Ice Dragon's Analysis Column: Hana v. Swords (Beta)

[Ice Dragon]

My mass match-up calculator is now in PROD. This means I can finally begin doing analyses in earnest. However, I'm still configuring the list of opponents, so the analysis column for the time being is still in beta.

If there are any character builds I should be aware of in this and future analyses, feel free to include those in the responses in addition to comments about the analyses themselves. Here are a few I already plan to address:

• Any sword-user with Swordbreaker.
• Robin (M) and other mages with Close Counter and a forced follow-up attack skill (Weaponbreaker or Quick Riposte).
• Takumi and Ryoma with Vantage.

If you have any more detailed builds, I would be grateful for those, too.

Anyways, onto the first beta analysis. Note that I am still covering a limited set of opponents (in this case, vanilla swords and swords with Swordbreaker), hence the "beta" disclaimer. I'm using Smogon's section headers because they work. I don't care if you don't like Smogon; at the very least, they know how to write good competitive analyses.

Tell me what you think of the analysis, of the format, or of how I can make the thing less wordy without sacrificing content (because it will only get wordier when I add more enemies and enemy builds into the mix).

 

Hana

Infantry, Red Sword
Level 40 Stats:  37 / 35 / 36 / 23 / 26 (Total: 157)
Positive Nature: +4 / +3 / +3 / +3 / +3
Negative Nature: -3 / -3 / -3 / -3 / -4

Default Skills

• Weapon: Armorkiller+
• Assist: Rally Atk
• Special: (none)
• Passive A: Life and Death 3
• Passive B: Obstruct 3
• Passive C: (none)

Overview

• Hana has very high base Atk and Spd. She naturally learns Life and Death 3, which pushes her offensive stats even higher.
• Hana has below average Def and Res, both of which are decreased by Life and Death 3 to well below average.
• Hana naturally lacks a special skill and a C-type passive skill.
• Obstruct is difficult to make use of. Her weak defenses mean she will be more likely the target of enemy attacks than her teammates.
• Hana cannot be pulled as a natural 5-star character. This makes it easier to hunt for a good nature and easier for her to gain SP to learn inherited skills, but also requires the high promotion cost to reach 5-star rarity.

Shielded Glass Cannon

Stats: 37 / 51 / 36 / 18 / 17 (Total: 159)

• Nature: +Atk, -Res
• Weapon: Brave Sword+
• Assist: ---
• Special: Escutcheon
• Passive A: Life and Death 3
• Passive B: Swordbreaker 3 / Desperation 3
• Passive C: Threaten Atk 3 / Threaten Def 3 / Savage Blow 3

Her high base Atk and Spd with Life and Death 3 give her a massive 51 Atk and 36 Spd with a Brave Sword+. This set sacrifices Hana's bulk for a strong offensive presence both on player phase and enemy phase.

Escutcheon is used as the special skill due to the high damage Hana takes on counterattack and enemy phase due to her low defenses. Many of the common sword-users can deal over 30 damage to her and most blue units deal far more, meaning Escutcheon is mitigating at least 9 damage against them. Even if it rarely prevents her from taking more than 50% damage, it allows her to survive many otherwise fatal attacks:

• Sharena with Fensalir against Hana with Escutcheon ready: 39 - 11 = 28 (76%) damage.
• +Atk Azura with Sapphire Lance+ against Hana with Escutcheon ready: 46 - 13 = 33 (89%) damage.
• -Atk Effie with Silver Lance+ and Death Blow 3 against Hana with Escutcheon ready: 51 - 15 = 36 (97%) damage.

Due to Escutcheon's low cooldown of 2 and the fact that Hana fails to kill any sword-user other than -HP Hana and -Def Hana on the first hit from her Brave Sword+, Escutcheon will always be ready to activate on the opponent's counterattack or on enemy phase if the enemy is killed before it can counterattack.

Swordbreaker should typically be used as the B passive skill to negate Swordbreaker on opposing sword-users. If opponents with Swordbreaker are not an issue, Desperation can be used instead to guarantee all 4 hits of her Brave Sword+, assuming Hana out-speeds her opponent, land before the opponent is capable of counterattacking.

Against opposing sword-users with Swordbreaker, Hana with Swordbreaker will fail to kill only the following in a single round of combat (all unmentioned stats neutral): +Def Marth (3 HP), +Def Eldigan (1 HP), +Spd Ogma (1 HP), Corrin (M) (2 HP), Hinata (1 HP), +Def Selena (5 HP), Draug (8 HP).

On enemy phase, assuming Escutcheon is ready to activate, only few opponents, mostly those capable of attacking twice, are capable of killing Hana in a single round of combat: Ogma, Lon'qu, Hana, Cain, +Atk Caeda, and +Atk Draug.

If Hana is using Desperation, the opposing sword-user is not using Swordbreaker, and Desperation is not yet active, Hana has identical matchups as above.

If Hana is using Swordbreaker and the opposing sword-user is not using Swordbreaker, only +Def Eldigan (1 HP), Hinata (1 HP), and Draug (8 HP) survive one round of combat.

Threaten Atk 3 allows Hana to better tank enemy units, assuming they end their turn within range. Threaten Def 3 allows Hana to avoid taking counterattack damage from many of the tankier sword-users that normally survive the first two hits, again assuming they end their turn within range. Savage Blow 3 deals small AoE damage that can help teammates kill nearby enemies.

Usage Tips

Escutcheon only activates at melee range, meaning Hana is still vulnerable to archers and mages.

Hana at full HP with Escutcheon ready to activate can be left in the open in an emergency to tank a single hit, provided it is not from a ranged unit or Effie (or a special skill activation).

Team Options

A +4 Atk buff, e.g. from Hone Atk 3, allows her to land a one-round kill on all unboosted sword-users in the game except +Def Hinata (1 HP) and +Def Draug (4 HP).

Hana greatly appreciates healing support, even from weaker sources like Ardent Sacrifice and Breath of Life 3. No sword-user is capable of bringing Hana below 9 HP on a counterattack, allowing Ardent Sacrifice to bring her HP high enough for Swordbreaker 3 to reactivate. The only sword-users capable of bringing Hana below 12 HP on a counterattack are +Atk Chrom and +Atk Eldigan; Breath of Life 3 brings her HP high enough for Swordbreaker 3 to reactivate against anyone else.

Because Hana can only attack at melee range, she benefits from repositioning skills to move her closer to her target or pull her back to safety after an attack. Using a Dancer allows Hana to move again on the same turn, either killing another enemy unit or moving back to safety.

Other Options

Using Death Blow 3 (37 / 46 [52] / 31 / 23 / 22) instead of Life and Death 3 (37 / 51 / 36 / 18 / 17) allows Hana to survive one round of combat on player phase with greater than 50% health remaining due to having better defenses. In exchange, assuming Hana is using Swordbreaker, she loses one-round kills against +Spd Chrom with Swordbreaker, +Def Ogma with Swordbreaker, +Spd Seliph with Swordbreaker, +Def Roy with Swordbreaker, +Def Corrin (M) with Swordbreaker, and +Spd Stahl with Swordbreaker, and she is far easier to double attack and kill on enemy phase due her much lower 31 Spd.

Edited March 20, 2017 by Ice Dragon

[Elieson]

20 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

My mass match-up calculator is now in PROD. This means I can finally begin doing analyses in earnest. However, I'm still configuring the list of opponents, so the analysis column for the time being is still in beta.

If there are any character builds I should be aware of in this and future analyses, feel free to include those in the responses in addition to comments about the analyses themselves. Here are a few I already plan to address:

• Any sword-user with Swordbreaker.
• Robin (M) and other mages with Close Counter and a forced follow-up attack skill (Weaponbreaker or Quick Riposte).
• Takumi and Ryoma with Vantage.

If you have any more detailed builds, I would be grateful for those, too.

I'm probably a few days away from finishing my own variant of a Mass Calc that accomodates for full -built skill matchups.

 

You should probably cover Fury 3 variants of every unit, as it's no doubt going to be one of the most commonly run skills in the Arena at higher levels. I'm personally taking it slowly until the new Arena mechanics are unveiled, before diving into the full analysis, since matchmaking might vary based on the quantity of altered skills, team layouts and more.

Regarding the Format; I'd personally put the +/- Nature stats in seperate rows (a row for Positives, and a row for Negatives), sharing the +4 / -3 or w/e potentials exist. Most people viewing these won't know who has a +4 or a -4, and will probably need explanaition to grasp the concept. Save yourself the effort and just add one row while retooling your current 2nd row. 

Also, post the stats of your "builds". Passive A skills like Fury, Death Blow and Life and Death all handle stats differently and when seeing numbers, people can make more educated assumptions for themselves based on what they're actually...seeing, rather than scrolling back and forth to figure stuff out for themselves, and compare stats of say, Death Blow vs Fury in terms of durability, etc.

As for the review itself; format looks good. You should probably consider optimized mass damage builds of units, running Reprisal and Moonbow instead of durability boosters like Esc/Pavise. IMO if you're running your Threaten Atk/Def build, why not run a build with Threaten Spd? It can offset the -5 from Braves and help grant some safety from getting doubled back by the key reds that she doesn't naturally obliterate, like Lucinas.

Edited March 20, 2017 by Elieson

[Florete]

This is pretty crazy elaborate. Good work. Two questions:

1. Why no Assist? My guess would be that assists typically are chosen based on the rest of the team rather than the unit itself, but I still feel you could pick an assist that seems most suited to the unit. In Hana's case, I'd go with Swap or Pivot for easy escaping or defending against axes. They can also work well alongside Obstruct should someone leave that on her.

2. Who's Celice? And Serena, but I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be Selena.

[Ice Dragon]

1 hour ago, Elieson said:

I'm probably a few days away from finishing my own variant of a Mass Calc that accomodates for full -built skill matchups.

My current one has one sheet to specify up to 2 player characters (fully customizable), one sheet to specify up to 200 enemy characters (also fully customizable), and one sheet for a digest of results. I'm planning on expanding to 4 player characters (requires copy-pasting with find-replace on several sheets, so not too hard) and increasing the enemy character limit to 1000 so long as doing so doesn't kill the time it takes to run the calculations. Worst-case scenario, I can use plain-text documents to hold the lists of test cases.

 

1 hour ago, Elieson said:

You should probably cover Fury 3 variants of every unit, as it's no doubt going to be one of the most commonly run skills in the Arena at higher levels. I'm personally taking it slowly until the new Arena mechanics are unveiled, before diving into the full analysis, since matchmaking might vary based on the quantity of altered skills, team layouts and more.

Oh god, double the test cases. I guess that's what expanding the spreadsheet is for.

 

1 hour ago, Elieson said:

Regarding the Format; I'd personally put the +/- Nature stats in seperate rows (a row for Positives, and a row for Negatives), sharing the +4 / -3 or w/e potentials exist. Most people viewing these won't know who has a +4 or a -4, and will probably need explanaition to grasp the concept. Save yourself the effort and just add one row while retooling your current 2nd row. 

Done. Added build stats at the top of the build section and in-line stats in the other options section.

 

1 hour ago, Elieson said:

As for the review itself; format looks good. You should probably consider optimized mass damage builds of units, running Reprisal and Moonbow instead of durability boosters like Esc/Pavise. IMO if you're running your Threaten Atk/Def build, why not run a build with Threaten Spd? It can offset the -5 from Braves and help grant some safety from getting doubled back by the key reds that she doesn't naturally obliterate, like Lucinas.

Almost everything that Hana fails to out-speed is still dying before they get a chance to counterattack. I don't think Threaten Spd is as useful as the other two because it doesn't gain her as much. Threaten Atk decreases enemy counterattack damage, Threaten Def prevents enemies from counterattacking as a result of being dead.

Threaten Spd means Hana is still getting counterattacked for the same damage, but only gains one-round kills against +Def Marth, +Spd Ogma, Corrin (M), and +Def Serena. Now that I think of it, this could probably have been mentioned under other options, at least, because this information would actually be useful.

 

I actually specifically left out Reprisal, Moonbow, and Glimmer builds because Hana is already one-round killing so many enemies. I suppose that could be added under the other options because you do gain a few kills with them.

 

54 minutes ago, Florete said:

1. Why no Assist? My guess would be that assists typically are chosen based on the rest of the team rather than the unit itself, but I still feel you could pick an assist that seems most suited to the unit. In Hana's case, I'd go with Swap or Pivot for easy escaping or defending against axes. They can also work well alongside Obstruct should someone leave that on her.

Mostly because I'm sleepy and it really does depend on the rest of your team.

 

54 minutes ago, Florete said:

2. Who's Celice? And Serena, but I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be Selena.

Remembering English localized names is hard. I'll fix that.

 

EDIT: @Elieson Moonbow or Reprisal gains her a kill against +Def Eldigan and =Def Hinata, but loses her a kill against +Atk Chrom because Chrom kills her on the counterattack. Probably not worth it unless you want to want to chip a lance for more damage.

EDIT2: Well, that's unfortunate. I can't add a third player character because it would exceed the maximum number of cells allowed in a single Google Sheets spreadsheet. I guess I'm stuck at 2 player characters and 1000 enemy characters.

Edited March 20, 2017 by Ice Dragon

[DehNutCase]

@Ice Dragon30 minutes after I write about how you'll never see L&D Swordbreaker Hana in arena, I see a topic discussing L&D Swordbreaker Hana.

: /

Don't forget +Hp Swordbreaker Selena also survives with 3 hp.

(In other news, thank god +Atk Death Blow 3 Chrom is the only brave sword user Selena can't survive with Fury 3, and Selena 1 rounds him).

Edited March 20, 2017 by DehNutCase

[Ice Dragon]

7 minutes ago, DehNutCase said:

30 minutes after I write about how you'll never see L&D Swordbreaker Hana in arena, I see a topic discussing L&D Swordbreaker Hana.

To be fair, you probably won't. She's far too easy for a player to pick off on an arena defense team because the AI won't bother to play her carefully. A player would also be able to better use the terrain to their advantage since she's limited to melee combat.

On the other hand, you can probably scare the crap out of people with her, though. However, if I were to use Hana for arena defense, she'd use Wings of Mercy instead of Swordbreaker because the AI is very good at using Wings of Mercy to get kills and has no real loss from trading 1 unit for 1 unit.

[Silith13]

My Hana is -Hp and +Atk (also only 4*) She dies to Takumi's in one shot. Was thinking of going Killing Edge instead of a brave sword since the brave cuts down her speed to the point where she cannot double some of the other sword users anymore (Like Lucina)

[Elieson]

@Ice Dragon

Duplicate a spreadsheet and give everyone +3 to all nonHP stats, and null out their Passive A, to just speed things up. Last time i did three dozem+ calcs per cell for a few hundred  cells, it lagged hard and i ended up just porting all my work to Excel if not to only save myself time since Google performs calcs every time you change any value anywhere, and it cant be disabled like in excel

Edited March 20, 2017 by Elieson

[Ice Dragon]

27 minutes ago, Elieson said:

@Ice Dragon

Duplicate a spreadsheet and give everyone +3 to all nonHP stats, and null out their Passive A, to just speed things up. Last time i did three dozem+ calcs per cell for a few hundred  cells, it lagged hard and i ended up just porting all my work to Excel if not to only save myself time since Google performs calcs every time you change any value anywhere, and it cant be disabled like in excel

Performance seems to be fast enough to not have to worry about that. I can keep typing while Google does its calculations.

Plus, if I just give everyone +3 to stats, that won't automatically subtract 6 HP at the end of combat. The more work I can have the computer do, the less I have to deal with myself.

[Elieson]

Valid point. if your speeds are fine then not much to worry about sans the actual build.

 

Last thought, mind posting summed BST for arena rating purposes?

[Ice Dragon]

3 minutes ago, Elieson said:

Valid point. if your speeds are fine then not much to worry about sans the actual build.

 

Last thought, mind posting summed BST for arena rating purposes?

Done.

Individual build sums won't be relevant after the April update, but I suppose it doesn't hurt to include them until then.

[Elieson]

1 minute ago, Ice Dragon said:

Individual build sums won't be relevant after the April update, but I suppose it doesn't hurt to include them until then.

Team based summed BST might matter in some way though. Won't know for sure until it comes out.

I have a hunch that it will in some way.

[Sire]

Everything looks great, and the only suggestion I have is to highlight the threats more. Maybe even put a spotlight on common Arena characters too. So...

Quote

"Against opposing sword-users with Swordbreaker, Hana with Swordbreaker will fail to kill only the following in a single round of combat (all unmentioned stats neutral): +Def Marth (3 HP), +Def Eldigan (1 HP), +Spd Ogma (1 HP), Corrin (M) (2 HP), Hinata (1 HP), +Def Selena (5 HP), Draug (8 HP)."

goes to...

"Against opposing sword-users with Swordbreaker, Hana with Swordbreaker will fail to kill only the following in a single round of combat (all unmentioned stats neutral): +Def Marth (3 HP), +Def Eldigan (1 HP), +Spd Ogma (1 HP), Corrin (M) (2 HP), Hinata (1 HP), +Def Selena (5 HP), Draug (8 HP)."
-----
Then again, all this highlighting and bolding may make it read too much like a textbook. I suppose it is a matter of preference.

I would also suggest trying to make a chart, but such things will likely have to be embedded images since I see no real way to make a chart using this forum editor. Lists can work, but they take up far too much vertical space and will have too long a title. ("Red Swords with Swordbreaker || Hana with Swordbreaker" // followed by a long vertical list)

* * * * *

For stat formatting, I highly recommend listing what values are what (newcomers may not know that it goes HP, ATT, SPD, DEF, and RES and see only random numbers). Then, for the Shielded Glass Cannon, include the modifiers so players can understand how they got from base stats to final stats. Here is my version of your chart if you want to use it.

Infantry, Red Sword	HP | ATT | SPD | DEF | RES
Level 40 Base Stats:  	37 | 35  | 36  | 23  | 26
Positive Nature: 	+4 | +3  | +3  | +3  | +3
Negative Nature: 	-3 | -3  | -3  | -3  | -4
----------------------------------------------------
Shielded Glass Cannon	HP | ATT | SPD | DEF | RES
Level 40 Base Stats:  	37 | 35  | 36  | 23  | 26
Boon & Bane:	 	 0 | +3  |  0  |  0  | -4
Brave Sword:	 	 0 | +8  |  0  |  0  |  0
Life and Death:	 	 0 | +5  | +5  | -5  | -5
Final Stats:		37 | 51  | 36  | 18  | 17

Also, for the record, I really, really dislike this forum's editor. It always bugs out on me. (Screw it, I'll submit the post and fix it through the edit.)

---------- Super Edit (3/23/2017) ----------

Just in case you come back to this topic at a later date, I have two requests regarding Hana, @Ice Dragon. Specifically, I want to know Hana's effectiveness against Reds and Blues. (I assume Hana will naturally annihilate all Greens, so I leave them out of the equation.)

1. +ATT, -RES Hana, but with +4 ATT & SPD (from buffs)
2. +SPD, -HP Hana, but with +4 ATT & SPD (from buffs)

Both run Brave Sword +, Life and Death, and Desperation. Assume Desperation is active and the enemy does not have Swordbreaker. For now, leave her Special Skill, Assist Skill, and C Passive blank. (I may try giving my newly pulled +SPD, -HP Hana Threaten DEF for C and maybe Draconic Aura for A depending on her performance against Blues.)

For the most part, I am just curious how effective a +SPD Hana is compared to a +ATT Hana. I know +ATT is likely preferable, but if Hana can activate Desperation on practically everybody (save Lon'Qu and some +SPD characters, provided a SPD Hana has a +4 SPD Buff), I wonder if that will make up for her lack of damage.

Edited March 23, 2017 by Sire
Didn't want to double post, so did a super edit instead.

[Ice Dragon]

On 3/20/2017 at 9:39 AM, Sire said:

---------- Super Edit (3/23/2017) ----------

I'll be at a friend's place after work today, so I won't be home until 6-7 hours from now. I might do a more in-depth look at the numbers when I get home, but here's the digest version gleaned from looking at the colors my calculator spat out (vomit divination, if you will). Vanilla enemies.

I'll also have to take a look at some of the formulas in my spreadsheet. I found a few bugs while looking at my digest report where Desperation wasn't working correctly.

Things +Atk Hana kills that +Spd Hana does not kill with your skill and buff setup (not including negative defense enemies):

• =Def Hinata
• =Def Draug
• =Def Ephraim

Things +Spd Hana kills that +Atk Hana does not kill:

• [=Spd, =Def] Azura
• +Spd Catria
• +Spd Shanna

Things neither Hana kills

• +Def Hinata
• +Def Draug
• +Spd Azura, +Def Azura
• Effie
• Abel
• Sully
• Gwendolyn
• Subaki
• Oboro
• Nowi
• Corrin (F)

Things I don't have stats for yet as enemy units:

• Karel (Wo Dao isn't implemented yet in my calculator)
• Florina (level 40 stats unknown)
• Donnel (level 40 stats unknown)

Things I didn't include because they don't matter:

• Anyone with a staff