List units that can get RNG screwed

[Tolvir]

48 minutes ago, DLuna said:

TBH Micaiah is one of the worst examples because her growths are lopsided to the point where her variance isn't very high at all and at the very least, extremely likely to cap ram certain stats to BEXP others. She's the type of non-prepromote who's genuinely one of the least likely to be 'screwed' by definition. Her speed base/growth is bad enough to the point where you cannot reasonably expect her to double. So if it ends up lower than average it won't really effect much anyway. And that's pretty much her only stat with any important variance.

 

  

I am just speaking from experience personally. I personally have never had a Micaiah that had very good stats. Guess it is just bad luck. My point with her getting RNG screwed also has to do with the fact that overall they have a small amount of screentime resulting in them falling behind fast. So if she does het RNG screwed, it hits her harder than say, Soren who has a lot of time to build up strength.

[Slumber]

1 hour ago, DLuna said:

TBH Micaiah is one of the worst examples because her growths are lopsided to the point where her variance isn't very high at all and at the very least, extremely likely to cap ram certain stats to BEXP others. She's the type of non-prepromote who's genuinely one of the least likely to be 'screwed' by definition. Her speed base/growth is bad enough to the point where you cannot reasonably expect her to double. So if it ends up lower than average it won't really effect much anyway. And that's pretty much her only stat with any important variance.

Micaiah's biggest issue is that Luck is her highest stat, and she really can't cap it until she's nearing her second promotion, which makes BEXP abusing her kind of wasteful. Obviously it's good to pump BEXP into her once she hits her natural Mag and Res caps, but she'll still be getting Luck, while you sit there, hoping she gets good enough HP, Skill, Def or Speed to not be an awful unit. Luck will pretty much always take one of her 3 stat boosts she gets through BEXP.

She's not quite so BEXP ideal compared to somebody like Aran, who WILL cap Skill, Def and Strength pretty quick on his own, giving you tons of EXP to give him so he can get the Speed, HP and Res he needs to fix his glaring issues.

Micaiah can still get RNG screwed, even with BEXP, purely due to the 40 cap on Luck that she'll take 35 hours to hit.

Edited May 10, 2017 by Slumber

[Dunal]

9 hours ago, Tolvir said:

I am just speaking from experience personally. I personally have never had a Micaiah that had very good stats. Guess it is just bad luck. My point with her getting RNG screwed also has to do with the fact that overall they have a small amount of screentime resulting in them falling behind fast. So if she does het RNG screwed, it hits her harder than say, Soren who has a lot of time to build up strength.

But that isn't the definition of being RNG 'screwed'. You've "personally have never had a Micaiah that had very good stats" but that just means that she's genuinely not very good. Like I said, her SPD ending up on average or below average doesn't make much difference and that is her only stat with any kind of varience. Magic/Luck/Res are all such high growths that the chance they'll be far from their averages is very minuscule.

Her low availability or factors other than stat variance has absolutely no bearing on being 'screwed'. Because by definition, being screwed indicates being unlucky with her stat growth and her performance varying rapidly based on that. The truth is, Micaiah functions almost exactly the same no matter how she grows (even if she's extremely lucky and caps SPD is tier 3, she still can't even double many enemies -- and that's her best case scenario). Her bad promotion times solidify this solely because no matter how her SPD (again, the only stat with any kind of notable variance) ends up, she simply doesn't have the opportunities for it to matter anyway. It's not her being 'screwed', she's just not that great of a combat unit. And staff usage has zero bearing on stat growth to boot, aside from magic which almost guaranteed to grow.

 

Basically, Micaiah's average SPD is not that good, based on multiple factors (base stat and availability being two of them) so any variance outside of that doesn't impact her at all. Keep in mind that a unit being RNG screwed indicates they are very prone to a lot of variance in their performance based on stat growth. As a unit, Micaiah is almost as far away from that as any tier 1 unit in FE could be. Screwed doesn't mean "this unit doesn't turn out good". That's not really how it works.

 

Sure, Micaiah could get massively SPD blessed in tier 1 and start doubling, but that is a very unusual occurrence, not the norm. So if she doesn't turn out that way, that doesn't mean that she's 'RNG screwed' because on average she isn't meant to gain that much SPD to begin with. With Micaiah you're 95% likely to end up with a mage with huge MAG/LCK/RES and not a lot else. Deviating from that is the exception, not the rule. 

Edited May 10, 2017 by DLuna

[Shin]

Pretty much anyone with a fairly middling growth and a relatively poor base, so around 45-55% in general, will be the most obviously screwed. It's a combination of variance ranges and also player expectations. Ardan's never going to proc much speed, so you're always going to have to accept his speed will be trash. However, in FE7, Kent's strength and speed are only passable when he starts off and any procs that he doesn't get really go on to hurt.

[Dark Holy Elf]

@DLuna

I think you're underestimating the difference Micaiah's speed stat can make. If she gets speed-screwed she'll need Resolve not to be doubled which dramatically makes her combat worse. Her HP is also very volatile (which is unusual if we're comparing GBA FE where most have 65%+ HP growth, and amplified on her because her base is so low) and if she gets HP-screwed, she can be OHKOed which again negatively impacts her combat significantly. There's also a definite snowball effect here: a Micaiah doing decently on speed/HP gains levels more easily thereafter and thus her magic will get significantly improve (not due to RNG, just due to levels) which makes a difference for OHKOing some key enemies if memory serves.

She'll still have utility regardless but her combat can easily fluctuate quite a lot. You're right that her Magic and non-HP defensive stats don't fluctuate much, and of course stats don't matter much for her staff utility in Parts 3-4, but HP/speed are still big and Radiant Dawn's Part 1 is challenging enough to amplify the changes that happen, so I'd certainly say the RNG makes a big difference for her.

[Interdimensional Observer]

15 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

I think you're underestimating the difference Micaiah's speed stat can make. If she gets speed-screwed she'll need Resolve not to be doubled which dramatically makes her combat worse. Her HP is also very volatile (which is unusual if we're comparing GBA FE where most have 65%+ HP growth, and amplified on her because her base is so low) and if she gets HP-screwed, she can be OHKOed which again negatively impacts her combat significantly. There's also a definite snowball effect here: a Micaiah doing decently on speed/HP gains levels more easily thereafter and thus her magic will get significantly improve (not due to RNG, just due to levels) which makes a difference for OHKOing some key enemies if memory serves.

 

And if Miccy is significantly speed screwed, she can get doubled in 1-9, which makes it much harder to survive that chapter. Looking at 1-8 HM's stats (1-9 aren't available), we're dealing with 15-16 AS. Miccy only averages 13.65 at 20/--, the first speedwing doesn't come until 1-E. At 23 HP and 6 Def minus the robe and shield, Miccy's dying in two vs. 23 atk. 25 Lck doesn't help her dodge that so much vs. 115 hit.

So yeah speed is sorta a big deal for Miccy.

[Dark Holy Elf]

As I mentioned you can use Resolve to avoid those doubles (as long as her speed is at least ~9, and you remember to take it off Tauroneo/whoever else before 1-8 since you can't access them in 1-9's prep screen) but that's still a reasonably valuable resource that someone else could take, and it's not perfect, for instance it doesn't protect her from doubles if she can't counter (e.g. longbows, not that there are any in 1-9) and it means that if she dodges the first attack she still gets (non-fatally) doubled decreasing her survivability overall.

[Jotari]

On 4/30/2017 at 3:36 AM, Interdimensional Observer said:

Canas has been called the Eliwood of mages (though Erk can also be irksome), and yeah the last time I used him, he was pretty crappy.

Haha. I see what you did there.

On 5/5/2017 at 3:03 AM, L9999 said:

Gaiden is the king of getting RNG screwed, both in combat and in growths. Sometimes you might as well play it 0% growths since you units barely improve. The Jugdral games are also guilty of empty levelups. I think getting RNG screwed pre-Awakening isn't too bad since the enemies suck ass and they give you good prepromotes.

Neither of those games are partial to RNG screwage. They have low growths by design. Units aren't expected to gain a lot of stats so the rise in enemy stats is very slow and very small. Not proccing a lot of stats in Gaiden will not screw you over since your character's bases or promotion bases are enough to carry you through the game. You're not getting screwed if you were never meant to improve to begin with.

[Camus The Dark Knight]

On 4/29/2017 at 3:17 PM, Harvey said:

This thread is to list out units that have the chance of getting RNG screwed so careful training is required for such units.

I'll start with Eliwood and Raven in FE7.

 

I never had an issue with Raven personally. The only RNG screwage was defenses, in terms of strength skill and speed he was consistently good. As for me, probably any character from FE6 just about. The "average" growths from that game are terrible, very few consistently good units. Only ones I can think of are Melady and Fae, the later of which only has a single 30 use weapon.

[Chad Radwell]

I know Eliwood is kind of the poster child for this, but he's doing alright in my current run, so really, who can't? If we're doing personal anecdotes though, my poor current Oscar has the upper body strength of a five-year-old girl with advanced muscular dystrophy  on the flip side, my last Shadow Dragon run gave me Olympic Sprinter Merric, which was...a wild time.

[Baldrick]

On 5/11/2017 at 0:05 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

@DLuna

I think you're underestimating the difference Micaiah's speed stat can make. If she gets speed-screwed she'll need Resolve not to be doubled which dramatically makes her combat worse.

I wouldn't call it dramatic - even if she can take a hit she's not being exposed to combat, and doesn't need to be. Compared to a unit like Aran, who's built to tank hits, the difference being doubled and not isn't much.

[Jotari]

5 hours ago, Tibarn's Distracting Lisp said:

I know Eliwood is kind of the poster child for this, but he's doing alright in my current run, so really, who can't? If we're doing personal anecdotes though, my poor current Oscar has the upper body strength of a five-year-old girl with advanced muscular dystrophy  on the flip side, my last Shadow Dragon run gave me Olympic Sprinter Merric, which was...a wild time.

That's sort of the point. Eliwood is the poster child for it because he can potentially be good but can also easily turn out quite bad due to his growths being so variable. He's not treated like Wendy who's out and out awful. RNG screwed are units who can go either way.

[Dark Holy Elf]

On 2017-05-23 at 1:35 AM, Baldrick said:

I wouldn't call it dramatic - even if she can take a hit she's not being exposed to combat, and doesn't need to be. Compared to a unit like Aran, who's built to tank hits, the difference being doubled and not isn't much.

Playstyle differences account for some of this I suppose, but I personally find units like Micaiah (and mages in general) significantly more useful when they can take even 1 or 2 hits, since every hit they take is one they can counter for large damage (regardless of the range of their attacker). It also allows them to make more attacks. e.g. when you really want Micaiah to delete that particular cavalier/armour but doing so will expose her to someone on the enemy phase.

[Jotari]

11 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Playstyle differences account for some of this I suppose, but I personally find units like Micaiah (and mages in general) significantly more useful when they can take even 1 or 2 hits, since every hit they take is one they can counter for large damage (regardless of the range of their attacker). It also allows them to make more attacks. e.g. when you really want Micaiah to delete that particular cavalier/armour but doing so will expose her to someone on the enemy phase.

To take an unobjective look at this comment, mages generally are praised by the fanbase for having 1-2 range when compared to archers who are locked at 2 (in the past at least). So a large number of people must utilize mages on enemy phase to some extent otherwise that 1-2 range wouldn't really be seen as a benefit and they might as well be locked at 2 range.

[Heptade]

I once had a Franz with five consecutive HP-only levels (and the rest wasn't much better)... My worst unit ever...

[Shoblongoo]

On 4/29/2017 at 3:17 PM, Harvey said:

Eliwood and Raven in FE7.

 

I have literally never had a problem with Raven getting RNG screwed in FE7.

I use him on almost every playthrough. He gets  monstrous growths in HP / STR / SKILL / SPE and turns out amazing everytime.

Eliwood? Yeahhhhhhhhh. Eliwood is pretty-hit-or-miss.

I've found that Florina and Bartre sometimes get RNG screwed.

They CAN, and often will, turn out amazing. But Florina can get screwed out of STR growth, and Bartre can get screwed out of SPE. A Florina that doesn't gain strength and a Bartre that doesn't gain speed is pretty shit.

Edited June 1, 2017 by Shoblongoo

[Heptade]

Just now, Shoblongoo said:

I have literally never had a problem with Raven getting RNG screwed in FE7.

I use him on almost every play-through. He gets  monstrous growths in HP / STR / SKILL / SPE and turns out amazing everytime.

Eliwood? Yeahhhhhhhhh. Eliwood is pretty-hit-or-miss.

I've found that Florina and Bartre sometimes get RNG screwed.

They CAN and often will turn out amazing. But Florina can get screwed out of STR growth, and Bartre can get screwed out of SPE. A Florina that doesn't gain strength and a Bartre that doesn't gain speed is pretty shit.

I'm pretty sure Raven getting RNG-screwed in nothing but a GameFAQs meme.

[Nimbostratus]

Eliwood and Roy. It runs in the family I guess.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Eliwood relies so much on getting that golden 11 speed asap to be "good"

[Camus The Dark Knight]

Really any pre-promote with "average" growths.