Rate the Unit 5: Alfred

[Imuabicus der Fertige]

Guidelines:

2.1.) mention the diffculty on which you rate the unit 

2.2.) what classes your unit went through, what skills they had and so on; don´t consider obviously suboptimal builds.

2.3.) no DLC rings, no non-unit DLC bonuses

2.4.) no grinding in skirmishes

2.5.) no rng abuse (no resetting for bond rings)

2.6.) cooking is allowed

2.7.) ratings to be given in the format X/10

2.8.) if it isn´t mentioned above, it´s fair game

2.9.) no "Kagetsu exists and obsoletes Lapis, 0/10", explain your rating

 

Unit: Alfred

Class: Noble

                     Lvl   HP    STR   MAG   DEX   SPD    LCK   DEF    RES     BLD

Bases:          5     27      9        2          10      6         8       8         5        5

T. Bases:      5      5       2        0         4        1         4       2          1        0

Growths:      /     65     40       5       35      40      40     40       20       10

 

Personal Skill:  If unit uses Wait without attacking or using items, grants Str+2 for 1 turn.

Innate Proficiency: Lance

SP: 300

 

Support Bonuses:

C Hit +10

B Hit +10, Crit +3, Avoid +5

A Hit +10, Crit +3, Avoid +10

S Hit +10, Crit +3, Avoid +20

 

Tools and mo stats:

Engage Numbers - Google Tabellen

Average Stats - Fire Emblem: Engage (FE17) (triangleattack.com)

 

Rating: 3.75

Next unit on Monday

Edited June 26, 2023 by Imuabicus der Fertige

[Barren]

So it’s time to talk about Alfred. One of the first royals you automatically recruit in this game. They are good right? Well, maybe not all of them but is he good? Also slight correction @Imuabicus der Fertige he actually has a 5% build growth because according to the calculator you provided he gets 1 point of build by level 14 assuming that he kept him from promoting until that time.

 

First off I will say that his starting base stats are pretty underwhelming and loses 1 point of speed thanks to him being weighed down by an iron lance that he comes with. On hard mode, it’s not too bad but on maddening, being doubled by around 90% of the enemies during his joining chapter is a not a good first impression. Though to be fair, he is bulky enough for his joining chapter to not be OHKO by the sword fighters or the lance fliers since 27 HP and 8 defense isn’t all that terrible.

 

And I know that part of this criteria is to not compare any physical unit to Kagetsu since he’s really damn good, but he does get over shadowed by Chloe and to an extent Louis one chapter later. That’s really a pretty bad first impression for the guy.

 

But let’s say you did want to keep using him, his growths are not too bad but you wish his bases were better. Like at least 1 across the board including build. His unique class promotion Avenir gives him an A rank in lances and B rank in swords. He would then eventually learn Golden Lotus which is Pavise basically. Part of the problem is that his unique class doesn’t address the problems he has. Which is he needs better speed to at least not get doubled.

Mekkah in his video, talking to a co-host about Alfred pointed out that there is more utility he can provide before the end of chapter 10 when you use a master seal then later a second seal you can make him a Great Knight for better defense, Royal/Griffon Knight for staff utility. Now don’t get me wrong. All of these sound pretty good if you could get him to contribute somehow, but these roles can be used by strictly better units.

 

He just doesn’t feel like worth a go after his own’s country’s arc but if you believe in him as a underdog, absolutely go for it. The thing about Fire Emblem is that you can take anyone can make them good. Stat boosters exists and knowing their better matchups is always the key so yes your mileage will vary.

 

I would honestly give him a 5/10. He just gets over shadowed as a lance user pretty badly as the game goes on and while he could venture outside of his unique class, just be aware that others can do his job better than he could. Except for being a  staff bot as a royal knight with Canter, or a chain attack bot with dual assist as a hero. Anyone can accomplish that.

 

[lenticular]

So, let's start with the positive points about Alfred. He has pretty decent bulk when you first grab him, and can almost work like a second, worse version of Vander. He also has access to a unique class, meaning that technically he can do some stuff that nobody else can do.

And that's about all the positive things I have to say about him. Even when you first pick him up, he's not particularly impressive. He does have halfway decent bulk, as I said, and he arrives early enough in the game that even just having a warm body is useful. But right from the start, he isn't really bringing anything unique to the table, while everyone else is. Boucheron has chain attacks, Etie has effective damage against fliers, Clanne doe magic damage, etc. But Alfred is just worse Vander. This isn't the worst thing to be, since Vander is still your best unit at this point, but being in direct competition with said best unit is an immediate mark against Alfred's usefulness.

Then as we move into the mdeium term, he's still getting outclassed. One chapter after you get Alfred, you also get Louis, who is better as a tank, and Chloé, who is better as a highly mobile player-phase attacker. Once again, there's no role where Alfred particularly excels.

And then in the long term, he ends up getting seriously outclassed by multiple late joiners. Which is a flaw that is shared by most early recruits and not something that's unique to Alfred, but most of the other early recruits have a better early game, either in terms of overall performance or in terms of having a specific niche.

I'm also not particularly impressed by his unique class. Golden Lotus is pretty bad. Even at level 20/20 (or 10/20/10) you can still only expect a dex of around 25, which means an activation rate of 25%. Which is equivalent to saying that each physical hit will on average be reduced by 1/8. Or, as an alternative, you could just have promoted him to Great Knight instead of Avenir, which has 5 higher base def, which is going to save you from more damage on average unless you're being hit for over 40 damage at a time. And just having more defense is also something that is reliable and can be planned for.

I don't want to come across as too down on him because, like almost all units in the game, I don't doubt that he can turn out decently if you use him regularly and invest in him. And he does come in at least a little bit useful when you first get him. But overall, I'm not impressed. 4/10.

[SnowFire]

Alfred as a 20/20 Avenir:

55 HP, 29 Str, 6 Mag, 25 Dex, 23 Spd, 31 Def, 18 Res, 28 Lck, 11 Bld, 6 Move
HP is good, Defense is great, but...  bad Speed (penalized further by build), bad Res.  Str is okay by endgame but he's a growth unit there so it's gonna take awhile for that to catch up.

--

I used Alfred all the way through to the bitter end in my first playthrough on Hard.  I was pleasantly surprised by his character - he's a bit deeper than just one funny quirk, so I like him as a person!  But he was bad, so bad.  He was both strength and build-screwed and kept his base build like the entire game, so he was weighed down by everything from his bodybuilding failure, worse build than my Chloe.  Ended up being a mobile source of Reposition...  which given how important placement is, a tanky unit that repos frail units out of the way is still handy.  But the tankiness was compromised by the bad speed.

Anyway, Alfred is sadly pretty ditchable.  I suspect many people will try out Sigurd on him - I certainly did - and that will absolutely help salvage his usability, but this will be Sigurd being good, not Alfred.  He has major trouble killing stuff until a lot of catchup, and the idea of a mobile tank is compromised by his weak speed as already noted.  You can find uses for him, sure, but why not use better units?  Avenir having access to both Sword & Lance is nice, I guess, but is probably more useful on offensive units that can kill but need a double to do so.  For a tank....  honestly, being broken on a tank isn't that bad.  The AI likes to fish for breaks, so if they want to break a Great Knight (Lances) Alfred with an axe unit, please do.

Alfred isn't unusable or anything, and as I noted in my opening post, he'd get a slightly nicer score if this was some cross-series ranking.  But within Engage?  3/10, only escaping 2/10 from simply existing when deploy slots aren't that contested.  He should probably be ushered to the bench once you hit the Brodia arc if playing "optimally".

[Imuabicus der Fertige]

On 6/22/2023 at 11:39 AM, Barren said:

So it’s time to talk about Alfred. One of the first royals you automatically recruit in this game. They are good right? Well, maybe not all of them but is he good? Also slight correction @Imuabicus der Fertige he actually has a 5% build growth because according to the calculator you provided he gets 1 point of build by level 14 assuming that he kept him from promoting until that time.

I dunno how i messed it up, but allegedly he has 10%.

´tis fixed now either way

[Dark Holy Elf]

Alfred is the least useful unit we've rated so far.

Stat-wise he has surprisingly bad speed (amplified by not-great build) and no super strong points to make up for this (his str and def are both a bit above average, but that's it). He's arguably the worst unit on his join chapter - Clanne has magic for troubleshooting armours, Etie troubleshoots fliers, Boucheron provides linked attacks. Then he faces extra competition from there on as you get two other lance users who are arguably the two stars of the starting squad. And long-term he just doesn't really offer much. He does have some utility early, but in both playthroughs he was one of the first units I dropped, and I don't really regret that.

I don't think he's the worst unit in the game, and I'm inclined to rate Engage on a 2~9 scale instead of 1~10. I could be argued into a 2, since I do think he's quite a bit worse than Clanne, but sure, 3/10 works.