Rate the Unit, Days 31-33: Lethe, Geoffrey and Kieran

[PKL]

Dat Rules (borrowed/stolen from Integrity)

- Ratings are assumed to be on Hard Mode (JP Maniac). And only hard mode!

- Votes need some explanation regarding their gameplay performance to be counted. If somebody else said what you want to already, quote them explicitly.

+/- ≤1 point extra regarding personality/appearance is encouraged, but no more. If you exercise your bias privileges, please do so explicitly.

- Numerical votes out of 10, or something proportional to it. Make it easy to calculate for my sake.

- Every ranking phase ends when the next RTU thread is posted (at this point, it's hard to tell).

- I will insist you do not use the "Not X" reason on any character, where X is another unit. If you do, your vote will be thrown out.

- "Recruits X" or "takes you to X chapter" or "Gives you Bronze Sword" arguments are explicitly banned. C'mon, people, this shouldn't need to be a rule. That's not gameplay performance.

- Assume that the character in question is being recruited.

- Similar to the "Recruits X" rule, do not use "she brings a Savior to the team" as an argument.

- BEXP is free to be used in any quantity on any character.

- Skills can be reassigned freely.

- No transfers.

- Anyone that has done a RD RTU withholds the privilege to tell you your rating is bogus and demand you revise it if it breaks any of the above. I will not throw out votes anonymously, you will be informed and given a chance to revise.

Averages:

Fiona: 1.20

Meg: 1.34

Vika: 2.40

Leonardo: 2.53

Lucia: 3.06

Tormod: 3.28

Brom: 3.56

Ilyana: 3.75

Nealuchi: 4.41

Tauroneo: 4.50

Black Knight: 4.60

Maurim: 4.72

Aran: 4.92

Laura: 5.13

Heather: 5.29

Edward: 6.31

Micaiah: 6.50

Mordecai: 7.17

Marcia: 7.31

Zihark: 7.44

Nephenee: 7.74

Elincia: 8.21

Leanne: 8.38

Rafiel: 8.45

Jill: 8.46

Volug: 8.87

Sothe: 8.93

Nailah: 9.00

Nolan: 9.06

Haar: 9.91

Edited June 2, 2012 by PKL

[Shadow Mir]

Lethe: 2/10. She really got noifed from her PoR incarnation. It doesn't help that her high starting level makes her gain exp rather slowly (and her level's still low enough that getting to level 30 will be long and hard). Her bases don't do her case much good either. And there's the fact that non-royal laguz aren't that great aside from a select few, and cats in particular (except for Ranulf) are nearly unusable.

Geoffrey: 4.5/10. Useful in 2-3 and 3-9, but not so much after that.

Kieran: 3.5/10. Again, useful in 2-3 and 3-9, but unlike Geoffrey, he does get extra availability.

Edited June 2, 2012 by Golden Cucco

[Shotguner159]

Lethe is kind of terrible - bad stats, cant stay transformed without constant Olivi Grasses, but does have some use. 2/10

Geoffrey has terribad availability, but when he's around in Part 2/3 he is one of your best characters, but when he comes back in Part 4 he's not good. AT ALL. 2/10

Kieren has issues, but they're mostly fixable - his doubling issus can be fixed by a speedwing, and he can use BEXP to raise up his defence, since he has a decent DEF growth. He has availabilty problems, but when he comes back in Part 3, he's one of your best candiadates for Paragon. When he joins up with the GMs, he can be used if you have an open space in deployment for whatever reason. He's still going to be useful in Part 4, since he does have 4-2 to gain EXP before 4-5. 5/10.

[Bluedoom]

Lethe: Sucky stats, lolcatgauge, w/e. 2/10

Geoffrey: Can be insta-crowned in 3-9 to solo it. He's pretty decent in part 4, not a great unit, but he's probably the best of the CRK's, even if his availability SUCKS. 5/10

Kieran: Has what, 3-4 more chapters over Geoffrey? Doesn't really matter, because he's slower and probably does worse because of more availability. He has more time to grow but srsly, Geoffrey is just so much easier to us. 4/10

Edited June 2, 2012 by Bluedoom

[Samias]

Lethe: Not good. Cats are just not good. Her transformation problems are terrible and her stats aren't really very impressive to begin with. Better than Lyre, but anything is better than Lyre. Bad affinity too. Overall bleh. 2/10 because she's useable, at least.

Geoffrey: I actually like Geoffrey. He starts overleveled but has paragon so his exp gain, while not great, is still okay. He'll cap a bunch of stats without too much effort and start beefing up some lesser stats. You could theoretically bexp cap-ram him, though I'd say because of his endgame potential and sad, sad availability, it's not worth it. Because pallies were nerfed he only has Lance A, and then he'll class up into bows, which is unfortunate, but I think Geoffrey is one of the better units to fill your army with, even if he's not endgame material. He can parablossom just like Astrid, except he's not as bad as she is. Fire is an alright affinity too. His availability really blows but he pulls his weight through part 2 as your 3rd best unit. When he comes back, he's definitely inferior to Oscar and Titania, but Geoffrey shows up on Tibarn's route, where Titania won't be. 6/10 with +1 bias for 7/10 for being Elincia's OTP.

Kieran: Kieran's got a better classup than Geoffrey, Astrid, or Oscar, and is one of the better paladins in the game. He's worth training just to have him in shape for part 4, though he probably won't be in the endgame due to his speed cap. Many of his bases actually match Geoffrey despite being 4 levels lower, but Kieran doesn't cap stats as fast to abuse bexp. At any rate, he's one of the CRKs worth training for his eventual reapperance in part 4. I like to send him on Tibarn's route, personally. Too bad the nerfs to paladins are reeeeaaally evident in this game. 6.5/10.

[Snowy_One]

Lethe: She's not too strong on the stats and has to put up with the gauge. It's not as bad (on the whole) than in FE9, but in FE9 she also had the stats to be a viable constant fighter. 2.5 (+2 + .5 bias)/10

Geoffry: Nrggggg.... He has good stats and even has a few uses, but really doesn't shine on the whole. Plus, he gets Elincia. 3 (4 -1 bias)/10.

Kieran: Slow, poor bases, and everything. Even though he has some room to grow, Geoffry comes already decent. 3/10.

[Shadow Mir]

It's not as bad (on the whole) than in FE9

Personally, I'm almost inclined to think it's even worse than in FE9, what with laguz exp gain being garbage transformed, not to mention the fact that enemies don't suck, whereas untransformed laguz stats completely suck...

Edited June 2, 2012 by Golden Cucco

[Melonhead]

Lethe-

Laguz arn't all that great, and the cats (besides ranulf) are almost unuseable. Lethe is not an exeption. She can chip damage some units to give some of your then-weaker units a kill, but not much else. 2/10 with -1 bias for a 1/10

Geoffrey-

Personally one of my favorite knights in the game, has amazing stats in part 2, runs over people in 3-9, and can be crowned to become a decent unit in part 4's swamp level. Overall fairly decent. 5/10 with +1 bias for a 6/10

Kieran-

One of the better CRK. He has issues, and Geoffrey is better, but at least he has good availability. That, and he can do some serious damage in part 2. 4/10

[Titamon]

Lethe: Bad Stats, bad class, but good availibility. Bad. 2/10

Geoffery: Good stats when he is around but bad availability. Ok. 4/10

Kieran: Geoffery with axes, more availability but craptacular speed. The speed is kind of a problem. Meh. 3.5/10

[Loki Laufeyson]

Lethe, warrior of Gallia.

Pros:

Decent base level.

Great speed.

Good availability.

Cons:

Low strength.

Cat gauge of doom.

Defense is meh.

Lethe got gimped pretty hard in this game. In PoR, she was pretty decent for most of the game. Here? lol. Shes not bad in part 2 though but shes not doing a lot of damage overall. Her gauge totally works against her. Its the curse of the cat laguz big time. In part 3, shes just not doing much and isnt all that worth training. Her defense is lacking even though shes got good speed.

2/10. I really loved her in PoR...shame.

______________________________________________

Geoffrey, leader of the Crimean Royal Knights.

Pros:

Paragon.

Great base level.

Decent strength.

Horsie.

Cons:

Growths are kinda in the pooper.

Availability is among the worst in the game.

Defense is eehhh..

Geoffrey is kind of a badass when we meet him again in part 2. Hes at a pretty high base level and kinda stomping on junk pretty hard. Paragon means hes gonna be gaining EXP for his troubles. But due to his high base level, hes not soaking up a ton of it until 3-9. He does hit hard in part 2 and hes got a horsie for canto shenanigans. His Brave Lance makes quick work of the boss in his joining chapter. In 2-E, he appears kinda late and is not really gonna be that useful. In 3-9, hes like, ehh. Not horribad or anything but his defense is starting to show. He will be gaining more EXP if you left Paragon on him but im really doubting yer doing that. After that, he vanishes until 4-5. wtf. When he does come back, hes badly underleveled and right crappy. Geoffrey has his uses but overall ehhhhhh...

3/10. 2.5/10 bias because he always bugged me as a unit.

________________________________________________________

Kieran, loudest knight in the Crimean Royal Army.

Pros:

Great strength.

Horsie.

Decent growths.

Good weapon ranks.

Good bases.

Cons:

Speed growth is a bit lame.

Kieran isnt bad. Hes not exactly the badass he was in the previous game, but he didnt suffer a serious nerf. He comes in with weapons he doesnt take penalties from and he can double just about everything except myrms in his joining chapter. Kieran (other than Marcia) is probably doing the most in that level. Breaking down that door, smackin fools around. Yeah. The CRK team doesnt do a lot in 2-E anyway so D:. But Kieran can at least smack some guys around. In 3-9, hes still smackin fools, hes just not doubling much anymore. His meh speed is catching up with him now but still hes a workable unit. With some Paragon/BEXP abuse, he can catch up with the rest of the team in 3-11. If he promoted by the time 3-E came around, he can stomp fools pretty hard. But it can be unlikely hes promoting then. His part 4 is actually not terrible either. Hes strong and sturdy enough to take some abuse. Imbue can help him there if need be. If one gives Kieran a speedwing, that can really help him in the murder department.

6.5/10. 7/10 bias because i love him.

[Shadow Mir]

Imbue can help him there if need be.

Personally, I wouldn't consider Kieran for Imbue because healing little more than what you'd gain from an herb (which would undoubtedly be obsolete by the time you get someone who could use it well) fails to impress me whatsoever...

Edited June 2, 2012 by Golden Cucco

[nano]

Lethe

Cat gauge and no range, with subpar combat all around. Barely usable.

2/10

Geoffrey

Kicks major ass in his mandatory chapters, and has Brave Lance access for easy clearing of laguz in 4-5 (or ferrying with his 9 move), and can help in 4-E-1 with a crown. I think he can one round the generals with the brave lance, and should have enough speed to double them.

5.5/10

Kieran

Inferior to Geoffrey. He can help in 2-3 and 3-9 with clearing out path blockers. With some self-improvement in 3-11 and 3-E he can help routing 4-2. Greil is too fast for him and Silver has terrible terrain, so Hawk is basically his only choice. He is marginally better than Geoffrey in 4-E-1 due to hammer access.

5/10

[Caliban of Sycorax]

Lethe: Useless cat gauge, useless unless she has Olivi Grass (which Mordecai wants so much more to keep killing), bad attack, bad defenses. Just bad.

2/10

Geoffrey: Brave Lance and Paragon make Geoffrey more useful than people give him credit for--he can promote in his join chapter with BEXP. He's probably getting most of the kills anyway. His availability's terribad, though. 2-3, 3-9, and 4-5. He'll probably return in 4-5 a third tier unit, though--better than a few others in that sense.

+1 because <3

6/10

Kieran: Titania lite. Has a Silver Axe from the get-go, has a decent base level, doing most of the kills in his early chapters alongside Geoffrey. When he joins Team Ike, he's not that spectacular because of Titania being the SAME CLASS and probably promoted. But he is far from terrible. Great stats and bases, and everyone wants another Titania on their team.

6/10

[Shadow Mir]

Geoffrey: Brave Lance and Paragon make Geoffrey more useful than people give him credit for--he can promote in his join chapter with BEXP. He's probably getting most of the kills anyway. His availability's terribad, though. 2-3, 3-9, and 4-5. He'll probably return in 4-5 a third tier unit, though--better than a few others in that sense.

I'm sorry, but I can't buy this because Paragon has no effect on BEXP costs in this game. Also, with the fact that you have essentially 1/4th the BEXP that you'd get in Normal mode in hard mode...

[I don't play for turns]

Lethe has the same attributes of all laguz : a gauge and level ups that gain double stats because of transformation. However, she still isn't good after transformation, because she can't kill. 3/10

I've always liked Geoffrey, and most of his bases are pretty good. However, his growth rates leave room for improvement in speed, defense, and even a little bit for strength and HP. He also suffers from low caps, and BEXP abuse can't help his weak areas because he shows up for 4 chapters before the endgame, and even auto-paragon can't save him from that. 3.5/10+1 bias, so 4.5/10

Kieran has high strength, defense, and HP, with all of his other stats on the lower side. He'll be a good tank unit, and after promotion he can use the more accurate swords for combat to help his lack of skill. He won't need to dodge anyone but mages and effective weapon-users. His availability isn't great, but he'll have a decent joining level, and I like him. 5.5/10+1 bias for being so funny. 6.5/10

Edited June 3, 2012 by I don't play for turns

[Starwave]

Lethe

Her only redeeming factor is her laguz esque health (though if she's hit outside of transformation she's dead) and speed, but her awful transformation gauge and weak nature in general makes her a bad unit. Eats up olivi grass like crazy too (you should be giving it to MORDECAI). She's usable, but not very good.

3.5/10

Geoffrey

Good bases, high level and decent growths = awesome

Crappy availability = not so awesome

This dude is one of your premier fighters in part 2. He just demolishes everything with that kickass Brave Lance and levels up pretty quickly (by hard mode standards no less!) with Paragon. If he would only join his royal knights when they're transferred to the GM's in part 3 though... He'd be kickass unit. It's too bad he's usable in very few chapters, and comes back in part 4-5 (really IS...? Really?).

5/10, because as a unit he's really not that bad, the game just screws him over badly.

Kieran

Kieran isn't really impressive. He's acceptable in part 2 (though he's slow as molasses) but in part 3 he rejoins the GMs and has to compete with Titania. Nothing about him as a unit is interesting, whatsoever.

4/10

Edited June 3, 2012 by Starwave

[Exiledwolf]

Lethe: Her POR self has taken a nose dive for RD. The cat gauge is so freaking terrible that it also lowers her usefulness. Shes kinda good for part 2 endgame, then gets benched along with her other laguz comrades in part 3

2/10

Geoffrey: His level is mediated by his innate paragon, but his growths are crap to compensate his meh bases. He does help in his part 2 chpater and in 3-9. Then disappears to comeback useless in part 4, especially with those feral ones. uh.. 4.5/10

Kieran: His class is decent by itself because of axes, but he has such a poor speed growth and base. At least its better than Astrid... He has a lot of power, but his speed hindrs him. Useful for his CRK chapters to hold his own. He has more time to grow, but he would still not keep his speed up to par. Also, hes not endgame suitable. uh 5.5/10

[Caliban of Sycorax]

I'm sorry, but I can't buy this because Paragon has no effect on BEXP costs in this game. Also, with the fact that you have essentially 1/4th the BEXP that you'd get in Normal mode in hard mode...

I wasn't counting Paragon into BEXP.

[bottlegnomes]

I think people are drastically overstating Kieran's speed issues. He's got the same base and growth as Haar. They literally have identical speed. Now Haar has a lot of other advantages over Kieran, but saying Kieran has bad base speed and growth means you think Haar has a bad speed base and growth, and I didn't see anyone complaining all that much in his topic.

[I don't play for turns]

I think people are drastically overstating Kieran's speed issues. He's got the same base and growth as Haar. They literally have identical speed. Now Haar has a lot of other advantages over Kieran, but saying Kieran has bad base speed and growth means you think Haar has a bad speed base and growth, and I didn't see anyone complaining all that much in his topic.

It has to do with the timing, and people on that thread were all willing to give Haar speedwings because he's the most worth it. Besides, I complained about both of their speeds

[Epic Fail]

People give Haar the speedwings because he's around for longer, he flies and he beats Kieran in STR/SKL/DEF (higher bases, growths and caps (he also eventually surpasses Kieran in luck, but it's by one point)). His only real losses to Kieran are HP (Haar's not exactly struggling here) and RES, which is arguably his only weakness (Nullify helps him not get hammered by thunder sages, which as people have said before he can avoid).

[MacLovin]

Lethe-

3/10, average in p2, and can get a str transfer and is better than Lyre and Fiona and Astrid.

But, still shitty.

[s[ LetheXIke[/s]

Kieran-4/10

Str/skl problems, but useful for CRKs.

Geoffrey-3.5/10

USeful for the CRKs, then goes off partying with Bastian and VOlke.

[bottlegnomes]

It's ridiculous to say Kieran is anywhere near as good as Haar, but people are holding Kieran's speed against him while they had absolutely no problem with Haar's for the most part.

These are all the votes that hold his speed against him significantly, there are others, but they just say his speed isn't great, not that it's terrible or anything worse than mediocre, which it is and he doesn't have anything like flight, obscene strength/def, availability to make up for it like Haar.

Kieran: Has what, 3-4 more chapters over Geoffrey? Doesn't really matter, because he's slower and probably does worse because of more availability. He has more time to grow but srsly, Geoffrey is just so much easier to us. 4/10

Kieran: Slow, poor bases, and everything. Even though he has some room to grow, Geoffry comes already decent. 3/10.

Kieran: Geoffery with axes, more availability but craptacular speed. The speed is kind of a problem. Meh. 3.5/10

Kieran

Kieran isn't really impressive. He's acceptable in part 2 (though he's slow as molasses) but in part 3 he rejoins the GMs and has to compete with Titania. Nothing about him as a unit is interesting, whatsoever.

4/10

Kieran: His class is decent by itself because of axes, but he has such a poor speed growth and base. At least its better than Astrid... He has a lot of power, but his speed hindrs him. Useful for his CRK chapters to hold his own. He has more time to grow, but he would still not keep his speed up to par. Also, hes not endgame suitable. uh 5.5/10

I think the thing that just kills me is that in many of these ratings people had no problems with Geof's speed when he has the exact same base and all of 5% more growth, in addition to starting 4 levels higher. Hell, I don't disagree with the general scores; I just feel like people are significantly overstating one of Kieran's flaws, and not even his biggest one.

[Shadow Mir]

I wasn't counting Paragon into BEXP.

Whoops. My bad. But I'm still not seeing Geoffrey promoting in his joining chapter short of him soloing the chapter (and I think even that ain't enough)...

[Ema Skye]

I'll post Day 34. Just give me a few minutes.

Tallying now.