Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War 2017 Tier List - Day 39: The support kids (Corple, Lene, Sharlow and Laylea)

[Yojinbo]

Sylvia doesn't really need the leg ring and the only time giving it to her would do anything that special would be Thove castle where it saves like 1 turn if you didn't train up Dew. She does just fine with only the knight ring. Having Sylvia pick up the bargain ring and then prayer abuse an arena gets her 40k pretty easily.

How does she get past the armor knight in the Ch.2 arena? Afaik he cleanly one-shots her at full HP with no chance of prayer activation.

[Valkama]

How does she get past the armor knight in the Ch.2 arena? Afaik he cleanly one-shots her at full HP with no chance of prayer activation.

If you are talking about the Level 5 battle then he has 14 str and uses a steel lance for 30 total attack. Sylvia has a base of 28 hp and 1 defense so she either needs 2 hp, 1 hp and 1 def, or 2 def to survive. If she doesn't get it then she still has the chapter 3 arena to earn money and the chapter 4 arena since the knight ring doesn't really become that effective until then. There is also the end of chapter gold to factor in which is 4000 in chapter 2 and 3000 in chapter 3.

Edited December 27, 2016 by Valkama

[FionordeQuester]

Grinding a 100 kill Slim Sword sounds like the most tedious shit of all time.

I actually timed it once; took about 43 minutes for me. Now that I think about it, part of my logic for inventing that tactic was the assumption that it would save time OVERALL by helping Arena fights go faster for ALL the units that could use it (as in, most of them).

Of course, it's not quite as helpful in a casual run...especially when Sigurd's Steel Sword would have a head start...hmm.

Edited December 27, 2016 by FionordeQuester

[CT075]

"not quite as helpful in a casual run"

I am legitimately curious as to what kind of run allows you to spend 43 minutes grinding slim sword kills on reinforcements for a niche (at best) purpose that isn't "a casual run"

Edited December 28, 2016 by CT075

[Valkama]

Grinding 43 minutes for a 100 kill slim sword might be the worst idea I've ever heard of. If you are going to do that at least make it a good sword like the light sword or the thunder sword.

Edited December 28, 2016 by Valkama

[FionordeQuester]

"not quite as helpful in a casual run"

I am legitimately curious as to what kind of run allows you to spend 43 minutes grinding slim sword kills on reinforcements for a niche (at best) purpose that isn't "a casual run"

An AAAA Ranked run, where almost EVERYONE (if not everyone) is fighting in the Arena, and not just Sylvia. For example, each of my failed attempts at getting Aideen to beat Keimos in my Chapter 2, Part 4 update costed me 1 minute and 7 seconds (yes, I have everything I've done recorded on my computer). It took...

1) About 11 Seconds to get past the intro screen (after resetting)

2) About 30 Seconds to change the RNG by having, say, Levin, beat someone he can definitely beat.

3) About 26 seconds to try, and fail, to beat Keimos once again.

Aideen then died about five times before she finally beat Keimos; a total of around 5 minutes was wasted on just ONE unit trying to get past ONE tough opponent. So I took that to heart, and decided "Wow...so if the Uber Slim Sword could just guarantee at least 40 Arena fights that might have otherwise ended in failure (like Noish vs. Emmile, or Alec vs. Dulles)...it would actually SAVE time in the long run!" That's the logic I used; and I think it's sound logic.

After all...you get 15 units just from Prologue-Chapter 1 alone. If each faces 7 opponents from Chapters 1-5, that's about 525 battles in Gen 1 (or, 105 battles per Chapter). Then Chapter 2 gives you 6 more units, while Chapter 3 gives you 3 more. So that's an additional 231 battles (168 total from the units in Chapter 2, and 63 total from the units in Chapter 3); that adds up to a total of 756 Gen 1 Arena battles (or about 151 Battles per Chapter). Gen 2 then adds another 644-679 battles (depending on how many battles you decide to put Leen through; she can participate in up to 35 Arena Battles throughout the game). And according to my math, I only need the Slim Sword to save me a defeat in 40 of those fights to save time over the long run!

That's about that's why I'm thinking that it's probably much more helpful in an AAAA Rank run than in a casual one. Because as MartytheDemonSlayer said (I got him to be a co-commentator for my LP)...

The EXP rank in this game is extremely stringent, and if you're playing for reliability it can be very hard to train units. Essentially, not doing well in early arenas can start a vicious cycle, where once a unit is finally powerful enough to do well in the arena, their poor early performances means they don't have enough money to buy the elite ring, making it very difficult to reach the EXP requirement. Normally this issue can be worked around by RNG abusing or just having your units fight in different orders. In a run where neither of these options are allowed, I think a high kill slim sword might be one of the best ways to let chumps like Arden and Dew get far in the arena.

Edited December 28, 2016 by FionordeQuester

[Excellen Browning]

If you're going for ranked play all of a sudden, why not just burn RN's till you get what you want? Or prayer abuse? Or set up an elite ring chain?

[FionordeQuester]

If you're going for ranked play all of a sudden, why not just burn RN's till you get what you want? Or prayer abuse? Or set up an elite ring chain?

The only reason I'm talking about Ranked play is because CT075 was curious as to how anything involving a 100 crit Slim Sword could count as anything but a casual run. As for your other suggestions...

1) Burning RN's takes longer to do than grinding the Slim Sword, because each reset takes 1 entire minute, while the Slim Sword only takes 43 minutes and 22 Turns to forge.

2) Prayer Abuse is only possible for about 2 units, unless we're counting glitches (and at that point, I may as well just utilize the Rescue Staff glitch)

3) I do use an Elite Ring chain; but level ups are random. I can't possibly build entire strats around the assumption that I'll get awesome level ups.

[Tetragrammaton]

How does she get past the armor knight in the Ch.2 arena? Afaik he cleanly one-shots her at full HP with no chance of prayer activation.

She's still alive after that with 1 HP left

[Valkama]

Have you ever actually done the math on the exp rank? Gen 2 has 559 possible levels and it's no struggle at all to have all of your units cap unless you are using subs or have bad units like Claud!Lester. Because of this you only need 441 levels gen 1. All your staff users can cap with no effort whatsoever so that is Aideen, Deirdre, Raquesis, Ethlyn, Tailto, Claud, and Erin. In addition you have Sigurd, Ayra, Holyn, Lewyn, Jamke, and Midir who never have trouble clearing arenas ever and they can easily make it to their cap. Also, Noish and Alec easily clear arenas once the brave sword becomes available so they should be able to reach promotion at the very least. Arden can kill the pirates in chapter 3 to easily reach promotion. Finn has all of gen 2 to cap his level. Quan can hit about level 20 without any effort. Sylvia can get a few levels from just dancing and by this point you're already over 441 levels and I haven't even covered Bridget, Azel, Dew, and Beowulf who all just give you more freedom so you don't have to cap everyone in gen 2. Unless you're going at LTC speed while AAAA ranking you really should not have much trouble with the EXP rank but then a 100 kill slim sword is definitely not something that is happening in an LTC.

Edited December 28, 2016 by Valkama

[eclipse]

Since when were we talking about the Slim Sword and LTC?

[FionordeQuester]

Have you ever actually done the math on the exp rank? Gen 2 has 559 possible levels and it's no struggle at all to have all of your units cap unless you are using subs or have bad units like Claud!Lester. Because of this you only need 441 levels gen 1.

"Only" 441 Levels? That's still a lot.

All your staff users can cap with no effort whatsoever so that is Aideen, Deirdre, Raquesis, Ethlyn, Tailto, Claud, and Erin....

In the interest of fairness, I would point this out: I forgot how they and Fin left before Chapter 4. So actually, one only faces a possible 714 Gen 1 Arena Battles. In addition, not everyone can use the Slim Sword; so there are only about 341 Gen 1 Arena Battles where the Slim Sword can be used. That's still a heck of a lot though, considering that we're not even factoring Gen 2 yet.

That being said however...Raquesis, Tailto, and Erin can only staff spam upon promotion, so they need to do plenty of fighting before then. And in regards to Aideen and Deirdre, money doesn't exactly grow on trees; the Warp Staff costs 1000G per use, and needs to be used about 43 times to level Deirdre and Aideen to Level 30. That's 45,000G each! They don't have nearly THAT much money to burn!

In addition you have Sigurd, Ayra, Holyn, Jamke, and Midir who never have trouble clearing arenas ever and they can easily make it to their cap...

See, this statement here tells me that you've never done an AAAA Rank run that didn't contain extensive use of RNG manipulation and/or Save States. Midir doesn't have nearly as easy a time as you're suggesting, and even Jamke has trouble against some of the opponents he fights. Plus, Jamke's Killer Bow costs 10,000G to repair; it's very hard for him to keep up on that while STILL spending 40,000G per chapter on the Elite Ring.

And hey, Aira and Holyn are good, but they're not THAT good! I've seen them die in PLENTY of Arena fights throughout the game!

Also, Noish and Alec easily clear arenas once the brave sword becomes available so they should be able to reach promotion at the very least.

"Easily"? That's a surprise to me, considering my own experiences.

Arden can kill the pirates in chapter 3 to easily reach promotion.

True; but I find said pirates to be better for training Azel. I save Ardan's training for Slaydar's infinitely respawning reinforcements in Chapter 5.

Finn has all of gen 2 to cap his level.

But he also doesn't get that many level ups in Gen 1. In my experience, getting him every Arena fight in Gen 2 is JUST enough for him to level cap without actually fighting anything beyond Chapter 7.

Quan can hit about level 20 without any effort. Sylvia can get a few levels from just dancing...

True.

and I haven't even covered Bridget, Azel, Dew, and Beowulf who all just give you more freedom so you don't have to cap everyone in gen 2. Unless you're going at LTC speed while AAAA ranking you really should have much trouble with the EXP rank but then a 100 kill slim sword is definitly not something that is happening in an LTC.

Dew and Beowulf both have trouble clearing the game's Arena's without dying a few times; enough so that they can't beat Keller (Chapter 3, Rank 6) even WITH the 100 crit Slim Sword! And the Arena isn't enough to cap all units; I can only afford to neglect one Gen 2 character in the run I have going now.

Edited December 28, 2016 by FionordeQuester

[OliKad]

Since when were we talking about the Slim Sword and LTC?

Okay, I think the whole Sylvia master race whatever has gone far enough. xD

Speaking of, she got an average of 7,91/10 with... 26 votes!? How the hell did this happened?

Let's finally wrap up Chapter 2 now, shall we? We'll now focus on the only flier of the first generation, Fury/Ferry/Erin/Green-haired chick!

Class: Pegasus Knight (Level 6)

Holy Blood: None

Personal Skills: Pursuit

Class Skills: Continue (after promotion)

Stats:

32 HP (50%)

11 Strength (20%)

1 Magic (10%)

12 Skill (20%)

18 Speed (30%)

9 Defense (30%)

9 Resistance (10%)

7 Luck (20%)

My thoughts: Fury is a pretty solid unit. She joins in Chapter 2 at Level 6. Yes, this sounds absolutely disgusting, but she has some REALLY good bases for her level, and is a lance user where axes start to be way less present, which is a good tradeoff. However, to compensate this, she actually has one of the worst growth rates in the game, to the point where they would barely be considered good in Gaiden! This big issue is however well balanced by her very solid promotion gains, which are hampered by not gaining Power, and that's very bad to be honest. But, she does have the oh-so important Pursuit skill, as well as Continue after promoting, which is good enough.

But, the key aspect of Fury/Ferry/Erin/Green-haired chick is that she's a flier: the only one in the first gen. This very fact will automatically give her a lot of importance and utility in your team, although not as much as in other FE games, because of the lack of rescuing and that she cannot use roads and terrain to her advantage. Still, she is more-or-less a must-train, and thanks to her bases, her combat is quite solid all around, especially if you give her Finn's Brave Lance at any point. So, she'll recieve a 7.5/10 from me.

[Excellen Browning]

Fury starts out not capable of taking much of a hit, but she does make a good hero lancer and a good magic sworder after promotion, so offensively she's pretty good. Being a flier matters maybe twice in gen 1, but she's still mounted so that's good. 6/10

Edited December 28, 2016 by Excellen Browning

[Valkama]

Jamke and Midir don't have problems clearing the arena, I don't know where you're getting the idea they do. Maybe there is 1 level 7 enemy they have to retry a few times to kill but the killer bow pretty well guarantees them a victory. Raquesis can staff spam before promotion and it is in fact the best way to get her promotion. Tailto has no troubles in the arena until promotion and Erin has some troubles but she can reach promotion via the brave lance. Noish and Alec always promote by the end of the game unless you are specifically ignoring them. I also forgot to mention Lex who will also cap even though he never finishes Arenas because of Elite. 45k gold is not much for this game especially for Deirdre who can get a personal money dump from the richest man in Jugdral. Aideen has all game to promote so the occasional money dump from a spouse or Dew is enough to ensure she promotes, she also can do some Arena's once she promotes. Using all these units excluding Sylvia's dancing levels you hit 440 levels. So just one level of dancing gets you to 441 but Sylvia is obviously getting more than that from dancing. Dew, Azel, Beowulf, and Bridget levels also all add to this so even if you're having some minor problems capping anyone I mentioned earlier these units can fill in. A 100 kill slim sword is outright ridiculous investment and I don't think any player would realistically want to spend 43 minutes getting a weapon that offers such marginal and unneeded benefits.

I've done the math: https://puu.sh/t3lPp/598689ff03.png

And just I was about to post that I see Erin is up.

Erin is unfortunately hurt a bit because of her lack of access to roads however she is also your only flier and the game seems to always have a use for her somewhere. She also is only available for half the game which is kinda unfortunate 7/10

Edited December 28, 2016 by Valkama

[FionordeQuester]

So Fury is, er...different. Not in a bad way mind you, quite the opposite in fact. Her growths and promotion bonuses stink, but she's got so much else going for her, that she's STILL quite handy in-spite of that. First and foremost, she can fly over all types terrain, even oceans. So she can maneuver around this game's maps in a way that most units can only dream of.

First of all, she starts off really good. 18 Speed is a ridiculous amount to start with, she's got a B rank in both swords AND lances, she gets staves upon promotion, and even her Strength and Defense stats are pretty decent for her level. Yeah, eventually those are going to sag, but that won't be for a while, and she's still got the Uber Slim Sword to cover for that. Plus, with C staves + the Return Staff + the Elite Ring + Sylvia, she's not going to have any problems getting to Level 30.

Now, that being said, she's not a heavy duty fighter. Unlike some of our other units, You can't just throw her into an enemy army and expect her to survive, at least not if it has anything other than axe users. Plus, all bows in the game score automatic critical hits on her, so that's something you have to watch out for too. So if she does do any fighting, it's usually only for the sake of clearing out MBandits that no one else can reach, or for picking some stragglers off. But frankly, that's all you really need her for anyway. Because the she does with that flying horse is stuff that NO ONE else in the army can do.

8/10. She doesn't do anything THAT important; but her ability to fly over terrain is still handy.

Edited December 28, 2016 by FionordeQuester

[ZemZem]

Fury keeps Finn's brave lance warm while he's gone (though he isn't gonna be getting it back until he'll borrow it from Fee to clear Gen II arenes), and she does a really good job with it. Her growths are pretty bad but her bases are decent enough (she's the one who should get the strength village in C3). Flying isn't too useful in Gen I, but hey, she's mounted and useful.

7/10, +1 bias for being my favorite Gen I female (she's very pretty, too...). 8/10

[General Horace]

fury is decent, her bases are really good and she's actually good in chapter 4/5 unlike most units. She's a late joiner and flight isn't as great in FE4 as other games.

6.5/10. Shes good for her whole existance, which is unfourtunately not all that long.

[Peppy]

Flying utility is pretty good. Thankfully, her lack of growths don't completely kill her capabilities in combat. Would probs be considered better if she didn't join so late.

7.5/10 (+0.5 bias included for putting up with Lewyn's bullshit)

[Flee Fleet!]

Jamke and Midir don't have problems clearing the arena,

Midir can only ever complete an arena with either the Killer Bow or Brave Bow (most likely Killer Bow, just sayin). Maybe it's just my experience with him though...

Anyways, Ferry! 8.5/10, with positive bias.

Ferry's the only flying unit you get in Gen1, thus it makes her kind of special. She has high movement, so escaping danger is easy for her. She's average in combat, but better than the Chalpy Knights. She does decent damage, and has Pursuit, so stealing kills is mostly easy for her. She also has good bases( that 18 speed) for her level, so she fight fairly good enough. However she has really bad growth rates, and that honestly sucks.

But, Ferry is pretty useful, especially since she's on a pegasus. Most notably, she can attack enemies that can not be reached by other units, such as those mages with Meteor in Ch5. Since terrain doesn't effect her, Ferry can also easily traverse mountains, deserts, and even reach to far away places (such as reaching the Blaggi Tower before anyone else by flying over the ocean/sea). Thus she's very useful in getting rid of pirates in water, long range magic using mages, and the like, as well as even helping Tailto and Claude fight the pirates. She can also easily save villages before they get destroyed. Due to this, she can also reach the villages that increase some of the units stats, and Ferry would gladly like it. Ferry also comes with lances, at a time when there are more lance enemies than axe enemies, so she doesn't get hurt from weapon disadvantage for at least Ch2, Ch3, and Ch4. Even Ch5, after the first castle is captured.

Ferry suffers from one thing: Bows and Arrows. So yeah you should keep her away from them at all costs, unless she can ORKO them. Also, like most pegasus units, Ferry will likely dodge enemy attacks, though not to the extent of someone like Lewyn or Ferry. Ferry will also prefer the Brave Lance, after Finn leaves at the end of Ch3. With that, she could easily ORKO enemies.

Upon promotion, she becomes quite better, with more movement.

Overall, she's your only flying unit for Gen1, so it would be a good choice to train her.

Edited December 28, 2016 by Flee Fleet!

[Koumal8]

Ferry's task is bandit hunting, and she's great at that with the Hero Lance and, if you want to, the addition of a Power Ring, two not-so-contested resources (unless you're investing on Alec, but why would you when the benefits of giving them to Fury is much greater). Being the only flier she has utility, makes good use of magic swords upon promotion and makes a breakfast out of those annoying Meteor mages at the end of Ch10. One of her best pairings (Levin) does not slow her down thanks to that conversation in Chapter 4. Really, her only problem is her low durability, but being a flying unit she can just kill an enemy and Canto back to safety inside a forest or over the ocean where enemies can't reach her. She dies as soon as she smells a bow, but, IIRC, there aren't that many bow users in 1st Gen, are there?

7.5 with negative bias, because her entire characterization revolving around Levin kinda bugs me.

[Levin's Scarf]

Fury's mobile and has canto, albeit she can't utilize the roads. She won't pack a lot of punch but will do decently with a brave lance. Not too special as a unit, but she can make solid contributions. 7/10

[eclipse]

And this will be the last unit I rate, since that's as far as I got.

Fury's recruitment sucks. The rest of her is decent enough. She can fly, which makes certain things a lot less annoying. She also gets swords and lances, and can choose which one she wants to pile the hurt on with. . .somehow. Her growths look like they're her personal growths in SD (though anyone with that much personal Speed and Defense would be pretty darn good). Last but not least, she's Yet Another Staff User, except she flies.

7/10, for being a jack of several trades and one of the worst-written characters

[Vaximillian]

I thought she won't attack Lewyn guarding Evans because unlike her flightmates who dutifully suicided into his Elwind, she didn't.

Is it the usual case or did I somehow get lucky?

[Darrman]

Fury can fly. Flying is good. Very good. Sure it isn't as good as in some other games but it's still good. Need someone to get past that annoying terrain to kill that siege person? Better get Fury on the job. Slogging through Ch5 and its Meteor mages? You have to get Fury to kill them. So how does Fury kill things, you ask? Well her bases are pretty good, what with the 18 speed and all that. However, her growths leave a lot to be desired. She tends to get loads of blank levels and when your highest non-HP growth is a mere 30%... She isn't getting much when she does get stats. But there are ways to make her more useful. The biggest one involves her robbing Fin of his brave lance while he's packing up to head to Lenster, and keeping it for herself into Ch4. Her combat gets a lot better when you can quadruple enemies. When she promotes, she also gets staff access, although she isn't using much better then Mend/Return. Still, it's there and doesn't come at the expense of sword access like it does in 3DSFE... She can even fall in love with Levin instantly because it's canon dammit if you want, but that's besides the point.

She flies, and that's always good. 8/10. So I checked how frequently our green-haired chick on a horse (not to be confused with the dancing green haired chick) was called her many different names, and she was Fury six times, Ferry twice, and Erin once. Checkmate, Ferry fanboys.