Alright, I'm tempted now.

[Junkhead]

Second. Seals.

Those things are amazing...at the moment, I feel like using one, but I only have one, and I can only pick one character out of these:

- Chrom (lvl 13-14): Tell me Cavalier!Chrom just isn't a sexy idea.

- The Avatar (same as Chrom): With 9001 re-class options, a few of those look tempting (at the top of my mind, Cavalier, Wyern Rider, Mercenary, Archer...)

- Panne (lvl 10): I just love the Taguel class...but I don't know if I'll be able to get another gem of those, and she currently has about 30 uses left. Changing her to another class would solve that issue, but her unique class is really cool...and as silly as it sounds, the only reason I bothered training her is because I just love the laguz-like class. Planning to have her go Wyern Rider.

Oh, I also have 1-2 Master Seals, and one of those is kind of reserved for Liz (currently lvl 12 Cleric) so she can be a battle nun. Should I promote Chrom or The Avatar yet?

[Faye]

Beast Stones are buyable in this game. oAo So you don't have to worry about Panne being defenseless.

As for Second Seals...Cavalier!Chrom is nice, but what I would do is promote him to Great Lord, then Reclass into Paladin or Great Knight. He gets no useful skill from Cavalier except the 2x Weapon Experiance one, but even that won't be useful for StreetPass or DLC or something... Aegis or Luna are better options.

If Lissa is at level 12, it might be safe to promote her now, unless you want to get her to Level 20 Cleric for extra stat boosts.

#doIsoundlikeaproyet

[Only My Unit]

What chapter are you on, and what stats did you pick for the best and worst?

[Redwall]

promote Avatar; the GM class learns a super-good skill at Lv 15. you need not worry about gimping EXP growth with Avatar since Veteran is so good.

the Second Seal should be used on Panne to reclass to Wyvern; if you haven't been using Sully, Panne is going to be your number one offensive threat not named Avatar.

Chrom is just kind of a disappointing unit; he's good, but there's a reason he's at the bottom of S tier.

[Silver Lightning]

Yay, another person who likes Laguz-type characters!

But yes, as mentioned already, you can buy a steady stream of them once you get farther in the game, and until then I believe the boss of chapter 10 drops an extra beast stone too. But I would personally reclass Panne ASAP so that she can learn good skills to make her a more badass taguel and to pass on to Yarne eventually. She and Nowi are the first I usually give my second seals to.

[Cookies]

Change Panne, because you won't be seeing any buyable beast stones till Chapter 12, and I have no idea how much grinding you are doing. Meanwhile Master Seal on Chrom or Avatar works well, because Chrom gets Aether at level 5 and Avatar gets Ignis (one of the best skills damage-wise for it IMO) at level 5.

[BlueFire]

I would Master Seal Lissa early so she can fight.

[AstraLunaSol]

Panne would probably benefit the most from using the second seal first since the taguel class is kinda shit.

Chrom should wait till 10/15 to get rightful king/aether then reclass to paladin (way late in the game) to get aegis/mobility.

MU can do whatever the fuck s/he wants since they'll be good no matter what. Rally Spectrum (the --/15 skill on grandmaster) isn't too good since they want to be killing everything. Usually end up second sealing them once they reach level 10 to mercenary to get armthrift and eventually sol, once in hero.

[Shadow Mir]

Well, I tend to be in a position of indecision on these as well, so I can't really help.

[Book Bro]

If you haven't used it yet...

I usually give it to either Avatar or one of the healers. If you make Lissa and Maribelle go Peg Knight early, they can be a little more independent and gets them closer to the Galeforce skill, which is generally considered one of the better skills. If you don't particularly care about them or would rather Master Seal them first, Avatar is a good choice. Like others have said, if you really wan to use it on Panne go right ahead as she's a great Wyvern unit. Just so you know you can reclass her to Taguel anytime with another Second Seal, so don't be afraid about losing that class :). You can't buy any until after chapter 16 (I think that's right), so you definitely should think hard about it.

[BlueFire]

And Taguels can't get 1-2 range, which is no fun :c

[Junkhead]

Well I'm not really LTC'ing yet, but I'm not going at a turtle's pace and grinding the crap out of it. Yeah, I went through the first two Paralogues and a Skirmish, but I don't particularly take my time.

Thanks for the advice so far guys.

[Hawkeye]

Panne definitely benefits the most from a second seal, because when she changes to wyvern rider she goes from being average offensively to being the strongest unit in your group except maybe Avatar, along with getting flying and 1-2 range. Avatar will be hitting level 20 first so you might as well use the other master seal on him/her.

[Thor Odinson]

Chrom should wait till 10/15 to get rightful king/aether then reclass to paladin (way late in the game) to get aegis/mobility.

Or go GK if your Chrom ends up being the support unit since that gives +1 move. Move is nice to have regardless of LTC.

BowKnight also gives +1 move if you want him to give speed supports instead of str/def.

My Chrom's basically a supportbot right now since both his wife (MU) and Lucina (who will probably be my designated dragonkiller) are both superior statstically and have higher leveling speeds due to veteran. So if he does end up looking like he's going to be in the back most of the time, might as well reclass him to something that gives good support.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Thor Odinson

[darkkfan]

Beast Stones are buyable in this game. oAo So you don't have to worry about Panne being defenseless.

As for Second Seals...Cavalier!Chrom is nice, but what I would do is promote him to Great Lord, then Reclass into Paladin or Great Knight. He gets no useful skill from Cavalier except the 2x Weapon Experiance one, but even that won't be useful for StreetPass or DLC or something... Aegis or Luna are better options.

Like he said, definitely promote to Great Lord first, although I'm not sure what he means about Aegis and Luna being better options since you can get those no matter whether you go Cavalier->Paladin/GK->Great Lord or Cavalier->Great Lord->Paladin/GK, in fact the first route actually nets you aegis or luna sooner.

As for Panne, I'd definitely recommend reclassing her in a non-DLC run because beaststones are pretty expensive to use.

I'm sort of curious why everyone here seems to have Chrom as a support unit, since his stats seem to be pretty well suited for frontline combat (he's always turned out as such for me). Maybe it's just because most of this discussion is in the context of grinding and I'm used to no-grind.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Walhart

[Interceptor]

Chrom is probably the single greatest dedicated Support in the game, honestly. He has a free weapon, Dual Strike+ works in the back line (which he can hit three different effective target types with), and has a SPD support (so a lot of people want him as a partner). Even his class set (Cavalier) is a good backliner. Plus being a support unit covers up his biggest weakness (lack of good 1-2 range options).

[Thor Odinson]

Well in my case he happened to be paired to MU and veteran's kinda a thing

So uh yeah gg Chrom (also he's kinda badly str-screwed in mine and is paired with a str+ res- for max str stat feMU who would have double his strength if you don't count the 2 drops I gave him)

She's 18/10/9 Hero with 39 strength right now. He's 20/5 GL with 19+4. Lucina, for reference, is 10/7 and has 26. This is with chapter 16 completed plus Morgan paralogue.

I mean, I play nogrind as well but with a mix of rng being mean to him, his wife completely dominating the battlefield what with general-killing handaxes and his daughter taking after the mom, there's not much he can do, really.

I play with like, a team of 3 dedicated offensive units that's going up to 5 once I get all the kids (that exist), though. So levels are a bit inflated due to a centralised team, I guess.

But I can't speak for everyone else. Just in my run he's pretty much relegated to support and I'll probably have him go Bow Knight for the movement support if he ever hits level 10.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Thor Odinson

[euklyd]

I'd use it to re-class the Avatar to a Mercenary, because Armsthrift is great, and Sol is awesome. I've got Armsthrift on every character I use with access to it, same with Sol (so Gerome has Sol but not Armsthrift, b/c he only had access to Fighter).

Of course, if you're low on tome wielders, that might not be such a great idea, especially if you don't have any Levin Swords (you can buy them off Sothe, and I think Eliwood and Leif as well, to name a few).

[Thor Odinson]

Gangrel also drops a free Levin sword, so there's that.

Kinda depends on his asset and flaw and difficulty, imo. My strength-focus MU was a pretty shoddy mage and did far more damage with an iron sword than tomes on even tanky enemies, but currently has no problem ORKOing anything with a steel axe(or hell, hand) on hard as a Hero and I didn't use mages on my team until I recruited Morgan but didn't really miss them either. I'd imagine a magic-focused MU may not want to go Merc if he's not grinding and just wants to reclass during the storyline, though, 10 levels of Merc should be pretty fast for MU to go through since veteran if he's good at strength, and then handaxes is only an arms scroll away.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Thor Odinson

[euklyd]

Gangrel also drops a free Levin sword, so there's that.

Kinda depends on his asset and flaw and difficulty, imo. My strength-focus MU was a pretty shoddy mage and did far more damage with an iron sword than tomes on even tanky enemies, but currently has no problem ORKOing anything with a steel axe(or hell, hand) on hard as a Hero and I didn't use mages on my team until I recruited Morgan but didn't really miss them either. I'd imagine a magic-focused MU may not want to go Merc if he's not grinding and just wants to reclass during the storyline, though, 10 levels of Merc should be pretty fast for MU to go through since veteran if he's good at strength, and then handaxes is only an arms scroll away.

Yeah, I never bothered much with my mages, and once I started recruiting/training children, I just had SO many Heroes (5, just amongst the children). Give me a Hand Axe - or later, a Short Axe or Tomahawk - and I'm golden. This is from Lunatic, so I'm especially partial to Sol.

[Shadow Mir]

Gangrel also drops a free Levin sword, so there's that.

Kinda depends on his asset and flaw and difficulty, imo. My strength-focus MU was a pretty shoddy mage and did far more damage with an iron sword than tomes on even tanky enemies, but currently has no problem ORKOing anything with a steel axe(or hell, hand) on hard as a Hero and I didn't use mages on my team until I recruited Morgan but didn't really miss them either. I'd imagine a magic-focused MU may not want to go Merc if he's not grinding and just wants to reclass during the storyline, though, 10 levels of Merc should be pretty fast for MU to go through since veteran if he's good at strength, and then handaxes is only an arms scroll away.

Yeah, I never bothered much with my mages, and once I started recruiting/training children, I just had SO many Heroes (5, just amongst the children). Give me a Hand Axe - or later, a Short Axe or Tomahawk - and I'm golden. This is from Lunatic, so I'm especially partial to Sol.

Huh. It's the other way around for me - I like mages, but hand axes (and javelins), not so much. Probably what stems from hand axes and javelins being nerfed to hell and back.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Levant Fortner

[Thor Odinson]

When you have 39 strength by chapter 16 without even grinding I don't think you really care about mt anymore (something like 11 mag in comparison)

Meanwhile javs and handaxes go on all the nice high-move t1s to bring into t2 in the case of 2/3 of my main attackers.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Thor Odinson

[Shadow Mir]

When you have 39 strength by chapter 16 without even grinding I don't think you really care about mt anymore (something like 11 mag in comparison)

Meanwhile javs and handaxes go on all the nice high-move t1s to bring into t2 in the case of 2/3 of my main attackers.

Okay, but how likely is that unless you've been low manning (or at least favoring a very small portion of characters)?

Edited April 18, 2013 by Levant Fortner

[Thor Odinson]

I think I've mentioned that I have a hypercentralised team in a few places already

When I said 2/3 I meant literally two out of my three. I have 3 gen1 moms and their support-husbands as my combat team and it's glorious.

Really don't want to expend effort on spreading out exp when I can have gods it's not like there's that many deployment slots and I kinda wanna use the kids of my team too when they come :B

Also I have a MU built for maximum strength (+ str/-res so it theoretically gimps the magic a bit too, this is not a MU built for magic to start with). I think the strength I have on Panne (something like 28-31) is probably more likely on a more spread out team and Panne's a handaxe orkoing god as well so the 39's more or less overkill except on bosses until I get to OHKO range on nonmages.

tl;dr I don't like the mages 'cuz I prefer strength MUs and the other mages don't have veteran or 7 move in their t1 classes so fuck that shit

Edited April 18, 2013 by Thor Odinson

[euklyd]

Huh. It's the other way around for me - I like mages, but hand axes (and javelins), not so much. Probably what stems from hand axes and javelins being nerfed to hell and back.

That's the way I usually play too, actually.

In most FE games, I'm generally very magic heavy, but I don't really like any of the mages in Awakening besides Henry (not to mention the first two times I played they turned out horribly compared to units at the same level).

So Avatar and Morgan are usually rockin' Bolt Axes and Levin Swords, generally forged 'cuz I've got Armsthrift. Except now Avatar is a Dread Fighter, so he wields whatever the hell he feels like.

Edit: But yeah, as Thor said, nerfage isn't that much of a problem when you've got a ridiculous Str stat. The 1-2 range means I can hit mages and such with Sol, so I can regain much more HP than if I'm just hitting melee units with relatively high Def.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Euklyd