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

[Yojinbo]

People seriously underestimate flying utility in FE4.

[Mekkah]

45 minutes ago, Yojinbo said:

People seriously underestimate flying utility in FE4.

It's really nice for the pegs but Altenna's flying work is pretty superfluous. 

[CappnRob]

Altenna is more of a supplement to Fee than an upgrade or advantage. Fee can be exceptionally utilitarian and has far more availability, but Altenna being her massive damage-doing partner in crime doesn't hurt.

[Excellen Browning]

Altenna wouldn't be bad if she joined at the start of the generation, but she only has the last two maps and her primary use is getting Areone off your back. 3/10

[Yojinbo]

2 hours ago, Mekkah said:

It's really nice for the pegs but Altenna's flying work is pretty superfluous. 

I'm not arguing specifically for Altenna's case here but just the way flying in FE4 is looked upon in general. Fee being better at doing the same things as Altenna is a different matter - that's Fee just being the better unit but flying is still a very useful ability that doesn't get its fair share of credit imo.

[Refa]

8 hours ago, Inference said:

Fee doesn't actually have to retreat because they won't kill her unless you let the entire map attack her at once for some reason. That and Claude!Fee can use Silence instead without having to get close. 1 Mov doesn't give Altenna a viable niche over Fee.

She does because otherwise the other ones will put her to sleep.

Edited January 29, 2017 by Refa

[Vaximillian]

12 minutes ago, Refa said:

She does because otherwise the other ones will put her to sleep.

She could wear a Barrier ring though. It won't help Altena's non-existent Res much but makes Fee immune to status staves.

[Refa]

You could, yeah.

[FionordeQuester]

Alright, so...Althena...eh.  She's pretty good.  She's still basically a flying fortress with 60+ Might + Pursuit + Continue + Critical + 124 Accuracy.  All of that would have been incredible earlier on in the game, but...well...

 

The enemies in Chapters 10-Final kind of take a dump all over that.  There are reams and REAMS of magic users coming out of the woodwork, and tons of status staves flying around; none of Althena's defenses can save her from that onslaught.  Granted, the same could ALSO be said for 80% of our army, but...most of THEM come earlier than Althena does.  The game itself kind of just becomes the "Celice, Aless, Leen, Leaf, and Arthur/Sety show (with special guest star Narga!Julia)" by that point, just because of all the nonsense the Final Chapter throws at you.  

 

Plus...that Gae Bolg is far too heavy.  The Dragon Master class already has one of the lowest SPD caps out of any promoted class in the game, so that 15 WT is not doing her ANY favors.  Hilda & Manfroy 2HKO her, Ridale has Hero Sword + Pursuit + Critical, Alvis usually OHKOes her...and don't even get me started on the Pegasus Trio!

 

That all said...she's still a flying unit; and flying units are especially handy to have on Chapters 10-Final.  She can rescue far away villages, she can ORKO some of the staff and magic users near Chalphy (Final), she can help protect Palmark and his kids on Chapter 10, she helps get Arionne off your back in Final, she can OHKO Ishtar on Chapter 10 (she doesn't get 5 Leadership stars until Final, so Althena CAN still hit Ishtar)...and you also NEED her for LTCing strats in Final if you didn't get Sharlow's Berserk Staff.  Heck, she can even do 54 Damage to fricken ALVIS if you can somehow get her RES high enough.  Granted, Celice can do that too; but even Celice can sometimes take a while trying to chop through Alvis's Big Shield (30% activation rate) + 40 Defense + 16 HP Regen + 104 Evade.

 

EDIT: Well, OK, you don't NEED her for LTC strats in Final; that was needless hyperbole on my part.  But she does help make things much more reliable if you don't have Sharlow.

 

7/10.  She's not one of your best units...but she still has her uses.  And frankly, that's more than I can say for even some of the child characters (*cough*Faval*cough*).  I personally found her helpful, but, I can see how others might not.  

Edited January 30, 2017 by FionordeQuester

[Inference]

Was Ishtar supposed to be hard or something? I keep seeing her name brought up, but I'm not sure why; Seliph can run up and one-round her with Brave Sword like he does every other boss in the game.

Please don't quote me assuming he has no rings. That discussion should already be resolved through virtue of Sigurd being his father.

[Inference]

(Can you even delete posts here...?)

Edited January 30, 2017 by Inference

[CappnRob]

Isthar does enough raw damage to one shot most characters. Anyone with a hero weapon doing 31+ damage a hit can one round her, sure, but she still possesses an immense danger to your party and has really good evasion due to her ridiculous speed (and the +10 from Mjolnir offsets its weight). Add to the fact she has continue and has ambush so if you botch your first try she's going to get first strike on everyone thereafter and you're set up for a bad time. Heck, she's basically set up for Faval to take her out as he should be packing enough heat to one shot her with Ichival.

[Inference]

Oh, wait, Mjolnir. Nevermind. I was thinking of that one dudette with Bolganone. I want to say Seliph still handles Ishtar, but I wouldn't know without any numbers in front of me; Arthur was the one who ran up and blew her away.

Edited January 30, 2017 by Inference

[CappnRob]

Hilda is.... moderately dangerous. 50 attack power is nothing to sneeze at, but Volcannon can never compare to a holy weapon and their stat buffs. She only has a piddle battle speed of 12 as a result, but she is more physically tougher than Isthar with 19 defense and 70 HP. But eh!

[Valkama]

8 hours ago, FionordeQuester said:

and you also NEED her for LTCing strats in Final if you didn't get Sharlow's Berserk Staff.

If for whatever reason you aren't grabbing the berserk staff, you would use the berserk sword on Fee. Altenna is legitimately the only unit the whole game that costs turns to recruit, even Faval/Asaello and Hannibal can be recruited without turn loss. Altenna is likely the worst unit in an LTC setting so this really isn't an argument in her favor.

[Levin's Scarf]

2 hours ago, Inference said:

Oh, wait, Mjolnir. Nevermind. I was thinking of that one dudette with Bolganone. I want to say Seliph still handles Ishtar, but I wouldn't know without any numbers in front of me; Arthur was the one who ran up and blew her away.

In the endgame I attempted to have Seliph deal with Ishtar but his hitrate was pretty iffy. Forseti works great with leadership star boost, though.

[FionordeQuester]

1 hour ago, Valkama said:

If for whatever reason you aren't grabbing the berserk staff, you would use the berserk sword on Fee. Altenna is legitimately the only unit the whole game that costs turns to recruit, even Faval/Asaello and Hannibal can be recruited without turn loss. Altenna is likely the worst unit in an LTC setting so this really isn't an argument in her favor.

Actually, (and this is spoilers for anyone who follows my LP)...

There's a glitch in the game, where Status Swords have a 100% chance of afflicting anyone with more than 30 RES.  So in addition to Berserking the Hel Mage, you can ALSO put Julius to Sleep.  Do that, and the Hel Mage will ALWAYS target Julius over everyone else!  But if you don't do that, then the guy could attack just about anyone.  So once you have Fee Berserk the Hel Mage, you can THEN have Althena put Julius to sleep.  If you have Sharlow, however, then yeah; Fee is the only flier required.

[Mekkah]

It probably costs more turns to recruit Altenna than it does to make sure Julius gets Hel'd, if any. Marty's LTC seems to have done it just fine.

Edited January 30, 2017 by Mekkah

[Irysa]

Assuming Fiorde is correct and Julius always gets attacked if he's asleep, then what Marty says here means Altenna at least can get back one turn in a scenario without the Berserk staff.

Besides, penalising Altenna for the turns cost to recruit her seems off to me, especially since nobody's been penalising various second gen chars for the fact you have to spend extra turns to get their parents paired up to recruit them. Altenna is there every run regardless of how fast you did Gen 1. (or if they have I missed that!)

Edited January 30, 2017 by Irysa

[Valkama]

2 hours ago, Irysa said:

Besides, penalising Altenna for the turns cost to recruit her seems off to me, especially since nobody's been penalising various second gen chars for the fact you have to spend extra turns to get their parents paired up to recruit them. Altenna is there every run regardless of how fast you did Gen 1. (or if they have I missed that!)

I'm not penalizing her for having a recruit cost but saying she's good in LTC is ridiculous. Also the only kids it cost turns to create are Arthur and Tinny which would cost you 3 extra turns to have Tailto paired with Azel, Altenna costs you 4.

6 hours ago, FionordeQuester said:

 

  Hide contents

There's a glitch in the game, where Status Swords have a 100% chance of afflicting anyone with more than 30 RES.  So in addition to Berserking the Hel Mage, you can ALSO put Julius to Sleep.  Do that, and the Hel Mage will ALWAYS target Julius over everyone else!  But if you don't do that, then the guy could attack just about anyone.  So once you have Fee Berserk the Hel Mage, you can THEN have Althena put Julius to sleep.  If you have Sharlow, however, then yeah; Fee is the only flier required.

 

You don't need to put Julius to sleep as he is guaranteed to attack Julius turn 2 and it's impossible for Seliph to seize in 2 turns.

Edit: Actually you can get a 2 turn on the last castle but it requires you to sacrifice a turn on Freege castle which is a less reliable way to do the map. This is such an odd ball scenario that I'm not even sure why we are considering it.

Edited January 30, 2017 by Valkama

[FionordeQuester]

6 hours ago, Valkama said:

I'm not penalizing her for having a recruit cost but saying she's good in LTC is ridiculous. 

Whoa now; when did I ever say that she was good for LTC's?  All I said was that she was necessary for LTC in the final chapter, IF you didn't have Sharlow.  I'll admit, that was still a hyperbolic statement; but I never said she was good in LTC.  She just happens to have a few uses (assuming that you're going out of your way to recruit all characters).

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You don't need to put Julius to sleep as he is guaranteed to attack Julius turn 2 and it's impossible for Seliph to seize in 2 turns.

I dont know what to tell you; I've had that Hel Mage attack other units before.  But even assuming my memory is faulty (which I'm pretty sure it isn't in this case; I've been up to very extensive testing for the purposes of my LP), the Hel Mage has a very low chance of hitting Julius; and a very HIGH chance of getting killed by him.  Putting Julius to sleep makes the strategy much more reliable.

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This is such an odd ball scenario that I'm not even sure why we are considering it.

Because it's one of the reasons why I gave Althena a 7/10 instead of a 6/10.  There are other reasons, like the ones I mentioned in my rating; but this here was one of them.

Edited January 30, 2017 by FionordeQuester

[Valkama]

Nah he won't attack anyone else because they should be too far away or dead. The most reliable way I have found to complete the map is to 2 turn Freege castle and then 3 turn Belhalla(You can't 2 turn it because Leif and Laylea are too far away). This gives you enough time to bait away/kill everyone and keep your team safe. The Hel mage will likely not attack Julius the first turn he's berserked because there are other targets but once those targets are out of reach he goes for Julius.

Doing the Sleep strategy would actually put Altenna at a significant chance of Death. Fee can get away with it because Fee can equip the Earth sword(Although it's still not ideal) but Altenna's magic is terrible.

[FionordeQuester]

1 hour ago, Valkama said:

Doing the Sleep strategy would actually put Altenna at a significant chance of Death. Fee can get away with it because Fee can equip the Earth sword(Although it's still not ideal) but Altenna's magic is terrible.

Meh, that's what the Valkyrie Staff is for.  And how do you propose that the Hel Mage NOT get killed by Julius if he misses?

[Valkama]

If he misses then you aren't getting the low turn count so it's a reset. He has a 33% hit chance which is fine since the rest of the map is a breeze and actually reliable. Valkyrie staff is on Lester in LTC so no revives gen 2. I suppose you could let her die and not revive her if all you care about is turns but I don't see much of a point to it. If you aren't going for the Low Turn count I don't see much of a reason not to pick up Julia and just win the game normally. Hel mage strats are super cheesy and I doubt many people care for it outside of low turning.

Edit: Actually it is theoretically possible to 1 round Julius with Faval charge procs so I suppose you could try that as a last resort if he does miss. Though the odds of that happening are slim to none.

Edited January 31, 2017 by Valkama

[FionordeQuester]

1 hour ago, Valkama said:

If you aren't going for the Low Turn count I don't see much of a reason not to pick up Julia and just win the game normally. Hel mage strats are super cheesy and I doubt many people care for it outside of low turning.

Time mainly; I'm not actually sure whether or not it costs more real time to do the Hel strat than normal strats, but I'm thinking it might.  Enemy phases last for a really long time in FE4, so I'm not one to pass on a chance to cut a lot of that nonsense out.  

 

Besides; it's great for JUST in case you took too many turns on your AAAA Rank run.  That should never happen (considering how absurdly lenient the Tactics requirement is), but...you never know.  Hence, that's one way in which Altenna is minorly useful.

Edited January 31, 2017 by FionordeQuester