Olivia's Viability as a combat unit

[Melonhead]

So here is my thing: Olivia was always doing nothing being paired up with someone on hard mode, and I'm kinda stuck with her not dancing.

I've never been a fan of dancers/herons in the first place, so I decided to skirmish grind her to level 30 and reclass to Swordmaster to make her a viable combat unit.

After the huge amount of +5's, +4's, and +2's all across her stats after a reclass (really satisfying) She now has crazy luck, skill, and speed with mediocre strength and horrible HP and Def.

Rating: 163

HP: 39

Str: 24

Mag: 10

Skill: 34

Spd: 35

Lck: 31 (+4)

Def: 16

Res: 13

This is a replacement for a dancer, not a replacement for an actual swordmaster/myrmidon.

Anyone else done this or something similar? I know a lot of people find dancers crazy useful, but I never find myself using them to their full potential.

Edited April 13, 2013 by Melonhead

[Teapot]

The incorporation of the Galeforce skill kind of obsolesces dancing, IMO. I end up using her more as a combat unit than a dancer unit in the first place. I usually stuff her full of skills, then reclass back to Dancer just because it's a unique class. And it's sparkly.

[Vorena]

LTC. They are invaluable.

In FE13, not so much. I mean, Olivia has to constantly be kept at the rear to avoid being attacked and killed easily on all of these "get swarmed by hordes of enemies" with the rout maps. This is probably the one game where a Dancer is actually not all that great.

Edited April 13, 2013 by Vorena

[mewyeon]

Can I first say that I admire you for doing all that grinding? Your patience is great, as is the patience of the many people who did something similar. (Personally, I gave up on her after one battle). AHEM. However, from what I've seen and heard, a lot of people also chose Swordmaster, or went Dark Flier for the Galeforce. Her skill and luck growths turned out quite nice for them.

Edited April 13, 2013 by mewyeon

[Sunwoo]

Olivia has stinky base stats and is really frail when you first get her. I have to grind her like mad even on normal mode just to make her usable :P But I do like using her and I use her in most of my playthroughs.

I don't actually believe that Galeforce "obsoletes" dancing, honestly. I mean, I don't use the dance command as much this game either, but dancing is always situationally useful.

[shadowofchaos]

The incorporation of the Galeforce skill kind of obsolesces dancing, IMO. I end up using her more as a combat unit than a dancer unit in the first place. I usually stuff her full of skills, then reclass back to Dancer just because it's a unique class. And it's sparkly.

Kinda hating myself for saying this, but AK's right here.

I never found myself using Olivia to dance for units all that often because of Galeforce.

However, that doesn't stop me from giving her all the stat boosters because of blatant favoritism, get her all her skills, and reclass her back to Dancer simply because of the "unique class" factor.

Wheeeeee.

[Interceptor]

I used to neglect using Olivia; then I got good at the game.

[Psych]

I find it's easy to grind her if you've paired her with Chrom, as then as soon as Chapter 11 is over she has an S rank support partner who usually has about an 80 percent chance to double attack for me. Since her combat is bad and I usually have a pretty good Chrom, he basically kills stuff for her from behind.

[Da Bear]

I used to neglect using Olivia; then I got good at the game.

sorry but that sounds exactly Inui..

[Tao]

I'm usually a fan of using Dancers/herons in other games but I do admit it's rather hard in this game even in Normal mode. Or that it gets way too easy without the class and then with Galeforce. But I still got her to 15 to reclass her to...Assassin and she was a really good combat unit for me anyway. She doubles units easily and can hit them hard. Then I tossed her to Peg Knight/Dark Flier for the Bride class. Still, I found her to be a better combat unit (even without being paired up) though I guess I can't really say it would still apply in Hard mode. You probably have to pair up in Hard mode anyway.

[I.M. Gei]

I think my Olivia got stupidly magic-blessed; she had about 11 at the time I reclassed her at level 15 Dancer o.o

[Dragrath]

I just grinded her to 30.... she may have garbage growth as a dancer but she actually turns out pretty good once reclassed... (honestly I think the could have had dancer promote to somthing like "blade dancer ect" also Dancers hate galeforce for stealing business...

[Faye]

I like Bride Olivia a lot, she gets to be pretty and dance and twirl about in that foofy dress. I never really used Dancers, since I couldn't care less about LTC. 8D;

[LycopolisKing]

Olivia and I got off to such a bad start upon her introduction that I refused to speak to her for some time and benched her.

But then, I started training her, and she did extraordinarily well. I reclassed her into an Assassin - because who can resist the Dancer / Undercover Assassin - and she did so well there that she Lethality-killed most everyone - including Aversa. I did reclass her back, because I do find dancing useful for this game, even with Galeforce. Rally Movement + Move + Galeforce + Dance = Ah, Wonderful.

The fact that Olivia can use swords, in my opinion, makes her the best dancer I've ever used. It is great that isn't a complete liability on the board, because that simply won't work in Awakening. It's that reason that I use her so much; I think she's fantastic in her base class.

[Rhaegar Targaryen]

Kinda hating myself for saying this, but AK's right here.

I never found myself using Olivia to dance for units all that often because of Galeforce.

However, that doesn't stop me from giving her all the stat boosters because of blatant favoritism, get her all her skills, and reclass her back to Dancer simply because of the "unique class" factor.

Wheeeeee.

I've been torn on this since Day 1. Since I pretty much always make her Chrom's wife, she has to be useful, since she'll either be in his pocket 24/7 or switching to cover things he can't. I tried justifying leaving her as a Dancer but those caps are horrendous. Plus, Galeforce happened, which caused this to be the first FE that featured a Refresher unit that I didn't use for that purpose. So, after maxing her through every class, she ended as Chrom's Bride. I gave her Limit Breaker and whatever else was needed, be it Rallies and Bond or actual combat abilities, like Galeforce, Astra, Lethality, and Lancefaire. Heck, she's one of only four first gen characters that get used beyond breeding better units: Avatar, Chrom, and our waifus (Tiki and Olivia).

Edited April 13, 2013 by Søren