Best class for Donny?

[Shadow Mir]

OMG who the hell cares

Remember that games are supposed to be fun...spend too much time debating stats and stuff and it becomes work.

Okay, fine. Though honestly, the only time I even bothered working with Donnel was on my first playthrough.. Nya. That said, I'm not sure if you're talking about promoted class or what to reclass into. If the latter, there's a conundrum as to whether you want another axe user before Cherche or Armsthrift. If the former, it's likely Hero.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Levant Caprice

[GigaBreaker88]

Hero is generally best: Better skills and better caps for Donnel. Warrior works, of course, and gets bow access, but in general Hero works better.

[Florete]

I hear Bench warmer is a good class. Good skills and caps.

Benchwarmer is best for Donnel. Also, I read that on the parenting front, Donnel makes everyone lackluster - his "best" child winds up essentially being no different from their mother mod wise. I mean, sure, mods aren't everything, but they certainly don't help Donnel's case...

Let's get something straight: Donnel sucks. No one is trying to argue anything different, and I'm sure Dragoncat understands that.

That. is. not. the. point.

If someone just wants to use a character and is asking for advice on how to use them, don't you think it's kind of rude to say, "Lol that character sucks, don't use them"? Let people use who they want to use. Save the character debates for the appropriate time and place. This is what people complained about tier lists for, even though the people who discussed tier lists weren't typically the kind of people who made these statements in the wrong contexts.

[Shadow Mir]

Let's get something straight: Donnel sucks. No one is trying to argue anything different, and I'm sure Dragoncat understands that.

That. is. not. the. point.

If someone just wants to use a character and is asking for advice on how to use them, don't you think it's kind of rude to say, "Lol that character sucks, don't use them"? Let people use who they want to use. Save the character debates for the appropriate time and place. This is what people complained about tier lists for, even though the people who discussed tier lists weren't typically the kind of people who made these statements in the wrong contexts.

Okay. Back to the topic at hand, If this was in terms of promoted class, I'd likely say Hero. If the question was in the context of what to reclass him to, I'd say that's dependent on whether you want Armsthrift or another axe user before Cherche (I'm offering both perspectives up for the sake of being detailed).

EDIT: Dragoncat stated that she wasn't going to have axe issues, so Merc it is.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Levant Caprice

[Ownagepuffs]

Let's get something straight: Donnel sucks. No one is trying to argue anything different, and I'm sure Dragoncat understands that.That. is. not. the. point.

If someone just wants to use a character and is asking for advice on how to use them, don't you think it's kind of rude to say, "Lol that character sucks, don't use them"? Let people use who they want to use. Save the character debates for the appropriate time and place. This is what people complained about tier lists for, even though the people who discussed tier lists weren't typically the kind of people who made these statements in the wrong contexts.

My comment was a joke, everyone already mentioned Hero anyway.

[Melissa]

Why's everyone complaining about Bow Knight even though it gives two useful skills?

[Knusperkeks]

Why's everyone complaining about Bow Knight even though it gives two useful skills?

That, I would like to know as well.

[Shadow Mir]

Why's everyone complaining about Bow Knight even though it gives two useful skills?

That, I would like to know as well.

I'm starting to get curious as to that now...

Anyway, on the useful skills bit, Rally Skill's about the least useful of the rallies, and Bowbreaker... ehh, I don't have much to say about it, really.

[Ownagepuffs]

Rally Skill can improve accuracy sometimes. Bow breaker is sex. On higher difficulties, enemies Snipers, Assassins and Bow Knights were stupid accurate towards the end. Being able to dodge tank their hits is quite the boon.

Pretty much any breaker skill is wtf amazing. Sword breaker is also really good for the same reason as bow breaker, sword wielding classes get stupid forges (lol 115 Hit Silvers, anyone?).

[Dragoncat]

Let's get something straight: Donnel sucks. No one is trying to argue anything different, and I'm sure Dragoncat understands that.

That. is. not. the. point.

If someone just wants to use a character and is asking for advice on how to use them, don't you think it's kind of rude to say, "Lol that character sucks, don't use them"? Let people use who they want to use. Save the character debates for the appropriate time and place. This is what people complained about tier lists for, even though the people who discussed tier lists weren't typically the kind of people who made these statements in the wrong contexts.

Yeah this isn't a tier list...but isn't he worth building up? He sucks how? I mean when you first get him I can see that, but?

[Ownagepuffs]

His viability is relative to the difficulty you play on.

[Eselred]

His viability is relative to the difficulty you play on.

And how much time you wish to invest in Donnel when you can invest less time into other units who all end up better.

[Shadow Mir]

Yeah this isn't a tier list...but isn't he worth building up? He sucks how? I mean when you first get him I can see that, but?

As stated earlier, his viability is relative to difficulty. I dunno if you're on Normal, but if you are, he's perfectly fine to use.

EDIT:

Rally Skill can improve accuracy sometimes. Bow breaker is sex. On higher difficulties, enemies Snipers, Assassins and Bow Knights were stupid accurate towards the end. Being able to dodge tank their hits is quite the boon.

Pretty much any breaker skill is wtf amazing. Sword breaker is also really good for the same reason as bow breaker, sword wielding classes get stupid forges (lol 115 Hit Silvers, anyone?).

Ehhh, I consider Swordbreaker less useful relative to other breakers, if only because save for the occasional sword toting great knight, most sword classes tend to be on the weaker end of the power spectrum. And as to Rally Skill, I don't tend to use anyone who has Bow Knight as a promoted class option.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Levant Caprice

[Czar_Yoshi]

On Normal and hard Donnel performs very well if you get him going... But he's the hardest unit in the game to get going. You're pretty much paying a higher price for the same thing.

On Lunatic and Lunatic+, he takes a huge amount of effort in the beginning to get going, does well midgame (if he avoids getting his face blown up by Counter, which I'll talk about soon), and then utterly tanks lategame due to bad caps and no class options. Considering as those difficulties start out hard, lighten up a bit to let you train up a team, and then get hard again to test that team, his bad points correspond with when the game is hard and his good points correspond with when it's easy (and his highs and lows aren't linked to the enemy power, this is completely coincidental), which makes him incapable of pulling any real weight and being a net drag on your team.

As mentioned he has a bigger problem with Counter than most on Lunatic+: due to Aptitude giving a flat boost instead of a multiplier, his Str growth winds up being uncomfortably close to his HP growth. Add on weapon mt and low enemy Def, and he's often at risk of one-shotting himself on enemy Counter, whereas most units, by the time they're strong enough to do any real damage to themselves with it, will have at least enough HP to take two or so hits back.

Bowbreaker: It's pretty great on Lunatic+ Cht.22. Bovis always spawns with it and if he gets Counter and you have no Bowbreaker of your own to fix your Hit against him, he'll be a huge pain to take down.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Czar_Yoshi

[Ownagepuffs]

As stated earlier, his viability is relative to difficulty. I dunno if you're on Normal, but if you are, he's perfectly fine to use.

EDIT:

Ehhh, I consider Swordbreaker less useful relative to other breakers, if only because save for the occasional sword toting great knight, most sword classes tend to be on the weaker end of the power spectrum. And as to Rally Skill, I don't tend to use anyone who has Bow Knight as a promoted class option.

I'd like to introduce you to my friend, the 29 Str, 39 speed swordmaster in C21 with his 19 Mt, 105 hit Silver Sword. Let's not forget that his A rank in swords provides +3 Atk so that's a 22 Mt silver. Trust me, Sword breaker is really good. It let me do crazy shit like ORKOing Swordmasters with a Brave Axe. Plus it comes from a good class anyway.

While Bow Knight's main claim to fame is Lunatic+, the class is also good on Lunatic as well. Powerful indirect damage with high mov is always appreciated. So are its pair up bonuses.

[Florete]

Being able to just tank hits and self-heal is typically better than relying on dodging and breaker skills in Lunatic. Enemies are diverse enough that I can't consider the breaker skills all that valuable, and Rally Skill is pretty weak. Sure, it can improve chances of things, but unlike any other Rally (minus Luck), it can't help you hit any necessary benchmarks.

[Shadow Mir]

I'd like to introduce you to my friend, the 29 Str, 39 speed swordmaster in C21 with his 19 Mt, 105 hit Silver Sword. Let's not forget that his A rank in swords provides +3 Atk so that's a 22 Mt silver. Trust me, Sword breaker is really good. It let me do crazy shit like ORKOing Swordmasters with a Brave Axe. Plus it comes from a good class anyway.

While Bow Knight's main claim to fame is Lunatic+, the class is also good on Lunatic as well. Powerful indirect damage with high mov is always appreciated. So are its pair up bonuses.

Yeah, let's just go and completely ignore the fact that giving him WTD takes a lot of the bite out of him already...

Edited March 9, 2015 by Levant Caprice

[Glitchy]

Donnel is a great unit in the Hero class. I'd go:

Villager (Lv. 10) > Mercenary (Lv. 20) > Hero (Lv. 20)

Get all skills you need from other classes, but end at Hero.

[Ownagepuffs]

Being able to just tank hits and self-heal is typically better than relying on dodging and breaker skills in Lunatic. Enemies are diverse enough that I can't consider the breaker skills all that valuable, and Rally Skill is pretty weak. Sure, it can improve chances of things, but unlike any other Rally (minus Luck), it can't help you hit any necessary benchmarks.

You'd be surprised. A breaker skill on top of durability (a la Swordbreaker!Cherche) can make an enemy phase much easier to bear. While enemies are varied, they are also grouped in repeated formations. Speaking from experience, Cherche learned S.Breaker at C20 end. This was immediately put to use against C21 Assassins and Swordmasters, the 51 speed C22 Balmung Swordmaster, C23 Silver Sword Heroes and Assassins, C24 Paladins and C25/26 got 1 turned so whatever. Bow breaker makes dealing with those same assassins much easier because they tend to attack at 2 range with their Silver Bows anyway like assholes. B.Breaker also works for the snipers in Excellus's group in C20 if you have it by then. Tome breaker is even more helpful. C21 Mire sorcs and the 50 crit (60 with Anathema, 75 with Hex/Anathema) become less threatening.

Don't underestimate breaker skills. They basically act as a complete nullifier to their respective weapon type.

Edit: If for nothing else, Rally skill improves hit vs Grima, who is a major asshole. Grima has 90 Avo on lunatic, and I'm not even sure I'd that includes Grima's Ire (+20 Avo).

Yeah, let's just go and completely ignore the fact that giving him WTD takes a lot of the bite out of him already...

As mentioned in my response to RFoF, they aren't the only sword wielding threat you see late in the game. Not to mention even after WTD they have massive hit anyway.

The only one that really isn't that useful is Axe Breaker, since late game axes tend to be Berserkers and Great Knights, who have pitiful hit. Axe heroes are rare later on too.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Ownagepuffs

[Florete]

You're still relying on usually unreliable avoid, especially if the enemies also have breaker skills. Snipers can also have +20 Hit, making Bow Breaker in particular even less useful. And then there's the fact that Bow-wielding enemies can be attacked without counter on player phase anyway.

I get that they can be helpful, but when it comes to Lunatic, I'd prefer solid defense and self-healing.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

The end result of fighting a sword with an axe while Swordbreaker is in play is that you gain 20 Hit, lose 2 damage, knock 35 off of their Hit and give them an extra damage. Sure, it's better than going axes vs swords without the breaker, but it's still not recommended.

Axebreaker is actually really good in the mid-late campaign and if you decide to go on to do the Spotpass Paralogues. Axes end up quite common and while hit rates against a decent dodger is going to be around 40-60 (depending on class and if the free Hit skill is 10 or 20), this can still be a concern when the damage is as high as it is and the enemy can afford to suicide a bunch of them, especially if Luna+ is in play (60-79mt axe hits from that really smart). Axebreaker completely removes any remaining risk from those guys unless they have Hawkeye. Also, Walhart 2 cries with sad if he has to face Axebreaker, which is just delicious.

A nicher use, but still notable is having Lucina run around with it. She completely ruins all those late game Wyvern Lords who thought they were being clever by bringing their Swordbreaker to the table. Other sword users with access to Hero can technically achieve a similar effect with a Wyrmslayer, but I mostly mentioned Lucina because she's so easy to train.

It's worth noting that when I was doing my first run (on Lunatic), I wrote off Axebreaker too (sounded overly-specialized), but kept it on because it still sounded better than Solidarity (didn't realize the paired unit counted as "adjacent"), Rally Move (was basically a Chrom/Robin duo after Fred and Sully fell off around chapter 18) or Defender. I changed my tune when I started taking a much harder look at numbers and realized just how much it was contributing to my Robin's invincibility.

[omega zero]

I'm guessing it's too much work to make Donnel into a Warrior and get that bow rank up on L/L+ no grind?

I'm just not sure what Czar means by "no class options."

Edited March 9, 2015 by omega zero

[Florete]

Yeah this isn't a tier list...but isn't he worth building up? He sucks how? I mean when you first get him I can see that, but?

It depends on how you play, really. If you don't mind grinding him up, once he reclasses he'll basically be destruction incarnate. The problem is that he has to get there, and since most people don't want to spend a lot of extra time grinding a weak unit, the payoff just isn't worth it for someone who is overkill.

[Ownagepuffs]

Enemies don't sport hit +20 until C24 and beyond, and C24 is filled with predominantly low hit classes while C25/26 are 1 turn clears. The Silver Bow assassins will never spawn with hit +20. It's certainly not unreliable avoid. +50 avo pretty much nullifies the weapon type as a threat, especially if you apply WTD and various support bonuses and skills. Some of the breakers come with fairly durable classes (Hero, Wyvern Lord), which makes them a plus. Only enemies with access to the breakers ever spawn with it.

I'm not saying breakers > self healing and strict durability, but they are very useful skills that are not to be overlooked. A promoted level 15 unit will most likely be able to take care of themselves anyway, so it's not like they will rely solely on the breakers.

[Czar_Yoshi]

I'm guessing it's too much work to make Donnel into a Warrior and get that bow rank up on L/L+ no grind?

I'm just not sure what Czar means by "no class options."

He's got like three promoted classes, compared to the standard up to six for first gen units and up to twelve for 3nd gen units. That's pretty much nothing when a long-term non-Veteran Lunatic+ combat unit is expected to be in their third promoted class by endgame- other than different class paths he's got literally no variation in what his set allows him to do.

All of the classes he does have are mostly ending classes on top of that- he doesn't really have room to take a class path other than reclassing back into what he already is. His skill pool as a result is very small and doesn't compliment him well- you can throw together a few that are good/decent on paper but never get any combos going.

Sol Warrior is definitely his best option on Lunatic+ nogrind but he'll be reaching Bows A fairly late (he doesn't really want to go through Fighter and has no Discipline), and with a Spd cap of 39 he'll run into some trouble doubling stuff lategame depending on his pairup.

You're still relying on usually unreliable avoid, especially if the enemies also have breaker skills.

If you can show me a Lunatic run that never has any chance of a bad hit/miss killing you, then I'll take that. But as-is dodgetanking is an extremely powerful method of survival, and I'd rather have a small% chance to get bad hit RNG and die than be restricted to one or two units who can survive Lunatic through Def alone (namely Nowi and +Def Robin). Just because it has a chance of failing doesn't mean it's not good.

A note on Swordbreaker: guess what weapon type Paladins, Bow Knights and Dark Knights all have in common, and guess which major boss is incredibly fond of spamming huge waves of those at you?