Finally making my own, personal, rating topic/tier list.

[Snowy_One]

You are mistaken: Calill joins with Meteor.

Ah. You are right. I did not remember it and I didn't think to look in the starting equipment section to find the tome. My bad.

Without Hammerne use or stealing (both of which are possibilities), there are up to 20 (but probably 18 or 19) anima siege tome uses available. That is quite a lot. And their Mt is impressive. Even the weakest Sage can 2HKO almost all non-boss enemies with the siege tomes. The most powerful (or over-trained) can 2HKO bosses and occasionally OHKO enemies!

So on average they 2HKO, but will occasionally critical/target weak enemies resulting in a rough average of 10 (assuming constant 2HKO's) to 15 long-range kills.

There just isn't much in chapters 17, 18, and 19 that you would want to use a siege tome on.

Bosses aside, wouldn't they be spent on the same thing most of the time? Namely enemies would could be quickly picked off at long range?

And if you're playing with any kind of haste (even meeting the Bexp turn limits), Soren will be lucky to reach C Thunder by 17-3.

It takes 120 Wexp to reach a B-rank from a E. Soren can start using thunder from chapter 8. Assuming a thunder tome (no el), that means he needs a average of 10 attacks per-chapter to reach a B-rank by the time Calill joins. Assuming reliable doubling, that's about 5 turns of combat, less if you factor in counters, and even less if you opt for El-tomes over basics for the purpose of training (critical aside, if you can score a 1RKO with both the Forged thunder and a El-tome, why not use the El? Doesn't require a forge and gives more WEXP after all).

In fact, for Soren to reach a C by the latter half of 17, he would need to attack only 7 or so times each chapter with the forge meaning a average of 3-4 rounds assuming reliable doubling each chapter. I hardly see that as being impossible or unlikely.

But say you are training a Mage, and have them use Bolting 5 times in chapters 17, 18, or 19. There are still at least 15 anima siege tome uses left when Calill joins before C20. And unless you babied/Bexp'd your Mage, Calill will perform better with them from that point forward. But unlike the Mages, who can only use one or maybe two siege tome types if they are babied/trained, Calill can always use them all when she joins, every time.

A fair enough assessment, but I don't really separates the siege tomes from a normal tome beyond its range.

Below Danved, at least. Probably in company with Largo, Ranulf, and Tauroneo. Yes, siege tomes are a big deal - at least in efficient play. There are no small number of bosses that are generally too tough to ORKO. Adding a siege tome attack on top of a regular attack allows us to ORKO bosses with greater ease. C22's boss, Schaeffer, in particular, can be killed quite easily with siege tomes alone (2 attacks with a very well-trained Sage, 3 attacks from base Calill). Ballistae operators can also be ORKO'd (occasionally OHKO'd) with siege tomes from afar, enabling our fliers/Reyson to safely advance. There are tough chokepoint Generals in C27 that also make great siege tome targets. Finally, siege tomes are just helpful in general in the C25 rout, allowing your Sage to pick off enemies from afar that your other units can't handle themselves. The Mages can do some of this (and other things) with a lot of training, but Calill can always do it - and do it well.

Hmmm... Interesting. I will consider it and may increase her customization score by .5.

Edit: I think I should be a bit more clear here. I've done some thinking and I am determined to get this RIGHT! Flexibility is a score as well and, while I admit it has strayed away from its intent at applying characters advantages to multiple playstyles, I want to start bringing it back into line (expect re-reviews after everyone gets reviewed). As such, I am going to raise Calill's Customization score by .5 for being able to wield all the siege tomes, but lower her flex score by .5 as well. How good she is seems to depend largely on how the player will utilize the siege tomes and if they will use them to an extent where more than one or two siege tomes is needed.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Snowy_One

[Anouleth]

Bosses aside, wouldn't they be spent on the same thing most of the time? Namely enemies would could be quickly picked off at long range?

Well normally, you'd pick off enemies that can't be dealt with on enemy phase or at short range, or are particularly troublesome. The most excellent example is the Ballista operators in Chapter 23. They use ballista and won't die on enemy phase. The terrain makes it much easier to reach them with a tome than with Paladins. And they get effective damage against fliers which can be troublesome.

[Lord Raven]

Especially for Reyson. She helps with an efficient Shiharam clear, can kill the boss in one turn with some backup in the priest chapter, helps pick off the superbosses (Petrine, Bertram), and with supports and with Reyson she can OHKO ballista operators. Granted she's not as good as Tormod here but she is the least cost efficient way to do it. If you don't use Tormod you're not really going to be worried about spirit dusts either so you can just give it to her.

[Anouleth]

Especially for Reyson. She helps with an efficient Shiharam clear, can kill the boss in one turn with some backup in the priest chapter, helps pick off the superbosses (Petrine, Bertram), and with supports and with Reyson she can OHKO ballista operators.

Not sure what Reyson has to do with it. Surely he'd be up front pushing the Paladins forward anyway?

[Lord Raven]

To chant Calill but yeah I forgot about smite. Switching out of FE8 mode here..

[Snowy_One]

It still seems to be a awfully large amount of weight to put onto her ability to use siege tomes off the bat. All another player would have to do is decide to invest the scrolls in another mage to jump them from D to B (I recall mages getting a auto-C in magic on promotion, but I could easily be wrong). I understand the cost-effeciency, I'm just trying to figure out what play-styles it would be relative too.

[uzy5o]

Mages get auto D-rank on promotion. You only need C-rank to use siege tomes anyways.

[aku chi]

It's still difficult to get the Mages to C-rank in more than one type of magic (without using Arms Scrolls) before the siege tomes become available (C20-C23) if you're playing with any kind of haste. Soren probably has the easiest time, being able to wield Blizzard and Bolting if you promote him before C17-3. Tormod has a chance to be able to wield Meteor and Bolting if you promote him before C17-3. Ilyana won't be able to wield anything other than Bolting unless you use an Arms Scroll or have her focus on non-optimal magic types.

Relevantly, all of the Mages need ~700-900 Bexp to be as competent as Calill (at her game) with 0 Bexp. If the Mages are granted this Bexp, they do have advantages over Calill. All of the Mages can wield staves, Tormod has +2 mov, and Soren has slightly better offense. The Mages also have a varying amount more availability when compared with Calill (Soren the most, Tormod the least). Balancing all of the pros and cons when comparing these Sages is not a trivial task.

[Anouleth]

To chant Calill but yeah I forgot about smite. Switching out of FE8 mode here..

Then it's not a OHKO if Calill needs Reyson to do it??

[Lord Raven]

needs reyson to get to meteor range in the first place.. at least for the second sniper. but once again i forgot about Smite >_<

[Refa]

Then it's not a OHKO if Calill needs Reyson to do it??

I think he was talking about attack range, not that she needed another attack for the KO.

EDIT Ninja'd.

Edited January 14, 2012 by Refa

[Snowy_One]

That still seems like far too much weight is being put onto Calill's capability to use the siege tomes when any sage could wield them if we decided to give them the arms scrolls. Soren and Ilyana are around for much longer, Soren has more attack, Tormod has more movement, and all three have access to staves instead of knives. That seems like it would make Calill's siegeing worthless to me.

Anyways, I put Tanith's name back in the bowl because I simply have no clue what to do with her as of now and would rather deal with someone much easier. Lucia.

[spoiler=Lucia]Lucia is typically considered to be one of the worst characters in the game. It is not hard to see why either. Joining at the start of chapter 24, she basically has only 5 chapters of use before the game is even over. Even if she was an amazing character, her availability makes it so that she's almost assured to not make it higher than mid. She is not an amazing character though. For starters, her supports are... less than good. Ilyana, Janaff, and Bastion. Now, I prefer to say 'the support is bad' rather than 'the unit is bad so the support won't happen', so I will be fair about this. However, Ilyana has options in Gatrie, Mia, Zihark, and Mordi, all four of which are around for much longer than Lucia. Zihark offers the exact same things Lucia does, Mordi and Mia can offer attack boosts, and Gatrie and Mordi offer defensive boosts. Earth is a great element, but any avoid bonus needs to have a unit with actually notable avoid to be worth much. Even with a A/B Zihark/Lucia Ilyana gets only +25 AVO. +5 defense from a Gatrie/Mordi support seems far more helpful to her durability than that and boosts her ATT by 1 too. Long story short, Ilyana probably won't support Lucia. However, Bastion and Janaff will be willing to support her... And they DO give good bonuses... (~35 AVO if a A/B with them), however they won't be complete until almost the end of the game. So even if they did get played, they would not be of much value. Lucia's skill, Parity, also gets in the way of this. As long as it is around, she cannot get the benefits of her support bonuses. Why is this skill here? Why does it even exist? The only unit who would find this skill of value is a enemy on open terrain. Do the enemies even have this skill? Why not just give her nihil instead?

Now on to the more pressing matter... Lucia's stats. Lucia has awful stats. For starters, she joins with 15 STR. It is sad to think that Bastion can potentially match her in strength (course she has swords and he has knives, but still). To make it worse, she uses swords, which have both a constant WTD and low MT. The only way I don't see her coming in as the weakest melee unit is if the party is super-speedrun through the game. Like, probably faster than the tier standards. Her stats are so bad that she is the only SM who does not naturally cap SPD. While it still ends up being more than enough to double, that is still pretty bad. Her one redeeming grace is that her MAG score is quite high, meaning she could possibly use the magic swords well... but let's face it. Even if you despise the idea of dropping both dusts onto Mia/Stefan, the simple availability and superior functionality of them outside of the sword, not to mention availability, makes it a better choice. Pretty much the only time her MAG score will matter is if you decide to give her the RS, which isn't around for long anyways.

Speed: 1. This is probably too gracious a score here. Anyways, Lucia joins very late in the game and isn't amazing. At least the dragons were strong and Ena could be... not as sucky... if BEXP-dumped. Even if Lucia is Bexp dumped, she's coming in lower than your other swordmasters who have been around for a lot longer (and would probably be amazing given the same Bexp dump) and are generally just more useful on the whole.

Flexibility: .5: Lucia can be good... If she support Bastion and Janaff and you don't care about late joining times and are willing to spot her a energy drop or two. The only reason I didn't bottom this out to a 0 is because it still isn't as bad as Ena, who requires a load of Bexp to only be around for, like, two chapters and has low movement on top of it. I can't see a single playstyle beyond a 0 EXP run where Lucia could be considered really useful though.

Customization: 2: Swordmasters have good customization naturally. Lucia, however, comes so late that you might as well have worked with other swordmasters. With low STR, she probably will end up having trouble killing as well. Her one redeeming trait is her high MAG score, which would have been handled much better by Mia/Stefan. The only other notable thing is potentially good supports with Janaff and Bastion, but that is unlikely to happen as both of those units are pretty awful.

Overall: 3.5: Had Lucia joined earlier... she would still have sucked, but at least something could be done about it, like letting her use the SS or something. In fact, I'm slightly curious now. Stefan at base is almost identical to Lucia at max. Why didn't she join us in 15 and he join us in 24?

Edit: As I have not gotten any replies, I cannot make a new post without doubleposting. Still, I will continue on. I will complete this eventually.

[spoiler=Ilyana]Ilyana. Ilyana is, sadly, a very overlooked character. She often gets shoved down to being the worst non-Bastion sage on a lot of tier lists and is treated as 'average at best' quite often. It's such a shame too as she is not a worthless character at all... just lacking in overall distinction. Anyways, let us begin.

Ilyana joins partway through chapter 8 and is actually quite good for the time. She is one of two ranged attackers in 8 and, until Astrid joins, one of two ranged units who don't blow (Rolf isn't too good). To top it off, depending on level and luck, she can be better than Soren when she joins and/or will likely end up being better than him overall pre-promotion. Her starting point of STR means she can wield forged thunder without AS loss (Soren needs 1 STR) and her fairly good bases mean she won't suck. Later on, she can promote and gain staves as well, plus she has shade. While I admit that no one really understands how Shade works, if it even stops one attack that would have otherwise hit her, it is not useless. She has a solid support list as well with Mia, Mordi, Zihark, Gatrie, and Lucia. All of them want her support when given the option and the bonuses are not small. Ilyana can feasibly net +5 DEF making her possibly durable enough to head out onto the front lines for short bursts (she won't be on them for long, but she CAN at least touch on it). Additionally, Mordi can get a sizable DEF bonus from her (and doesn't miss out on much), Mia desires her for attack boosts, and Zihark for AVO, and all of these are important.

However, Ilyana has one flaw, and it isn't minor. She is slow. At 20/20, she had 21 SPD. However, this can be worked around and dealt with. Namely through the useage of speed bands/wings. The problem is that, even when this is done, she simply fails to end up truly distinct from other mages/sages. Soren has high MAG, Tormod high move, and Calill her weapon ranks. Ilyana has a potentially useless skill and maybe, maybe early-game superiority over Soren (by a small amount if even that). This is in a class already noted for its low movement. In a playstyle less-focused on efficiency, she could be useful. There her early joining time and staff-access is more valuable and her speed less of a issue. However, her slowness combined with being a sage mean she won't ever likely climb the tier lists.

Speed: 2.5: Ilyana can be useful in the early-game and is... not awful overall. However, in order to make her good and useful requires a lot of work compared to other sages, and it is simply easier to raise Soren or dump on Tormod, especially since both have later advantages instead of a disadvantage. Even when dealt with, Ilyana simply ends up lack-luster.

Flexibility: 3: Ilyana struggles in effeciency, but in other play-styles, her early joining time, ability to use staffs, solid support list, and potentially less care over her speed issues means she can end up good. Tormod will always have more move, Soren always more magic, but that doesn't mean Ilyana is bad... just less-effecient.

Customization: 2.5: Ilyana doesn't really have much. She's as customizable as Soren and Tormod without their skills since Shade doesn't combo into anything good, but those two have adept and celerity respectivally. Though sages are decently flexible, her needing a speedband/wing is also a mark against her overall.

Overall: 8: Ilyana can be good and has a good joining time, just needs some work and ends the game less than stellar. Effeciency players won't like her a lot, but others might... Try at your own risk.

[spoiler=Rolf]Okay... Rolf. Rolf is probably the most underrated character in the game. Quite often he ends up at the bottom or very near too it of any tier list. It... does make a degree of sense. Rolf comes underleveled and is a unit who can only wield bows meaning, for the most part, he will lack the ability to counter on the enemy phase. However, here in lies one of the problems with the tier list. To paraphrase Spock in TOS in the episode where the computer takes over the Enterprise 'I merely said it was more efficient, not better'. When the standard of efficiency is removed, Rolf is not as bad so as to be the bottom unit... this does not mean he is good however.

Rolf joins in chapter 9 at level 1. This is his first problem. Even though he comes with his own special and unique bow, his attack clocks in at only 13 (11 with a standard iron). While other units may have lower attack values at this point, they can do a bunch of other things he cannot. For example, base-level Mia has more defense and blows Rolf out of the water in terms of speed, not to mention is capable of both wielding weapons like the armor-slayer and countering. If Rolf is to be used, he will need a lot of caretaking. First off, his lack of 1-range counters means he will not likely get EP kills. This will cut into his EXP gain as he can only net kills on the PP. If the player works to ensure that most/all kills happen then, it might not be to bad, but if he doesn't Rolf will start to lag. Additionally, since he can't counter, he will be a prime target for most enemies, meaning he is going to slow the team down as they need to strip the fuzz off him.

So what happens when you do raise him up? You get a swordsmaster. A ranged swordsmaster. That could be awesome if he could counter at 1-range, but since he can't... it REALLY blows! He can't tap into the many skills that make swordsmasters so good since, if he did so, he would only get to use them on the player phase at most. Adept, wrath, guard, and the like? Only 1/2 chances to activate. Much better to give these skills to a unit who has vantage (which he has no use for) or, failing that, someone who can at least counter on the EP. To make it worse, Bows are not terribly good anyways. Normal bows aside, there is only the longbow (because Snipers problem was how they dealt damage at 3 squares), the Laguz bow (not really notable), and the Double Bow (comes at chapter 27).

Rolf doesn't even have a strong support list. Rhys, Mist, Marcia, Shinon, and Tauroneo. Rhys, Mist, and Marcia are all attack-giving supports who offer no notable overlap with Rolf in any way. If they were to support him, they would get only a small amount of avoid along with 1 attack (and 1 DEF in Mist's case) and a bunch of hit, which doesn't matter to them anyways. Marcia is a flier as well, and Mist is commonly adored for her mounted movement, meaning neither will likely even be in range all that much. Shinon is a sniper as well and, ignoring the questionable nature of deploying two, doesn't even come until the latter third of the game, making his support largely meaningless, same for Tauroneo.

So, if all this is so bad, why is he underrated? Well, at the end of the day, most of his problems stem from the fact that he lacks 1-range counters. This is why so few skills are good with him, why we have to strip fuzz off of him, and so-forth. In a playstyle where the player is moving slower/more carefully, it doesn't matter as much. Then he's... just a ranged swordsmaster. Sure, Lucia aside, he could never be argued as better, but bottom-tier? Probably not.

Speed: 0: Coming at a low level, lacking counters, foot-movement, and so-forth. He's simply not good for players seeking speed.

Flexibility: 2: However, on a playstyle where the team is moving slower as a whole... He's not as irredeemable.

Customization: 2: He can even make use of some skills reasonably well (like Gamble), but his lack of 1-range counters really hampers what he can do.

Overall: 4: In speed, he sucks. Outside of speed... He's not SO bad... just... still less than stellar.

[spoiler=Janaff]

I would like to go on record as saying that I would be lying if I said I understood much about the hawks. Among the various characters of the game, the end up among the lesser-talked characters by a fair longshot. People seem to universally accept that they are bad units, and it's no wonder why. They don't even exist until chapter 18, just past the point I'm sure most people consider the 'midpoint' of the game. They end up lacking in key areas (Janaff in STR and Ulki in SPD), and to top it off, they're laguz and have to deal with the cruddy Laguz weapons and transform gauge. In any style of play, those are all hampering factors. If these were ground laguz, it would be over right here and now. I'm sure they would be immediately placed at the bottom of the list and forgotten about in a heartbeat. However, not only are they fliers, but I do want to deal a bit more with them.

Janaff comes in 18 as one of two hawk laguz. Of the two he is, by far, the better. However, 'by far', is a relative term in this case. He still sucks. Janaff is cursed by the same problem almost all Laguz have, a weak weapon. The Hawk Beak clocks in at only 7 MT, the same as a iron lance. Upon joining, Janaff has only 13 STR upon joining and can get up to 6 more transformed, 3 banded. This means his starting MT is, at best, 26. That is not terribly impressive, especially since this is not a constant amount and Janaff will be addled by working with his transform gauge. For comparison Tanith, who joins in the same chapter, has 16 base STR and can wield a silver sword/steel lance right off the bat giving her more/equal amount to Janaff (not to mention access to forges and weapon variety). Worse, Janaff ends the game HORRIBLY! At level 20, he has 19-20 base STR. Unbaded, this means 32-33 MT... an amount that most other units can blow right by without even blinking and/or caring about their transform gauges. His one redeeming factor is his high SPD, which means that, while he is transformed, he can double well. Honestly though? In terms of combat prowess, Lethe beats Janaff, which is... very sad.

On the plus side, Janaff has a decent enough support list. Oscar, Shinon, and Lucia... That is... well... Oscar has 'better' supports avalible for longer, Shinon will have trouble keeping up with Janaff as he is a archer and Janaff a flier, and Lucia won't even be around until very late in the game. It's not a 'bad' list in the sense that he isn't unwanted. Just a list that can't really take off.

Speed: 1: Janaff's one use is rescue-dropping. That aside, he can at least double, which is a mark over Ulki, but... on the whole, he simply is not that good of a unit.

Flexibility: 1: I'll be gracious here. Janaff isn't useful outside of rescue-dropping. End of story. His problem is the same as all other Laguz, poor weapons, but he has it worse in that at least other Laguz were around for longer and ended up better in the endgame. He's dealing less damage than Lethe, and Lethe has people who at least have a feasible chance of supporting her!

Customization: 1: UGGGGG!!! In order to be valuable, Janaff needs at least one, if not two, strength-drops. He will likely need the demi-band on top of that, and the end result? A unit who is still weak, but at least not as horribly so.

Overall: 3: Janaff is good for rescue-drops. That is it. You have three other non-Laguz fliers before him, Haar in five chapters, and even the Lethe is a better fighter than him endgame. He's inflexible, and unless you REALLY need 4/5 rescue drops, not even worth his rescue dropping. The one good thing I can really say about him is that using him to drop instead of, say, Jill frees the latter up to be more useful. That's... kind of fail.

[spoiler=Devdan]

Ahhhh... Devdan. I really feel sort of bad for this guy. He's basically the token black guy of FE. Little importance, strange at best, ranked low, and largely unnotable except for his creepiness and blackness. I actually feel a bit bad for the guy, even though I never really liked him. It is FE's first african american character and it feels more like the punchline to a joke than a actual character... Anyways...

Devdan is actually a bit hard to rate. He joins a bit above average on the whole. Lots of STR, SPD that's, at worst, slightly below average and solid stats all around. If he had maintained this level relative to his teammates throughout the game, he might have even ended up 'above average' (if only barely) on tier lists. However, he has a SPD growth that is outright hideous, and that's the problem. As long as he doubles, he's good, but when he stops... Why do I get the feeling IS was making a joke about black people being lazy/slow here? UGGGGGGGGG!

On the plus side, he has good HP and STR which means he will deal more damage on average, but has defenses that feel unusually low for a non-SPD foot solider and... Ummm... I suddenly feel like they just made a joke about black people being good at physical tasks and... Let's move on.

Support wise Devdan has Nephenee, Tormod, and Largo. Two of which (nephenee and Largo) don't overlap at all with his fire element and Largo has much better supports with everyone else on his list (either giving him decent boosts or being useful to the person being boosted). Only Tormod gets a good support bonus from him and even that is iffy (Reyson and Calill give better, but to be fair, Reyson doesn't use the bonus, meaning a Tormod/Devdan is probably his B choice if in play.)

I'm getting REALLY uncomfortable talking about him. It just feels really... like a backhanded attempt to include racial diversity while making a ton of inbetween-the-lines black jokes. Slow, good with physical labor, likes children and country-women, and just... Ugggg!

Speed: 2: He starts off good, but ends up way to slow to be of any real use. For a few chapters he's good and he CAN be redeemed with some work, but he's still lacking on the whole.

Flexibility: 1.5: Coming late and slow with a weak support-list and no skill to really speak of (serenity is weak at best), he's not terribly flexible on the whole. Not too much in terms of playstyles he can fit into.

Customization: 2: He needs a SPD-wing and possibly KW to be good. Once that's done... he's not terribly flexible. Nephenee had an innate wrath which is great for skill customizations and such. Devdan has nothing. He might have scored a 3 here since he doesn't really fail at skill useage, but needing something to deal with his SPD killed that down to a 2.

Edited February 2, 2012 by Snowy_One