The Great LTC Debate Thread (Yay? Nay? Burn in Hell?)

[Refa]

Sure they do, check the top.

I think they do that in every FE game.

[RJWalker]

Pulling up the 20/20 stats is a very bad argument as is saying that grinding makes the trainees good. As has been stated before anyone becomes good with sufficient grinding. The truly good units are the ones that DO NOT need it in the first place. I'm sure the argument of "LTC isn't fun" has been brought up before and I will agree. LTC isn't my cup of tea. You know what else isn't fun? Grinding. It is incredibly boring to play Valni floor 1 multiple times just to get a few scrubs up to scratch so that they can stop being deadweight, or building your powerhouses (eg Seth and Franz) up so that you can trivialise an already easy game.

As for stats, FE8 is an incredibly short game. Nobody is reaching 20/20 in that main story, especially not Amelia or Ewan, unless we decide to drain all challenge that was in the game with the unlimited exp pool. And yes, Str/Mag and Spd ARE the most important stats. Luck is a largely superfluous stat and resistance is only important for a very small number of endgame chapters (ie Ch 18 and maybe 20) so leads there mean almost nothing. Offense and evasion are very important to any FE game and take a guess at which stats help the most in achieving high quantities of those.

Some advice. Study your environment before you make a post. Spouting bullshit is generally generally frowned upon here.

I was replying to someone else who brought up 20/20 stats. He was saying that the trainees were statistically vastly inferior to others which isn't true. They are about the same really with Amelia being better than the unit he compared it to.

Leaving that discussion behind, I've seen several LTC playthroughs where Bosses are completely ignored when defeating the boss isn't the main objective(Survival Chapters). To me, that feels like leaving the game incomplete.

[Anouleth]

The problem is that your premise is flawed. The criteria of tier lists should be one that conforms to our biases of what makes a unit "good" and "bad". That is to say, that "good" units should have good offense, durability, and movement, be reliable, have alternative forms of utility (like staff or dancing), and not require training.

In addition, Ewan/Ross/Amelia are not really game breakers. For me, a game breaker is a tool that radically changes how the game is played and makes it easier, and can be relied on to the exclusion of other tactics. For example, in FE11, Warpskipping is game-breaking since you no longer need to bother with fighting 80% of enemies in the game. Seth/Sigurd are gamebreaking because when you use him, you do not need to use other combat units, and indeed when you use them it becomes quite tough for other combat units to be useful. Whereas the trainees can only do this when at a very high level. This is not meaningful since most units in FE8 can do the same. It would be more meaningful to say that "having really really high-levelled units is a Game Breaker".

[Defeatist Elitist]

Yep, I'm convinced. Oh wait, no I'm not.

I'm gonna assume that you mean Magic and Speed as 'important stats'

Amelia has better stats period. Ross has better strength but lags behind in the rest. Ewan has less Magic but better everything else. So I'm not seeing how you can say the trainees are 'awful'.

If these average stats are wrong, then someone might want to go correct them on the Sacred Stones page of this very site.

No, Amelia does not have better stats "period". If we're using 20/20 stats, Amelia as a Paladin loses Strength by 2, though admittedly wins speed by 1 for having a higher cap. That might not be "completely outclassed", but it is definitely not "game breaker". Great Knight Amelia is basically the same except Mov 6, and General Amelia has Mov 5. You conceded that Ross is a worse Hero than Gerik, but even as a Berserker, while he wins Strength, his Speed is significantly worse, and, unlike Franz and Amelia, there is a pretty big gap in concrete durability between the two, with Gerik having significantly more HP and Def. And as you said Ewan has less Magic (and less Speed unless he's a Druid but lolDark Magic). Though honestly, real stats probably aren't a good way to compare them, but I'm too lazy to draw up Combat Stats.

Basically, what you are arguing is that three units, two of which don't show up until almost halfway through the game, who take a significant (and somewhat prolonged) amount of extra input in order to not be appreciably better than any of the other units you're probably using are somehow "gamebreakers", or evenn decent, when in reality, they're basically the definition of bad. It's like if you go to the store, and there are two deals, one where you can buy 10L of Coca Cola for 5$, and one where you can buy 10L of Coca Cola for $30. It's pretty difficult to argue that the second option is not, strictly speaking, a worse deal than the first.

[Loki Laufeyson]

What people like to do isn't always for the best.

But it can be for that person. For a lot of people doing what you may consider to be the best isnt the best for that person's style.

[Progenitus]

Badly, as I recall. Some of those lists had stuff like Knoll and Syrene at the bottom and Colm at the top of top. I'm led to believe that these lists were basd on a kind of pseudo-FE7-ranked criteria that was never actually established, or for that matter, applied (since unpromoted units were never penalised for the cost of their promotion items and Tethys/staff users were rarely praised for the value of their contributions towards EXP Rank).

You missed the point.

That's the point. People could never agree on the exact value of each rank. It would depend entirely on how well each person could debate. And when people actually bring up good, sound points to defend their argument, that's what made debating fun.

By the way anouleth, do you even know how the old gamefaqs and FEFF tiers were run? They were community based where changes were made based on a consensus of sorts, so in fact unit placements were based on "whoever has the most passionate fanboys". Only, the old debaters weren't fanboys. They used logical arguments, they were willing to listen to other people, and were willing to compromise. Things that I have not seen on this site.

The point is that despite the fact that the standards were always changing, debates were fun because the people who argued for them were generally intelligent and good listeners. And they were not, as you put it, "passionate fanboys". It has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not you personally agreed with the standards used for the list.

The rest of your post can be answered with snippets from various posts from me, Othin, and paperblade. You generally ignored them (or if you addressed them, you missed the point) so I'll repost a few for your convenience.

Maybe Franz and Vanessa will be LV10, maybe they'll be LV20, maybe they'll be somewhere in between. Maybe Seth or Titania or whoever is dead, or simply isn't being used constantly. Maybe we'll have to consider a number of uncertain priorities rather than being able to default to one cookie-cutter strategy. That's a good thing. That gives us options, looking at the whole world the game has to offer rather than this narrow sliver of it. It gives us things to think about that don't fit into just one mold, so we can understand the importance of characters that don't fit into that mold.

Assuming people like Smash have nothing to say is part of the very LTC mindset this thread exists to discuss. This demonstration of more problems the mindset has caused is as on-topic as anything could possibly be.

It's not a significant problem as long as...

1) People can bring up good arguments and points to make the debate interesting.

2) People are willing to listen and compromise.

At this point, what else is there to say? You say "well because of this and this, it causes the tier list standards to be too different and thus should be argued in a different list"? As I said, multiple lists with different standards have been made. But the fact is that the more tier lists there are, the less discussion each list will have, as opposed to having 1 major list that everyone can agree or compromise to use for the standards. Discussion between different FE games is already divided pretty heavily, and now you want to divide everyone's attention even further? People only have so much free time available to them. Saying that multiple tier lists should be created will cause the community to divide even further, and this topic is trying to do the exact opposite; find out where the differences are and hopefully consolidate the community.

[Refa]

Maybe he didn't respond to those specific things because he agreed with them?

[Narga_Rocks]

Fine, you want a response to one of your quotes?

Also, do you disagree with this statement

"any tier list that forays into middle ground will be plagued with endless arguments regarding how Seth can be used rather than where the other characters should go."

If so, how would you resolve that potential problem?

It's not a significant problem as long as...

1) People can bring up good arguments and points to make the debate interesting.

2) People are willing to listen and compromise.

We've got number 1 and 2 covered with the sethless and sethskip tier lists. There was lots of discussion on sethless that I assume made things interesting for those people, there was even some interesting points on sethskip, and the compromise is that there are two lists.

Why can you not see that this is the compromise we created? What makes your compromise any better? After "discussion regarding how Seth can be used", this is what we went for. This is the compromise.

I'm curious about something, smash. How do YOU use Seth? Note that not deploying him or stupidly getting him killed (aside from the <1% chance of him dying in chapter 9 eph route) is pretty much covered by the sethless list. So when you DO deploy him, what the hell does he do that you aren't ending chapters in 3 to 7 turns each?

edit:

might as well give you more stuff to ignore

At this point, what else is there to say? You say "well because of this and this, it causes the tier list standards to be too different and thus should be argued in a different list"? As I said, multiple lists with different standards have been made. But the fact is that the more tier lists there are, the less discussion each list will have, as opposed to having 1 major list that everyone can agree or compromise to use for the standards. Discussion between different FE games is already divided pretty heavily, and now you want to divide everyone's attention even further? People only have so much free time available to them. Saying that multiple tier lists should be created will cause the community to divide even further, and this topic is trying to do the exact opposite; find out where the differences are and hopefully consolidate the community.

Let's say there is a combined tier list that has x amount of discussion. Now let's assume that we split the list into sethless and sethskip. Do you believe that there would be > 0.5x discussion on each list, = 0.5x discussion on each list, or < 0.5x discussion on each list?

Frankly, if you can get more discussion total from having two lists than having only one list, I see that as a good thing even if there is less discussion per list.

Also, you haven't responded to comparisons of Sethskip/sethless to warpskip/warpless in fe11. I'm curious about your stance on that separation as well.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Narga_Rocks

[Anouleth]

The point is that despite the fact that the standards were always changing, debates were fun because the people who argued for them were generally intelligent and good listeners.

That sounds acceptable enough, since tier lists are supposed to be for fun, after all. But the implications of where you want tier lists to go don't really make sense. You seem to be arguing in favour of a tier list that has no criteria, or criteria that seems to include each of the FE7 rankings without actually making any commitments to how they should be fulfilled. Maybe I'm too used to tier lists with rigid criteria, but I don't see how such a list can be fun to debate on or in any way meaningful.

And they were not, as you put it, "passionate fanboys". It has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not you personally agreed with the standards used for the list.

And I think that the current crop of debaters are intelligent and good listeners too. You seem to disagree, but given that you don't seem to think that tier lists should have any rigid criteria whatsoever, it seems perfectly obvious that people will dismiss your arguments.

The rest of your post can be answered with snippets from various posts from me, Othin, and paperblade. You generally ignored them (or if you addressed them, you missed the point) so I'll repost a few for your convenience.

Because Othin's post is not worth replying to. I could wipe my ass with my keyboard and you'd get a better idea of how tier listing works. The implication of Othin's post is that every tier list out there assumes One And Exactly One Strategy Only, when that is very far from the truth. Sure, we could consider if Franz or Vanessa are level 1 or 20 or every level in between, but what would we get from it? We would probably realise that yes, overlevelled characters tend to kick ass and underlevelled characters tend to fail. What a gem of fucking insight, that characters tend to get better as they gain levels. Clearly we have been just wandering around with our heads up our asses for the past five years of debating, deprived of Othin, God of Wisdom's divine fucking insight, because surely none of us could EVER have figured out on our own that Titania can die.

And guess what happens if you acknowledge that Titania has a 0.0000001% chance of dying starting in Chapter 18? What kind of enormous ramifications would this have for the FE9 tier list? JACK SHIT. Maybe Mist will move down a single spot because of being deprived of a support. Maybe.

So that's precisely why I didn't respond to Othin's post. Because it's stupid, and irrelevant. No doubt, Othin had a big stiffy over his amazing idea of tier lists have a broad scope rather than a narrow scope, as if it's not something I've been saying for years.

I am willing to compromise, and to listen. I was willing to take supports into consideration on your FE8 ranking thread, for instance, or to consider stuff like training units to level 20, even though that is completely at odds with what I am accustomed to discussing.

At this point, what else is there to say? You say "well because of this and this, it causes the tier list standards to be too different and thus should be argued in a different list"? As I said, multiple lists with different standards have been made. But the fact is that the more tier lists there are, the less discussion each list will have, as opposed to having 1 major list that everyone can agree or compromise to use for the standards.

I don't see why this is a problem at all. I don't particularly care if I argue on List X or List Y, it doesn't make the activity any more or less enjoyable for me. I'm not going to cry myself to sleep because splitting Tier lists P and Q causes them to have only half the volume of discussion each since the overall volume of discussion is unchanged, it's just that posts about topics that are very different are seperated. This seems perfectly rational.

Discussion between different FE games is already divided pretty heavily, and now you want to divide everyone's attention even further? People only have so much free time available to them.

Which is why it's good that tier lists are properly separated: since it forestalls fruitless, endless bickering over routes or Warp staves or ranks or Seths or drafts, or the absence thereof. Discussion is more organised and more rigid. Remember that enormous Merlinus argument in the FE7 list? It should have ended with the person in charge of the list putting their foot down and moving the discussion to a separate topic where it wouldn't interfere with regular discussion.

In addition, there is hardly a problem that people's lives are being consumed by tier listing, which doesn't have a whole lot of activity nowadays.

Saying that multiple tier lists should be created will cause the community to divide even further, and this topic is trying to do the exact opposite; find out where the differences are and hopefully consolidate the community.

Except there is no "consolidation". There is not a separate pack of Ranked and Unranked debaters or whatever: largely, the same people post on tier lists for the same games. Othin dislikes the current lists, but he doesn't post on any of the lists afaik, so why should an amalgam of them attract him?

[Florete]

That's the point. People could never agree on the exact value of each rank. It would depend entirely on how well each person could debate. And when people actually bring up good, sound points to defend their argument, that's what made debating fun.

By the way anouleth, do you even know how the old gamefaqs and FEFF tiers were run? They were community based where changes were made based on a consensus of sorts, so in fact unit placements were based on "whoever has the most passionate fanboys". Only, the old debaters weren't fanboys. They used logical arguments, they were willing to listen to other people, and were willing to compromise. Things that I have not seen on this site.

The point is that despite the fact that the standards were always changing, debates were fun because the people who argued for them were generally intelligent and good listeners. And they were not, as you put it, "passionate fanboys". It has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not you personally agreed with the standards used for the list.

This smells of "They Changed it Now it Sucks" (or whatever similar term would apply to this situation). Have you ever considered the possibility that the real reason you don't like the way things are now is because you're not used to it and weren't part of the change? Maybe you're still living in the past. Honestly, I find it pretty hard to believe that people back then were much more willing to compromise and listen than now. I don't mean to speak down on them, it's just people and the internet.

[Progenitus]

@ narga and anouleth

The whole point is not being so rigid in the assumptions of the tier list. Each factor should just be a part of the tier list. For example, if Saleh > Lute when Seth is assumed to blaze through maps (thus Lute has no time to gain levels or supports), then that's good. But the tier list should also examine cases where Seth isn't soloing half the map and Lute does have that time to gain levels or supports.

I did say that a compromise should be reached so that there's one major tier list for each game, but it appears that this cannot be the case. I suppose having two separate tiers with different standards is fine. However, "Sethless/warpless" should be changed to "use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount" while "Sethskip/warpskip" should be changed into "blast through the game with guns ablazing", but those names might be too long.

Again, you may be saying that you argue for a wide variety of playthroughs, but my personal run-ins with you and the rest of the SF niche say otherwise. For a recent example, my FE9 ranking topic where someone (I think it was Raven) who kept saying that use of top tiers was assumed and so he could afford to BEXP Tormod to his heart's content, or that Oscar didn't need BEXP because all he's doing is picking up the scraps left behind by Marcia. These are extremely rigid criteria to be judging units by, and make for extremely inflexible playthroughs.

[Narga_Rocks]

Well, the thing with sethskip is that the only rigidness in the playthrough is "rush Seth at boss and kill boss asap". How you accomplish everything else in the chapter is pretty much up to you. There are, I'll admit, instances in which there are things like chapter 7 carry eirika over the mountains after Seth or fly Tana/Vanessa over to the western village in chapter 9 Eir while the other flyer drops Seth in the southeast, but in general (like, most other chapters) there isn't something so rigid. I'm not sure if people like Merc Raven have more involved ideas about what MUST happen, but I don't believe there is much more to it than what I listed. And then sethless is pretty open as well. Beat the game without Seth. There shouldn't be anything too rigid in that.

Oh, and I remember Othin's description of how he uses Seth (partial for two chapters and more for like 1 and then Seth died). That's not all that different from Sethless, so I doubt there'd be much difference in the list if you treated "use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount" in the same way Othin does.

As for warpskip/non-warpskip, I'm not sure how non-warpskip can be turned into "use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount". Like, you skip anywhere from no chapters to all but one that is normally warpskipped?

[Lord Raven]

I'm not sure if people like Merc Raven have more involved ideas about what MUST happen, but I don't believe there is much more to it than what I listed. And then sethless is pretty open as well. Beat the game without Seth. There shouldn't be anything too rigid in that.

What do you mean? Are you referring to the FE9 tier list where we were arguing Marcia vs Jill then trying to weigh Tormod on absolute Efficiency compared to other units (which is admittedly a tough thing to do and I doubt I was approaching the argument correctly)? Because I think higher tiers are the ones you argue based on this entire "skip with best units" thing whereas if you go a bit lower, I don't agree with this "Seth trivializes this unit" kind of arguments, although they're inevitable when you allow Seth into your tier list (and Seth pretty much centralizes the way you play your game; Sethless has Franz doing an inferior job at this).

Smash, you also missed the point I was making; BEXP comes to you in very very large amounts in FE9. Lower tiers or not, you have a ton of BEXP to go around, and even your higher tiers need some of that BEXP to go by; my point was that I made use of a rather large team (even if they were some of the higher tiers, they needed BEXP to be very good) and I still got Tormod up to par. And I wasted ~1300 BEXP on Marcia to top this all off, while having mostly everyone promoted by Chapter 18 like a normal person would. This was against the argument where you stated that he costs BEXP, which he does but it's not as big a deal when you get a very good (read: better than Soren) unit out of it. But that's something to take back to your thread; I am merely clarifying my stance at this point.

Also, I think the fact that pumping resources into Lute to make her Saleh on a horse and without a decent staff rank pretty much makes her inferior by default (no matter what standard is assumed), but that's beside the point. I still think that "low turns, low EXP, low gold, high reliability, high combat, high survival" is more or less pretty broad and already applies to our tier lists. It's hard to give lower tiers a chance when they don't fulfill much of the above criteria. The higher tiers in the current list more or less have flexibility on their side, which by in large would allow them to be ranked just as good in a different criteria of tier list.

Finally,

"use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount"

The problem with this tier list is that we go into stupid ass arguments about why we'd be cutting "specific amount" off at a certain time. If we go by what Narga stated, then it doesn't change anyone's ranking on a tier list or affect anything at all. If we make it less limited, we still run into the problem of "Seth kills the first half of the game." Tier lists have always had the problem of turning into shitstorms because there wasn't any sort of rigidity in the standards.

Long story short, a bunch of *my* higher tier arguments are more rigid, which is to be expected. I'm sorry that it's been interpreted as "tier lists are LTC only," because that was not my intent. Marcia vs Jill arguments are completely different to Brom vs Devdan, for instance. It also makes a unit like Tormod hard to rank, because of his value in higher efficiency playthroughs and his "being Soren with 8 move" in a lower efficiency playthrough.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Mercenary Raven

[Anouleth]

@ narga and anouleth

The whole point is not being so rigid in the assumptions of the tier list. Each factor should just be a part of the tier list. For example, if Saleh > Lute when Seth is assumed to blaze through maps (thus Lute has no time to gain levels or supports), then that's good. But the tier list should also examine cases where Seth isn't soloing half the map and Lute does have that time to gain levels or supports.

And we have an entire tier list dedicated to that possibility. I think that case is relevant and important when discussing Lute, which is why it's good that we have a tier list that can deal with it.

The way I see it, having an extra tier list isn't somehow denigrating non-seth playthroughs as "inferior". It's giving them the room they need to be discussed properly.

I did say that a compromise should be reached so that there's one major tier list for each game, but it appears that this cannot be the case.

I doubt that you will ever achieve a single tier list for each game.

I suppose having two separate tiers with different standards is fine. However, "Sethless/warpless" should be changed to "use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount"

The problem is that's not really any different. From the perspective of Lute, she doesn't really care if Seth is deployed or not. All that matters is how fast we beat the earlygame chapter and thus how much opportunity she has to gain experience. From the sounds of things, your "idea" for a list wouldn't have very different expectations of how the game is played than the Sethless list.

Seth is a character who can break the game over his knee. That is what makes using him so different to using other characters and what makes playing with him so different to playing without him. If you are using him but not using this quality of his, then it is no different than not using him at all. I doubt there is any argument or discussion that you could have on one list that could not be made on the other.

Again, you may be saying that you argue for a wide variety of playthroughs, but my personal run-ins with you and the rest of the SF niche say otherwise. For a recent example, my FE9 ranking topic where someone (I think it was Raven) who kept saying that use of top tiers was assumed and so he could afford to BEXP Tormod to his heart's content, or that Oscar didn't need BEXP because all he's doing is picking up the scraps left behind by Marcia. These are extremely rigid criteria to be judging units by, and make for extremely inflexible playthroughs.

I think that often, other people on this site can take efficiency too far. Like those people complaining about the presence of supports on your FE8 ranking thread. My only issue was that it was at odds with your statement in the first post about efficiency. Even now it's a bit iffy since it seems to place priority on speed.

Or that ridiculous Aran thing on the FE10 tier list, where Edward is somehow better because Aran is assumed to be super-underlevelled forever.

Also, I think the fact that pumping resources into Lute to make her Saleh on a horse and without a decent staff rank pretty much makes her inferior by default (no matter what standard is assumed),

Actually, if Lute can promote before Chapter 11, she has better staff rank. Torch is just that good. Both routes. It's why Lute is higher than Saleh on the draft tier list.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Anouleth

[Progenitus]

Well, the thing with sethskip is that the only rigidness in the playthrough is "rush Seth at boss and kill boss asap". How you accomplish everything else in the chapter is pretty much up to you. There are, I'll admit, instances in which there are things like chapter 7 carry eirika over the mountains after Seth or fly Tana/Vanessa over to the western village in chapter 9 Eir while the other flyer drops Seth in the southeast, but in general (like, most other chapters) there isn't something so rigid. I'm not sure if people like Merc Raven have more involved ideas about what MUST happen, but I don't believe there is much more to it than what I listed. And then sethless is pretty open as well. Beat the game without Seth. There shouldn't be anything too rigid in that.

Oh, and I remember Othin's description of how he uses Seth (partial for two chapters and more for like 1 and then Seth died). That's not all that different from Sethless, so I doubt there'd be much difference in the list if you treated "use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount" in the same way Othin does.

As for warpskip/non-warpskip, I'm not sure how non-warpskip can be turned into "use of these gamebreakers varies between playthroughs but are not used to the point to break the game nor are they assumed to be used a specific amount". Like, you skip anywhere from no chapters to all but one that is normally warpskipped?

Well, if Seth is rushing towards the boss, that's usually the path that will have the most enemies, and so in his run to the boss he'll be clearing out most of the enemies anyway. And if you say "well Seth is actually accompanied by a bunch of people too", then that doesn't actually make it much different than a normal playthrough (where you want a team that just goes straight for the boss) and so I don't really see how that entails having two separate tier lists.

As for warp, it should be available as a possibility. No one chapter should be assumed that it's warpskipped or not, but it should be available as an option. For example, suppose you're arguing two units and so far you assumed that no chapters were warpskipped. Unit A has 6 spd over the enemies while B has 4 spd. While both units can double, the fact that chapters CAN be warpskipped, and thus units could possibly have a lower level, should be considered, because B cannot double if he is short on levels, which is an advantage for A as he can have 2 less spd and still be fine, and so by using unit A you CAN warpskip a few chapters and he can still double. On the flip side, you should not assume that certain chapters ARE warpskipped and thus B is never doubling. (There's also the possibility of unit B getting RNG screwed, but that's beside the point).

This also applies to "sethskip", or like everything in general. If X unit has great stats while Y unit has stats that are just enough to get by, the fact that Seth CAN blaze through maps and cut into units' exp gains and supports should be brought up against Y's case.

If a map can be completed in X turns using the best units, you should not assume that the map is always being done in X turns, as again that implies the best units are only being used. When lower tiers are being considered, this map could be considered to be completed in X + Y turns, or even X + Y + Z turns, so that these lower tiers have more things to do in the map. But again, the fact that the map CAN be done in X turns, and thus these lower tiers could possibly have lower stats, should be considered.

And like what has been said multiple times in thsi topic, turns should not be the only factor (or the driving factor). For example, if by taking 1 extra turn, I could instead use generic weapons instead of forges/silvers and save gold, I may want to do that. Or maybe sometimes I don't care about the gold and want that 1 turn faster. Sure, in a game with a lot of gold, the 1 turn will usually be better, but the option to have a tradeoff should exist.

If I extend, say, 2-E by a certain number of turns, I have an opportunity to gain those extra statboosters and items in the map and exp for the team. And I may want to do that. or maybe I don't need them and will just fast clear 2-E with Haar (or whoever is critical for the fast clear).

And like I said earlier and the SF niche agreed, that not every turn is equal, that a turn in a short map like 1-P is not the same as a turn in a long map like 4-4, and so I think it's fair game to say that some tradeoffs between turns and other resources available can be considered throughout the game, especially if you can prove that the traded turns are not significant.

This, of course, brings up a lot of subjective factors to the debate. "how often are we warpskipping and how often is B going to have this 4 spd? How often are we beating the map in X turns, or X + Y turns, or X + Y + Z turns?" Ranked topics of old had things like "What weight do we give each rank?" and such. This is what I find to be interesting in debating. I'm not saying to have no standards, as that would cause chaos, but the standards should be flexible enough to allow for more things to be talked about and not constrict the player to specific playstyles.

Smash, you also missed the point I was making; BEXP comes to you in very very large amounts in FE9. Lower tiers or not, you have a ton of BEXP to go around, and even your higher tiers need some of that BEXP to go by; my point was that I made use of a rather large team (even if they were some of the higher tiers, they needed BEXP to be very good) and I still got Tormod up to par. And I wasted ~1300 BEXP on Marcia to top this all off, while having mostly everyone promoted by Chapter 18 like a normal person would. This was against the argument where you stated that he costs BEXP, which he does but it's not as big a deal when you get a very good (read: better than Soren) unit out of it. But that's something to take back to your thread; I am merely clarifying my stance at this point.

My experiences with FE9 tell me otherwise. But you are right; it's not something for this topic.

Also, I think the fact that pumping resources into Lute to make her Saleh on a horse and without a decent staff rank pretty much makes her inferior by default (no matter what standard is assumed), but that's beside the point.

I again disagree; I find Lute with exp and supports to be better than Saleh on a horse and lower staff rank. But yes, that isn't for this topic.

I still think that "low turns, low EXP, low gold, high reliability, high combat, high survival" is more or less pretty broad and already applies to our tier lists. It's hard to give lower tiers a chance when they don't fulfill much of the above criteria. The higher tiers in the current list more or less have flexibility on their side, which by in large would allow them to be ranked just as good in a different criteria of tier list.

That's pretty much the point. High tiers are usually high tier because they are good in a wider variety of standards than lower tiers. They don't really care how you play the game. Lower tiers need more flexible standards in order to conjure more discussion about them.

The way I see it, having an extra tier list isn't somehow denigrating non-seth playthroughs as "inferior". It's giving them the room they need to be discussed properly.

I doubt that you will ever achieve a single tier list for each game.

Well, I did say that, at this point, a single tier list for each game is almost impossible, albeit for different reasons. I still think that a game should only have one major tier list if possible, but it's clear that it's easier to split into separate tier lists than to continue this argument.

The problem is that's not really any different. From the perspective of Lute, she doesn't really care if Seth is deployed or not. All that matters is how fast we beat the earlygame chapter and thus how much opportunity she has to gain experience. From the sounds of things, your "idea" for a list wouldn't have very different expectations of how the game is played than the Sethless list.

Seth is a character who can break the game over his knee. That is what makes using him so different to using other characters and what makes playing with him so different to playing without him. If you are using him but not using this quality of his, then it is no different than not using him at all. I doubt there is any argument or discussion that you could have on one list that could not be made on the other.

I think that often, other people on this site can take efficiency too far. Like those people complaining about the presence of supports on your FE8 ranking thread. My only issue was that it was at odds with your statement in the first post about efficiency. Even now it's a bit iffy since it seems to place priority on speed.

I can accept the fact that using Seth to his fullest will break the game. However, "Sethless" implies that Seth is not even touched at all. I do believe that Seth can be fielded, even if just for supports/meatshielding/etc., whether or not that isn't using Seth to his fullest.

[Lord Raven]

That's pretty much the point. High tiers are usually high tier because they are good in a wider variety of standards than lower tiers. They don't really care how you play the game. Lower tiers need more flexible standards in order to conjure more discussion about them.

Then I don't understand what the argument is? I don't recall a tier list in recent memory where a low tier argument has been shut down because they're not high tiers (though FE6 and such tend to be like that, and FE12's Lunatic list is justifiably so). I'm pretty sure if you're in favor of a low tier argument in a tier list you won't receive much ire; if you're making a high tier argument it gets rigid because that's precisely what's required, and if you get a unit that ranges from decent in regular runs to extremely useful in efficiency/borderline LTC then thats where we have problems. At that point we need to define standards to some extent so half the argument (namely "what are we arguing about") can be cut down, and the argument made a lot less irritating on everyone's part. Edited February 20, 2012 by Mercenary Raven

[Progenitus]

Then I don't understand what the argument is? I don't recall a tier list in recent memory where a low tier argument has been shut down because they're not high tiers (though FE6 and such tend to be like that, and FE12's Lunatic list is justifiably so). I'm pretty sure if you're in favor of a low tier argument in a tier list you won't receive much ire; if you're making a high tier argument it gets rigid because that's precisely what's required, and if you get a unit that ranges from decent in regular runs to extremely useful in efficiency/borderline LTC then thats where we have problems. At that point we need to define standards to some extent so half the argument (namely "what are we arguing about") can be cut down, and the argument made a lot less irritating on everyone's part.

It's been years since I argued in SF tiers, but I know at least Aran's level was always sandbagged. Of course he's not low tier, but he's mid-upper mid, and he's a victim of assuming maps are being super fast cleared with the best units and so Aran is never getting kills. Apparently that happened even recently, as Anouleth said so.

Lyre vs the other unholy trinity members, where Astrid/Fiona get to play around with free deployment maps while Lyre never does, despite the fact that a trained Lyre can actually do something while Astrid/Fiona are just awful forever always no matter what you do. Of course it's a valid point to say that those two have some very minor contributions while Lyre can't do anything without hurting the team, but of course that kinda means there's nothing to talk about concerning those units.

it also affects things like FE10 Jill and Mia, where it's commonly assumed that the top/high tiers are basically always used. As the other top/high tiers do not require a whole lot of favoritism, this lets the SF debaters dump the resources into them instead, whereas if the team isn't assumed to be godly then you can't really afford to do that.

EDIT: Athos/Lehran/etc as well. Their position varies a lot depending on the standards used, although not quite for the same reasons as low tiers.

Edited February 20, 2012 by IMPrime

[Narga_Rocks]

Actually in the case of fe10 Jill, I'm not seeing your point. Giving her Paragon and having her gain a lot of levels I don't believe is reliant on having a support team of top tier units, though it certainly makes the map go faster. And then 3-12 and 3-13 are basically Jill's stomping grounds so again the support team doesn't really matter. If you are concerned about her in part 1, I'm not sure why either.

As for Mia, why does she need top tiers? The money isn't that tough. Int got through with just one forge and a bunch of half-price steel blades, so you can't be talking about money concerns. The Ike support is even more easily argued for Mia if the supporting team is a bunch of low tiers. If it's Ike + Mia + scrubs then why would you support Ike to the scrubs? You'd have to hold Ike back or his support partner would die. This is clearly a bad idea in general, so Mia more easily gets him. The strongest argument against Mia getting the Ike support is in fact Saviour Haar plowing ahead with Ike in tow for maps like 3-4 and 3-11 (might as well have them supported, and thus they'd be supported on other maps). So this is a case where always using top/high tiers only would in fact potentially hurt Mia.

[Progenitus]

Actually in the case of fe10 Jill, I'm not seeing your point. Giving her Paragon and having her gain a lot of levels I don't believe is reliant on having a support team of top tier units, though it certainly makes the map go faster. And then 3-12 and 3-13 are basically Jill's stomping grounds so again the support team doesn't really matter. If you are concerned about her in part 1, I'm not sure why either.

Because justifying jill resources is a lot easier if your team is liek Volug/Sothe/etc (Tauroneo/BK/etc. are used when applicable), whereas replacing a single unit on this team suddenly means that DB maps can't be ez'd and that the extra levels and stats on dudes like Nolan/etc. suddenly matter.

As for Mia, why does she need top tiers? The money isn't that tough. Int got through with just one forge and a bunch of half-price steel blades, so you can't be talking about money concerns. The Ike support is even more easily argued for Mia if the supporting team is a bunch of low tiers. If it's Ike + Mia + scrubs then why would you support Ike to the scrubs? You'd have to hold Ike back or his support partner would die. This is clearly a bad idea in general, so Mia more easily gets him. The strongest argument against Mia getting the Ike support is in fact Saviour Haar plowing ahead with Ike in tow for maps like 3-4 and 3-11 (might as well have them supported, and thus they'd be supported on other maps). So this is a case where always using top/high tiers only would in fact potentially hurt Mia.

You'd have to be pretty silly to use a mid tier in any given playthrough and say "damn this guy sucks why are we even using him, let's just leave him at his suck and not help him ever". When using mid and lower tiers, the general idea is to actually give them the resources they need so they don't suck, and the fact that they require these extra resources is the reason why they're mid or lower tier (or more accurately, look at input vs output). So something liek Ike x Soren CAN happen if Soren is also given a few more resources, like Ike support + 3-3 crown + BEXP abuse in 2nd tier.

As for the forge, I've heard lots of varying stories about how many forges she's blowing through, but the less she uses the forge, the weaker her cancel/vantage/whatever combo becomes, and the weaker her offense becomes.

Edited February 20, 2012 by IMPrime

[Lord Raven]

Because justifying jill resources is a lot easier if your team is liek Volug/Sothe/etc (Tauroneo/BK/etc. are used when applicable), whereas replacing a single unit on this team suddenly means that DB maps can't be ez'd and that the extra levels and stats on dudes like Nolan/etc. suddenly matter.

Here's the thing; if someone can blow everyone else out of the water with equivalent resources, they should be considered higher tier. Place all of Jill's resources into another unit and you don't have as effective an output. This is an argument that has been thrown around.

Though I am inclined to agree that it should only apply when you are making arguments in favor of resources for one unit; I don't believe this should penalize anyone below Jill.

[Progenitus]

It's a problem if a team has to be a specific setup so they can deal with the sacrifices of not being able to use paragon/energy drop/etc.

And by "blows out of the water", what exactly do you mean by that? And how much is it worth? I'm pretty sure if Nolan/Zihark/etc. received the same amount of favoritism that Jill would be receiving in this scenario, they would also be soloing half the map. Maybe they'll take 1-2 more turns because of no flying, but again, not every turn is the same. 1-2 extra turns doesn't really matter if all you're doing during those extra turns is watching your unit destroy everything on enemy phase with no strategy required.

[Lord Raven]

I'm dropping this argument because it was covered in the FE10 tier list.

It's a problem if a team has to be a specific setup so they can deal with the sacrifices of not being able to use paragon/energy drop/etc.

What do you mean by this?

[Progenitus]

Exactly what it says.

[dondon151]

And by "blows out of the water", what exactly do you mean by that? And how much is it worth? I'm pretty sure if Nolan/Zihark/etc. received the same amount of favoritism that Jill would be receiving in this scenario, they would also be soloing half the map. Maybe they'll take 1-2 more turns because of no flying, but again, not every turn is the same.

And 4-P. And 4-3. And 4-E. Huge difference between Jill and Nolan or Zihark.

1-2 extra turns doesn't really matter if all you're doing during those extra turns is watching your unit destroy everything on enemy phase with no strategy required.

Someone needs to revisit preschool math.

[aku chi]

Lyre vs the other unholy trinity members, where Astrid/Fiona get to play around with free deployment maps while Lyre never does, despite the fact that a trained Lyre can actually do something while Astrid/Fiona are just awful forever always no matter what you do. Of course it's a valid point to say that those two have some very minor contributions while Lyre can't do anything without hurting the team, but of course that kinda means there's nothing to talk about concerning those units.

Did you skip my post? All units being evaluated have free deployment for all of their chapters now. This still doesn't mean that we need to expend other resources (like your infamous 2 Energy Drops) to salvage abysmal units like Lyre. We should only do so if they provide the greatest benefit when given to Lyre. So we are still at odds in that I don't believe training (slowing down for or giving many resources to) Lyre, Fiona, Astrid, Meg, or Kurthnaga is compatible with any efficiency run. But free deployment does open up consideration to training units like Kyza.

It's been years since I argued in SF tiers, but I know at least Aran's level was always sandbagged. Of course he's not low tier, but he's mid-upper mid, and he's a victim of assuming maps are being super fast cleared with the best units and so Aran is never getting kills. Apparently that happened even recently, as Anouleth said so.

But things are slow to change on the FE10 tier list, so Aran is still above Edward (which, in my opinion, is at least debateable). I agree with Anouleth that too many individuals prefer to assume that Aran is not trained when evaluating Aran. Aran is no Meg.

Here's the thing; if someone can blow everyone else out of the water with equivalent resources, they should be considered higher tier. Place all of Jill's resources into another unit and you don't have as effective an output. This is an argument that has been thrown around.

"Equivalent resources" is not precise. If Jill is given no resources, she is less valuable than Zihark with no resources. If Jill is given a bunch of resources (Energy Drop, Seraph Robe (or two), Master Seal, Paragon in a few chapters, a substantial amount of Bexp, a Master Crown), Jill is more valuable that Zihark with those same resources. In both cases, the two units get the same amount of resources. In each case we reach a different conclusion concerning their relative value. As smash fanatic rightly points out, the cost of Jill getting her optimal resource bundle does change depending on which other units we're using. But I happen to believe that Jill's rival high and top tier units also make the next best use of many of the resources that Jill takes. Volug can make great use of the Energy Drop. Nolan makes good use of one of the Seraph Robes. If we early-promote Jill, she faces stiff competition for Paragon in 1-7 and 1-E from both Zihark and Sothe. However, if we consider training Aran or Edward, that's another Master Seal we need to retrieve for Jill to get one (the cost is higher), Aran makes a good candidate for one of the Seraph Robes, and Bexp used on Jill is more costly. I guess my point is: properly accounting for the cost of Jill's optimal resource bundle is difficult and it does change depending on which other units are being used (though perhaps not to the extent that smash fanatic suggests).