Awakening Skills tier list

[Tables]

Skills are fun. Tier lists... can sometimes be fun. Combining the two is probably a terrible idea. I'm gonna do it anyway.

[spoiler=Assumptions]

• Skills are rated on the criteria of how effective they are in completing Lunatic/CLA, without any grinding or DLC, as easily as possible. 'As easily as possible' is intentionally left slightly vague, but in short it means things such as reducing the risk of death (and thus reset), increasing the chance to recover from tricky situations, enabling the player to do things they couldn't before (such as beating chapters more rapidly), grant solutions that can be found more quickly than without the skill and so on.
• As an implication of the above, this list is NOT directly concerned with minimising turn count, speedrunning, or any other such self-imposed challenge. Similarly, it isn't concerned with the spotpass maps (which are harder than Endgame, which is the goal), or DLC maps including Apotheosis, or streetpass teams. In any of those situations, skills may take on different values and may need to be assessed differently (for example Apotheosis is extremely offence heavy and the element of when skills are learned becomes irrelevant).
• The player is assumed to be perfectly knowledgable about game and chapter mechanics (i.e. they know basically everything you can find on Serenes Forest, and also things like reinforcement spawn times and locations and what enemies are in each chapter).
• The player is assumed to be reasonably skilled, but not perfect. They won't blunder (leave units in positions needing extreme luck to survive) but might not make the tactically or strategically optimal choices.
• The list assumes the player is not lowmanning* and is training somewhere between 6-10 main combat units (so excluding units primarily for healing, dancing, thieving or other such utility). This number includes possible trained children.
• Robin and Chrom are the only characters guaranteed to be trained. For other characters, their chance of being used is roughly proportional to how good they are, according to the same metric we judge skills. For children, this also depends on their parents. For example Sully is a reasonably strong character in Lunatic, while Donnel struggles significantly and thus an argument about skills Sully obtains will carry more weight than one about Donnel.
• Robin's gender and asset/flaw can be anything. However the better options (as better is defined above) are assumed to be chosen more frequently. For now, that means female, +SPD, +DEF, -SKL and -LUK are assumed to be the most likely options for Robin.
• Skills are assessed only on their value to the player, not on how damaging they are in the hands of the enemy. Only skills the player can obtain are rated, therefore.
• When comparing skills, assume the skills in question have been obtained by at least one person on the team. However, the negative cost of obtaining the skills over other options may be considered. E.g. If you wanted to argue Lancebreaker vs. something, then it's okay to point out that getting Lancebreaker requires going through Griffon Rider, generally considered inferior to Wyvern Lord. It isn't okay to assume one won't have Lancebreaker however for this reason.
• This list only considers learned skills. Weapons which give temporary skills are not considered.
• Renown up to the Large Bullion is allowed. Bonus Box items and other wireless features are not.

*Lowmanning is pretty much Robin x Chrom solo (mostly Robin). A lowmanning list would be a far less interesting one to produce and to read, as most skils would drop to low/bottom simply because they aren't worth having Robin obtain.

Assumptions can be potentially changed, I suppose, but the basic idea is, we assume that a fairly good player is trying to beat the game, how a real person would actually play the game.

Tiers are currently not sorted. There are four main tiers, which are subdivided into other tiers. Ideally, skills in each tier should be roughly equally useful to the player. Depending on interest in the list a precise ordering may come later, but probably it's more important to get skills into the right tiers first.

[spoiler=The list]TOP TIER

Tier 1

Veteran

HIGH TIER

Tier 2

Dual Strike+

Galeforce

Rally Spectrum

Vengeance

Tier 3

Aether

Anathema

Locktouch

Outdoor Fighter

Tier 4

Quick Burn

Sol

Solidarity

Tomebreaker

MID TIER

Tier 5

Avoid +10

Axebreaker

Charm

Discipline

Lancefaire

Luna

Rally Move

Rally Speed

Speed +2

Tantivy

Tier 6

Aegis

Armsthrift

Bowfaire

Healtouch

HP +5

Ignis

Lucky Seven

Move +1

Rally Strength

Special Dance

Strength +2

Swordbreaker

Swordfaire

Tomefaire

Vantage

Tier 7

Astra

Bowbreaker

Defence +2

Defender

Deliverer

Demoiselle

Even Rhythm

Hex

Hit +20

Lifetaker

Magic +2

Patience

Rally Defence

Rally Luck

LOW TIER

Tier 8

Axefaire

Despoil

Dual Guard+

Gamble

Lancebreaker

Odd Rhythm

Pavise

Rally Magic

Rally Resistance

Renewal

Zeal

Tier 9

Acrobat

Aptitude

Dual Support+

Focus

Indoor Fighter

Lethality

Miracle

Prescience

Rally Skill

Relief

Resistance +2

Rightful King

Wrath

Wyrmsbane

Tier 10

Beastbane

Counter

Luck +4

Pass

Skill +2

Slow Burn

Underdog

Original Spreadsheet

[spoiler=updates]

13/8/14: Bowbreaker 8>7, Axefaire+Wrath 7>8, Vantage 5>6

16/8/14: Galeforce 1>2, Healtouch 5>6, Charm 6>5, Tantivy 6>5, Hex 8>7, Wrath 8>9, Demoiselle 9>7

Edited August 16, 2014 by Tables

[Interceptor]

You say it's not a speedrun tier list, but it seems tuned that way if you put Galeforce as high as it is. If you're not going for records, and the player isn't supposed to need frequent bail-out buttons, I'm not sure how you can justify it next to Veteran.

[Czar_Yoshi]

Ooh, interesting. Is it safe to assume that skill value also depends on how good its class is (Rally Def would be higher, except that Generals reek)?

Anyway, I've never understood why people make so much of a fuss about LTC in tier list debates. For a tier list to be useful, its criteria need to be pretty close to how most people actually play, and the percentage of players who actually care about absolute LTC is pretty low.

So, skills: I think Luna should be in the same tier as Ignis. Ignis has poorer distribution, but GK isn't the best class to be in and the units that do get Ignis have good growths in both Str and Mag so its damage will mostly be higher (enemy Def is fairly low).

I also feel like Bowbreaker should be a little higher. Lategame enemy Bows are some of the hardest things in the game to dodgetank, and BK is arguably the best thief-killing class in the game so it's worth keeping one around earlygame.

Rally Str is completely free on Basilio and I pretty much always use it in the endgame. It's useful for a very short amount of time, but when it is there's absolutely no downside. I'd argue for it to be higher.

Berserker's skills feel like they should be a little lower since you have no natural Barbarians and they always require at least two seals to get, and most of the units you're willing to invest that much time into have better things to do.

AT seems like it should be higher, partially by virtue of Merc being good but also because it can save very large amounts of cash for lategame forges. Any particular reason why it's so low?

Patience is also very low, especially when Outdoor Fighter is so high. Since most combat is done on EP, I find it to be active far more often.

I've always found Vantage to be pretty awkward to get as a part of a combo, especially on non-Avatar units. Since no lowmanning is assumed, it seems like it should be lower.

You say it's not a speedrun tier list, but it seems tuned that way if you put Galeforce as high as it is. If you're not going for records, and the player isn't supposed to need frequent bail-out buttons, I'm not sure how you can justify it next to Veteran.

GF is also pretty useful as an offensive skill, if you can get six Galeforce units by Valm (pretty easy if Avatar marries Cordelia, Chrom marries Sumia and both of them pass Galeforce to both children) then you have enough PPO to play an offensive game instead of a defensive one without wasting all your money on Rescue Staves.

[Shadow Mir]

My two cents:

Wrath feels out of place anywhere outside of low tier. And I think Axefaire should take a dive as well.

[Interceptor]

Anyway, I've never understood why people make so much of a fuss about LTC in tier list debates. For a tier list to be useful, its criteria need to be pretty close to how most people actually play, and the percentage of players who actually care about absolute LTC is pretty low.

Tier Lists Are Not Character Guides. It appears that the reason you didn't understand the fuss, is that you didn't understand the purpose of a tier list. They are nothing but vehicles for discussion and debate; they lack the necessary context for informing people on how to play efficiently.

GF is also pretty useful as an offensive skill, if you can get six Galeforce units by Valm (pretty easy if Avatar marries Cordelia, Chrom marries Sumia and both of them pass Galeforce to both children) then you have enough PPO to play an offensive game instead of a defensive one without wasting all your money on Rescue Staves.

Nobody said GF wasn't useful, but consider that it's currently tied for best skill in the list. Does it make the game "easier" to the extent that it's first amongst equals with Veteran? An entire tier better than DS+?

Auras and passives are a little under-represented here, as well. Tantivy is really badass, for example. It's a big stat stick in a small package.

Edited August 13, 2014 by Interceptor

[Czar_Yoshi]

Tier Lists Are Not Character Guides. It appears that the reason you didn't understand the fuss, is that you didn't understand the purpose of a tier list. They are nothing but vehicles for discussion and debate; they lack the necessary context for informing people on how to play efficiently.

But you can debate gameplay from any number of possible angles. Why LTC?

[Interceptor]

But you can debate gameplay from any number of possible angles. Why LTC?

One advantage is that there's a distinct common ground upon which to debate gameplay. When you have a perfect tactician that always makes the best decisions and goes as fast as possible, you can focus on the real differences between characters, which are exposed when you push the pace.

"Easy" is a very vague term by comparison. You spend a lot of time just arguing about the parameters of the argument. The closer you get to an objectively determined environment, the more time you can spend comparing things that aren't player tendencies.

Not that I'm endorsing LTC tier lists; I've never liked them.

[Tables]

You say it's not a speedrun tier list, but it seems tuned that way if you put Galeforce as high as it is. If you're not going for records, and the player isn't supposed to need frequent bail-out buttons, I'm not sure how you can justify it next to Veteran.

Galeforce is absolutely huge, even in casual play. The amount of things it lets you do is crazy. It lets you take out key dangerous enemies and then retreat to a safe place. It lets you clear out an extra enemy on player phase, reducing nearby risk. It lets you rush ahead and defeat the boss when things are getting hairy. It provides a huge bonus, no matter how you're playing. The obvious downside is that you're not getting it until the game is half over - and I could certainly see that as an argument for it dropping down, but in terms of usefulness, it's definitely matching Veteran or coming close.

Ooh, interesting. Is it safe to assume that skill value also depends on how good its class is (Rally Def would be higher, except that Generals reek)?

Definitely, to some degree. I kinda actually feel like a class tier list might have been a better way of doing this, since skills are closely linked to it, but alas.

So, skills: I think Luna should be in the same tier as Ignis. Ignis has poorer distribution, but GK isn't the best class to be in and the units that do get Ignis have good growths in both Str and Mag so its damage will mostly be higher (enemy Def is fairly low).

Pretty reasonable argument. Do you think Ignis should go down or Luna up? Although I do think you're underrating GK slightly - total weapon control is nice, good defences are, uh, good, and it is mounted.

I also feel like Bowbreaker should be a little higher. Lategame enemy Bows are some of the hardest things in the game to dodgetank, and BK is arguably the best thief-killing class in the game so it's worth keeping one around earlygame.

Hm, I don't have much experience with Bow Knights in-game personally (I find them to be a not-too-useful class, especially when there's Hero or Sniper as alternate options). This argument makes sense to me at least. I'll move Bowbreaker up to tier 7 for now.

Rally Str is completely free on Basilio and I pretty much always use it in the endgame. It's useful for a very short amount of time, but when it is there's absolutely no downside. I'd argue for it to be higher.

It's the short time bit that I feel is the issue. I did factor in that it's free on him when placing it, and also the availability of other rallies and their use. Right now I'm not convinced it should be in the same tier as speed (which is easily available to a good class and very helpful for doubling faster units and boosting avoid) or move (which... hmm, actually this one I could probably be convinced on. Move is obtained on the way to Galeforce, in a very good class, and +1 move can often open up options you might have been just short of before, but in general, it's not that great).

<quote>Berserker's skills feel like they should be a little lower since you have no natural Barbarians and they always require at least two seals to get, and most of the units you're willing to invest that much time into have better things to do.</quote>

Yeah, again, I did (try to) factor this in, but you're probably right. I think Vaike has a good case for going Fighter > Barbarian > Berserker as a reasonable class route, but asides from that, it's probably kids only. I'll drop Wrath and Axefaire a tier each for now.

AT seems like it should be higher, partially by virtue of Merc being good but also because it can save very large amounts of cash for lategame forges. Any particular reason why it's so low?

Patience is also very low, especially when Outdoor Fighter is so high. Since most combat is done on EP, I find it to be active far more often.

I'll tackle these together: It's mostly the same issue as with Barbarian - not many people have Merc as a class. Now I realise I'm probably being slightly inconsistent here, valuing it more sometimes and less other times, but that's what guys like you are for, to whip things back into shape. Anyway, here are the natural mercs you get: Robin, Donnel (sucks), Cordelia (good chance of not going Merc), Gregor (natural Merc), Flavia (endgame) plus Inigo (hard to recruit kid), Severa, Morgan and the children of Donnel, Gregor and Vaike. It's not a big list, basically, and especially in AT's case Gregor, the most likely one, has pretty mediocre luck (8 base, 45% growth). Cordelia isn't much better either. AT has some obvious usage, preserving valuable weapons slightly early on and braves/forges late, but it's that limited distribution that I think holds it back. I could see a good argument for what it can do on Robin/Morgan/other likely candidates pushing it up, but right now, I'm not convinced.

Patience vs. Outdoor Fighter has a similar issue. Three units start in the class to get (or start with) Outdoor Fighter, by chapter 2 (Fred, Sully, Stahl). One more is likely to switch into that class (Chrom). And I don't know the exact details of when it takes effect (I read that it's terrain based?) but I'm fairly confident it's a lot of the early to midgame at least (like... basically everything up to chapter 16 except chapters 4 and 6). And avoid skills, I find, matter most in the early to mid game, before enemy hit rates start jacking up (they're still good after that, but less so). Patience is good, don't get me wrong, but it's lower distribution holds it back.

I've always found Vantage to be pretty awkward to get as a part of a combo, especially on non-Avatar units. Since no lowmanning is assumed, it seems like it should be lower.

I was really on the border about where to put Vantage. On the one hand it's main combos are not easy to put together on most non-kid units (mostly it's Dark Mage stuff it combos with). On the other hand, it's still a useful skill sometimes anyway, if you can kill before getting hit, and with crit boosts, procs, dual strikes and the like, that's possible. Still I'm probably overrating it slightly. I'll drop it 1 tier for now.

Nobody said GF wasn't useful, but consider that it's currently tied for best skill in the list. Does it make the game "easier" to the extent that it's first amongst equals with Veteran? An entire tier better than DS+?

I think I'm comfortable putting it higher than DS+. DS+ is a good skill, but it requires high support levels and good skill to be really valuable, and of course is limited to two characters - one certain and one likely to be used, of course, however. The time DS+ starts being a top value skill is not long before you'd start getting Galeforce, and Galeforce is likely to help significantly more. As for if it's equal with Veteran... I'm fairly confident Veteran > Galeforce when the list is actually finalised, but for now, I think Galeforce beats out everything below it at least.

Auras and passives are a little under-represented here, as well. Tantivy is really badass, for example. It's a big stat stick in a small package.

Wow. I never thought someone would tell me I was underrating the auras. I was expecting cries of "Charm is overrated! Low tier!" What ones in particular do you think need to move up, and why?

For Tantivy, I don't feel like it should really be any higher. How often do you end your turn 3 spaces away from the nearest ally? I tend to find it's not that often but maybe you have different experiences? On the other hand, a lot of people can go Wyvern Rider, and it's a good class thanks to flight, axes and good promotions, so they likely will.

[Red Falcon]

I'm surprised that a skill as useful as Counter is listed in the bottom tier.

[Roflolxp54]

Counter is most likely low tier since for most characters that learn it, it requires reclassing and it's not really that useful on player hands outside of Streetpass and Double Duels.

[XeKr]

Imo:

Veteran is its own tier. The tactical implications of Galeforce mentioned itt are (mostly) covered by Rescue, and “saving money”, while useful, does not put Galeforce on the level of Veteran. Especially since Dark Fliers have lowlow combat stat/skills compared to say…Wyverns/Paladins. Alternatively, you could say you’re using Sumia/Cordelia as combat units over Panne/Sully/etc. And Robin is Robin because of Veteran, not Galeforce.

I’d say both in Top, tier 1 and 2, shift everything.

On a similar note, Galeforce probably means no/less Falconknights, which is less Rescue and less Rally Speed. I find Rally Speed is extremely underrated, because it allows Robin/Morgan to go better classes than GM (Ignis is good enough, but 15 levels in GM is a long time) and still allow dealing with a lot of the really fast lategame enemies/bosses.

Re: Class tier list. Yes similar, but there’s notable distinctions between say Veteran and Solidarity, even though Robin will always have both. Though in terms of practicality, one generally chooses between classes, not skills (ingame).

Re: LTC. In brief, players are (ostensibly) concerned with tactical/strategic/(efficient) gameplay for which the optimization of some parameter becomes important.

[Zkirsche]

Is healtouch really that good? I never found it useful at all once Lissa got her hands on Mend, and especially not after Libra appears. Stuff like Deliverer is much better given that you get it fairly early (only level 20/5) and griffen rider isn't horrendous. Also, if patience is low because not many people can use it then healtouch should be much lower as even fewer people can use it.

I feel like rightful King should be higher as it helps with skills quite a bit, although I admit not many can use it, but it helps Aether a lot (giving it like 15-20% extra per round). I think it can go up into tier 8 at least (who uses rally magic?).

Since this list clearly favours sorcerers a lot (tomebreaker) I feel Hex should go up 3-4 tiers. It definitely doesn't deserve low if outdoor fighter is in high, it's basically an outdoor fighter which only applies to enemies with 1-range and works indoors.

[Interceptor]

Galeforce is absolutely huge, even in casual play. The amount of things it lets you do is crazy. It lets you take out key dangerous enemies and then retreat to a safe place. It lets you clear out an extra enemy on player phase, reducing nearby risk. It lets you rush ahead and defeat the boss when things are getting hairy. It provides a huge bonus, no matter how you're playing. The obvious downside is that you're not getting it until the game is half over - and I could certainly see that as an argument for it dropping down, but in terms of usefulness, it's definitely matching Veteran or coming close.

Let's not get carried away, here; Galeforce is just an extra Player Phase action after a kill. There are lots of neat little things that you can do with it, but some of those things can be duplicated with other skills/abilities. Also, this isn't an LTC list, and the primary thing that it's good for isn't actually critical for completion. Finally, as you noted, it's missing for basically half of the game: there's a big availability gap.

Put all of those things together, and hopefully you can see why I am scratching my head that this skill is being touted as one of the Top Two. It's really useful, but not irreplaceably so. Take Veteran away, and you've handicapped one of your strongest units by kneecapping his/her stat growth. Take Galeforce away, and... who cares? Dark Flier isn't a great class anyway.

I think I'm comfortable putting it higher than DS+. DS+ is a good skill, but it requires high support levels and good skill to be really valuable, and of course is limited to two characters - one certain and one likely to be used, of course, however.

DS+ is useful as soon as you have access to it, AKA immediately. Starting units have really pitiful DS chances, and +10% is very significant.

Wow. I never thought someone would tell me I was underrating the auras. I was expecting cries of "Charm is overrated! Low tier!"

And you'll probably still get those cries, because people are notoriously bad at estimating the long-term effects of small things. Everyone and their mother is wowed by wombo-combo stuff, because those things are impactful in an obvious way, but auras and passive stat sticks have a lot of hidden power in this game.

What ones in particular do you think need to move up, and why?

I haven't done any kind of deep statistical analysis, but probably many of them, with some exceptions for reasons of availability or situational use.

Take Charm, for instance. We know it's going to be available all of the time, because Chrom is assumed to be used. On the surface, +5 HIT/AVO doesn't seem like a whole lot, but consider that it impacts allies in a 3-tile radius from Chrom (even when he is a Support unit), and thus is going to take part in hundreds of battles over the course of the game. Any time that an ally or enemy's hit rate is at a low-to-moderate value, you can expect Charm to have a sizable impact on the result.

As a crude example: take someone who is 5HKO'ed, and faces four attacks at 50% HIT from enemies. There's no CoD here, but suppose that you're going to need to take the time to heal them if they get hit three or four times. That's going to happen roughly 32% of the time normally, but only 19% of the time with the +5 AVO from Charm. It's nearly 1.7x more likely that you have to heal without Charm, and this is just for a pedestrian ~50% HIT rate. If you drop that to 40% listed HIT, now the difference becomes 10%/5%... Charm is twice as likely to save you the hassle of having to deal with fixing up high damage.

You can flip this for ally attacks, too, because misses will frequently require clean-up.

tl;dr -- a little in a abundance is a lot.

For Tantivy, I don't feel like it should really be any higher. How often do you end your turn 3 spaces away from the nearest ally? I tend to find it's not that often but maybe you have different experiences? On the other hand, a lot of people can go Wyvern Rider, and it's a good class thanks to flight, axes and good promotions, so they likely will.

Consider that it's a Wyvern Rider skill, and that Riders are among the most likely units to be flying off somewhere on a solo sortie because of their mobility advantage. Panne is the poster-Taguel for this.

[Elieson]

I'm surprised that a skill as useful as Counter is listed in the bottom tier.

By the time you learn Counter, your def/avo will be so high that even if enemies do hit you, the damage returned will be negligible (unless you're Vaike and bumrush Warrior class)

[Red Falcon]

Interesting... we're also judging the skills by how available they are and how soon you can get them?

[Shadow Mir]

I'm surprised that a skill as useful as Counter is listed in the bottom tier.

It's probably because Counter is learned late, to say nothing of you needing to take damage at melee range to get anything out of it.

Is healtouch really that good? I never found it useful at all once Lissa got her hands on Mend, and especially not after Libra appears. Stuff like Deliverer is much better given that you get it fairly early (only level 20/5) and griffen rider isn't horrendous. Also, if patience is low because not many people can use it then healtouch should be much lower as even fewer people can use it.

I feel like rightful King should be higher as it helps with skills quite a bit, although I admit not many can use it, but it helps Aether a lot (giving it like 15-20% extra per round). I think it can go up into tier 8 at least (who uses rally magic?).

Since this list clearly favours sorcerers a lot (tomebreaker) I feel Hex should go up 3-4 tiers. It definitely doesn't deserve low if outdoor fighter is in high, it's basically an outdoor fighter which only applies to enemies with 1-range and works indoors.

Don't have much to say about the first paragraph.

Rightful King is probably as low as it is because few people can learn it, not to mention that outside of Morgan, its other potential users are Chrom, Lucina (get it late), Inigo (hard to recruit kid), and Brady.

As to Hex, it requires being adjacent to your enemy, and outside of bows, why would a mage WANT to be next to their enemy??

Edited August 13, 2014 by Levant Caprice

[Interceptor]

As to Hex, it requires being adjacent to your enemy, and outside of bows, why would a mage WANT to be next to their enemy??

If you:

1) are using tomes with shitty HIT,

2) don't care about incoming damage because of either Nosferatu or Vengeance,

3) don't have a choice, because Enemy Phase.

[Shadow Mir]

If you:

1) are using tomes with shitty HIT,

2) don't care about incoming damage because of either Nosferatu or Vengeance,

3) don't have a choice, because Enemy Phase.

Out of those three, Enemy Phase sounds the best to me. Still sounds like it has the makings of a low tier skill to me, though...

Edited August 13, 2014 by Levant Caprice

[Interceptor]

Out of those three, Enemy Phase sounds the best to me. Still sounds like it has the makings of a low tier skill to me, though...

There's one more that I forgot:

4) are the Support unit, and will give the Hex effect to enemies without being in danger of getting hit.

Edited August 13, 2014 by Interceptor

[Elieson]

Aether really needs to drop a tier. It's activation rate is hardly reliable, even when nearing maximum stats, and it's only available on a maximum of three people (one of which can't even use tomes to take advantage of it to the fullest of its potential). The class itself is locked to foot-movement, and only has 2/3 of the weapon triangle. The majority of the time that you have Lucina on your team, you aren't going to be relying on it. It's more of a "Hey, look what just happened, I made sure to kill this enemy with Aetherprox" rather than "ok, Aether'll probably proc now". Shit reliability should not be that high on the tier, despite the results of the skill being good. Otherwise, Lethality should be right next to it for having shit proc rates too.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

Definitely agree with Interceptor on Charm. While its numbers may not be as good as Anathema, it's still a significant boost, especially in the 2 RN hit system. In the very least, it deserves to be on par with Solidarity.

Out of those three, Enemy Phase sounds the best to me. Still sounds like it has the makings of a low tier skill to me, though...

Consider that quite a few enemies in the game are melee and that the Dark Mages/Sorcerer line is built to be rather tanky. Throw in Nos and suddenly you have a pretty good main or secondary tank. Also, one of the best strategies for taking down Grima is having support Chrom with Exalted Falchion bypassing Pavise. The sword's hit is already not great and in a 5 combat pair environment, even if he's supporting Avatar, he's very unlikely to get anywhere near capped stats for Great Lord or Great Knight (the two popular support classes for this task). Hex can really help shore up that hit rate, especially when it's probably about on par with Hit+20 without having to go through a junk class like Sniper.

And as much as I love Galeforce, it doesn't deserve to be on the same level as Veteran (which is so good that even in a 5 combat pair environment, Avatar should get far enough ahead of the curve to just laugh at most enemies). My main issue is that Dark Flier, like most hybrid classes, isn't a very attractive class for most characters. This is because while the class seems balanced on paper, the practical growths of most units mean that it almost never gets used to its full potential. Of the first generation, Lissa and Maribelle are skewed toward Mag, making lances uselessly pathetic for them. Sumia and Cordelia are skewed toward Str, making the tomes just as useless for them. Therefore, the only character who can really make use of the class's versatility is Avatar. This means that those other mothers have to spend one or more seals to go through a class that's less optimal than the other choices in order to pick up Galeforce. Some second generation may be able to make use of it, but is it really worth having awkwardly subpar mothers for?

One might then say that at least the female kids could learn it on their own, but most of them also suffer from skewed growths. Really, the only one it's worth doing it for in a no grind environment is Chrom!Morgan and that's even in part because he'll come with Veteran. I've done separate runs where I've passed Galeforce or Veteran to Avatar!Lucina and the Lucina with Veteran was always way better. She didn't need Galeforce once she started rolling, because she could stat stomp her way through. She also suffers from Str-skewed growths (thanks, Chrom), which makes Dark Flier pretty unattractive for her. It's for a similar, if not even worse reason that passing Galeforce and reclassing her to Tactician (instead of say, Cavalier) is bad. At least with Dark Flier, she has Javelins. As a Tactician, she's sword locked to 1 range weapons, because the her Mag is terrible, which makes the Levin Sword and all tomes a pretty bad choice.

I'd argue it down to a least under Dual Strike+, if not bottom of tier 2.

Dual Strike+ is conveniently free for two units at a time where they want to be supporting/supported someone who is going to have a low Dual Strike chance thanks to low supports. Proportionally, this is a very big increase, not only affecting the lead unit's damage output, but helping the support to get more EXP by contributing more often. It then continues to be helpful in the late game by removing much of the uncertainty in using Dual Strike strategies (since it'll push the chance in to the 90s or even higher). It's at least as useful as Galeforce, but is a complete handout.

Rally Spectrum is a bit iffy. It should probably even go down, though I'm not sure by how much. Sure, it gives a huge stat boost to units, but it also requires one of the three combat gods to give up their turn and a skill slot (I'm assuming we're not building Spotpass rallybots). In the main campaign, with no DLC, that's a pretty raw trade. Still, it can benefit a lot of units, which can be helpful in a pinch.

I was going to argue Vengeance down too, since it's a bit lacking on other classes without Vantage, but if the unit sticks to the Dark Mage/Sorcerer line, it's still really powerful with Nostanking, sooo... yeah, I guess leave that. I think that does debatably put it a bit above Galeforce, though.

[Zkirsche]

Out of those three, Enemy Phase sounds the best to me. Still sounds like it has the makings of a low tier skill to me, though...

Except all three of those reasons are in play with said sorcerer? Avatar aside, If you're a mage and you don't want to go nostanking then you're not worth fielding in lunatic. Considering Nosferato's low hit rate, hex can be the difference between hitting consistently and not, the latter leading to that mage's death. I can't believe you think that's significantly worse than comparative junk like healtouch, single-rally skills, and even solidarity (ok 10 crit/dodge is nice but only to adjacent allies, how often are allies adjacent to each other?) which have little good use.

You're original complaint is that there's no reason to have a mage next to an enemy. That is clearly shown to not be true. What do you have to say regarding my comparison to outdoor fighter, which is obviously better due to being on more units but not significantly so?

Solidarity should probably be moved down too, it's only really useful when avatar is paired up with someone and not actually fighting. Stuff like charm (already covered) is much better.

Rightful King is probably as low as it is because few people can learn it

I mentioned and considered this, and I don't see the plethora of people learning wrath, Pavise, rally magic, rally res, dual guard+ etc and most of them are less useful than Rightful King.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

I mentioned and considered this, and I don't see the plethora of people learning wrath, Pavise, rally magic, rally res, dual guard+ etc and most of them are less useful than Rightful King.

To be fair to Rally Magic, it's quite likely to be learned, because Sage is a good class that's readily available and useful to quite a few characters (in my playthroughs, Lissa, Libra and Anna all go through it). It's helpful to throw on a magic combat pair when the staffbot is idling, but still niche, thanks to it being utterly worthless to any of the physical combat pairs. It's hard to compare, though, because it's in a different ballback from Rightful King, in that staffbots tend to have free skill slots anyway, so they might as well bring something that can be situationally useful. Rightful King has to fight other proc skills or survival skills for a spot on a frontline combat unit. There's also the weird thing about Rightful King basically needing a lot of proc skills on a character to make it all that useful, which may require a lot of leveling. Like, I don't think I'd use Rightful King unless I was running at least Aether, Luna and Aegis all on the same unit. Rally Magic, however, can be useful early on (just one promotion or reclass away for the characters I mentioned above) and if nothing else, at that point in the game, Avatar is likely to be preferring tomes as a weapon.

[Shadow Mir]

Except all three of those reasons are in play with said sorcerer? Avatar aside, If you're a mage and you don't want to go nostanking then you're not worth fielding in lunatic. Considering Nosferato's low hit rate, hex can be the difference between hitting consistently and not, the latter leading to that mage's death. I can't believe you think that's significantly worse than comparative junk like healtouch, single-rally skills, and even solidarity (ok 10 crit/dodge is nice but only to adjacent allies, how often are allies adjacent to each other?) which have little good use.

You're original complaint is that there's no reason to have a mage next to an enemy. That is clearly shown to not be true. What do you have to say regarding my comparison to outdoor fighter, which is obviously better due to being on more units but not significantly so?

Solidarity should probably be moved down too, it's only really useful when avatar is paired up with someone and not actually fighting. Stuff like charm (already covered) is much better.

I mentioned and considered this, and I don't see the plethora of people learning wrath, Pavise, rally magic, rally res, dual guard+ etc and most of them are less useful than Rightful King.

The non-Avatar dark mages you have, reclassing aside, are Tharja, who has trouble hitting with anything that isn't wind magic or maybe fire magic AND has shit luck to the point where mooks regularly have chances to critblick her off the map, and Henry, who has speed problems. Why the hell would I want to have someone who has chances to die to crits trying to Nostank?

I said that outside of attacking an archer, I struggled to find good reasons to want a mage to go into 1-range when it meant taking a counter, even with dark mages having Nosferato. Like stated earlier, I'd be okay with it if it was out of my hands because of Enemy Phase.

While we're at it, whatever is Rightful King doing below crap like Wrath and Zeal???

Edited August 13, 2014 by Levant Caprice

[Jotari]

I find it odd that Dual Guard+ is so low. As someone pointed out, Great Knight is a useful class with high defense, weapon triangle control and a mount with the addition of the other useful skill Luna. It's also a likely class choice for Chrom, one of our assumed to be used units. Fredrick also starts as a Great Knight and is available since the start of the game. By the time you get Dual Guard+ you should have high enough supports to make it very useful to the point where your negating damage half the time. Approximately. I haven't played in a while and don't have the numbers on hand but I do remember it being a very useful skill.

Edited August 13, 2014 by Jotari