Pairing review?

[Rosenmeir]

Whaaat, another pairing thread? And from a noobie??? Yeah, sorry, everyone! It's never really been an issue for me in other fire emblem, games, for the obvious reason - no kids. Even then, it shouldn't be too much of a big issue, if not for my own indecisiveness, so I was wonder if any of you had any suggestions, or just generally what you thought of what pairings i'm planning on having. (I've been on chapter 11 for a little while now, basically just grinding everyone's support up to A level.)

Things to keep in mind- I'm not really trying to min/max or anything here. I'm just playing a normal difficulty run with deaths on. I'll worry about min/max later. :v My preferred play style is to use mostly physical based attackers unless I like a particular caster (Tharja for example) so even if I don't end up -using- the kids, i'd like them to have mostly +str stats. I also don't know if I have every parent listed here-I haven't had a very extensive look at parents/kids yet and haven't remembered all of them. Anyway, here are the pairings!

ChromxFMU +str/-res modifiers. (This has been my 'OTP' for my first one through and it is very unlikely to be changed, but i'll still consider what people have to say about it.)

FredrickxSumia

Lon'quxCordelia

DonnelxSully

TharjaxGaius

VirionxOlivia

MirielxRicken

MirielxHenry

CherchexVaike

LissaxLibra

These are all the pairings I have so far. Thoughts, changes, opinions? Hell, even suggestions for characters that I haven't listed here? I'm happy with all feedback! However, It is very late and I am very tired as I write this, so i'm going to jump into bed and check this in the morning. Thank you in advance!

[Djing]

Frederick!Cynthia is the best nonMU physical Cynthia. She'll make a good Paladin.

Lon'qu!Severa is ironically one of the best magical Severas with vantage and Sorcerer. She can still work as a speedy hero or wyvern lord.

Donnel!Kjelle is awesome. Armsthrift general or Galeforce assassin. One of the more versatile kids.

Gaius!Noire is also awesome. Dark flier or Assassin for her. Maybe Sniper if you're into that.

Virion!Inigo is an offensive powerhouse. One of the few good Virion pairings. possiblymyotp

Ricken!Laurent is pure brute force magic. If you're into that go for it.

Henry!Brady (I'm assuming you had a typo) is one of the most versatile Bradys. Can either go Sage or Sorcerer. Or Assassin and Beserker for support.

Cherche!Gerome is pure glass cannon. No defensive skills or mods mean that you have to use him carefully but datstrength.

Libra!Owain is usually going to be magical. Might I suggest Stahl if you want a physical one? He'll get luna (the best offensive proc in the game to make up for meh strength)

Never question a MU pairing. They will always be fine.

Edited May 19, 2013 by Spaceman Craig

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

I can make some quick review Wait a sec

- FredrickxSumia

IMO this is the worst Sumia's choice, mostly because Sumia's other choice are amazing, and Frederick is a path towards some pretty amazing pairing. Frederick is one of three father who hits jackpot and have the Knight line, something that is frankly pretty amazing, but Sumia already have Knight. Of course, Sumia is unscrewable, so even this one creates a +2 Speed Cynthia with nice SKL. Thats Freddy manseed for you.

For in game runthrough though, this is the most popular pairing seeing how almost everyone used the Frederick and Sumia combo.

Cynthia does just as fine in everyone of her class, with the added bonus of Palladin, allowing her to do what she does best, being a pair up fodder for any kind of unit whether its Physical or Magical

- Lon'quxCordelia

Contrary to what many would believe, this is by far the least versatile of Severa. Severa's innate class set is actually pretty limited and Lon'Qu only provide Omni Breaker and Vantage. Lon'Qu is a pretty limited father in general, so its still a good choice though

I don't know how this would work in game because Lon'Qu provides a rather overkill speed boost

- DonnelxSully

Pretty fine, Donnel is in fact the top two of Sully's pairing, the other being Vaike.

For In game, better raise dat Donnel

- TharjaxGaius

Gives Galeforce, so this is pretty good if you planned Noire to be a Dark Flier and Archery classes. Pretty fine in game if you can promote Gaius into Trickster.

For In game, Gaius provides sufficient Speed Boost for Tharja, so I guess its pretty nice

- VirionxOlivia

Personally, I think this pair is kinda overrated. Virion provides Sage, Archer, and Wyvern giving acess to Omni Breaker which seems kinda weird.

For In game, Virion and Olivia is pretty hard to pair.

- MirielxRicken

Double Miriel? Personally I would not go with this because Laurent did not get many stuff from Ricken, especially if you want him to be a Sorcerer

- MirielxHenry

Bad pairing, To be perfectly honest. Henry provides effectively nothing of importance to Laurent who already have Sorcerer.

- CherchexVaike

Another questionable pairing. 7 STR is not worth much when you have barely increased skillset.

- LissaxLibra

Pretty good, but IMHO, Luna are better than Vengeance for Owain

So, quick fix for optimization

- Virion x Maribelle

Virion class set is pretty terrible, however this is one of few moments where Virion is legitimately good. Virion gives speed mods for Brady, and Brady actually like to have some more supporter class in his class set, which is provided by Virion. Also Lifetaker which is pretty amazing

In game, this is pretty hard because of they did not synchronize well from their Pair Up bonus

- Ricken x Lissa

Don't be fooled. This Owain is actually some of the best Physical Owain because he got Luna of the deal and a not so much dump to his speed.

As for how easy it is to do this, its actually pretty hard because Ricken and Lissa is pretty abysmal as far as it goes in game.

- Henry x Sumia

Henry provides Sorcerer for Cynthia, however the deal breaker is Assassin to replace Palladin, so that Cynthia can perform Mixed Pair Up fodder just as well as Chrom!Cynthia and Frederick!Cynthia does with Palladin

This pair can be planned starting from Chapter 13, hopefully with Sumia as a Dark Flier which want to have Henry as a Pair Up partner around.

- Frederick x Cherche

This version of Cherche gives Gerome Pavise and Aegis to play with, instead of overkill STR.

This one is pretty tough if Frederick is not a Palladin because Cherche would like to have some speed to go with at first

- Miriel x Gregor

Gregor gives Vantage, Armthrift, and Wrath. Basically, Laurent can run one of the best Sorcerer set up in the game in form of Vengeance and Vantage

On that note, Gregor gives SPD, SKL, and DEF which is pretty amazing for Miriel as a Sorc I guess

So that leave

Vaike

Stahl

Kellam

Libra

and

Panne

- Panne x Stahl or Kellam

Stahl offers Palladin which is amazing, Myrmiddon, and Archer.

Kellam offers Priest, Knight, and Thief

Choose one

Personally I would go with Stahl because he gives Myrmiddon, and because Panne liked Stahl's solid Pair Up Bonus

Last but not least

- Libra x Olivia

Inigo have Vantage and Armthrift. Libra gives Sorcerer which means Inigo can become a nice Sorcerer, this one also come with good mods for Inigo to play with

But the real reason why I suggest this is because they are easy to made on your way playing through the game because of Rescue Staff

Hope this helped

Edited May 19, 2013 by JSND

[Shadow Mir]

- FredrickxSumia

IMO this is the worst Sumia's choice, mostly because Sumia's other choice are amazing, and Frederick is a path towards some pretty amazing pairing. Frederick is one of three father who hits jackpot and have the Knight line, something that is frankly pretty amazing, but Sumia already have Knight. Of course, Sumia is unscrewable, so even this one creates a +2 Speed Cynthia with nice SKL. Thats Freddy manseed for you.

I dunno - if you ask me, it's better than GaiusxSumia.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

I never done it so much, I forgot it exist

Lol joking

Gaius gives Sol and Vantage, and some speed. I preffer Palladin over Assassin so, yeah Frederick is better

[Shadow Mir]

I never done it so much, I forgot it exist

Lol joking

Gaius gives Sol and Vantage, and some speed. I preffer Palladin over Assassin so, yeah Frederick is better

Well, Sol or Hp +5 or Rally Strength is the best Cynthia could get from Gaius - Vantage doesn't count because needing to have one foot in the grave to work is a dealbreaker.

Edited May 19, 2013 by Levant Fortner

[Anacybele]

Geez, so many pairing review threads. I think we should just have one official pairing review thread where anyone can get their pairings and resulting children reviewed. What do you guys think? I'd be happy to start it up right away as well.

Edited May 19, 2013 by Anacybele

[euklyd]

Geez, so many pairing review threads. I think we should just have one official pairing review thread where anyone can get their pairings and resulting children reviewed. What do you guys think? I'd be happy to start it up right away as well.

I believe that this has been suggested before, and I will argue against it now, just as I did then.

[spoiler=Long-ish argument]

Yes, pairing threads are common, and occasionally clutter up the FE13 forum. However, if you were to have a single pairing thread, it would be chaos:

• Person A asks for advice, and gets advice.
• Person B asks for advice...
• Then person C asks for advice. Suddenly, you have two discussions going on at once, often about mutually exclusive pairings. The people posting advice have to expend considerable amounts of effort keeping track of who is asking what, and which pairings they already have, etc.

I'm not 100% sure that this would be the case, but it's certainly a likely possibility. I imagine that in periods of particularly high numbers of people asking for pairing advice, someone(s) would get forgotten, or at the very least neglected.

My preferred solution would be a page/topic detailing the options for various characters, and the positives and negatives of each possibility. I've certainly seen FE4 Pairing guides on GameFAQs (one particularly good/thorough guide comes to mind*) that take this approach.

*It is a general FAQ/Walkthrough, but the Pairing Guide section clearly details every pairing for each female, what you can expect from the resulting children, and what items you'll need/want to pass down to that particular child.

-------

My thoughts on various pairings (note - I'm entirely looking at postgame, assuming grinding, etc. You may call this min/maxing, I'm not sure.):

[spoiler=Pairings]

[spoiler=Cynthia]

- Fred|Cynthia - the closest you can get to a tanky Peg Knight, barring Avatar (F)/Morgan (F) or a re-classed Fred|Severa. Aegis/Pavise

is good on anyone, and Aegis in particular should be good for a flier. Certainly the most potent physical Cynthia possible, given your first pairing choice (Chrom x Avatar).

[spoiler=Severa]- Lon'qu|Severa - Ridiculous speed, good Skill, and a nice class set. As a Hero, Severa benefits from Swordfaire, and Astra is OK. Vantage is not quite as effective as it would be for a Nosferatank, IMO, but still not bad. Omni-breaker is a nice bonus, but I never find much use for it.

Frederick|Severa is another somewhat popular option, and similarly grants omni-breakage.

[spoiler=Kjelle]- Donnel|Kjelle - As a tank, she will be inferior to Vaike|Kjelle, since she shouldn't need Galeforce. She could go some other route, but when you have Aegis/Pavise, why not tank? Sol makes her extremely durable, and Armsthrift is nice as well, since it means she can abuse the hell out of a weapon like Gradivus or Helswath, or a Brave weapon. IMO, Donnel is better fathering male children who can't get Merc quite as easily, or a daughter who can make better use of Galeforce.

[spoiler=Noire]

- Gaius|Noire - A solid pairing. She gets GF. This is especially good for a Sniper, IMO, because you can kill an enemy and then retreat so you don't get mobbed w/o being able to counterattack. Sol should probably get passed down, as the only other male-exclusive skill of note here is Counter, and that sucks. She will have access to a LOT of proc skills (Astra, Luna, Lethality, Sol*) with this pairing (when I did this, Sniper Noire was able to kill basically anything she attacked, but only being able to get 1-2 kills per turn is annoying).

If you're willing to consider a ridiculous magical tank, try Ricken|Noire. She gets Pavise for Tharja, and Ricken grants access to Aegis and Tomefaire. Nosferatanking with Aegis/Pavise seems hard to go wring with.

[spoiler=Inigo]- Virion|Inigo - Inigo will already be pretty solid (Merc, Myrm, Barbarian), and what Virion brings to the table is mostly the Wyvern class tree, and nice Skill/Spd mods. As with Severa, Frederick also works well.

If you're grinding, pass down GF.

[spoiler=Laurent]

- Ricken|Laurent - OK. Mag will be impressive, and Laurent will get access to Luna. Ricken is a crap unit, IMO, but the classes he passes are solid as far as skills are concerned. Probably not as good as Ricken|Noire, however.

Consider a father who gives access to Myrm, for Vantage Sorcerer shenanigans.

- Henry|Laurent - Not a great choice. Laurent already gets Dark Mage, and Henry's mods aren't particularly notable. Henry is considerably better fathering Cynthia or Brady.

[spoiler=Gerome]- Vaike|Gerome - Overkill Str and Axefaire are really all Vaike brings to the table. Gerome already gets Fighter (and thus Sol), and Vaike is better for a daughter, as his male-only classes become very solid alternatives (Merc and Knight). Consider Gregor, for Armsthrift and Bowbreaker, or Fred, for a super-tank.

[spoiler=Owain]

- Libra|Owain - Solid. Owain can do all sorts of crazy things as a Sorcerer, since he already gets Vantage, and he gets all the magical classes he needs. Henry isn't a bad choice either.

Owain is rather versatile, as his mods suggest a Mag-oriented path, but his classes are mostly physical. For physical Owain, Gregor and Donnel give Merc, which lets him be a Hero, just like like he always wanted. More seriously, Sol.

Either way, pass down GF if you're grinding, and you shouldn't try tanking physical enemies with Owain.

BTW, Dread Fighter is (usually) very good on a physical Owain, as he can usually make good use of Tomes as well as Swords/Axes.

[spoiler=Brady]- You forgot Maribelle. Brady is a Magical unit considerably more than Owain is, but can't get both Sorc and Vantage. Still, give him Henry or Libra as a dad, slap on Aegis for giggles, and watch him kill stuff. Again, pass down GF if you're grinding, simply because 99% of the time, it is much better than other female-exclusive skills.

[spoiler=Nah]- Now for Nah. Nowi passes very tanky mods, and Nah benefits from Aegis and Pavise both. Frederick allows access to both, for what may be the most formidable tank in the game. Actually, I might have lied. Vaike|Nah gets both Pavise and Sol, and so will be healing herself as well. Kellam seems to be a popular choice as well, given Pavise and his excellent Def mods.

- I seldom use Panne, and she generally gets the leftover guys.

Edited May 20, 2013 by Euklyd

[Rosenmeir]

Thank you very much for all your help, everyone! It's much appreciated. And yeah, I should have been more clear on what I meant by Min/Max. I meant in the Warcraft sense of the style, maximizing out a character for one particular 'job'. (At least, I think that's what it is, it's been a very long time since I've played WoW.) Although I suppose it'd be fairly hard to Min/Max the kids for this game due to all the parent and class options.

[SYFEA82]

Euklyd, already posted an awesome response.

I would say, have fun with the first few walkthroughs and experiment (what I'm doing).

Break the game with galeforce children, extra manaketes or super broken dark magicians (sounds like yugioh).

The sequential playthroughs after you get the hang of the game. Set the difficulty you want to achieve for yourself and do pairings (canon or non-canon) and see what works best with your play style.

have fun!