Meg Topic

[Wisper]

Blossom, Bonus experience, lances, and a horse say Astrid is a good alternative bow user.

Meh.

Blossom can help, no doubt. Problem is she will be completely underleveled when she gets it and will NEED Paragon.

BEXP can be used on a better unit.

You have Oscar for lances.

A horse can be a mixed blessing in this game. Nerfed movement indoors and being able to cross water/pitfalls/mud and probably other things might sometimes outweigh the +2 movement (isn't the entire endgame indoors, too? Meaning Astrid has normal move?)

[Reikken]

Endgame looks indoors, yet there is no movement penalty for mounted units.

[Florete]

You don't need to go out of your way to get max when you can very easily get almost max.

and ~7 turns of getting +9 exp for a hit isn't getting her enough to really matter at all. Exp from nonkills fails on hard mode. Seriously.

Lol what? How many enemies are you leaving alive?

~7? More than that.

Meh.

Blossom can help, no doubt. Problem is she will be completely underleveled when she gets it and will NEED Paragon.

BEXP can be used on a better unit.

You have Oscar for lances.

A horse can be a mixed blessing in this game. Nerfed movement indoors and being able to cross water/pitfalls/mud and probably other things might sometimes outweigh the +2 movement (isn't the entire endgame indoors, too? Meaning Astrid has normal move?)

BEXP is overly adundant. Everyone can get plenty. Oscar is on a different team and isn't that great anyway... Paragon and enough use says she won't be too underleveled anyway.

[Reikken]

Lol what? How many enemies are you leaving alive?

most of them

Set the yellow doods to Target rather than Roam, charge past enemies instead of attacking them, etc. I only intentionally kill the two crossbow warriors, hoseslayer lance paladin, bow paladin, speedwing halberdier, and maybe one of the armors. Oh, and the boss. Maybe like 3 others I have to kill because they get in the way, and a few more suicide on yellow doods.

~7? More than that.

I remember ending on turn 7 last time I played, but meh. ~9, then?

BEXP is overly adundant. Everyone can get plenty. Oscar is on a different team and isn't that great anyway... Paragon and enough use says she won't be too underleveled anyway.

Bexp is quite limited on hard mode. You get half as much as on normal mode, and it's half as effective. So you effectively have 25% as much.

[Florete]

most of them

Set the yellow doods to Target rather than Roam, charge past enemies instead of attacking them, etc. I only intentionally kill the two crossbow warriors, hoseslayer lance paladin, bow paladin, speedwing halberdier, and maybe one of the armors. Oh, and the boss. Maybe like 3 others I have to kill because they get in the way, and a few more suicide on yellow doods.

Gah. Wish I'd thought of that. Would have been awesome for my Dawn Brigade Slaughterfest.

I remember ending on turn 7 last time I played, but meh. ~9, then?

Whoops, I meant for the experience part. I'm reasonably sure she can gain >9 experience a hit, definitely more if she kills.

Bexp is quite limited on hard mode. You get half as much as on normal mode, and it's half as effective. So you effectively have 25% as much.

True. Only not everyone is playing hard mode.

[Reikken]

Well, exp on hard mode is 5 for a normal hit on someone of the same level, and most enemies in that chapter are level ~18 1st tier, while Astrid is lv 1 2nd tier, so that's 4 exp per hit. Doubled makes 8. That would be 18 on normal mode, though.

Edited October 24, 2008 by Reikken

[Warrior of Dawn]

Well, exp on hard mode is 5 for a normal hit on someone of the same level, and most enemies in that chapter are level ~18 1st tier, while Astrid is lv 1 2nd tier, so that's 4 exp per hit. Doubled makes 8. That would be 18 on normal mode, though.

Actually, I think she's Level 2 2nd Tier.

Not that it makes any difference at all. The slight innacuaracy was bugging me.

[sandmanccl]

Enemy phase.

You still do more damage to enemies attacking them from 2 range on your turn with a regular style bow, almost in every scenario. You can hit a guy for 9 twice with crossbow, and then hit them for 9 twice again on your turn, or you can hit them for 20 twice on your turn without risking counter attack.

Besides, that's only in the first few stages of the game! Crossbows are next to useless end-game because even the most powerful one won't be hitting for even double digits against the warriors and swordmasters you fight.

When my archer has 30+ def and can counter melee, I want enemies to attack him.

Why, when you've got guys who have better defense that can do even more damage during a counter, have better defense, and better HP, who are already more likely to be a couple spaces ahead of your archers because they need to get within one space of the enemy to attack in the first place?

Attack with standard bow. Trade -> move crossbow up to top.

As a sniper, okay. As a marksman, this usually means you're wasting your turn with the person who did the trading because they themselves will need a weapon of 1-2 range in order to attack the same guy your marksman just hit from 3 range out. Granted, you might have a guy who really can't accomplish a whole lot so this is the best use you can find for them (say, maybe, a healer with no one to heal or an untransformed laguz or a heron that's going to refresh someone near the marksman) but it's not common enough to make me care about crossbows.

Unless it's completely unavoidable, you shouldn't be letting your bowmen get attacked, even Astrid. Especially Astrid. Canto + Bow = win.

[Destiny Hero]

MEG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I used to be a huge Meg fan ^_^

[Former Guest]

I never said Rolf wasn't good. He's fine. It's just Astrid and to a lesser extent, Leo, who are subpar.

Huh? No, all of them suck choad like Meg. Hard mode proves it. For them to be any good, they'll require less favoritism than........who, exactly?

Leonardo and Rolf begin sucking massively. There are plenty of superior options within their respective initial squads (never mind act 4) - namely, most everyone - you could be fielding instead once the awesome option to bench them arises (or Leo can be dragged out to fill the deployment quota and still be failure even with his Prf bow plus BEXP - Rolf isn't so lucky). Astrid is no better off but not much worse off either as she's barely around for acts 2-3 and thus not going to be building up as much suck.

Unless it's completely unavoidable, you shouldn't be letting your bowmen get attacked, even Astrid. Especially Astrid. Canto + Bow = win.

Or I could use Shinon to my heart's content, outfit him with a crossbow (much later on the SS bow) on the front lines, and not worry about dying ever compared to a great many others.

With enough people on my team who can one-round a very fair deal and flip KO the bird on enemy phase besides him, your total might as well be Lose/Who Gives a Shit? What Astrid is made of, essentially.

Edited November 2, 2008 by Former Guest

[Florete]

I never said Rolf wasn't good. He's fine. It's just Astrid and to a lesser extent, Leo, who are subpar.

Huh? No, all of them suck choad like Meg. Hard mode proves it. For them to be any good, they'll require less favoritism than........who, exactly?

Leonardo and Rolf begin sucking massively. There are plenty of superior options within their respective initial squads (never mind act 4) - namely, most everyone - you could be fielding instead once the awesome option to bench them arises (or Leo can be dragged out to fill the deployment quota and still be failure even with his Prf bow plus BEXP - Rolf isn't so lucky). Astrid is no better off but not much worse off either as she's barely around for acts 2-3 and thus not going to be building up as much suck.

Unless it's completely unavoidable, you shouldn't be letting your bowmen get attacked, even Astrid. Especially Astrid. Canto + Bow = win.

Or I could use Shinon to my heart's content, outfit him with a crossbow (much later on the SS bow) on the front lines, and not worry about dying ever compared to a great many others.

With enough people on my team who can one-round a very fair deal and flip KO the bird on enemy phase besides him, your total might as well be Lose/Who Gives a Shit? What Astrid is made of, essentially.

Leo doesn't start sucking unless all of the units at first tier start sucking. Leo comes in the first map at level 4 with decently good bases. Rolf is worse in comparison to the rest of his team, but he's actually not bad to start and gets pretty good pretty quickly.

Astrid, on the other hand, is one of few in her chapters that actually gets any significant experience, and feeding her kills is easy since Geoffrey and maybe Kieran are the only guys one-rounding anything. Levelling her is easy, and she can quickly surpass the others on her team.

And Crossbows suck. No getting around that.

[Reikken]

Leo doesn't start sucking unless all of the units at first tier start sucking.

Everyone starts sucking except Nolan, Jill, and Ilyana. Mostly Nolan.

[Florete]

Everyone starts sucking except Nolan, Jill, and Ilyana. Mostly Nolan.

Nolan starts off losing 3 AS.

Jill is the same unless she has transfer bonuses.

Ilyana isn't doubling or dodging a thing without transfer bonuses.

They all have positives and negatives to them.

[Former Guest]

I think you missed my gist. Leonardo starts functioning considerably worse than take-your-pick beorc on the field (besides......Fiona........or Meg ) and remains that way for the rest of the game, as does Rolf.

They all have positives and negatives to them.

Yes, but few have any as scant or as gaping, respectively, as these two kids.

[Florete]

Rolf passes up Shinon fairly quickly. They both end the same, though. I prefer Shinon.

[Former Guest]

Rolf passes up Shinon fairly quickly.

And how is that, with the sheer handholding he requires, hmmmm?

That already casts a negative light on Rolf, and if investing in him paid off as you say it does (it doesn't, since I could have devoted a slot to someone better), he would stay ahead of Shinon (which he doesn't) and not tie as you say they do (which he doesn't).

Edited November 3, 2008 by Former Guest

[Florete]

And how is that, with the sheer handholding he requires, hmmmm?

That already casts a negative light on Rolf, and if investing in him paid off as you say it does (it doesn't, since I could have devoted a slot to someone better), he would stay ahead of Shinon (which he doesn't) and not tie as you say they do (which he doesn't).

He doesn't start out bad. Only Ike and Titania are one-rounding anything, possibly Shinon, when you get them, so getting him a few kills isn't hard. He's tied for the highest strength growth in the game and is only real bad growth is resistance, which isn't as much as a problem when he's one-shotting most mages. They tie because their caps are the same, and they can both reach them all fairly easily. Rolf is also an easier unit to get transfer bonuses with.

[Reikken]

Nolan starts off losing 3 AS.

So what? He's not getting doubled, and he wipes the floor with everyone else until Sothe joins. He takes like 4 hits to die instead of 1 or 2 like the others, and he does more than twice as much damage.

Jill is the same unless she has transfer bonuses.

No. Forged iron with the same mt is lighter, more accurate, and most importantly, cheaper. You should never touch unforged steel weaponry (except steel bows since they have +4 mt over iron instead of +3 and only +2 wt instead of +4) unless you have no choice, like in part 2.

Ilyana isn't doubling or dodging a thing without transfer bonuses.

She's like Micaiah except she doesn't get doubled and doesn't die in one hit. Or like Leo except can counter melee, avoid counters from archers, and does more damage. Maybe that still qualifies as sucky, but she's certainly better than the other unpromoteds that aren't Jill or Nolan.

Edited November 3, 2008 by Reikken

[Florete]

So what? He's not getting doubled, and he wipes the floor with everyone else until Sothe joins. He takes like 4 hits to die instead of 1 or 2 like the others, and he does more than twice as much damage per hit.

He's taking more hits to the face than Edward, who is your only other frontliner. He'd be much better with an Iron Axe.

No. Forged iron with the same mt is lighter, more accurate, and most importantly, cheaper. You should never touch unforged steel weaponry (except steel bows since they have +4 mt over iron instead of +3) unless you have no choice, like in part 2.

Very true.

She's like Micaiah except she doesn't get doubled and doesn't die in one hit. Or like Leo except can counter melee, avoid counters from archers, and does more damage. Maybe that still qualifies as sucky, but she's certainly better than the other unpromoteds that aren't Jill or Nolan.

She's only good until you beat the dragon chapter, and is still frail before that. Don't get me wrong, I love her, but I actually would say Micaiah is likely better.

[Former Guest]

She's like Micaiah except she doesn't get doubled and doesn't die in one hit.

+Shade, which is >>>>> no Shade and unlike Cancel, a suitable skill for a unit not so inclined to take counters or get mobbed by Def-targetting foes.

[Former Guest]

Rolf is also an easier unit to get transfer bonuses with.

Except he's balls in Radiance as well, which has been gone over and substantiated countless times, so you'd have to be a fanboy.

[Reikken]

He's taking more hits to the face than Edward, who is your only other frontliner. He'd be much better with an Iron Axe.

Edward does not start out with anything anywhere near good avoid, if that's what you're implying. And +6 avoid wouldn't help Nolan be any better. An 84% chance to get hit is really no better than a 90% chance. The 3 extra damage is much more helpful. And iron axes don't have that much more hit either. No, a steel axe is the best choice.

She's only good until you beat the dragon chapter, and is still frail before that. Don't get me wrong, I love her, but I actually would say Micaiah is likely better.

I'm not saying that Ilyana is better. Micaiah is certainly better, because she has an 80% magic growth, Thani, a better affinity, and gets staves at tier 2. But this isn't about who is better. This is about who starts off better.

[Florete]

Except he's balls in Radiance as well, which has been gone over and substantiated countless times, so you'd have to be a fanboy.

How can I be a female fanboy?

He's easily usable in PoR no matter how much anyone thinks he sucks. He's easier to get stats capped in that than Shinon is, that's for sure.

[sandmanccl]

Edward does not start out with anything anywhere near good avoid, if that's what you're implying. And +6 avoid wouldn't help Nolan be any better. An 84% chance to get hit is really no better than a 90% chance. The 3 extra damage is much more helpful. And iron axes don't have that much more hit either. No, a steel axe is the best choice.

On hard mode, using a steel axe gets Nolan double-attacked. Iron is better until his strength catches up because it causes significant AS loss due to high weight.

Addressing Ilyana:

Ilyana is terrible, in my opinion. If you want a ranged person in Part 1, Leonardo is better. You can buy him a Longbow before the chapter you pick up Z, Jill and Big T, and while I know there's an associated loss to accuracy at 3 range, you can pretty much leave him to fight on top of ledges in almost every chapter so that won't be much of a problem. While Ilyana is targetting resistances so she does more damage when she actually hits, Leonardo doesn't miss unless you're at max range with the Longbow and so he is more reliable.

Let's not forget that Leonardo is actually faster than Ilyana, who I believe is tied with Brom for slowest Beorc unit in the game. (The other people with 30% speed growths have better bases, so they are the only ones that end up with less than 30 speed on average. Even Sigrun, with the worst speed growth of any Beorc unit, ends up faster.) If you're calling Leonardo slow, you're calling Ilyana slow. To seal the deal, he gets a pretty nifty bow that will probably get him fast enough to double-attack anything assuming you use him on par with what the game devs figured you'd do for people you planned on keeping level equivalent with enemies.

Hell, Micaiah is almost as fast as Ilyana. She gets doubled by enemies as easily as Micaiah does, except she doesn't have Micaiah's ridiculous luck score so she's not likely to dodge. Yeah, she's got Shade, but then again so does anyone else if you strip it from Ilyana and give it to a unit that matters. Go compare stats and tell me there's much of a difference. Micaiah vs. Ilyana. Let's not forget Micaiah can heal people before tier 3 (before tier 2 even), has a unique tome that obliterates a large number of enemies in Part 1, and is one of the two main characters of the game so you can't get rid of her even if you wanted to.

He's also more durable than she is, which I don't care about but it seems to mean something to you guys. His defense is better than hers, his HP is better than hers. She beats him in resistance, but that's kind of a given because she's a mage and has significantly better caps in that area.

Yeah, Ilyana has more playtime. Wait, no she doesn't. Reason: you're not going to use her in Part 3. Even if you used her a lot in Part 1, you're lucky to get her to level 5 or so as a Sage. The ONLY map you can bring her on that she doesn't hold back other better units is the map she rejoins on. At least Leonardo is playable on every map he's available on and is a benefit to your team on each of those maps.

Using Ilyana is a detriment to your team. You're better off letting the experience she'd get go to another DB member that doesn't leave that party to make their Part 3 maps easier. Everyone is worth using at least once, but that's about all Ilyana is good for, is variety's sake.

In regards to Rolf:

Rolf ranks among the best units in FE10. Saying he requires babying is hilarious because it's incredibly easy to gain him levels in Part 3. He gains twice the XP Shinon does for hits and kills because of Shinon's massive level lead, and as Fox pointed out, there's only a handful of units that will one-shot enemies for you. Shinon won't be doing it on his own without crits.

[Reikken]

On hard mode, using a steel axe gets Nolan double-attacked.

You are mistaken. Unless you're talking about later chapters, like 1-4 and on, in which case you're talking about something else entirely. By then, you can forge iron axes, so he has no more reason to use any unforged steel or iron.

and while I know there's an associated loss to accuracy at 3 range, you can pretty much leave him to fight on top of ledges in almost every chapter so that won't be much of a problem.

I can count one chapter (1-5) where you can do that. The other chapters either don't have ledges or don't have enemies below the ledges. Or don't have enemies below them that you need 3 range to reach. And this is also beside the point.

While Ilyana is targetting resistances so she does more damage when she actually hits, Leonardo doesn't miss unless you're at max range with the Longbow and so he is more reliable.

Stop using Elthunder. It sucks. You can forge a thunder tome that's just as strong but with much more hit for the same cost or not much more.

Let's not forget that Leonardo is actually faster than Ilyana,

This isn't about later on. This is about who starts off not sucking. I know Ilyana is terrible and Leo is better. She just doesn't start terrible. She starts faster than Leo, doing much more damage, and has more versatility (can counter melee and avoid counters from archers).

and to your Micaiah bit.. Micaiah has about 8 spd by the time you get Ilyana, who has 13.

post that started this discussion:

Leo doesn't start sucking unless all of the units at first tier start sucking.

Everyone starts sucking except Nolan, Jill, and Ilyana. Mostly Nolan.

Edited November 3, 2008 by Reikken