Rate the Unit, Day 25: Stefan

[ZemZem]

Dat Rules (stolen/borrowed from Integrity)

- Ratings are assumed to be on Hard Mode+Fixed Mode.

- Votes need some explanation regarding their gameplay performance to be counted. If somebody else said what you want to already, quote them explicitly.

+/- ≤1 point extra regarding personality/appearance is encouraged, but no more. If you exercise your bias privileges, please do so explicitly.

- Numerical votes out of 10, or something proportional to it. Make it easy to calculate for my sake.

- Every ranking phase ends whenever I get out of bed, between 0700 and 0800 EST. Do the math for your timezone, Brits.

- I will insist you do not use the "Not X" reason on any character, where X is another unit. If you do, your vote will be thrown out.

- "Recruits X" or "takes you to X chapter" arguments are explicitly banned. C'mon, people, this shouldn't need to be a rule. That's not gameplay performance.

- Assume that the character in question is being recruited.

- Similar to the "Recruits X" rule, do not use "she brings a Knight Ward to the team " or any other justification as an argument.

- BEXP is free to be used in any quantity on any character.

- Rating a unit too low because you think its overrated will make me throw away your vote without mercy public/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif.

- I withhold the privilege to tell you your rating is bogus and demand you revise it if it breaks any of the above. I will not throw out votes anonymously, you will be informed and given a chance to revise.

Averages:

Rolf: 1.15

Sothe: 2.03

Brom: 2.32

Shinon: 3.00

Volke : 4.82

Ilyana: 4.98

Soren: 5.15

Rhys: 5.31

Gatrie: 5.46

Mia: 5.71

Mist: 6.41

Mordecai: 6.55

Makalov: 6.59

Zihark: 6.65

Lethe: 6.75

Nephenee: 6.79

Astrid: 7.76

Boyd: 8.29

Ike: 8.57

Oscar: 9.08

Kieran: 9.23

Jill: 9.31

Marcia: 9.36

Titania: 9.91

I rounded the scores to the nearest hundredth, BTW.

Stefan and Heath have similar hair-styles. Weird, huh?

Edited April 28, 2012 by ZM456

[Sunwoo]

Stefan is a good pre-promoted filler unit. He has solid stats (except luck) and great growths to go along with it. He will have no speed or strength problems. His defense is good when he first shows up, and his Vague Katti gives him additional defense to help him out. He will probably be the only person able to use it for a while anyway. His HP is great as well, so he's still solid. His biggest problem is actually his luck, which means he will be nailed by more critical hits later on and that his dodge will suffer. But he is still a great unit to have.

Of course, his recruitment is utterly dumb but I won't hold that against him.

7.5/10

[DarthMikey]

Shouldn't Shinon be 3.00?

A sword-locked foot unit who comes a bit late and is sort of annoying to recruit. But HOLY GOD IN HEAVEN LOOK AT THOSE STATS. His durability is only average, and he does have some LCK issues, but come on. 25 SPD base + 55% growth in a game full of generally slow enemies. He's generally capable of dodging, and will do much doubling. 40% growth in SKL, oh wait, 27 base. He's a Swordmaster so his STR is low, oh wait, 19 base + 50% growth. And we can't forget about his instant Astra and S-rank in swords.

He's hardly necessary, but he's some of the best filler you could ask for, really.

8/10 + 1 bias = 9/10

Edited April 29, 2012 by Cosmic_Harold

[ZemZem]

Shouldn't Shinon be 3.00?

I suppose you're right, since it gives it that more professional feel.

[Loki Laufeyson]

Stefan, that Branded bloke who lives in the desert.

Pros:

Prepromoted Swordie.

Complete with mastery still.

Vague Katti.

Cool support with Soren.

Decent bases.

High base level.

Cons:

Recruitment is a bit out of the way.

May be outclassed.

Stefan is one of those units you either really like or really dont like. I rarely see a middle ground oddly enough. Hes got pretty nice bases and a nice base level prepromoted AND his Mastery skill, Astra all built in. You might be wondering why people dont like him. Well there are people who still have a thing against prepromotes. Stefan is pretty good though if you didnt bother training Mia or Zihark. Either of them do require an Occult scroll to get Astra and this guy already has it for free. His luck isnt fantastic but hes already got good speed and avoid anyway so its not that big of a deal. Plus theres not a lot of enemies with killer weapons around anyway. He supports with Soren for some interesting backstory. I think if you do train Zihark to promotion, he may have a little bit of lead on speed but its been so long im not sure if thats even true anymore. [/too lazy to look it up]

Stefan may be the only one to be able to use that Vague Katti for a while anyway. (since weapon exp kinda sucks in this game) So hes good with that if you dont mind burning uses (to Hammerne later). He is kind of a pain to recruit but its not THAT bad considering once you know just what square to stand on and with who, yeah. Not that big of a deal.

I think hes pretty solid especially if you didnt train any Swordies/myrms and he makes a great reinforcment in that multistage level.

7/10.

[Aere]

Don't normally do Unit Rates, especially for PoR, but PoR!Stefan is probably my favorite unit of all time.

Solid Bases + Solid Growths + Solid Sword + Solid Hair = 8.0

+ Bias = 9.0/10

[MacLovin]

dem bases

dem growths

dat Starting weapon.

No 1-2 range or Mount

Starts with Astra, and has luck problems.

Overall, solid and is worth bringing along in ch17 and further, and goddess icons are in low demand anyways.

6.5/10, useful, and has wtf bases and growths for his joining time.

But his class is pretty stinky.

[ZemZem]

A sword-locked foot unit who comes a bit late and is sort of annoying to recruit. But HOLY GOD IN HEAVEN LOOK AT THOSE STATS

8/10 + 1 bias = 9/10

Forgot to mention, but could you give some more explanation?

[Zman]

Overkill offense right from the start, and Astra just makes it even more ridiculous. His luck is terrible and his defense isn't exactly good, but his avoid should be enough to keep him alive. He only has two support options, and his Heaven affinity is pretty undesirable. It's too bad he's sword-locked and doesn't have a horse.

7/10

[Excellen Browning]

costs turns to recruit... sucky supports and foot unit, defensive stats leave something to desire as his low luck means his dodge isn't reliable enough. Amazing combat stats and the only one who is able to wield vague katti for a while even if it is overkill.

all in all a 6/10

[DarthMikey]

Edited.

[Sasori]

Stefan's base stats are awesomely overkill. 19 base strenght, 27 skill, 25 speed, his growths in those area's is nice too. His durability isn't bad at all when he joins, but later in the game is low luck and meh defense will be a bit troublesome.

I'm still wondering how he manages to beat Lucia in every stat except luck and magic while coming 9 chapters earlier, but that might be just me.

8/10, but he gets a -o.5 bias point for being annoying to recruit.

7.5/10

Edited April 29, 2012 by Sasori

[Silent Mercenary]

Pros:

+Astra is a good skill, but you need to limit him to Steel or Iron so he doesn't waste your best weapons by accident

+Great Str, Skl and Spd; and good HP

+S rank for instant Vague Katti

~Gets you Occult

Cons:

-.25 for foot unit mobility

-.5 for sword lock (you really don't want to give him a magic sword if he has Astra on)

-.5 for midgame joining, although with decent level/bases

-.5 for horrible luck and not so good defenses (good at jointime, barely salvageable later on) which do matter on him since his avoid is not reliable and he's prone to Critical hits

-.75 for worst affinity ever, considering his other supports don't give Hit and you shouldn't take off Astra for Gamble, which would be the only thing that can make Heaven worth it

-.5 for only 2 support options that won't help much, although you're probably giving him B Soren if you use both (Having B Soren/A Mordecai is +2St,+1Def,+5Av,+25 Hit -_-)

-.25 for the easiest Recruitment ever, hard to miss, with no need of previous knowledge of his location, can be recruited by anyone so no need to field in some laguz or keep them away from shoving/smiting your units

+.25 bias because I like his personality, cool look, supports, actions and his sudden appearance^

7/10 One of the best pre-promotes in the game and a good replacement swordsman if you didn't bother with the others or like swordsmen.

I used him for the first time last playthrough and he did great with just Iron Swords and Steel Blades (for the armors/tough enemies). Activated Astra quite often too, but was mostly unnecessary.

[Hawk King]

PROS:

-very high bases

-requires almost zero resources (might want goddess icons)

CONS:

-no reliable 2 range attack options

-durability issues later on

-recruitment

Stefan is a perfect filler unit to plug in if Mia and Zihark are not being used. His recruitment only costs 1-2 turns so its not really that bad especially if you plan to get most of the treasure anyway.

5.5/10 - Great stats dont make up for his poor class.

[Ken Zomg]

Well, you've got the good and the bad, it's already been said. Usually I just skip training Mia and Zihark and use Stefan. 6.5 + 1 for being a badass.

7.5/10

[ZemZem]

Never mind, I'm stupid.

Edited April 29, 2012 by ZM456

[Loki Laufeyson]

Pros:

+Astra is a good skill, but you need to limit him to Steel or Iron so he doesn't waste your best weapons by accident

+Great Str, Skl and Spd; and good HP

+S rank for instant Vague Katti

~Gets you Occult

Cons:

-.25 for foot unit mobility

-.5 for sword lock (you really don't want to give him a magic sword if he has Astra on)

-.5 for midgame joining, although with decent level/bases

-.5 for horrible luck and not so good defenses (good at jointime, barely salvageable later on) which do matter on him since his avoid is not reliable and he's prone to Critical hits

-.75 for worst affinity ever, considering his other supports don't give Hit and you shouldn't take off Astra for Gamble, which would be the only thing that can make Heaven worth it

-.5 for only 2 support options that won't help much, although you're probably giving him B Soren if you use both (Having B Soren/A Mordecai is +2St,+1Def,+5Av,+25 Hit -_-)

-.25 for the easiest Recruitment ever, hard to miss, with no need of previous knowledge of his location, can be recruited by anyone so no need to field in some laguz or keep them away from shoving/smiting your units

+.25 bias because I like his personality, cool look, supports, actions and his sudden appearance^

7/10 One of the best pre-promotes in the game and a good replacement swordsman if you didn't bother with the others or like swordsmen.

I used him for the first time last playthrough and he did great with just Iron Swords and Steel Blades (for the armors/tough enemies). Activated Astra quite often too, but was mostly unnecessary.

Omg that gif is too cute! Love that! Cuz he just does kinda....appear out of the sand doesnt he?

[PuffPuff]

Limited supporting options. Best to support him with Soren, but is slower than with Mordecai. Soren is best. Because his support is the only way to offer Stefan any better avoid which is a MUST on his behalf on his shit luck and worser avoid. Only downfall for Soren is that he will only get better accuracy. So it is recommendable to not support no higher than B with Stefan. As Ike will better benefit an A with him than with Stefan. Great points with him is...His base stats, coming with an Occult Scroll, having Vague Katti, and not having to baby him like u do with many characters. And starting as a promoted Merc all makes his joining time worthwhile.

NM

8.8/10

HM

8.5/10

Edited April 29, 2012 by リンダ

[Lord Raven]

5.7/10, he only deserves +.1 over Zihark because all 3 of them are the same, swordlocked units except Stefan doesn't have as good defense as Zihark. Though, he comes in ridiculously powerful so all is forgiven.

[Samias]

Hm, I ended up registering for this guy after a long time lurking.

Pros:

+High level pre-promote (especially for his join time) who really holds his own for the rest of the game with some solid bases in HP, strength, skill, and speed. No babying required.

+Comes with Astra, another Occult, and the Vague Katti. They aren't must-haves to beat the game by any stretch but it hurts to miss them.

+He can use the Vague Katti right off the bat, in a game where WEXP gaining can be taxing (UGH MIST)

+Better swordmaster model than Zihark (bias powers!)

Cons:

-Bad luck and defence. High speed =/= high avoid. His HP is an okay buffer and he holds up in the next couple of chapters after his join, but his endgame suffers.

-Limited supports that also don't give him what he wants (avoid), even if they are good for story reasons.

-Sword-lock without a 1-2 range option outside of the Sonic Sword and Runesword, both of which don't take advantage of his attack stat.

-Extremely obscure recruitment. Guide dang it. Not really a turn waster since why would you pass up one of the few S weapons (and best player-available) in the game? But still requires some extremely specific knowledge.

-Astra mercilessly eats weapon uses.

Stefan is cool. Comes in, kicks ass in his own chapter at the very least, has some cool base and support convos and nets you two of the most limited items in the whole game. Even if items don't make the unit, it's definitely a plus that he can use said weapon and that he will turn Ike into a monster too. Sadly you get a lot of other sword-locked units earlier in the game who are just as good/possibly better, so finding deployment space for Stefan gets tougher and tougher to justify if you've trained any of them. Perfectly serviceable but has a high potential of being overshadowed for everything but his items.

6.5/10 +1 bias for a 7.5/10

[Refa]

Overkill offense right from the start, and Astra just makes it even more ridiculous. His luck is terrible and his defense isn't exactly good, but his avoid should be enough to keep him alive. He only has two support options, and his Heaven affinity is pretty undesirable. It's too bad he's sword-locked and doesn't have a horse.

7/10

For a second there, I thought you were rating Shanan.

[NTNP]

I'll be honest, baring the fact that a lot of us probably didn't find Stefan on our first playthroughs and we may end up skipping him during low turn playthroughs, our little lion blood here is quiet a catch. The most noticeable part is that Stefan joins before the vast majority of the units we will be using haven't even promoted yet and can realistically 1 round (between astra, doubling and the option to use any sword in the game as needed) everything and with just some leveling he can still take out just about every generic or boss till just about endgame. Now while his supports and concrete defenses are fairly low, and due to his horrible luck he has avoidance issues, this is still by far the best filler unit in the game. If we are going through the game in a semi efficient (as in didn't skip him because he costs an extra 2-3 turns in the desert and some laguz BEXP) playthrough, most players can always find some use for a unit that is equivalent to an endgame character that joins in about half way through the game that has the same durability (between avoidance and concrete defenses) on par with any other unit in your team at that time and of course kills anything that comes anywhere near him. Admittedly in the last two chapters of the game Stefan has some problems compared to the 'growth' units that took the entire game to reach a level comparable to him. I'd give Stefan at least an 8 out of 10 just for his unique position in the game and ability to make the game a good deal easier up till endgame. I'd say that if hard mode was just a little harder (and less people doubled) that Stefan could probably be on par with the likes of FE7's Harken in regards to player opinion.

[XiSrOn]

Stefan is an interesting unit in my eyes, since he has a considerably different value in each of the 3 main ways I see people play FE - Casual, LTC and Draft.

In casual play, he's a god - he'll immediately be in the top 3-4 combat units that you have and stay that way until endgame where he might drop to top 8. He's still an easy choice to send to the final map though because he's a total beast. To that end, he's at 8.5/10 for casual play due to low availability.

In LTC play, he's not even worth using, since the turns and BEXP that he costs are quite a large cost on top of the fact that he doesn't have a mount. However, his combat is still extremely relevant in case you do choose to use him, much moreso than most units I'd rate below 5, so he gets a 5.5/10 for LTC play.

In draft play, his values is extremely dependent upon how your team is made up - if you have Jill or Marcia and have an easy 2 or 3-turn clear, he isn't worth getting at all and has roughly the value he would have in LTC play where you'd use roughly the same strategy. However, if you're needing to take longer on the map (The 3/4-turn mage strat possibly) and have the time to send a Laguz to bee-line to his spot, he has good value as a powerful unit that 2/5 of teams have no interest in using. 7.5/10

So my ratings:

Casual Play: 8.5/10

LTC Play 5.5/10

Draft w/ Flier: 5.5/10

Draft w/o Flier 7.5/10

Aggregate: 6.75/10

[Doga]

Pretty much the best swordsmaster in the game. Ends up on par with your other two (more or less) and you don't need to do any training. Getting him is a little out of the way, but considering the bulk of your party is promoting/on the verge of promotion when you get him, he won't eat up exp like an earlygame pre-promote would. He's fuckin' rad.

8.5/10.

[Snowy_One]

1/10. Worst swordsmaster in the game and overrated as heck.

*sigh* Okay. For real... Stefan is overrated. There. I said it. That being said, it's understandable why. First off, despite coming in 15, he joins far away from the group in a corner that basically assures he won't see combat action until 16 barring excessive luck/intentionally holding back. Anyways, he's powerful, doubles well, but... kind of peters out later on. His initial skill is worthless and his supports are junk, unlike Zihark and Mia who can actually offer something of value. To top it off, they both get skills that can actually be turned into something good, unlike Stefan. The only real reason to take Stefan over them is if you value the sudden mid-game spike of power or don't plan on developing either Mia or Zihark. Otherwise, he's worse than them.

Plus I'm freaking sick of hearing how 'bad-ass' he is and such. He's not. He's just some random branded who couldn't handle normal life and hid in the desert. He can't dress himself, has no real personality, and if he came three to five chapters later he wouldn't even be of real note.

5 (6-1 for how sick I am of hearing how awesome and such he is)/10