Advice for Hard Mode

[Ownagepuffs]

Micaiah is at least solid at chip...?

[-Cynthia-]

Yeah, Micaiah can chip for the first few chapters. She doesn't really need any 'training' to do this though and feeding kills to Nolan is probably the better investment longterm.

[Radiant head]

Micaiah is at least solid at chip...?

Problem is most the p1 bosses have ranged attack

[Florete]

Thani isn't as effective as one would think, given that Micaiah can't double, gets doubled, and can't take a hit. Like even if she leaves on hp left on the boss, she's done. You could have someone else chip first, but then you might as well let someone else get the kill too.

It might take a bit more training her than some would like, but killing armors and cavs in one shot with Thani is definitely within reasonable means. At the very least, it allows someone else to kill without getting attacked in return.

[dondon151]

micaiah needs to be L10 to OHKO armors with thani on average; that is a ton of investment.

EDIT: that's just for 1-6-1. 1-E armors require 19 mag for micaiah to even have a shot at OHKOing them, which she doesn't average until L16.

Edited February 14, 2015 by dondon151

[Florete]

micaiah needs to be L10 to OHKO armors with thani on average; that is a ton of investment.

But not unreasonable, depending on the player.

I'm not here to say "You should train Micaiah" or anything like that, I'm just pointing out that, with the proper (and not, at least imo, overboard) investment, there is stuff she can do.

[-Cynthia-]

Are you including the +2 Mt from Sothe in those metrics? That makes things a bit more reasonable.

[dondon151]

no, but micaiah is not guaranteed to have sothe around and the support might also be broken. micaiah's +atk is a rarity in the DB.

[Yojinbo]

Putting Micaiah to low HP via Sacrifice and getting unreasonable wrath criticals with forged Light tomes is very amusing though.

[Radiant head]

It might take a bit more training her than some would like, but killing armors and cavs in one shot with Thani is definitely within reasonable means. At the very least, it allows someone else to kill without getting attacked in return.

Sure, but reasonable is subjective. I find using other units who you're trying to train anyway to be simpler.

[Vorena]

I am still surprised anyone is thinking of trying to hardcore training Micaiah. It is indeed not worth it. However, there is the difference between simply using a unit, forcing yourself to set-up situations for a person to get KOs, and flat out not using them at all. I remember not having a very hard time getting multiple units to lv16-18 at 1-end preparation stage. Such units being Aran, Micaiah, Edward, Nolan, and Jill. Not all of them in one run, but usually 3-4 of them. Actually, I remember having to force myself to set-up KOs to actually use Aran at all along with a forge to get going and even then it did not amount to much. This is not a LTC pace, but neither a inch forward two spaces every turn type of run either.

The game gives you a ton of units which are over-leveled at your join time and it is very easy to siphon off the potential exp gain by giving all KOs to Sothe, Volug, Nolan (in like the first 2 chapters), Zihark, and Tauruneo. At the same time said units like Sothe and Nolan can often times not ORKO enemies in the starting chapters. Nolan is weighed down by his Steel Axe on the first couple of chapters and cannot double enemies.

--P-1 7 enemies and one boss. This is what? Like a 5-7 turn clear depending upon the person. With two units that could both warrant getting KOs. That is at least ~50 experience from sacrifice usage and chip damage. Probably a level-up and part of another one if you are willing to let her get a couple of the KOs possible on this map rather than being complete favoritism on Edward.

--1-1 is actually a very easy chapter to allow Nolan to enemy phase say two enemies and let Micaiah/Edward/Leonardo the KOs and it being more exp efficient than giving it to Nolan. But, at the same time you can use Micaiah to weaken an enemy for edward/nolan/leonardo to get a KO. Again, does not seem another chapter to expect a level-up out of and part of another one.

Its a similar thing on 1-prologue as well. Either Edward or Micaiah can get all the KOs, none of them, or an even split.

--1-2 is once again another set-up for that situation where Micaiah can either get KOs or set-up for them. Except this time you have two tank units with Nolan and Sothe. Sothe cannot KO soldiers with his bronze dagger. Actually, by the time Sothe turns up you can easily have him go south and weaken the soldiers on enemy phase and have the others get the KOs on player phase. Again, I could expect another level-up out of Micaiah. Probably two by this time with the idea of maybe 1.33 lvs per chapter.

--1-3 Oh, look, you have Thani now and 4 enemies which are difficult to KO that you can hit with. With 4 levels (I bet you could have gotten her to lv 5 by now) you can on average guarantee a OHKO on the armors while possibly having Sothe (not very hard on this map to stay near by) for the +1 Atk to turn it into a KO. At the same time enemy phase could have gotten them some chip damage from say Sothe or Nolan and now they are certainly in OHKO range. Same thing with the boss. While all the while there is chip damage and sacrifice usage to generally be had every turn.

--1-4 Now, the laguz chapter. This can either be a good place to get experience or simply let everything die while its in the non-laguz form. Who is probably the only character which can do a decent damage chip to laguz form while not having retaliation? Micaiah and Ilyana. Though Ilyana suffers occasionally missed attacks, will lose soon for Ikes group (not useful to the dawn brigade in part 3), and is overleveled (lv 12). Nolan, Aran, and Leonardo can all try to 2 range, but have potential accuracy issues and not doing enough damage. Lv7 Leonardo here with a steel bow does pretty much a 4-5HKO on tigers with a 4HKO. A level 5 Micaiah with Thani is a 3HKO with it being a very close to a 2HKO if the laguz generally take something like a 5hp hit on enemy phase or player phase.

From this point on pretty much in part 1 you can continue to keep using Micaiah to have a decent chip damage or be able to easily nab a weakened enemy KO. Along with any turn she is not able to attack something usually there is some player who leveled up with +1 hp that was not healed that you can Sacrifice for the +10 exp.

She is a forced unit that is also not a deadbeat unit to simply giving some combat or healing task to do each turn. Merely giving her something to do allows her to gain levels and in return 80% of the time getting a magic increase which after several chapters keeps her chip damage decent for the rest of Part 1. Afterwards you get forced promotion and you can continue to use her for the very same thing "chip damage" on the part 3 deployments. The last final hurrah she gets I feel is on the dawn brigade defend chapter where she does one last chip and healing tasks.

Again, do not bother to train her for say endgame stuff, but at the same time do not let her do nothing. Its free healing and free damage for a forced unit. If she ever gets a few KOs she can be a little bit more helpful with the healing and damage a little bit faster through out the campaign. She does not take some 15 levels to be relevant at all. She continues to be useful with no more effort than simply putting the cursor over her each turn and saying, "Give me free damage and give me free healing".

Edited February 15, 2015 by Vorena

[dondon151]

--P-1 7 enemies and one boss. This is what? Like a 5-7 turn clear depending upon the person. With two units that could both warrant getting KOs. That is at least ~50 experience from sacrifice usage and chip damage. Probably a level-up and part of another one if you are willing to let her get a couple of the KOs possible on this map rather than being complete favoritism on Edward.

are you aware of how ridiculously unlikely it is to 5-turn 1-P? you have to rig a 3% crit on the very first enemy in the chapter. a 6-turn is also very unlikely to happen and i maybe had to reset about 20 times before i got a successful 6-turn of 1-P. and, by the way, in order to clear the chapter in such low turns, edward is getting basically all of the kills and micaiah can't even risk getting near him and using sacrifice.

i'm not going to bother directly addressing your wall of text, but most of that stuff does not happen. sothe ORKOs soldiers in 1-2 with the kard and the enemy density is high enough such that micaiah wants nothing to do with them. you need to get her an insane number of kills just so she can fill your made-up role of thani bomber when you don't need a unit who can OHKO armor knights because a ton of other units do that job better with less investment. you could train micaiah to L10 or you could siphon all of that EXP into nolan and he'll probably come out, like, 4 levels higher.

micaiah is bad. it's great to get the situational use out of her when you need a sacrifice or a little bit of chip damage. training her is actively bad for the rest of the team and makes the game harder in the long run.

Edited February 15, 2015 by dondon151

[Radiant head]

Yeah, do people actually bother trying to get Micaiah to level 20 before her tier 2 and tier 3 promotions? Tier 2 it's somewhat doable because she has 9-10 chapters of Thani bombing and Sactifice spamming, but tier 3 seems impossible unless you just spam bexp.

Edited February 15, 2015 by Radiant head

[Florete]

Yeah, do people actually bother trying to get Micaiah to level 20 before her tier 2 and tier 3 promotions? Tier 2 it's somewhat doable because she has 9-10 chapters of Thani bombing and Sactifice spamming, but tier 3 seems impossible unless you just spam bexp.

I do when I want to use her as a combat unit.

It's not that difficult.

[Vorena]

are you aware of how ridiculously unlikely it is to 5-turn 1-P? you have to rig a 3% crit on the very first enemy in the chapter. a 6-turn is also very unlikely to happen and i maybe had to reset about 20 times before i got a successful 6-turn of 1-P. and, by the way, in order to clear the chapter in such low turns, edward is getting basically all of the kills and micaiah can't even risk getting near him and using sacrifice.

i'm not going to bother directly addressing your wall of text, but most of that stuff does not happen. sothe ORKOs soldiers in 1-2 with the kard and the enemy density is high enough such that micaiah wants nothing to do with them. you need to get her an insane number of kills just so she can fill your made-up role of thani bomber when you don't need a unit who can OHKO armor knights because a ton of other units do that job better with less investment. you could train micaiah to L10 or you could siphon all of that EXP into nolan and he'll probably come out, like, 4 levels higher.

micaiah is bad. it's great to get the situational use out of her when you need a sacrifice or a little bit of chip damage. training her is actively bad for the rest of the team and makes the game harder in the long run.

I think I worded the P-1 ideas poorly for what I was trying to get across. The turn estimate was more to illustrate the idea that you can get experience over several turns without actually getting any kills. Though I went with 1 level-up per chapter for the case of the person at the slower pace to try being more even about experience spread without completely hogging it to Micaiah or Edward. A more even distributor of experience.

Sothe does not with ORKO with the bronze dagger which I should have brought up at first. Not sure about what high enemy density you mean about.

As you said earlier, 7 base magic is useful. Thani bombing idea is not a made up thing. Thani+7 base magic is an effective 31 damage while which the knights only have 5 resistance against (on 1-3). That is a very significant amount of damage (when you have 28 HP in 1-3) that is very real. Now, will you actually get the chance to use Thani and Micaiah on knights and cavaliers after 1-3? Depends upon your set-up and tactics for those maps, but it is something she has access to that is not made-up and can be done at a very low level. Any levels she happens to get through simply sacrifice and chipping merely adds to the extra damage she gets to do with the 80% magic growth she has access too.

That was another point I was trying to make earlier. She does not have to be given any KOs, but the game often sets up up for her to get maybe or two. I wish I had the exp formula on hand at the moment. Otherwise, its pointless to guess exactly how much experience could be given to Nolan for the KOs Micaiah gets. Although, Micaiah getting to level 10 by the end of part1 honestly does not sound that far fetched from simply using her and maybe getting a KO her or there.

Though I think I have gotten my point across about Micaiah being an auxiliary character and not some unit which contributes nothing more than a single attack across the entire game.

[dondon151]

I think I worded the P-1 ideas poorly for what I was trying to get across. The turn estimate was more to illustrate the idea that you can get experience over several turns without actually getting any kills. Though I went with 1 level-up per chapter for the case of the person at the slower pace to try being more even about experience spread without completely hogging it to Micaiah or Edward. A more even distributor of experience.

so you're really suggesting taking 11 or more turns in 1-P just to feed micaiah kills.

Sothe does not with ORKO with the bronze dagger which I should have brought up at first. Not sure about what high enemy density you mean about.

there are literally 3 soldiers right where sothe spawns and a fighter usually walking nearby at that turn.

As you said earlier, 7 base magic is useful. Thani bombing idea is not a made up thing. Thani+7 base magic is an effective 31 damage while which the knights only have 5 resistance against (on 1-3). That is a very significant amount of damage (when you have 28 HP in 1-3) that is very real. Now, will you actually get the chance to use Thani and Micaiah on knights and cavaliers after 1-3? Depends upon your set-up and tactics for those maps, but it is something she has access to that is not made-up and can be done at a very low level. Any levels she happens to get through simply sacrifice and chipping merely adds to the extra damage she gets to do with the 80% magic growth she has access too.

"thani bombing" is useless. completely, totally useless. there is, like, one armor knight that you actually need to fight in 1-3 and he's backed up by an iron longbow archer that OHKOs micaiah. she also needs +3 atk on base to OHKO the guy. a much better idea is to just use sothe to 2RKO the armor knight on PP and EP, which he can do because he has more mov than micaiah and doesn't get penalized by thickets.

That was another point I was trying to make earlier. She does not have to be given any KOs, but the game often sets up up for her to get maybe or two. I wish I had the exp formula on hand at the moment. Otherwise, its pointless to guess exactly how much experience could be given to Nolan for the KOs Micaiah gets. Although, Micaiah getting to level 10 by the end of part1 honestly does not sound that far fetched from simply using her and maybe getting a KO her or there.

a kill "maybe or two" is not a substantial source of EXP for micaiah, lol. i used the tactic of "simply using her and maybe getting a KO here or there" and she ended part 1 at L4. if micaiah is doing chip damage, she is much more often not killing the enemy.

[Mekkah]

I find Thani Bombing useful, but I'm a filthy casual.

[Vorena]

so you're really suggesting taking 11 or more turns in 1-P just to feed micaiah kills.

there are literally 3 soldiers right where sothe spawns and a fighter usually walking nearby at that turn.

"thani bombing" is useless. completely, totally useless. there is, like, one armor knight that you actually need to fight in 1-3 and he's backed up by an iron longbow archer that OHKOs micaiah. she also needs +3 atk on base to OHKO the guy. a much better idea is to just use sothe to 2RKO the armor knight on PP and EP, which he can do because he has more mov than micaiah and doesn't get penalized by thickets.

a kill "maybe or two" is not a substantial source of EXP for micaiah, lol. i used the tactic of "simply using her and maybe getting a KO here or there" and she ended part 1 at L4. if micaiah is doing chip damage, she is much more often not killing the enemy.

Ah, so now we have reached the point of trying to put a value on the cost of turns :D Well, I think we have found the main issue on any consensus between us. I feel in this context turns hold very little value to a casual player. The only major reasons a person cares about turns in FE10 is due to player imposed goals, bonus experience, or turn sensitive bench marks. Like a thief getting to a chest before you can claim it. In 1-P, you have to finish it by turn 10 to get all the bonus experience or by turn 14 to get any bonus experience. With the bonus experience for this particular level being 10. The only reason you ever care turns on 1-P is for bonus experience or you have a player imposed goal.

Am I suggesting to take 11 or more turns to complete 1-P simply for Micaiah? No. But, neither am I saying you have to complete the level in as few turns as possible or have to abuse for every single ounce of experience you can get. There is a pretty hefty number of turns that you are allotted to complete and get bonus experience for turns. The minimum turns it takes to get all bonus experience in part one is 123 turns. With most stages allowing up to the next 4 turns with reduced bonus experience. Even then, you get more bonus experience for mere completion than you do on turns which is even less incentive to want to go fast all when you get reduced bonus experience. So, bringing up turns matters very little in this context since I have never been trying to argue for Micaiah in a LTC situation since I am not familiar with it as much.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyyHRFbjr2E&list=PLE4AD8DFA63DC496D#t=220

3:40 shows the 3 soldiers and enemy figher on this map. Sothe can go round and attack the fighter in the south and weaken it with Bronze Dagger on player 3 phase. Having another unit get the KO on it during player phase. On enemy phase, the two soldiers (3rd one is no longer in range to attack Sothe) will break there HP down to single digits which can be wrapped up by two units to nab the KOs the following player phase. Will Micaiah being near this to take advantage of it? Depends upon your style of tackling the first 4 enemies in the first 2 turns. Even if she is not she might get a KO on the first 4 enemies while Nolan/Leonardo/Edward get KOs on the ones Sothe weakened.

Thani Bombing is useless to you I assume since it is not something that is unique utility only to Micaiah that no other unit can do nor is it something which allows you to save turns. Yes, Nolan, Iyana, or Sothe could all attempt to deal with the knights. But, Micaiah can as well or weaken it down to a state that others can leech the kill off of as well. Thani bombing is not useless, but neither is it some great godsend like Niime and Warp usage in FE6. Or being forced to use Fredrick on Lunatic+ runs. It is merely another perk going for Micaiah in utility.

lol I like how you quoted the part that I missed a word. I should have typed "maybe one or two". I was using that phase akin to how when someone says "Everyone is doing it" they do not actually mean everyone, but mean "they have seen a lot of people doing it". In this context of that sentence, I did not literally mean one or two KOs the entire campaign. I meant something like 1 or 2 KOs in a chapter. Which is not unreasonable for the first 5 chapters. 1-End, 1-9, 1-8 is sort of hard for her to do anything without forcing yourself. Movement is too slow in 1-8 in the thickets. 1-9 she dies to pretty much everything. 1-End you have probably promoted units by now with better movement than her. Otherwise, for 1-P to 1-7 getting KOs with her is not that hard.

Please note I am not saying she needs to get all the KOs possible. In 1-P, you have 8 units with one of them being a boss kill. Is it so bad that Micaiah gets one KO in this map while Edward gets all the others and the boss KO? Or in 1-1 where you have reasonably 7-8 units that you will trigger towards you on your way to the escape tile. Does Nolan/Edward have to be so special that they get every single one of them while Micaiah is apparently too much of a leech to get one?

Edited February 15, 2015 by Vorena

[dondon151]

let me put things in perspective: micaiah's chip damage is worth less than lugh's chip damage in FE6. even if micaiah's chip damage is greater, she's on a team with better units who don't need the chip damage as much. the very few instances in which thani finds effective damage on something are rare enough such that they're not substantial contributions.

2 kills per map is still less than a level per map. micaiah is never reaching the benchmark of L10 to OHKO the armors in 1-6-1 with just 2 kills per map, even if she's getting in chip or sacrifice EXP on the side.

you'd think that chip damage is more valuable in 0% growth playthroughs given that units do less damage overall and need more help to finish kills. micaiah's chip damage is not commonly useful in a 0% growth playthrough. it's hard to get her in range to chip damage because she has a terrible 5 mov, and if she does chip or kill something, she has to make sure that there is absolutely nothing left nearby that could run up to her and OHKO her on enemy phase. basically, in order to safely train micaiah, you have to dedicate a special kill zone task force to keep her safe.

[Radiant head]

Man it's a bummer that I worked so hard to make Zihark and Nolan awesome, but they still just don't stand a chance in Part 4. Even with A support avo, I had to give Zihark resolve just so he won't die. I know you're supposed to be using Naesala and Skirmir for this reason, but I don't want my work in Part 1 and 3 to go to waste.

Edited February 16, 2015 by Radiant head

[Florete]

You should have sent them to Tibarn's army.

[Radiant head]

Yeah I wish I thought of that. I have a save file after 3-E, so I'll restart. Plus, Zihark can wrymslay dragons.

[Yojinbo]

What's your Zihark looking like? Trying to make Nolan competent enough for Part 4 is a waste of effort tbh and only decreases the amount of Exp that Jill / Zihark can gain during Part 3.

[Ownagepuffs]

Is Zihark a better candidate than Nolan for part 4? Honest question.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

After this discussion I've started a HM run once and I have to disagree about the complaints against Micaiah and Edward.

The problem of Edward might be that he needs the speed early on. If he doesn't get a speed point, he won't double the enemy soldiers and fighters.

At the latest in 1-4 Edward becomes more and more useful. Attacking the laguz with the wind edge in wrath-zone is pretty awesome and with supports he can kill lots of enemies in 1-5 (all the mages including boss).

If he has HP and a defense support (Leonanrdo recommended) he can even take two hits by steel lances thanks to the removed weapon triangle.

Imo Edward is the best first tier unit, if Jill doesn't get any transfer boosts. He is indispensable for me on hard mode because of his speed. His strength is pretty good too.

Nolan is way more tedious to train on hard mode especially if his strength is lacking.

It's correct that Micaiah will be one shotted by lots of enemies in earlygame. However if she reaches around level 18 and 19 she can have the stats to survive a hit even by a steel axe. So she's actually useable in 1-9 and you can give her resolve.

Her magic has great accuracy and Thani is an awesome tome in part 1.