Cleric Cecil

[darkkfan]

I have done a Lunatic playthrough of this game and am starting a Lunatic Reverse playthrough. Both times I have used Cleric Cecil and Mage Maliesia. Now I realize that Mage Maliesia needs to be babied quite a bit (she is better on Lunatic' because of range), but Cleric Cecil has always been reliable for me and I am wondering why people seem to hate Cecil and why Cleric->Sage Cecil isn't popular. I mean, you are going to need an early-game staffbot anyway, and I know that most people pick Maliesia, but she has much more potential as a Mage. If you are going to use a staffbot, why not use a good one like Cecil instead of a crappy one like Yumina? Even if you do use Cleric Maliesia, Cecil is a much better second staffbot than Yumina. Granted, her tome rank is low when she starts from scratch, but any staffbot will have that problem, and it would be remedied if I had let her steal some levels with tome instead of getting the majority of her Sage experience through healing. Without further ado, here are the stats I got on my first Lunatic playthrough (none of these are with stat boosters):

Cleric->Sage Cecil

And here is my Lunatic Mage->Sage Maliesia

And now for my Lunatic Reverse playthrough, as of the beginning of Chapter 5. Maliesia isn't really spectacular yet, she's at Level 4 Mage, but she does have 6 Mag and 7 Spd which isn't too bad for that level. But anyway, here's my Cleric->Sage Cecil without statboosters:

She has freakishly high DEF for her level (or my other one just had terrible Def, I don't know), and look at that MAG and SPD! She has the growths were she can promote from a reliable staffbot to a powerful Sage very early (especially if you abuse her heal staves which is actually viable even in Lunatic'). In fact, in my Lunatic playthrough (and probably in this one too), Sage Cecil made the game much easier and more possible by doing things such as ORKOing wyverns in CH.9 (she can OHKO them with Shaver if promoted early enough and also has a great crit rate with Shaver/Razor because of that Skill) and tanking the bishops in Ch.6 and 7. I may have some of the chapters wrong, but the point is that Cecil was probably the most indispensable unit in my party. I wonder why she doesn't get more credit?I can see why Mage Maliesia isn't used because although she has potential she needs to be babied, but she isn't that bad in Lunatic'. But I can't understand why Cleric Cecil doesn't get more love.

Edited December 31, 2012 by starfirelord

[Rapier]

I like to use Cecile as a Cleric -> Sage too, she gets really great level ups from time to time (especially speed). Even so, yours is absurdly blessed (or mine is absurdly cursed by the RNG goddess). I have a Level 20/1 Sage Cecile and her mag is still 8, and speed is 17. Am I doing something wrong? >:

[darkkfan]

I like to use Cecile as a Cleric -> Sage too, she gets really great level ups from time to time (especially speed). Even so, yours is absurdly blessed (or mine is absurdly cursed by the RNG goddess). I have a Level 20/1 Sage Cecile and her mag is still 8, and speed is 17. Am I doing something wrong? >:

Well, as Cleric she has 30 MAG growth and 85 SPD, 9 base spd and 0 base mag as a cav, so 1 mag and 6 spd base as a cleric at level 3. According to this, she has 6 MAG and 20 Spd as a Lvl20 cleric, so her final average stats as a 20/1 Sage would be 10 Mag and 21 SPD. So mine has average spd, +7 Mag which is, as you said, absurdly blessed. Yours is a little bit cursed too, with -2 Mag and -4 Spd. I knew mine was Mag blessed, but I didn't think it was by that much. I didn't do anything special when leveling her; no save state abuse or anything. I didn't do this, but I suppose reclassing her to Mage before leveling up and getting as many of these levels as possible as a Mage in the base arena would help that Mag a little, but aside from that I can't really think of anything else you could do so I guess you didn't do anything wrong XD. At least its good to hear that someone else recognizes Cecil's potential to be FE12's red haired sage goddess!

[Vicious Sal]

You do realise that your cecil is extremely blessed and that your own experience isn't an objective judgement?

These are her averages if she was leveled as a cleric in first tier and sage in second tier: [i left strength out since it doesn't matter anyway so it's HP/Mag/Skll/Spd/Lck/Def/Res] [i didn't care about caps so some stats might exceed caps here]

35 13.7 29.55 36.15 23 -0.15 20.5

As we can see her defense is normally 0, and 35 HP isn't helping that when enemies can easily sport 40+ attack, speed is fine, but linde has that too, and she has aura access Nosferatu is only useful if you survive the first hit, so she doesn't have that either.

Besides, why raise a unit with E staff rank when you get so many with C + staff rank? Arran starts with D rank as a bishop and will have B staves fast enough for again uses (which has unlimited range so he doesn't care if he's hiding in a corner.)

Edited December 31, 2012 by Vicious Sal

[darkkfan]

You do realise that your cecil is extremely blessed and that your own experience isn't an objective judgement?

True, but the two times I have used her she has turned out great. That doesn't mean that she isn't useful even when she isn't as blessed

These are her averages if she was leveled as a cleric in first tier and sage in second tier: [i left strength out since it doesn't matter anyway so it's HP/Mag/Skll/Spd/Lck/Def/Res] [i didn't care about caps so some stats might exceed caps here]

35 13.7 29.55 36.15 23 -0.15 20.5

As we can see her defense is normally 0, and 35 HP isn't helping that when enemies can easily sport 40+ attack, speed is fine, but linde has that too, and she has aura access Nosferatu is only useful if you survive the first hit, so she doesn't have that either.

Besides, why raise a unit with E staff rank when you get so many with C + staff rank? Arran starts with D rank as a bishop and will have B staves fast enough for again uses (which has unlimited range so he doesn't care if he's hiding in a corner.)

First off, those averages aren't considering something, either class bases or promotion gains, but the stats should be a little bit higher I think. Yeah, she really shouldn't take hits, but no healer should and at least Cecil has good offense. As for the staff rank, she can easily get to A staff rank as a cleric. before you even recruit many other staff users with high base ranks. And Arran doesn't have nearly as much potential to deal damage as Cecil. I'm sure there are other competent mages and healers, but if you use Cecil enough early in the game she will really help in midgame and staff rank won't be a factor. Not saying you shouldn't use Linde or Arran, but why not use Cecil when she turns out good so early?

[Rapier]

You do realise that your cecil is extremely blessed and that your own experience isn't an objective judgement?

These are her averages if she was leveled as a cleric in first tier and sage in second tier: [i left strength out since it doesn't matter anyway so it's HP/Mag/Skll/Spd/Lck/Def/Res] [i didn't care about caps so some stats might exceed caps here]

35 13.7 29.55 36.15 23 -0.15 20.5

As we can see her defense is normally 0, and 35 HP isn't helping that when enemies can easily sport 40+ attack, speed is fine, but linde has that too, and she has aura access Nosferatu is only useful if you survive the first hit, so she doesn't have that either.

I don't remember any mage with high HP, to be honest. 35 HP is pretty standard. Also, who would let a Sage/Bishop in range of melee units? They are made to stay AWAY from engaging directly on most FEs (unless it's Soren, Levin, Sety, Arthur and etc. who kill anything that stands on their path).

Besides, why raise a unit with E staff rank when you get so many with C + staff rank? Arran starts with D rank as a bishop and will have B staves fast enough for again uses (which has unlimited range so he doesn't care if he's hiding in a corner.)

Discarding Yumina, Malliesia is the only other option for Cleric (unless you reclass Arran, which I find a waste since he's pretty helpful being a General on C1, Dracoknight/Sniper on C2 and so on). From my current playthrough, I think Cecile has better stats than Malliesia in the end. Getting C staff rank isn't that difficult and not necessary from the start because you only have access to Mend and Heal at that point.

Well, as Cleric she has 30 MAG growth and 85 SPD, 9 base spd and 0 base mag as a cav, so 1 mag and 6 spd base as a cleric at level 3. According to this, she has 6 MAG and 20 Spd as a Lvl20 cleric, so her final average stats as a 20/1 Sage would be 10 Mag and 21 SPD. So mine has average spd, +7 Mag which is, as you said, absurdly blessed. Yours is a little bit cursed too, with -2 Mag and -4 Spd. I knew mine was Mag blessed, but I didn't think it was by that much. I didn't do anything special when leveling her; no save state abuse or anything. I didn't do this, but I suppose reclassing her to Mage before leveling up and getting as many of these levels as possible as a Mage in the base arena would help that Mag a little, but aside from that I can't really think of anything else you could do so I guess you didn't do anything wrong XD. At least its good to hear that someone else recognizes Cecil's potential to be FE12's red haired sage goddess!

Oh right, I almost forgot: I promoted my Cecil around Level 13. That's why her mag sucks so much.

[Aircalipoor]

Reminds me of those guys who are using FE11 Caeda as a healer/mage because she can double everything in this class, but ignoring the wing spear and flying. Cavalier Cecil can ORKO armors fairly well and her offense is better than Luke(who has really problems doubling) in early game, thanks to lady-sword. She is actually one of those units who could promote to a falcon knight with its awesome 26 spd cap.

Sure, she can be a good healer, but who can´t? Not using her as a combat unit is wasted potential.

[darkkfan]

Reminds me of those guys who are using FE11 Caeda as a healer/mage because she can double everything in this class, but ignoring the wing spear and flying. Cavalier Cecil can ORKO armors fairly well and her offense is better than Luke(who has really problems doubling) in early game, thanks to lady-sword. She is actually one of those units who could promote to a falcon knight with its awesome 26 spd cap.

Sure, she can be a good healer, but who can´t? Not using her as a combat unit is wasted potential.

I can't really disagree with this since I've never used her as a Cavalier or Falcoknight, and it really doesn't surprise me that she is versatile enough to go in the melee direction. I still think Luke and Rody are better choices for melee overall, but as I said I can't really exclude the possibility that melee Cecil is as good as you say. Yes, anyone can be a healer, but only a few people (Maliesia, Cecil, maybe Merric) can be a good healer and still have good offensive capabilities as a Sage. If you are right about her being good as a combat unit too (which her growths seem to suggest you are), then she is one of the few units (the only other one I can think of is MU) who has versatile enough growths and availability for her to either go the Magic route as a Cleric/Mage->Sage or the Melee route as Cavalier->Falcoknight/something else. In any case, it really can't be denied that she is an exceptional unit because you have the choice of making her either a magic or physical unit, and that can be said about very few, if any, other characters in this game.

[eclipse]

. . .or you can use literally any other Class A guy as your staffbot for threeish chapters, then swap over to Wrys/Yumina. From her stats, I'd rather have Cecil as a mage, because her personal Magic growth is pretty impressive. Cleric just wastes that, IMO.

[darkkfan]

. . .or you can use literally any other Class A guy as your staffbot for threeish chapters, then swap over to Wrys/Yumina. From her stats, I'd rather have Cecil as a mage, because her personal Magic growth is pretty impressive. Cleric just wastes that, IMO.

That's fine, the only thing I'm opposed to is people who don't use her at all. I do think that Maliesia makes a better Mage though because of that extra 10 Mag growth, although her base speed is terrible. But I have nothing against Mage Cecil. Again, that versatility. And besides, what good class A guys are there with magic growth? And for that matter, why bother to switch over Wrys/Yumina when you could have been using Cecil the whole time instead? IMO, Cecil has just enough MAG growth to make her a staffbot with killing potential, but not enough for her to go mage.

Oh right, I almost forgot: I promoted my Cecil around Level 13. That's why her mag sucks so much.

Oh, that would explain it. Again, although she can promote in early chapters if you are willing to invest in the heal staves and use your first master seal, she still benefits from a promotion before level 20 if you aren't willing to make the investment or are playing for turns.

*changes Member Badge* What, no Cecil? I'm going to have to talk to someone about this.

Edited December 31, 2012 by starfirelord

[charlie_]

You don't need a good magic growth to sit at around healspamming for 3 or 4 chapters and then be benched. Anyone who you're not using out of Luke/Rody/Ryan/Gordin can do this.

[Integrity]

That's fine, the only thing I'm opposed to is people who don't use her at all.

I didn't use her at all. Rody was my fixbot until Wendell showed up.

[darkkfan]

I didn't use her at all. Rody was my fixbot until Wendell showed up.

You don't need a good magic growth to sit at around healspamming for 3 or 4 chapters and then be benched. Anyone who you're not using out of Luke/Rody/Ryan/Gordin can do this.

Right, but why not use someone who has the potential to develop offensive capabilities. That way, you don't have to bench them at all. Why use Rody or anyone else as a healer when you can use Cecil and she will turn out better? Especially if you aren't planning on using her in another class? Since Luke and Rody's growths are better than Cecil's for melee units (and this is debatable) and Cecil's are clearly more intended for a healer/mage, I am missing why anyone would choose to use Rody as a healer over Cecil.

Edited January 1, 2013 by starfirelord

[Integrity]

Right, but why not use someone who has the potential to develop offensive capabilities. That way, you don't have to bench them at all. Why use Rody or anyone else as a healer when you can use Cecil and she will turn out better? Especially if you aren't planning on using her in another class? Since Luke and Rody's growths are better than Cecil's for melee units (and this is debatable) and Cecil's are clearly more intended for a healer/mage, I am missing why anyone would choose to use Rody as a healer over Cecil.

Because I wasn't using Rody anyway, I like him more than I like Cecille, and I was planning to bench whichever I used pretty quickly anyway. It's not like it's easy to use and feed sufficient XP to all of your Chapter 1 units anyway.

[Psych]

I don't understand why you wouldn't want Yumina/Mallesia as your staff bot, considering both have unique staves to them. Wrys is just...an old bald guy so....

[darkkfan]

I don't understand why you wouldn't want Yumina/Mallesia as your staff bot, considering both have unique staves to them. Wrys is just...an old bald guy so....

I'm not sure if I'd count Aum as a factor, since by the time you get it you get plenty of other people who can use it and it still only has one use.

Plus, Wrys has a staff named after him

[Silith]

Wrys is bald.

The only advantage he has is that he can escape collapsing cathedrasl 30% faster then others (Let's count the nerds who get that reference)

He also gets a headstart for being available during the prologue. It's not much and he likely isn't going to get picked past prologue 5.

[darkkfan]

Wrys is bald.

The only advantage he has is that he can escape collapsing cathedrasl 30% faster then others (Let's count the nerds who get that reference)

He also gets a headstart for being available during the prologue. It's not much and he likely isn't going to get picked past prologue 5.

I don't get that reference. Therefore I am not a nerd. Please explain.

But yeah, I suppose he is manageable as like a 4th/5th staffbot since he can get practically to level 10 with prologue use. I don't know, in my first playthrough I just used my extra Master Proof to early promote Elrean for this role, but in my most recent playthrough Wrys is getting some good Magic growths, so I may make him my 2nd, 3rd, or maybe 4th staffbot after Cecil, Mallesia (once I promote her), and maybe Yumina.

Edited January 5, 2013 by starfirelord

[Shin]

Your Cecille seems to have got 12 magic level ups in 17 levels. That's pretty impressive considering she has a 30% growth as Cleric :P. Her speed's a little up too, even considering how crazy her speed growth is. Whilst her growths let her be a magical unit too, she starts with no ranks and no personal magic. Of course you can raise her, but you might as well use...

This guy. What a champ.

[darkkfan]

Your Cecille seems to have got 12 magic level ups in 17 levels. That's pretty impressive considering she has a 30% growth as Cleric :P. Her speed's a little up too, even considering how crazy her speed growth is. Whilst her growths let her be a magical unit too, she starts with no ranks and no personal magic. Of course you can raise her, but you might as well use...

This guy. What a champ.

I've never heard of Yubello being good, and according to the averages he too seems to be blessed. Did you use any stat boosters on him?

Anyway, back to Cecil. Not starting with a staff rank isn't that much of a problem, since heal is all that is available in the early game anyway and if you use her she should gain a few ranks in the first couple of chapters. I suppose the fact that she starts with D rank magic as a Sage is a bit of a problem, but it is still good enough for her to use most of the important stuff like Shaver and Nosferatu. Of course, she probably won't be using Aura for a while, but if you use her to attack frequently she should hit B rank eventually (of course, A magic does nothing for a female Sage). And if that is really important to you, that's what arms scrolls are for.

I got Cecil 3 level ups on Chapter 5. Now, I am at the beginning of Chapter 6 and she is at level 20/4 Sage with the following stats:

As you can see, among other things, she proc'ed MAG and SPD in each of her 3 level ups since last chapter. And she even managed to get STR with a Sage's growths. If this game had Dark Knight/Dark Pegasus classes she'd be perfect! In any case, though, this is getting ridiculous! My 20/4 Cleric->Sage Cecil has 20 MAG, that's more than the average 20/20 Merric, Elrean, and Linde and tied with 20/20 Yubello (assuming all of them went Mage->Sage; if they were Clerics instead, the gap would be even larger)!

Edited January 5, 2013 by starfirelord

[PKL]

Thing is...why use Cleric Cecille when she makes a much better Cavalier->Falcoknight. It's just wasted potential if you ask me.

[shadykid]

Just gonna point out that A rank tomes does nothing for male mages too

[Rapier]

Thing is...why use Cleric Cecille when she makes a much better Cavalier->Falcoknight. It's just wasted potential if you ask me.

Because her HP is pathetic, her def is bad, and the only good thing about her as Cavalier is strenght and speed? She's useful as a Falcoknight, I admit, but these come too late.

[Jedi]

Because her HP is pathetic, her def is bad

You just described how Cleric/Mage Cecille doesn't work

[PKL]

Because her HP is pathetic, her def is bad, and the only good thing about her as Cavalier is strenght and speed? She's useful as a Falcoknight, I admit, but these come too late.

And in what way does Cleric fix that? Shes got the sword rank and availability to do falcoknight. if youre using her, shes not gonna be a priority to get a seal anyway unlike other potential Falcoknights.