blatant unthinking fanboy over everything Lilina does. It got brought up sometime, for some reason, I don't even know anymore. I probably said some mean shit and we moved on until you.

I *think* that covers it all.

[eclipse]

Hey, you guys. . .this would totally make for an interesting debate. Really. I see things like growths vs. bases, PEMN, and a bunch of other things that look like they need to be addressed.

I'm not taking a side, as I don't play efficiently in FE6, and don't care for Lute.

[Integrity]

Frankly, I'd never go seriously debate this, Clipsety. I don't know enough about FE6 :P

[zahlman]

I wouldn't want to do a proper debate because honestly I don't care that much. I'm just too easily drawn in to this kind of thing, I guess. Integrity, I admire your persistence in responding to all of that, and regret spending the time to write it, so I'll keep the summary short.

I think the key idea in my ranting is that Cecilia appears to be intended to fill the same role in 6 that Saleh does in 8, and can't do a good job in that particular role. As discussed in the recent Lute vs. Gerik debate, Saleh is a sufficiently pwnsome replacement for Lute that you'd only be using them both if you want to double up on Anima; Cecilia OTOH could supplement Lilina but isn't going to replace her any time soon - at least, certainly not with my playstyle. I can see how you'd fill the role out instead with one of the other Anima users, though. Just that they aren't prepromotes. I guess that isn't a particularly important factor, and I didn't really think about it that much.

So yeah, PEMN, but using Lilina made things a lot easier for me. Between her and Miledy (who I believe gets a lot more respect in general), much of my remaining hair was saved. I don't consider myself a fanboy (of any character, really) but it's hard to make this kind of argument without coming across as one, if only because there really aren't direct comparisons to be made (which seems to be our main point of agreement). And I'm not really good enough at FE to want to attempt FE6 with any real semblance of efficiency anyway

Oh, and what I meant about WTA/WTD is that because of the monsters (other than Bonewalkers/Wights/whatever), a greater % of FE8 enemies ignore WTA/WTD completely. But yeah, the reduced avoid bonus/penalty in 6 was kinda lol, and certainly surprised me. In retrospect it probably accounts for a lot of my frustration :s

Edited October 27, 2011 by zahlman

[Integrity]

Oh, I never claimed Lilina was useless, just that Lute is better compared to her enemies - which is what matters.

[Colonel M]

This is for all you Cecilia haters out there.

Hey, you guys. . .this would totally make for an interesting debate. Really. I see things like growths vs. bases, PEMN, and a bunch of other things that look like they need to be addressed.

DID SOMEONE JUST SEND ME A DEBATE CHALLENGE?

Cecilia has horrible bases and less-than-stellar growths. (10 speed + 25% strikes me as especially bad.) The arguments being put forward for her being any good are "she's pre-promoted and mounted". Seriously, when that's all you have going for you, how are you not all-around terrible?

Cecilia only needs to be able to ride a horse and use Staves to be good. And, to add more onto the plate, she can at least attack someone for decent damage with Aircalibur. Unlike someone like Clarine, for example, who might double attack but she's still pretty much thrashed by any enemy and her double attacks usually don't add up to a whole lot. Add to that she can only wield a fucking Fire tome... yeah. Having a mount is also cool school in a game where maps are so fucking huge that foot units take years to make it from point a to point b. Lilina is pretty trash, and Lute barely teeters on the "meh" side since she doesn't even have that many perks aside from she can become a Mage Knight and sort of balance some of the suck out. Also, to give an idea:

10/1 MK!Lute - 13.85 Mag | 11.05 Spd | 6 Con

Thunder - 21.85 Atk | 11.05 AS

10/1 Sage!Lute - 12.85 Mag | 11.05 Spd | 4 Con

Fire - 17.85 Atk | 11.05 AS

The next person that says Sage Lute is better than Mage Knight Lute can get a crowbar rammed across their face.

EDIT: I found this today...

Bors:

He's still a baller with that defense, but why he hasn't gained speed in like 4 levels is beyond me. Remind me not to use armors next time.

...Well I forgot to tell him. :(

Edited October 27, 2011 by Colonel M

[zahlman]

@Integrity Right, and my argument is that being good compared to likely enemies isn't (or shouldn't be) the only thing that matters for ranking a character. Of course, being good enough is worth a heck of a lot of the available points, but there's also something to be said for things like relative (ir)replaceability, supports (because of the effect on both units), trainability (which for mages mostly amounts to availability of individual good targets, since they aren't supposed to attempt tanking until late game)... lots of factors. But yeah, I think we're both abundantly clear, and done here. :)

Cecilia only needs to be able to ride a horse and use Staves to be good. And, to add more onto the plate, she can at least attack someone for decent damage with Aircalibur. Unlike someone like Clarine, for example, who might double attack but she's still pretty much thrashed by any enemy and her double attacks usually don't add up to a whole lot.

Ok, so 10/1 Fire!Clarine is looking at about 8 Mag -> 26 attack with a double, while Cecilia at base has 11 Mag -> 19 attack with Aircalibur. Ok, so it's 35 with effectiveness. If I'm thinking straight, that isn't going to OHKO the late-game wyverns, which means she's not replacing Lilina in Ch 21. (Of course, Clarine isn't either. :/)

And there's no "might" about the doubling; we're looking at about 6 points of speed difference here. (I guess I could say something about Aircalibur being expensive, but that's a pretty lol argument for FE6 :/ )

But I practically never use my base-class healers for additional attacking power after promotion. If anything it's the other way around.

Having a mount is also cool school in a game where maps are so fucking huge that foot units take years to make it from point a to point b.

FE6 does emphasize the value of mountedness, true. But then, you get the Warp staff in the same level as Cecilia, so...

The next person that says Sage Lute is better than Mage Knight Lute can get a crowbar rammed across their face.

Ok, 100% agreed on that one. It's not like the extra Mag cap room, you know, matters for anything.

...Well I forgot to tell him. :(

To be fair, Bors' speed growth is 40%, so he did kinda get screwed there. But yeah, lol using armors in 6. I used to use them to triangle-attack Leygance, until I remembered that I get an armorslayer, and that this isn't FE7 where there's any actual challenge to Funds ranking

Edited October 28, 2011 by zahlman

[Integrity]

@Integrity Right, and my argument is that being good compared to likely enemies isn't (or shouldn't be) the only thing that matters for ranking a character. Of course, being good enough is worth a heck of a lot of the available points, but there's also something to be said for things like relative (ir)replaceability, supports (because of the effect on both units), trainability (which for mages mostly amounts to availability of individual good targets, since they aren't supposed to attempt tanking until late game)... lots of factors. But yeah, I think we're both abundantly clear, and done here. :)

First, I respond to this.

Except that everything there contributes to a single thing: how the unit stacks up at killing or healing. Is Lilina a healer, or another kind of support class (like, incidentally, Cecilia)? No, she's not. Ergo, the only thing that really matters is how she stacks up at fighting and surviving. Replaceability for Lilina? Lugh. Lute? Artur. Supports? The only support either is liable to see is a Roy B (maybe) for Lilina. FirexLight B is a whopping situational 2atk, 1def, 10hit, and 10crit. 10 crit, admittedly, looks nice but I'm sorry I'm not creaming myself over this - especially considering she has to be within 3 squares of Roy to get it done. Oh, and did I mention the support's only effect is on how efficiently she fights? Trainability? That affects how quickly she's able to get up to speed at fighting. Any other factor you can think of - it matters because we're talking about her fighting because she has ZERO support utility.

EDIT: To illustrate why replaceability matters, here's a situation from one of our very own FEs:

Ardan is the only Armor in FE4 Gen 1. How many collective fucks does everybody give?

And no, sir, we're not done here because frankly not only are you wrong, you completely ignored the monster I typed up. That's just insulting.

Now onwards:

1: Remember if you will that doubling = enemy RES counts against you twice so on some shitty 3 RES unit Cecilia would be landing a single 16 point hit, while Clarine would be landing 2x 10. That's not as big a difference as you put down there, now is it? 8 MAG double is better than Cecilia's 11 MAG nondouble, you're true there. Way to ignore everything else I had to say about Cecilia and everything, though. Incidentally, 10/1 Clarine has a WHOPPING 15 SPD, which is enough to double some (hell, I might even grant you most!) enemies but certainly not all especially considering when are you promoting Clarine again? Nine levels isn't trivial for a healer.

Also at least Clarine got a pass for shitty offense but Cecilia didn't. Wait, what?

2: Because we can afford to burn the Warp staff on everything we feel like, like ...what, Lilina? You're kidding, right?

EDIT2: Just to stress, you know how silly it is to say Lilina's mobility versus Cecilia's mobility isn't an issue because Lilina has a 17-use (presuming you use Hammerne on nothing else ever) staff to compensate for Cecilia's horse?

Edited October 28, 2011 by Integrity

[zahlman]

Trainability? That affects how quickly she's able to get up to speed at fighting.

So you don't deny that it's easy enough to train her, then?

EDIT: To illustrate why replaceability matters, here's a situation from one of our very own FEs:

Ardan is the only Armor in FE4 Gen 1. How many collective fucks does everybody give?

I haven't played FE4, but I assume that nobody gives a fuck. If nobody gives a fuck about him being the only Armor, then that's because you don't have any real need for one, yeah? So then he isn't really all that irreplaceable.

you completely ignored the monster I typed up.

I explicitly gave you credit for it, and attempted to summarize my argument in the interest of winding things down here. Sheesh.

But in general, in this kind of context, with me, you can assume that points not addressed are points ceded.

Also at least Clarine got a pass for shitty offense but Cecilia didn't. Wait, what?

It was only to entertain you that Cecilia got compared to Clarine at all. If you'll recall, I was originally comparing Cecilia to Saleh, because of the (apparent!) role that each has in their respective games. Namely, to give you an anima user that you can just pick up and use and have perform decently in endgame, instead of having to raise one you get near the beginning and use a Guiding ring. I can see now how the Mag base and staff skill base would make her a good replacement for Clarine, but she's not going to be a good offensive unit. Clarine obviously isn't expected to be an offensive unit. If you come to FE6 having played 7 and/or 8 first (maybe even some others?), surely you can see how you might expect Cecilia to fill that role, and be sorely disappointed?

2: Because we can afford to burn the Warp staff on everything we feel like, like ...what, Lilina? You're kidding, right?

EDIT2: Just to stress, you know how silly it is to say Lilina's mobility versus Cecilia's mobility isn't an issue because Lilina has a 17-use (presuming you use Hammerne on nothing else ever) staff to compensate for Cecilia's horse?

Again, Cecilia isn't being compared to Lilina, but to Saleh. Ok, so it's still 8 move vs 6 (terrain notwithstanding), but that still doesn't make her even the same kind of unit.

The idea is: if you want, you can reasonably use Lute for half the game and then switch her out for Saleh. You can reasonably use Erk for half the game and switch him out for Pent (I know I do). You can't use any of the early game FE6 mages for the first half and then switch out for Cecilia, that's just insane. (Don't tell me you're going to suggest Hugh now?)

(Now I'm going to have to run through FE6 again using Lugh instead of Lilina to get a feel for how it works...)

[Dark Sage]

So you don't deny that it's easy enough to train her, then?

He's saying the opposite. It's quite difficult to train her since she's ORKO'd by nearly everything from Chapter 8x and onwards.

I haven't played FE4, but I assume that nobody gives a fuck. If nobody gives a fuck about him being the only Armor, then that's because you don't have any real need for one, yeah? So then he isn't really all that irreplaceable.

You seem to grasp it. Arden has 5 move in a game with huge ass maps and his offense is ass. He's pretty much one of the worst units in the game.

It was only to entertain you that Cecilia got compared to Clarine at all. If you'll recall, I was originally comparing Cecilia to Saleh, because of the (apparent!) role that each has in their respective games. Namely, to give you an anima user that you can just pick up and use and have perform decently in endgame, instead of having to raise one you get near the beginning and use a Guiding ring. I can see now how the Mag base and staff skill base would make her a good replacement for Clarine, but she's not going to be a good offensive unit. Clarine obviously isn't expected to be an offensive unit. If you come to FE6 having played 7 and/or 8 first (maybe even some others?), surely you can see how you might expect Cecilia to fill that role, and be sorely disappointed?

Not really. I have played FE7/8 before FE6 and I have to say that I never expected Cecilia to fulfill that "role" you're claiming. Cecilia's use comes from her statbotting, mount, and ability to chip. Her stats suck. I'm not denying that, but they're serviceable enough for what she does.

Again, Cecilia isn't being compared to Lilina, but to Saleh. Ok, so it's still 8 move vs 6 (terrain notwithstanding), but that still doesn't make her even the same kind of unit.

The idea is: if you want, you can reasonably use Lute for half the game and then switch her out for Saleh. You can reasonably use Erk for half the game and switch him out for Pent (I know I do). You can't use any of the early game FE6 mages for the first half and then switch out for Cecilia, that's just insane. (Don't tell me you're going to suggest Hugh now?)

(Now I'm going to have to run through FE6 again using Lugh instead of Lilina to get a feel for how it works...)

Or we could use both Lilina AND Cecilia. Also I don't see the point in putting in a lot of effort into raising a mage and then dumping them as soon as you get a prepromoted Sage. That's a complete waste of time and resources and it's akin to setting a pile of money on fire.

This problem you're claiming exists doesn't exist at all. Cecilia and Saleh don't fulfill any contrived role you have established in your own mind.

Personally, I ignore both Lute and Lilina in their games. In FE6 I use Lugh and in FE8 I use Saleh.

@Integrity: Just so you know, comparing Lilina to Ray to say Lilina sucks isn't the best example since they're practically the same character.

[zahlman]

Not really. I have played FE7/8 before FE6 and I have to say that I never expected Cecilia to fulfill that "role" you're claiming. Cecilia's use comes from her statbotting, mount, and ability to chip. Her stats suck. I'm not denying that, but they're serviceable enough for what she does.

Ok, I've learned to accept that if everyone says I'm the weird one, then I am.

Also I don't see the point in putting in a lot of effort into raising a mage and then dumping them as soon as you get a prepromoted Sage.

See, the point is not to "put a lot of effort into it", it's to have a decent anima user for the entire game without having to waste a Guiding ring for it. I'm not explicitly wasting turns for this, I'm just trying to have the early-game anima user in the right places at the right times to be useful, and hopefully get some kill exp so as to continue to be useful until the replacement arrives.

But come to think of it, Lugh probably does make more sense for this kind of strategy.

That's a complete waste of time and resources and it's akin to setting a pile of money on fire.

I'm trying to save a Guiding ring at the possible expense of one or two Fire/Thunder tomes that I wouldn't otherwise bother using, bro. Actually, not even that much, since I'd have to use something else to defeat the enemies anyway.

Edited October 29, 2011 by zahlman

[Integrity]

Actually, you both halfway got and halfway missed the point of that quip on Trainability. I didn't make any assumptions about how easy Lilina was to train in that line - that was for the original post - all I asked was what does trainability mean? How easy or hard she is to train affects how quickly or agonizingly she'll get up to speed at killing. If you didn't notice, that whole paragraph was linking every one of zahlman's "secondary" points to my global one - how she stacks up against enemies, because that's her job. Lilina doesn't have *any* utility besides killing things, so why should we consider her "other factors" which don't exist beyond helping her kill things?

@Sage: I didn't compare Lilina to Ray to prove that Lilina sucks - I compared Lilina to Ray and Lugh to show that there's a replacement - Lilina isn't irreplaceable as originally posited.

As for Cecilia versus Pent versus Saleh, how is it logical to go BACK a game and assume that X archetype is going to be filled? And if you look at anything about them like, say, their class you'd notice a little discrepancy. And as for Cecilia versus Lilina, uh-uh. You quite well compared Cecilia to Lilina and Saleh to Lute a couple times - posts #88, 92 and 95 all have readily identified "Cecilia can't replace Lilina"-type lines. Now how could I figure you were comparing the two? Hm.

Now to close, two things to say about this:

I explicitly gave you credit for it, and attempted to summarize my argument in the interest of winding things down here. Sheesh.

But in general, in this kind of context, with me, you can assume that points not addressed are points ceded.

1: If you'll notice, I was all but ready to cede the argument. Then, after you gave a ...sorta concession to me, you gave M a full response. That sure doesn't look like winding things down here to me, but if you insist.

2: In that case, why's there even still an argument? Given that you more-or-less failed to address every important point on the matter, wouldn't that mean that you ceded almost every important point - and wouldn't that just make me right?

Edited October 29, 2011 by Integrity