PAIRINGS The Pairing Thread

[tuvarkz]

You probably won't be able to get everyone paired, but overall a Cordelia/Lon'qu setup can work quite well (Esp in terms of the massive overall avoid boost Lon'qu gets against axe-wielders, I had him avoid tank in chapter 10 without much issue against the multiple axemen by staying on the bottom-right fort). Assuming you want a second male, you'll probably want Ricken!Laurent or Frederick!Yarne. The only problem is that Severa will be practically unrecruitable due to her map being already tough on Lunatic, even moreso in L+. Also, MU+pairup can easily solo anything in Lunatic after promotion, especially for tankier setups.

[Raftina]

The ease with which Jaffar can be killed is irrelevant, because his risk comes from lethality+his getting first strike.

To guarantee first strike, the unit must clear all other enemies blocking the way. Nos tank is not strong enough to do this consistently.

FP2 start spawning fliers soon. These cannot be blocked. If you have to limit parent deployment to 3 to accomodate Nos tank, you have a problem.

Aegis+ only occurs on Apo--where Nos tank is completely inadequate but VV with Celica's can be--and L+. I have admitted Nos tanking is useful on L+, because all L+ maps that can have Aegis+ also can have Counter. That leaves only Aegis. Aegis isn't threatening enough to give up 8 flying movement.

[Rin]

@tuvarkz: Thank you. Um, what about MU? Rollertoaster mentioned about Chrom, is he the best choice if the MU is female? or Fred/Lon'qu/early recruitable characters work just fine?

p.s: unrelated but... I love your avatar! =D 's sweet~

Edited April 28, 2014 by Rin

[Raftina]

MU marrying Chrom is useful because you can pass MU's stat gains to Lucina, and you don't have to deploy extra units. It works quite well for no grind runs.

[Viviphy]

What's a good pairing plan for all characters if playing as Female Avatar in Lunatic/Lunatic+ run no grind please? Thank you.

These are my pairings for a female MU:

FeMU x Chrom!Inigo = Morgan

Chrom x Olivia = Lucina + Inigo

Lissa x Ricken = Owain

Miriel x Gregor = Laurent

Sumia x Henry = Cynthia

Cordelia x Lon'qu = Severa

Cherche x Vaike = Gerome

Tharja x Gaius = Noire

Sully x Donnel = Kjelle

Panne x Fredi = Yarne

Maribelle x Libra = Brady

Edit: Forgot Nowi in this list, you could pair her with Kellam for a tanky Nah

This is a good pairing setup for min-maxing but for no grind Lunatic I wouldn't know how this would pan out, probably not the best. I have never tried L(+) without abusing the grinding :P

I'm currently doing a run on hard mode where I do FeMU x Chrom but I'm not very far, but I hear (as mentioned above) the pair works out well.

Edited April 29, 2014 by Viviphy

[Rin]

Thank you so muchly Viviphy this helps a lot!

Edited April 28, 2014 by Rin

[Gaia]

FeMU x Chrom!Inigo = Morgan

Chrom x Olivia = Lucina + Inigo

Lissa x Ricken = Owain

Miriel x Gregor = Laurent

Sumia x Henry = Cynthia

Cordelia x Lon'qu = Severa

Cherche x Vaike = Gerome

Tharja x Gaius = Noire

Sully x Donnel = Kjelle

Panne x Fredi = Yarne

Maribelle x Libra = Brady

Yeah, that's a post-game set. In Luna+, you're going to be pairing off characters for convenience and base stats.

[MelonGx]

Nostank: Not having one Aversa's Night before you have a unit prepared for RaR3 isn't a matter for 2nd~ LB farming. Nosferatu only has 8 MT inferior than AN. This is completely covered by equipping 1st LB.

For avoiding Jaffar's 1st strike, equip Galeforce. Pass is also recommended on 1st LB, but not necessary on 2nd~

FP2: Who cares? All the conversations are finished before the boss movable by using that LTC based strategy.

Or you meant the reinforces on 3rd turn or later ignored your units? Tanks+Carriers are Double-Gale otherwise they can't move to the bridge and block them. So if the reinforces do ignore you, you still have up to 6 hits per player phase.

You didn't answer me how 55% Sol and Celica Tanks could be safer than 100% Sol.

Edited April 29, 2014 by MelonGx

[Czar_Yoshi]

Outside of challenge runs, earlygame Lunatic(+) and nogrind Lunatic+, if you have a chance of death at all then you have a flaw in your strategy. Whether or not you have self-healing doesn't change this, it only becomes important if you're too lazy to Rescuebomb/Gale down every single threat (mostly postgame) and lack a tank who can take an EP with defenses alone (mostly ingame).

Admittedly, it is very nice to simply spam Start for RaR3, but this still isn't necessary, and honestly the time you waste from Avatar's Sol failing and causing deaths is going to be very small since the map is pretty insignificant when minmaxing a whole team. (and it may not even happen at all, you only need so many LBs).

[Raftina]

Nostank: Not having one Aversa's Night before you have a unit prepared for RaR3 isn't a matter for 2nd~ LB farming. Nosferatu only has 8 MT inferior than AN. This is completely covered by equipping 1st LB.

For avoiding Jaffar's 1st strike, equip Galeforce. Pass is also recommended on 1st LB, but not necessary on 2nd~

FP2: Who cares? All the conversations are finished before the boss movable by using that LTC based strategy.

Or you meant the reinforces on 3rd turn or later ignored your units? Tanks+Carriers are Double-Gale otherwise they can't move to the bridge and block them. So if the reinforces do ignore you, you still have up to 6 hits per player phase.

You didn't answer me how 55% Sol and Celica Tanks could be safer than 100% Sol.

RR3

Equipping Galeforce implies that there is only one line of enemy between the nostank and Jaffar. This is not necessarily the case, as Jaffar gets first strike from a damaged enemy dying to the second round of retaliation during enemy phase. This can happen as long as there is at least one damaged enemy next to the nostank, without reference to how many other enemies are between Jaffar and the nostank.

FP2

"All conversations are finished before the boss movable" and "Although you just have 3 in-game units to perform the conversations" are mutually exclusive, as there are more than 3 conversations on the map (at least 12, actually). You have a deployment limit of 12. You are forcing yourself to repeat the map to buy unnecessary safety.

Safety

I claimed that Sol is better, not Sol is safer--though Sol is safer on maps where it is possible to move out of melee range. You defined safer as better, but you have yet to show why safer should be taken as the definition of better, rather than faster or more versatile. It is quite obvious that nostank makes significant sacrifices in speed and versatility, sometimes to the point of being comical, like training 4 extra galeforce users and taking 8 out of 12 deployment slots on FP2. Compare that to a small chance of failing Sol activation.

Edited April 29, 2014 by Raftina

[Duke of Dozel]

Im going to marry my STR+/RES- Female Avatar to one of the paralogues male characters. (Donnel, Gangrel, Walhart, Yen'fay, Priam)

Which one do you think works the best?

Edited April 29, 2014 by Duke of Dozel

[tuvarkz]

Yen'fay or Priam. Donnel's mods plainly suck in comparison to the others' (And Donnie should always marry Sully anyways), Walhart will ruin Morgan's spd mod.

[Czar_Yoshi]

-1 Spd isn't "ruined" on a unit whose stats are more suited to being a support. I'd say Walhart is fine. Donnel is very no.

Another thing about Nos vs Sol: Sol can be used on offensive units. Sure, it interferes with the chance of getting a proc, but it works in tandem with Braves and doesn't require a low Spd/Skl class (or a rare skill) to use, as well as on 8-mov units. It also has much better distribution. Even though it's not 100% reliable, every successful proc can open up new options to deal with other times the RNG doesn't go your way, which is the whole point of a strategy game.

[Gaia]

Im going to marry my STR+/RES- Female Avatar to one of the paralogues male characters. (Donnel, Gangrel, Walhart, Yen'fay, Priam)

Which one do you think works the best?

Well, if children count, one of them. Otherwise, I'd put my choice at Priam or Walhart, but that's just me.

Edited April 29, 2014 by Gaia

[MelonGx]

RR3

Equipping Galeforce implies that there is only one line of enemy between the nostank and Jaffar. This is not necessarily the case, as Jaffar gets first strike from a damaged enemy dying to the second round of retaliation during enemy phase. This can happen as long as there is at least one damaged enemy next to the nostank, without reference to how many other enemies are between Jaffar and the nostank.

FP2

"All conversations are finished before the boss movable" and "Although you just have 3 in-game units to perform the conversations" are mutually exclusive, as there are more than 3 conversations on the map (at least 12, actually). You have a deployment limit of 12. You are forcing yourself to repeat the map to buy unnecessary safety.

Safety

I claimed that Sol is better, not Sol is safer--though Sol is safer on maps where it is possible to move out of melee range. You defined safer as better, but you have yet to show why safer should be taken as the definition of better, rather than faster or more versatile. It is quite obvious that nostank makes significant sacrifices in speed and versatility, sometimes to the point of being comical, like training 4 extra galeforce users and taking 8 out of 12 deployment slots on FP2. Compare that to a small chance of failing Sol activation.

RR3

I never engaged such a RR3 battle that you were trapped and unable to KO Jaffar while Jaffar was able to reach you wherever you moved that turn.

If it could be existed on the 1st LB farming, then approach Jaffar intentionally and use Celica to hit him with more output before the trapping happened, then switch back Nosferatu after Galeforce.

FP2

I found an alternative method for it - send all carriers and in-game characters to activate conversations, give up clearing stage.

5 conversations could be done within 1st turn's player phase by this method.

This could be more difficult on FP1 because of needing to open the doors, but the idea was simple.

This could be more efficient than my previous method.

Safety

Even the failure of 55% Sol * 2-hit is less than weapon consuming from LCK 49's Armsthrift, tanking is a continuous work that all unreliable thing should be avoided generally.

Although flying tanks has more speed and versatility, they sacrifice stability.

Flying tanks becoming important is because that your strategy in your condition requires flying tanks, which makes you have to choose their versatility instead of not having a low risk.

@Czar_Yoshi

Lazy comes from loving game breakers.

Edited April 30, 2014 by MelonGx

[MelonGx]

The threshold of doubling Secret Apo's fastest opponent with a Berserker or Dark Flier support (Spd+8) is Spd.45.

If equipped All+2 or Spd+2, then it's Spd.43.

+STR -RES with Spd+/-0 child or Spd-1 1st-gen can achieve Spd.43 on Berserker.

Edited April 30, 2014 by MelonGx

[Czar_Yoshi]

I prefer to think of it as 75 Spd, because that's what it is- taking specific boosts for granted is a great way to make your numbers confusing and prone to errors.

[Raftina]

RR3

I never engaged such a RR3 battle that you were trapped and unable to KO Jaffar while Jaffar was able to reach you wherever you moved that turn.

If it could be existed on the 1st LB farming, then approach Jaffar intentionally and use Celica to hit him with more output before the trapping happened, then switch back Nosferatu after Galeforce.

FP2

I found an alternative method for it - send all carriers and in-game characters to activate conversations, give up clearing stage.

5 conversations could be done within 1st turn's player phase by this method.

This could be more difficult on FP1 because of needing to open the doors, but the idea was simple.

This could be more efficient than my previous method.

RR3

You still fail to see the problem. Jaffar's problem is that the enemies are not cleared in the enemy phase beforehand. If you want to switch to Celica's just before Jaffar reaches you, then you give up life leech for an entire enemy phase. If you deliberately move toward Jaffar in the hopes of getting first strike before the enemies surround you, then you are no longer "doing nothing but hitting end turn" as you claim Nostanks allow you to do (except obviously the maps where there are objectives that require player phase movement, which killing Jaffar is not).

FP2

"Give up clearing stage" is a clear case of inferiority.

[MelonGx]

RR3

OK. I have changed my strategy out of doing nothing but ending player phase. Even it's only once.

Lethality & Aegis failure within a stage is only available to be avoided by Vantage + high enough DS%. But it leaves a problem - how to definitely wound the Vantage unit on early RR3 without player phase actions?

FP2

If combining clearing the stage and watching conversations is inefficient, I'll always seperate them because I can do both of them within the 1st turn, and not willing to bother it in several turn, unless 1) the strategy of achieving both make me lazy enough 2) it's an order on writing a guide for achieving them both.

Edited May 1, 2014 by MelonGx

[Czar_Yoshi]

Some numbers for RaR3 (Lunatic):

Sorc Avatar, +Mag/-Def (LB/SB/AT/V/V), and Chrom@GL (Charm/anything), at least an A support.

Jaffar has 52 Skl, 28 Lck and a Killing Edge+, or 192 Hit. Avatar has 40(base) +2(mods) +9(Chrom) +10(LB) +2(tonic) =63 Spd and 45(base) -1(mods) +9(Chrom) +10(LB) +2(tonic) =65 Lck, or 127 base Avo. Add 10 from Chrom, 5 from Chrom's charm, and 50 from LB, and you have exactly 192 Avo against Jaffar. Lethality can't kill you if it can't hit you, so Jaffar isn't a problem at all.

Damaging the Vantage unit: no need for that. On a Nostank, you're just going to heal right out of it. Vantage is merely there as a safeguard in case you end a fight under half HP (pretty much only caused by a miss) so that you can heal up before taking the next hit, and possibly score an OHKO with Vengeance. The setup will probably work just as well without it if you want to run Res+10, Hit+20 or another breaker or something instead (mainly looking at Lilina here, who is honestly more threatening than Jaffar and Linus put together).

[Shadow Mir]

Some numbers for RaR3 (Lunatic):

Sorc Avatar, +Mag/-Def (LB/SB/AT/V/V), and Chrom@GL (Charm/anything), at least an A support.

Jaffar has 52 Skl, 28 Lck and a Killing Edge+, or 192 Hit. Avatar has 40(base) +2(mods) +9(Chrom) +10(LB) +2(tonic) =63 Spd and 45(base) -1(mods) +9(Chrom) +10(LB) +2(tonic) =65 Lck, or 127 base Avo. Add 10 from Chrom, 5 from Chrom's charm, and 50 from LB, and you have exactly 192 Avo against Jaffar. Lethality can't kill you if it can't hit you, so Jaffar isn't a problem at all.

Damaging the Vantage unit: no need for that. On a Nostank, you're just going to heal right out of it. Vantage is merely there as a safeguard in case you end a fight under half HP (pretty much only caused by a miss) so that you can heal up before taking the next hit, and possibly score an OHKO with Vengeance. The setup will probably work just as well without it if you want to run Res+10, Hit+20 or another breaker or something instead (mainly looking at Lilina here, who is honestly more threatening than Jaffar and Linus put together).

Well, duh, he won't be a threat if you're assuming maxed everything and LB... <_< (Then again, what WILL, short of Apo?)

That second part has something to do with 57 Mag and forged Bolganone, doesn't it...

Edited May 1, 2014 by Levant Caprice

[Czar_Yoshi]

Yes, I am assuming maxed everything on the one character who is most likely to be maxed first, but if you aren't to the point of having a maxed Avatar yet why are you farming LB?

Maxed characters don't struggle against normal enemies, but green units do. Any time there's an allied army (that you actually care about protecting), it takes a little more than EP spam to do so.

57 Mag and Bolganone+ are annoying, but the main problem with Lilina is that she has both Tomebreaker and Luna, and if she procs Luna and hits followed by a missed AN, you're put in a very bad situation.

[Raftina]

Some numbers for RaR3 (Lunatic):

Sorc Avatar, +Mag/-Def (LB/SB/AT/V/V), and Chrom@GL (Charm/anything), at least an A support.

Furthermore, non-Apo stages Logbook accessible don't need Dual Strikes except fighting against Grima.

That means everything can be taken place by Einherjar Nostanks, unless fighting against Grima or Apo enemies for less failure.

A scenario originally proposed to illustrate how a strategy does not work under one set of assumptions does not illustrate how the strategy fails to work under a different set of assumptions. Unsurprising.

If we assume support with Chrom, RR3 is entirely trivial for the very simple reason that dual strikes from Chrom, even if he's using the Falchion, will take care of whatever MU's tomes can't--Lilina, for example.

Edited May 1, 2014 by Raftina

[Czar_Yoshi]

A scenario originally proposed to illustrate how a strategy does not work under one set of assumptions does not illustrate how the strategy fails to work under a different set of assumptions. Unsurprising.

I'm not trying to prove that anyone's strategy doesn't work, I'm showing that there's a better way to do things. But if it really bothers you that much, just swap Vantage for Patience and use an Einherjar.

Edited May 1, 2014 by Czar_Yoshi

[Raftina]

Actually, losing support also means losing the +2 additional bonus stats from pairing, which for GL means 2 spd and 2 luk. That means a loss of 15 avd. You will need to use Outdoor/Indoor Fighter or Lucky 7.

At this point, you are no doubt tempted to say "who cares about that low a chance?" But that was precisely my original point: Nostank is undesirable outside of tanking Counter bombs because VV or Sol is safe enough and isn't tied to sorcerers.

Edited May 1, 2014 by Raftina