Rate the Unit 25: Panette

[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: Panette

Class: Berserker

                     Lvl   HP    STR   MAG   DEX   SPD    LCK   DEF    RES     BLD

Bases:          1      46     25       3        19      13       11        7        11        11

T. Bases:      16    17      12       3        13       7         8        5         9         2

Growths:      /       75     45      10       40      25      30      15       20        15

 

Personal Skill: If unit’s HP is not at max after combat, grants Crit+10 as long as unit’s HP stays below max.

Innate Proficiency: Knife, Axe

SP: 1500

 

Support Bonuses:

C    Hit+15
B    Hit+15, Avoid+5
A    Hit+20, Avoid+5
S    Hit+30, Avoid+5

 

Tools and mo stats:

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

Engage Numbers - Google Tabellen

 

Rating: 9

Next unit on Monday

Edited September 4, 2023 by Imuabicus der Fertige

[samthedigital]

Panette has the best strength stat in the game to go along with a fantastic HP and dex stat. Her build is enough to wield most of the weapons she would want to use without getting weighed down. Everything else (particularly her defense and speed) is middling and need some kind of investment for her to use them effectively.

Before I get to Wrath I want to talk a little bit about how to use the tools in engage to fix Panette's speed. Normally you wouldn't consider her to be particularly fast, but even without heavy investment it is possible to get her speed up enough to double if we want. A base level Wolf Knight Panette has 17 speed, but we can swing it by 11 points with Speed+3, a meal/tonic, a random bond ring, and a covert instruct. That lets her double every enemy in chapter 17 besides the bosses on the top left, and this assumes that she hasn't leveled by this point. If she does level a few times (to get a point of speed) then she can be used as a Wyvern to the same effect depending on what you want out of her.

She can use more permanent resources or a desired emblem too. I think that these are better used on magic units, but if Panette didn't have the Wrath build she'd be the best physical target for these resources because of the strength. I'm really only mentioning this to show that Panette isn't exclusively tied to the Wrath build; her strength stat makes her a good target if we're looking to deal a lot of damage with an emblem attack or something too for example.

Wrath and the 10% crit from her personal skill is what makes Panette really shine though, and if I'm being honest there are enough ways to make it work that we can assume that we have the resources available on most playthroughs. To achieve 100% crit with Wrath against most enemies in Engage on Maddening she needs a +5 Killer weapon and a 20% crit engrave. We can get more crit through various means; Lief engage as a backup, a 30% engrave, and a dexterity instruct are all examples of such. Panette doesn't need them, but she could use them without access to a good forge or something like that. It does give some other units the ability to reach 100% crit too, but they're far more inflexible making Panette the better choice even if it wasn't for her strength (and therefore her OHKO potential) being better* than anyone else we could use.

*Amber has just as much strength assuming the same internal level I think. There are a host of problems with Amber, but he's worth mentioning I guess.

Ike is the natural choice for Panette. That will give her Wrath for free and two open skill slots. I like to use two of Canter, Hit+X, and Vantage. It can be a bit like the 4 move syndrome in Pokemon where I want all of them but don't have enough space. Generally speaking I'll go with Vantage and Hit+X, but Panette can get away without any of those depending on the map, enemy type, and playstyle. Ike also gives her +4 strength which helps with some OHKO thresholds. I found that she starts to lose her one shot potential late in the game against the bulkiest of enemies as a wyvern. It's still my preferred choice because of the movement, but she will naturally reach more as a Warrior if that's your thing, and it gives her a 2 range OHKO option too. Ike also gives her an appreciable amount of bulk. It's not really necessary most of the time because she has Vantage, but there are situations where I will send Panette in to tank because she has Ike, and she does just fine. For example in chapter 19 I like to bait Mauvier and Marni on turn one with Panette to break the gimmick and clear the chapter quickly.

Leif is the second natural option because he gives her Vantage instead. She can have a 1-2 range build making use of Adaptability while not going over a level 9 (or 4?) bond level to make sure it chooses between a Killer Axe and Bow. This build is pretty good; it opens up a 1-2 range enemy nuke that doesn't require Bonded Shield, but it does run into a few more problems that Panette won't run into with Ike. The 25% HP Vantage range and lack of strength make the build less generally applicable in my experience along with being practically forced into the Warrior class.

There are a lot of other emblem options that work too as long as Panette inherits Wrath (except Lyn where she is free to use something else), and it's fairly inexpensive with the well in play even if we distribute our SP evenly among everyone. That's not really happening anyway when we have units like Seadall, Hortensia, etc that aren't using SP books. I could make an exhaustive list of every single emblem that Panette synergizes with, but I'm going to avoid doing that because it seems pretty obvious to me. I just want to mention it because by the end of the game we should assume that Panette gets some sort of emblem if we've been using her the whole time, and she's going to get something good out of it.

Panette starts out somewhat unimpressive. I don't remember for sure, but she might start with a Silver Axe which would weigh her down enough to get doubled by a fair amount of enemies on her starting map. Ideally she gets a forged Killer Axe, but anything that doesn't weigh her down would be a significant upgrade. She can do a lot of damage on a crit for the next few chapters, but she's not really noteworthy until we beat the Ike paralogue because the crit doesn't reach 100% yet. Maybe it can be done sooner, but in my experience it's trivial to do after chapter 15 where we unlock Byleth. Once she gets Wrath and starts OHKOing with a 100% hit/crit setup she's going to be at least tied for the best player phase attacking unit, and when we can get Vantage after chapter 17 she's going to be one of the very few units that has a strong enemy phase presence without Bonded Shield or a lot of stat boosters. If you don't want to cheese it's going to be more difficult and potentially less reliable to set Panette up early, but I have no problem using the game's mechanics to my advantage.

Panette's main drawback in my opinion is her lack of a consistently good 1-2 range option without the Leif setup because of the noted problems with that build. I have theorized a meme Halberdier build with Brionac, but it's an expensive forge, and I'm not sure if she can reach 100% hit/crit with it on Maddening. Don't get me wrong though; Vantage is still really good and is applicable in a variety of situations even if she's limited to attacking at 1 or 2 range. She also doesn't have access to staves in any of the classes that she wants to be in, so she's only going to be used for attacking. Ivy is the only unit that I can think of that doesn't have these downsides, and I'd argue that every other combat unit besides Ivy has more of them than Panette, so my rating of her is going to reflect that.

9.5/10; I haven't used her below Maddening difficulty. If availability was something I considered more strongly maybe I'd dock her half a point, but I didn't do that with Kagetsu either.

In closing I want to quickly mention that I am not that familiar with LTC, but that I am pretty sure that she's a fantastic unit there too. Wrath is far less applicable, so I suspect that she's used for her high damage output relative to the rest of the cast, but I'll leave that to someone with more experience.

Edited August 31, 2023 by samthedigital

[SnowFire]

20/5 Berserker Panette:

70 HP, 42 Str, 5 Mag, 29 Dex, 21 Spd, 19 Def, 10 Res, 16 Lck, 17 Bld, 5 Move

That HP and Str is bananas, easily cast-best, although a lot of this is from leaving her in Berserker with its great Str growth and awful Spd growth.

EDIT: Actually should be 23 Dex in Berserker, see below, but that's because of dopey class maximums - she'd get her full Dex in classes like Warrior or Wyvern.

--

Panette gets a rare no rank from me.  If you use her naively with no skill shenanigans, you have a unit that aims for one-shots via monstrous Str, crits, or both, but whose suspect speed and resistance requires some careful use.  Luckily she can do some raw HP tanking, but still.  However, the real attraction in Panette is the whole Vantage / 100 Crit Leif enemy phase killing spree that gets hyped, and I've never attempted this, but would really want to have to get a sense how reliable & useful it is.

No rank.  (Minimum 6 out of 10 for the 'out of the box' performance,  at least. )

Edited September 4, 2023 by SnowFire

[SumG]

Panette is obviously a good unit.  She's got monstrous strength, a personal ability tailor made for a crit-focused build, and is solid enough in other stats to not be complete dead weight.  I know what the internet consensus is on the unit, but I do want to do at least a bit of due diligence to determine how much she separates herself from other comparable units.

The most comparable units to Panette's stat profile would probably be Amber and Etie.  The most common build I see for Panette is a crit focused Warrior build, so let's look at the stats for these units in Warrior at a comparable level.  I'm picking IL 20, but the specific level doesn't matter that much.

	Lv.	HP	Str	Mag	Dex	Spd	Def	Res	Lck	Bld
Panette	6(20)	49.75	27.7	4.6	22.9	16.25	14.3	9.15	12.2	11.15
Amber	11(20)	44.65	27.95	2	15.75	15.8	13.85	5.05	12.85	12.15
Etie	12(20)	40.45	26.3	1	16.1	16.55	10.9	9.95	12.8	9.45

The Str/Spd combo for these units is all pretty darn similar for all of this units, and those are the two key stats that will determine that build's efficacy in terms of raw damage.  Etie does have low build and will be getting slowed down by a Killer Axe, which does hurt.  The big difference between these units will instead be in terms of survivability.  Etie's bulk is laughable compared to either Panette or Amber, while Amber is definitely a healthy step behind Panette due to lower HP and Res.  And this does even take into account the free 10% bonus crit Panette gets from her personal skill.

My point with this comparison is twofold.  First, Panette's stat profile is not quite unique in this game.  My perception is that most people think that no one else can do the Warrior/Killer Axe build to the same effectiveness as Panette, but I do think Amber could to a reasonably good impersonation if he was obliged to.  And second, Panette definitely has flaws.  I don't think anyone would suggest that Amber or Etie have anywhere near acceptable speed, and Panette is hovering in the same area as those units with her raw stats.  I tried a Panette build using Leif while patching her speed using Speed+5, and to be frank it was not enough for me to feel comfortable.

The speed is definitely patchable, but you will almost certainly need to dedicate one of the previous speed boosting emblems and an inherited ability in order to do it (unless you're using Lyn).  The payoff is certainly there if you do it, but it's not something to ignore.  But I do think Panette is a touch overrated due to the charm of big number crits being fun, and so she tends to receive a bit more favoritism than most people are taking account for.

In comparison to the other top units we've done so far, I don't think I can rate Panette over Ivy or Kagetsu, but I do put her above Pandreo.  So I think that leaves me with Panette being an 8.5/10.

 

[Barren]

Hell Yeah! Time to talk about Panette. This assuming maddening.

 

@samthedigitalpretty much summed up my thoughts on Panette. So in an attempt to not repeat everything he said, I will give the cliff notes version.

 

She joins you along with Timerrs and Merrin at chapter 14. Her strength is among the highest starting bases in the game and her being a berserker helps. She is in no hurry to class change since you can piggyback off of her high ho, strength and build growth for a while. Her personal ability is easy to set up and this essentially makes her a crit machine.

 

Once she switches to warrior her versatility goes up as she can go for crit builds with killer axe/bow while chain attacking as a backup unit. Roy, Leif and Sigurd offer plenty for Panette but Ike for her has the most skills that suits her.

 

Sure she can patch up on her speed to avoid being doubled. But having more HP and defense/res helps her survivability alot.

 

10/10 for me. She’s one of the best physical units in the game if you’re looking for enemy phase builds like Kagetsu excels at player phase.

[Dark Holy Elf]

So I want to talk about how I used Panette on my first playthrough. I saw a monstrous strength stat and mediocre speed and said "you know, I bet if I stacked speed on her via Lyn she'd be really good". I was correct, Panette could double and 2HKO basically everything in the game, with surprisingly better hit than I'm used to from her archetype. Against particularly bulky foes I could try for crits which she's unusually good at too. Anyway she was great, easily one of the best physical units in the game. Like there's a case she's better than any competing Kagetsu build.

And here's the thing: by all accounts, this is not the best use of Panette. Because Lyn is a huge boost for anyone, but Panette can also do incredible things with Ike or Leif if you build around crit instead of speed, so arguably it's a better use of your resources to do just that.

Anyway she's very good. I'm trying to avoid giving many very high scores for this game and ultimately "very good physical combat" is relatively replaceable in this game (on my replay I did not use Panette and certainly built a Merrin and Kagetsu who killed things just as well). So I'll put her in what is now a three-way tie for best physical unit in Engage and give her 8/10.

Edited August 31, 2023 by Dark Holy Elf

[samthedigital]

1 hour ago, SnowFire said:

I've never attempted this, but would really want to have to get a sense how reliable & useful it is.

It's not going to be the same as actually trying yourself, but to give you a quick sense of how reliable Wrath/Vantage is I'll give you an example against a Swordmaster in the last chapter. She has a 100% hit rate and a 95% crit rate against them with a +5 forged Killer Axe engraved with Lyn at xx/20/5. She has 197 hit with the axe, so realistically there's nothing at this point that she won't have a 100% hit rate against. She would need to be engaged with Leif (I don't have any emblems on her right now) to reach 100% crit against them.

1 hour ago, SumG said:

My point with this comparison is twofold.  First, Panette's stat profile is not quite unique in this game.  My perception is that most people think that no one else can do the Warrior/Killer Axe build to the same effectiveness as Panette, but I do think Amber could to a reasonably good impersonation if he was obliged to.

To your point on the Warrior/Killer Axe build:

If we use the 14% crit difference number from the last topic and apply it to the example above then he's only going to have a maximum of 91% crit while engaged with Leif. He could use the Corrin engrave instead to cap out crit, but then his hit rate is going to plummet. In the example above I have Hit+20, so with Corrin he'd have 64 (I might not be mathing wrong, but the enemy has 93 avoid and Lyn gives 40 hit if you want to double check) displayed hit if he had the same dex, and he doesn't. If we want to use a flying class, aren't engaged, want to use a different emblem, etc then his crit is going to be markedly worse. You can criticize my choice of enemy to be sure; I picked one of the worst enemies to show SnowFire because I wanted there to be no doubt that the build is consistent against everything. Still, let's assume that he caps out against a more favorable enemy. He can't take advantage of Ike's +4 strength and will miss out on OHKOs (most of this is based on personal experience, but I looked at damage numbers against a Halberdier to confirm that Panette does need an emblem that gives her strength to one round them).

Anyway, I'm not trying to make Amber look bad, but my point is that to replicate what Panette does he needs to be built in a very specific way whereas Panette has a lot more freedom to choose an emblem or class.  If for the sake of argument these numbers didn't reflect the rest of the game and Amber was able to one shot everything without a lot of investment then wouldn't he just be a fantastic unit regardless of what Panette can do though? What more do you want than killing enemies in one hit on player phase and having a great enemy phase?

Quote

 I don't think anyone would suggest that Amber or Etie have anywhere near acceptable speed, and Panette is hovering in the same area as those units with her raw stats.  I tried a Panette build using Leif while patching her speed using Speed+5, and to be frank it was not enough for me to feel comfortable.

If you're using a Wrath build you don't need the speed, but as I mentioned in my first post you could also use a covert Instruct if you're looking to work with her speed and not her crit. I'd only suggest this if there are other units that you're targeting for the speed or otherwise need it for some specific threshold and don't want to use Wrath for whatever reason, but it's something to keep in mind. Even some of the fastest units in the game need help to double some enemies (kagetsu needs 7 speed in the example I provided for chapter 17 earlier), so it's probably one of the better instructs anyway.

[SumG]

33 minutes ago, samthedigital said:

If you're using a Wrath build you don't need the speed, but as I mentioned in my first post you could also use a covert Instruct if you're looking to work with her speed and not her crit.

You absolutely need some speed, even in a Wrath build.  Believe me, I tried doing a Panette!Lief build (not the one the caps out at bond level 9, but a more convention/casual build).  And the build functioned reasonably well.  But there were absolutely units as the game progressed that Panette could not OHKO, even with a crit.  There were absolutely units that would be able to attack (often uncontested when attacking from range) and get follow-ups on Panette even with Speed+5, and with her only OK defense she can die very quickly, particularly if you're keeping her at lower HP totals to take advantage of Vantage/Wrath.  I spent a non-trivial number of rewinds and keeping Panette alive even though I was told she was this unit that could kill anything and would never die.  And the fact is on her own she isn't.  She needs some help, maybe not a ton of help, but some help.

And I don't think a covert instruct is good, because then I'd have to have a covert unit in my party.  And that would inevitably be a weak unit to have in my party.  There's not need to have a unit who's only job is to instruct speed twice, Goddess Dance once, and then plink some daggers (or arrows) for virtually no damage while they try to get their Engage meter filled again.  There are plenty of strong units and builds in the game that can contribute every turn, so having a unit be nearly useless a large portion of the time is unnecessary.

 

[samthedigital]

22 minutes ago, SumG said:

You absolutely need some speed, even in a Wrath build.  Believe me, I tried doing a Panette!Lief build (not the one the caps out at bond level 9, but a more convention/casual build).  And the build functioned reasonably well.  But there were absolutely units as the game progressed that Panette could not OHKO, even with a crit.  There were absolutely units that would be able to attack (often uncontested when attacking from range) and get follow-ups on Panette even with Speed+5, and with her only OK defense she can die very quickly, particularly if you're keeping her at lower HP totals to take advantage of Vantage/Wrath.  I spent a non-trivial number of rewinds and keeping Panette alive even though I was told she was this unit that could kill anything and would never die.  And the fact is on her own she isn't.  She needs some help, maybe not a ton of help, but some help.

I didn't have this experience, but I also tied her to Ike who gives her bulk and +12 damage. I did notice a few missed one rounds when I swapped to Wyvern on my latest Maddening playthrough, and that should be similar to your experience damage wise. You wouldn't get Ike's bulk, so I would agree that you'd have to rewind more often if you don't do the math to make sure she can survive EP beforehand.

22 minutes ago, SumG said:

And I don't think a covert instruct is good, because then I'd have to have a covert unit in my party.  And that would inevitably be a weak unit to have in my party.  There's not need to have a unit who's only job is to instruct speed twice, Goddess Dance once, and then plink some daggers (or arrows) for virtually no damage while they try to get their Engage meter filled again.  There are plenty of strong units and builds in the game that can contribute every turn, so having a unit be nearly useless a large portion of the time is unnecessary.

You'll note from in the last topic that I don't have a problem keeping my units engaged permanently. Granted this isn't the case for every unit because as good as energy circle refills are they are limited, but my goddess dance unit is always my first pick for obvious reasons. Given the permanent uptime I can see the utility in having such a unit because they can contribute every turn by making my other units even better instead of having a mediocre unit who can also Goddess Dance.

Edited August 31, 2023 by samthedigital

[SumG]

6 minutes ago, samthedigital said:

I didn't have this experience, but I also tied her to Ike who gives her bulk and +12 damage.

This is a common build I have seen, and while I have not tried it myself I do believe that it's good.  But, and I note up front that this is my anecdotal perception, I do believe that many people who try this build and see success with attribute all of the success to Panette and very little of the success to Ike.  That just because the LCT Fire Emblem community doesn't view Ike as a top-3 emblem (and he isn't, in that particular playstyle) that Ike isn't actually that strong and it's not a giving Panette a very valuable resource to assist her.

In a more casual speed, conventional playthrough, Ike is extremely strong.  He can turn pretty much any unit into a tank defensive unit *and* a crit machine on his own.

[samthedigital]

1 hour ago, SumG said:

In a more casual speed, conventional playthrough, Ike is extremely strong.  He can turn pretty much any unit into a tank defensive unit *and* a crit machine on his own.

The numbers that I provided reflect my general opinion on the topic: Panette is the only unit that consistently gets the fully reliable 100% hit and crit with Ike. She can also do this with Roy and have some bulk with Hold Out, and Eirika would also give her the damage output if you just want to put her at one range without taking risks.

Quote

But, and I note up front that this is my anecdotal perception, I do believe that many people who try this build and see success with attribute all of the success to Panette and very little of the success to Ike.

I completely agree with you if this is your main point. Ike does provide a lot for Panette, and while I don't believe that any other unit is going to be as good as her with Ike I do think that they can still be pretty good. I also find this to be true in a more general sense. How a unit performs is very much tied to what emblem they get and what resources the player gives them. I remember a lot of people overvaluing the unit they gave Lyn right after release for example. In fairness though it is difficult to dissociate the two because a well built unit with an emblem is going to perform a heck of a lot better than another unit that didn't get the same treatment regardless of the unit's base attributes, and most people usually won't play through the game more than once or twice to try out different combinations.

edit: To put what I said in the last sentence another way: Emblems and skills are going to influence the feel of a unit far more than the unit themselves if that makes sense.

Quote

That just because the LCT Fire Emblem community doesn't view Ike as a top-3 emblem (and he isn't, in that particular playstyle) that Ike isn't actually that strong and it's not a giving Panette a very valuable resource to assist her.

I'd be interested in reading an LTCer's perspective on Panette. If I remember correctly (from the limited research I did) in that sort of setting she's worse than Merrin and Kagetsu while still being a top tier unit, but I don't really have much of a frame of reference for LTC and could easily be wrong.

Edited August 31, 2023 by samthedigital

[Dark Holy Elf]

1 hour ago, SumG said:

And I don't think a covert instruct is good, because then I'd have to have a covert unit in my party.  And that would inevitably be a weak unit to have in my party.  There's not need to have a unit who's only job is to instruct speed twice, Goddess Dance once, and then plink some daggers (or arrows) for virtually no damage while they try to get their Engage meter filled again.  There are plenty of strong units and builds in the game that can contribute every turn, so having a unit be nearly useless a large portion of the time is unnecessary.

I feel like Byleth is one of those game-warping emblems who can easily turn a unit into "instruct / Goddess Dance a lot". Obviously it's nice to have that on a unit who can otherwise contribute, because instruct isn't a useful action all the time (you simply don't always need hit extra stat benchmarks it enables). But most units can contribute otherwise. Just take your typical archer; with minimal investment they'll be able to kill fliers very easily, so if you slap Byleth on an archer they'll have access to instruct, Goddess Dance, and flier-murder as needed. This already sounds like a pretty good unit to me. Obviously it isn't the only use of Byleth - sages and dragons offer stiff competition in particular - but I would definitely consider it good. Also it definitely should be emphasized that if engaging is that important to a unit, they aren't going to be plinking daggers/arrows to build engage meter; they're gonna be grabbing emblem energy.

 

[Jotari]

Panette was my MVP on my blind Maddening playthrough. She had the classic Vantage Wrath build with Lyn helping her speed and, most importantly, a Crit Engraved Forged Killer Axe. Sure any unit could use this build, but Panette's strength and crit boosting personal makes her the most overkill (and for Maddening overkill can be necessary). She could deal upwards of 100 damage to enemies thanks to a near guaranteed crit rate and, provided enemies don't have 2 range, could often do it on enemy phase which is pretty difficult to achieve in Engage. And, of course, Lyn's Speed Eater and Alacrity allowed her to be the most reliable delete button on player phase as even armours stand very little chance of facing two consecutive Panette crits.

Edited September 1, 2023 by Jotari

[Alogeo]

On 8/31/2023 at 6:58 PM, SnowFire said:

20/5 Berserker Panette:

70 HP, 42 Str, 5 Mag, 29 Dex, 21 Spd, 19 Def, 10 Res, 16 Lck, 17 Bld, 5 Move

That Dex seems a bit too High for a berserker. Panette should cap at 23.

Regarding my rate i think She Is a solid 9/10 (Maddening). She has enought strenght to male phys combat good, and has a good enemy phase with either a killer axe or a killer bow.

But She lack a 1-2 option that is really great.

Edited September 4, 2023 by Alogeo
Adding the difficult on witch i valued the unit.

[SnowFire]

Oh, good catch.  That 29.35 Dex is actually accurate to her "uncapped" growth from gaining 23 levels, but yeah, the class maximum limiter misfired there.  Note that Warrior's Dex max is 30 and Wyvern Knight's is 43, so yeah, Panette is definitely leaving accuracy on the table if she never leaves Berserker.

[Bartozio]

I'm giving Panette a 9/10.

Honestly, Panette is just a great unit. She has insane strength, high dex and good physical bulk. I think the most obvious build for her wrath/vantage, as most people have talked about already, but I kind of want to mention it's not the only option she has.

If you want, you can try fixing her speed so you just have an alround strong unit. This is pretty good, but it might require her to have Lyn equiped which is a pretty valuable resource, and there's several units who can fill a similar role with less high in demand emblems. If nobody else wants Lyn though, it's a good choice.

You can also just aim to make her a player phase nuke. Wrath is the obvious answer here, but I've heard she can also reach one rounding thresholds with a brave axe late game. And at join time she's pretty close to one shotting most enemies with a iron Greataxe (to the point where she can actually one shot with some investment, like a tonic, higher bond level with Ike, Axe power, etc).

Wrath/Vantage is the real highlight though. While it doesn't destroy literally every enemy in the game, it does trivialize a good part of most maps. Panette isn't the only character who can use this combo, but she has several advantages compared to other options. Most notably, outside of having sky high strength, her dex is also very impressive, making her a lot more reliable than some other units. She also has good bulk, which makes it easier to get into vantage range, and a personal skill that gives her more crit.

Overall, she's similar to unit's like Kagetsu, in that she's strong right out of the gate, but you need to wait a few chapters before she fully comes into her own (in this case until you get Leif back and can give her vantage). I think being by far the most reliable wrath/vantage user is enough to give her a point above Kagetsu though.

[Jotari]

8 minutes ago, Bartozio said:

I'm giving Panette a 9/10.

Honestly, Panette is just a great unit. She has insane strength, high dex and good physical bulk. I think the most obvious build for her wrath/vantage, as most people have talked about already, but I kind of want to mention it's not the only option she has.

If you want, you can try fixing her speed so you just have an alround strong unit. This is pretty good, but it might require her to have Lyn equiped which is a pretty valuable resource, and there's several units who can fill a similar role with less high in demand emblems. If nobody else wants Lyn though, it's a good choice.

You can also just aim to make her a player phase nuke. Wrath is the obvious answer here, but I've heard she can also reach one rounding thresholds with a brave axe late game. And at join time she's pretty close to one shotting most enemies with a iron Greataxe (to the point where she can actually one shot with some investment, like a tonic, higher bond level with Ike, Axe power, etc).

Wrath/Vantage is the real highlight though. While it doesn't destroy literally every enemy in the game, it does trivialize a good part of most maps. Panette isn't the only character who can use this combo, but she has several advantages compared to other options. Most notably, outside of having sky high strength, her dex is also very impressive, making her a lot more reliable than some other units. She also has good bulk, which makes it easier to get into vantage range, and a personal skill that gives her more crit.

Overall, she's similar to unit's like Kagetsu, in that she's strong right out of the gate, but you need to wait a few chapters before she fully comes into her own (in this case until you get Leif back and can give her vantage). I think being by far the most reliable wrath/vantage user is enough to give her a point above Kagetsu though.

Out of curiosity, how is she actually using Leif as her Emblem? Unlike Lyn, Leif is very much not in high demand as an Emblem. And having Vantage be on her innately and not taking up a skill slot will still let you have Speed Eater as the equipped skill. Adaptable would also let her counter ranged enemies with a Killer Bow and as  a Back Up unit it would provide crit+10 for even more guaranteed crit. The only issue is...that same Adaptable. Would it make he use Leif's crappy weapons over a Forged Killer Axe/Killer Bow? I guess you could get around that by just not Engaging and just letting Leif provided Vantage so someone else can use Lyn. Without really tying it out, I feel like she could possibly be the best Leif user in the game, which is a fun niche to be in since he's considered so bad and not in much competition.

Edited September 5, 2023 by Jotari

[Alogeo]

21 minutes ago, Jotari said:

only issue is...that same Adaptable. Would it make he use Leif's crappy weapons over a Forged Killer Axe/Killer Bow? I

If you dont go over bond Lev 9 the only weapon available from Leif Is killer axe, and if your killer axe has higher stats than his, he will never use engagé weapon, leaving you either killer bow and killer axe.

[Bartozio]

33 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Out of curiosity, how is she actually using Leif as her Emblem? Unlike Lyn, Leif is very much not in high demand as an Emblem. And having Vantage be on her innately and not taking up a skill slot will still let you have Speed Eater as the equipped skill. Adaptable would also let her counter ranged enemies with a Killer Bow and as  a Back Up unit it would provide crit+10 for even more guaranteed crit. The only issue is...that same Adaptable. Would it make he use Leif's crappy weapons over a Forged Killer Axe/Killer Bow? I guess you could get around that by just not Engaging and just letting Leif provided Vantage so someone else can use Lyn. Without really tying it out, I feel like she could possibly be the best Leif user in the game, which is a fun niche to be in since he's considered so bad and not in much competition.

I've been using her with Leif in my current playthrough and it's really really good. as Alogeo said, you just don't get her past bond level 9 (simply don't watch the convo) and only give her a killer axe and a killer bow as weapons. That way, Adaptable only ever works to your advantage. I honestly don't even bother with speed taker and just gave her axe power as her second skill.

Most of the time I'm using her I don't even need to engage tbh, since a lot of enemies only have 1 range weapons, and with good positioning she can kill the only 2-range enemy in a group on player phase and kill the remainder on enemy phase. There are sitiuations where being able to counter at both ranges is very useful though.

The only real issue I have with this build is that you're stuck at only using regular vantage, so have to be pretty careful about getting her below 25% hp, but not getting her killed.

[Jotari]

44 minutes ago, Bartozio said:

I've been using her with Leif in my current playthrough and it's really really good. as Alogeo said, you just don't get her past bond level 9 (simply don't watch the convo) and only give her a killer axe and a killer bow as weapons. That way, Adaptable only ever works to your advantage. I honestly don't even bother with speed taker and just gave her axe power as her second skill.

Most of the time I'm using her I don't even need to engage tbh, since a lot of enemies only have 1 range weapons, and with good positioning she can kill the only 2-range enemy in a group on player phase and kill the remainder on enemy phase. There are sitiuations where being able to counter at both ranges is very useful though.

The only real issue I have with this build is that you're stuck at only using regular vantage, so have to be pretty careful about getting her below 25% hp, but not getting her killed.

 

1 hour ago, Alogeo said:

If you dont go over bond Lev 9 the only weapon available from Leif Is killer axe, and if your killer axe has higher stats than his, he will never use engagé weapon, leaving you either killer bow and killer axe.

But if you do go higher, will she use the Master Lance and Light Brand over the Killer Axe? If I recall, the main issue with Master Lance is actually atrocious hit (and the fact that it's not a double weapon like it's meant to be >.>) which her good Dex would be able to account for. Though, I reckon she would probably try to use light brand as it's res targeting might register it doing better damage than her forged weapons since it won't go for crit. On the other hand, her magic is pretty atrocious so maybe she would stick away from that completely. I think I'd rather raise her bond level to max and just not Engage for the full effects of Vantage. 75% HP gives you a lot of leeway to take another attack if something goes wrong.

Edited September 5, 2023 by Jotari

[Bartozio]

5 minutes ago, Jotari said:

But if you do go higher, will she use the Master Lance and Light Brand over the Killer Axe? If I recall, the main issue with Master Lance is actually atrocious hit (and the fact that it's not a double weapon like it's meant to be >.>) which her good Dex would be able to account for. Though, I reckon she would probably try to use light brand as it's res targeting might register it doing better damage than her forged weapons since it won't go for crit. On the other hand, her magic is pretty atrocious so maybe she would stick away from that completely. I think I'd rather raise her bond level to max and just not Engage for the full effects of Vantage. 75% HP gives you a lot of leeway to take another attack if something goes wrong.

I think one of the first criteria the game looks at to determine what weapon to use (after being able to counter) is weapon triangle. So Adaptability would very much have Panette use the light brand and master lance.

If it looked at being able to kill first it would be a lot better, but sadly that isn't the case.

[Jotari]

37 minutes ago, Bartozio said:

I think one of the first criteria the game looks at to determine what weapon to use (after being able to counter) is weapon triangle. So Adaptability would very much have Panette use the light brand and master lance.

If it looked at being able to kill first it would be a lot better, but sadly that isn't the case.

Ah, yes, of course. Leif's whole deal is weapon triangle. He reduces damage if you have WTA as well. But since Adaptability only works when engaged(?) or at least the weapons are only available when Engaged, I see no reason not to just get his Bond up to max and make use of his passive abilities. What would you even be missing out on by never engaging? It's not like his Engage attack is any good either.

[Bartozio]

21 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Ah, yes, of course. Leif's whole deal is weapon triangle. He reduces damage if you have WTA as well. But since Adaptability only works when engaged(?) or at least the weapons are only available when Engaged, I see no reason not to just get his Bond up to max and make use of his passive abilities. What would you even be missing out on by never engaging? It's not like his Engage attack is any good either.

My Panette generally one shots enemies with Leif's engage attack tbf, but considering she can also do that with a regular attack it's not that relevant, lol.

Not engaging means you won't switch to a killer bow to counter 2-range enemies. You also miss out on the +10% crit Leif gives backup units with Adaptability. (Yes btw, Adaptability only activates when engaged.)

At that point you're basically just using Leif to free up a skill slot for Vantage I guess, along with getting a bit of extra bulk. Ike's straight up better at that point, and probably some other emblems as well, depending on what skill you're filling that slot with. So how good this is really depends on whether the rest of your party can make good use of those emblems not being used up.

[Alogeo]

42 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Ah, yes, of course. Leif's whole deal is weapon triangle. He reduces damage if you have WTA as well. But since Adaptability only works when engaged(?) or at least the weapons are only available when Engaged, I see no reason not to just get his Bond up to max and make use of his passive abilities. What would you even be missing out on by never engaging? It's not like his Engage attack is any good either.

If avoid engage, you may as well just learn vantage and use another emblem like ike/sigurd/roy. The whole Leif thing for panette Is that allow her to oneshot both 1 and 2 range enemies thanks to adaptable. And since Leif Is (in my opinion) the less usefull emblem, having a char that sinergize with him Is pretty nice.

[Shadow Mir]

52 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Ah, yes, of course. Leif's whole deal is weapon triangle. He reduces damage if you have WTA as well. But since Adaptability only works when engaged(?) or at least the weapons are only available when Engaged, I see no reason not to just get his Bond up to max and make use of his passive abilities. What would you even be missing out on by never engaging? It's not like his Engage attack is any good either.

Ngl, it's still better than Great Aether. In general, charge attacks with a 1 turn wait period are seldom worth it. 

On Panette herself: I... don't know what to think, honestly. I see a lot of hype for her, but in my case, she was just... there for most of the run. She contributed, but didn't do anything special. Even as a Warrior(which I see hyped up as an actually good class), her performance was still ehhh. I only really appreciated her after she went into Great Knight.

Edited September 5, 2023 by Shadow Mir