Thoughts/Analysis on Alternate Heroes

[Hilda]

2 hours ago, Tenzen12 said:

Well, he can hard counter  both Lyn and Rein and everyone and their grandmother has former. Being Anti-meta unit in game ruled by meta put him on pretty much into OP spot. From my personal experience getting rid Ike is much harder than Rein. For once he is infantry which means other units are pretty close and if you say litrebade mages you mean infantry ones only, which already is pretty limiting.

I would say any unit you need especially to prepared for counts as OP, and Ike fits the bill.

well i use Sonya an infantery mage, which has no problem dealing with Brave Ike, because her Special is allready charged up at the start of the turn due to Infantery pulse and her Moonbow coupled with her Legendary Tome is enough to oneshot him. Only way for him to survive is with a +RES IV, which lets be honest, prolly none of the Ikes will be running (and even then the Followup attack whil finish him off, because he is left at 2 HP) I could even switch her to her Dragonfang setup with Quickened pulse.

But I guess thats my reception because I use Sonya in my mainteam.

[NekoKnight]

Seems like OP was just looking at stat lines and ignoring the unique or rare (which is relevant to F2P folks) skills.

It should be noted also, that CYL isn't limited so it doesn't really belong in this thread.

22 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

My thoughts:

- A melee Flier team with only Goads is, apparently, still busted. However, Spring Camilla and Summer Corrin both require Hinoka's Hone Fliers to truly be the centerpieces of Flier Emblem.

"Require"

Ranged weapons are huge for a flier team, so even if you don't have Hone, Corrin or Camilla deserve a spot on the team. The ability to give either of them +12 atk/spd through Goads is going to be enough to kill almost anything they ought to be fighting.

59 minutes ago, Hilda said:

well i use Sonya an infantery mage, which has no problem dealing with Brave Ike, because her Special is allready charged up at the start of the turn due to Infantery pulse and her Moonbow coupled with her Legendary Tome is enough to oneshot him. Only way for him to survive is with a +RES IV, which lets be honest, prolly none of the Ikes will be running

@Thane

[Ae†her]

4 hours ago, Hilda said:

I dont think Urvan is overpowered, there are plenty of units that can blow Ike with Urvan and Steady Breath up. I mean Litrblade mages can send him to hell and back, even other non Litrblade mages can do that due to his low resistence. Ikes Powercreep is nowhere on the level as Reinhardt and Lyns. Yes he is an excellent Enemy phase unit but he is nowhere near the powerlevel Reinhardt and Lyn offer. In my opinion he is powerfull but not unfair as opposed to the other 2.

I dont see this banner outdating much. Yes some units got obselete due to this banner, but thats gonna happen sooner or later anyway. Most units are still intact and useful they just need different builds to counter Ike and Lyn

Ike is insanely tough to kill it's not a simple matter of abusing blade tomes because his HP+Res combo still makes him pretty hard to kill. To one shot him for a green mage it'll require 43+20 damage so 63 Atk anything under and he will live. If you plan on doubling him you still need pretty high Atk because he blocks 80% of the damage from the second Atk. The only threats to him are high Atk and Spd Red Mages like Sanaki, and Tharja who you should not be putting him in the range of. In terms of Melee Ike will survive just about everything in the game that doesn't run Axe Breaker with extremely high Atk. Ike is the ultimate shield, and even if he is more enemy phase oriented, the especially broken thing about him is his A skill, Steady Breath. It makes him extremely scary on the player phase and enemy phase, and if you get +Spd Ike, you can buff him up with Brave Lucina do get even more doubles, if he's +Atk, and is buffed by Dark Aura+Drive Atk he is still pretty scary because he'll do even more damage and heal more with Aether. Ike is like direct evidence of powercreeping in FEH.

[XRay]

16 minutes ago, Logos said:

Ike is insanely tough to kill it's not a simple matter of abusing blade tomes because his HP+Res combo still makes him pretty hard to kill. To one shot him for a green mage it'll require 43+20 damage so 63 Atk anything under and he will live. If you plan on doubling him you still need pretty high Atk because he blocks 80% of the damage from the second Atk. The only threats to him are high Atk and Spd Red Mages like Sanaki, and Tharja who you should not be putting him in the range of. In terms of Melee Ike will survive just about everything in the game that doesn't run Axe Breaker with extremely high Atk. Ike is the ultimate shield, and even if he is more enemy phase oriented, the especially broken thing about him is his A skill, Steady Breath. It makes him extremely scary on the player phase and enemy phase, and if you get +Spd Ike, you can buff him up with Brave Lucina do get even more doubles, if he's +Atk, and is buffed by Dark Aura+Drive Atk he is still pretty scary because he'll do even more damage and heal more with Aether. Ike is like direct evidence of powercreeping in FEH.

I think it depends on your team composition. Ike is pretty easy to kill based on my experience. Olivia 4*+10 can totally solo triple BH!Ikes+10 defense teams, whereas she cannot against triple Hectors+10.

In my opinion, BH!Ike is no where as scary as Bonfire-Vantage Hector, so he is hardly power creep. Compared to Hector, BH!Ike has more movement at the cost of lower performance. Ike is hard countered by sword units, whereas Bonfire-Vantage Hector actually stands a chance against some of them due to his massive bulk.

[Ae†her]

10 minutes ago, XRay said:

I think it depends on your team composition. Ike is pretty easy to kill based on my experience. Olivia 4*+10 can totally solo triple BH!Ikes+10 defense teams, whereas she cannot against triple Hectors+10.

In my opinion, BH!Ike is no where as scary as Bonfire-Vantage Hector, so he is hardly power creep. Compared to Hector, BH!Ike has more movement at the cost of lower performance. Ike is hard countered by sword units, whereas Bonfire-Vantage Hector actually stands a chance against some of them due to his massive bulk.

I think it's somewhat unfair to compare armored units to infantry units for bulk. Of course Hector is going to have a better time tanking nearly everything than Ike because Hector is an armored unit he sacrifices movement for extremely high BST. He has even more Atk/Def Ike, and he has 9 more HP than him so it's easier for him to survive after melee encounters than it is for Ike, but for an infantry unit Ike's bulk due to Urvan, and Steady Breath make him pretty impressive of a unit. At least in my experience my Ike has been very bulky.*

Edited September 10, 2017 by Logos

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

11 hours ago, Johann said:

You're still missing the point: Roy using Galeforce is not winning fights against units that Cain or Seth wouldn't as well. The few differences in match-ups rely more on what skills the enemies are setting.

Oh, and comparing Dance with Galeforce is a false equivalency. There's no condition to activating Dance on a non-dancer.

Most of the above conversation started after you claimed Frederick is a better user of Galeforce, so it kinda was the point.

There is, in fact, a condition to activating Dance, being positioning, and positioning is not always free, especially if you run Cavs or Fliers. Freedom of positioning is the trade-off for Galeforce's cooldown-based activation.

51 minutes ago, NekoKnight said:

"Require"

Ranged weapons are huge for a flier team, so even if you don't have Hone, Corrin or Camilla deserve a spot on the team. The ability to give either of them +12 atk/spd through Goads is going to be enough to kill almost anything they ought to be fighting.

I personally prefer the buff playstyle I guess. LordFrigid also brought it up earlier.

[XRay]

2 minutes ago, Logos said:

I think it's somewhat unfair to compare armored units to infantry units for bulk. Of course Hector is going to have a better time tanking nearly everything than Ike because Hector is an armored unit he sacrifices movement for extremely high BST. He has even more Atk/Def Ike, and he has 9 more HP than him so it's easier for him to survive after melee encounters than it is for Ike, but for an infantry unit Ike's bulk due to Urvan, and Steady Breath make him pretty impressive of a unit.

I think it is pretty fair comparison though. For a unit to be considered power creep, that unit actually has to raise the performance ceiling, which Ike does not in my opinion. Ike is similar to Slaying Weapons; Ike makes running an Axe unit more viable, like how Slaying Weapons make Enemy Phase units better, but both are still far from touching the ceiling that is dominated by Player Phase ranged units.

[Johann]

7 hours ago, Tenzen12 said:

I know,  because as I said it doesn't take Galeforce in consideration. In vakuum Roy stomp, in actual match Roy stomp much harder. Again Roy is much better by pure stats alone already. His attack is 11 points higher with no demerit. That's 22 damage on combat and because his speed he take hit better as well. 

Cain has worse attack, defense as well as worse weapon. No matter how I look I don't see even single aspect where would Cain perform better. If you can explain me at least one I would be grateful.

Cain (or even Roy for that matter) with Brave Sword is better in certain situations, just like how everything else in this game depends entirely on the circumstances. Really, both are more than likely to kill most opponents easily. Roy isn't intrinsically better per se, but he's intrinsically more flexible because he has a unique sword. If you guys value Roy's flexibility over other sword cavaliers, then that's fine, and it's good that he's working out for you as a unit. Defining better/best by a single point or two of Spd isn't necessary because there are countless ways where you win or lose by a single point in any stat. Much more likely, however, is that you win or lose because of skill choices/combinations and tactics than those tiny stat differences.

In an example, you point out Roy's Atk being 11 higher from his sword, and then count that as 22 damage since he's more likely to double due to Brave Sword Spd penalty. Yet there are plenty of situations where both or neither of these units can double, whether due to high/low enemy Spd, or skills like Wary Fighter. Also, with extra Atk from A skills, cavalry buffs, etc, a Brave Sword can become a superior choice due to the extra hit(s) doubling those Atk bonuses. What works better, in the few match-ups where that even matters, depends on the enemy and what skills they have set, plus tactical things like positioning. You're never guaranteed that any one setup will work all the time.

2 minutes ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Most of the above conversation started after you claimed Frederick is a better user of Galeforce, so it kinda was the point.

There is, in fact, a condition to activating Dance, being positioning, and positioning is not always free, especially if you run Cavs or Fliers. Freedom of positioning is the trade-off for Galeforce's cooldown-based activation.

For my playstyle, Frederick is, yes, which I should have specified. You and I value units/skills in a different way though, so there's no point in me trying to "prove" something like that as objectively superior when I don't hold these differences to be objectively superior. Regarding Dance, don't be so ingenuous, positioning is still significantly simpler to manage than a 5-skill cooldown. You expect to use Dance nearly every turn, but you'd be lucky to accomplish that with Galeforce.

[Tenzen12]

Hmm. you are right. Against Zephiel Roy does 2 less damage than Fury 3 Cain and 3 less against Sheena as miniscule as it is Cain indeed better against Wary fighter armors. So yes there one aspect he is better. 

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

9 hours ago, Tenzen12 said:

Well, he can hard counter  both Lyn and Rein and everyone and their grandmother has former. Being Anti-meta unit in game ruled by meta put him on pretty much into OP spot. From my personal experience getting rid Ike is much harder than Rein. For once he is infantry which means other units are pretty close and if you say litrebade mages you mean infantry ones only, which already is pretty limiting.

I would say any unit you need especially to prepared for counts as OP, and Ike fits the bill.

The thing is with the way the game mechanic works at the moment theres really only 2 kind of unit that can ever be a threat

1 - ranged unit

2 - dancer

 

Thats it. No other class can really be a threat. While Ike can be considered OP under your usage, under your opponent usage he's about as effective as Hector, who went from S+ Tier/S Tier in effectiveness ALL the way to F- Tier in that regard

 

 

Edited September 10, 2017 by JSND

[Korath88]

People find CYL Ike hard to deal with in the arena? Huh. I've never had much trouble with him. He's hard to ORKO but that's really about it. Being a melee infantry makes him fairly easy to kite and separate from the other units. He's also slow, so unless you give him a free Aether charge he's not killing anyone on enemy phase.

As a player controlled unit he's definitely S+ tier material but he's not a "needs dedicated counter" type of arena threat.

Also regarding a prior statement about CYL Lucina, the only actual similarity that she and Ephraim/Eirika share is their vague role as a buffer. The Renais twins have always been mainly used to buff bladetomes, which Lucina has no effect on, as she's a physical unit spur buffer. Their roles barely clash at all.

[Tenzen12]

I myself have opposite experience. Cavalry much easier to bait separate as they have higher movement and tend run ahead. Rein especially is easy target. Well considering I myself need at least two or three hits to knock him down, they can't deal with other. Given I run  Olwen and Azura which complicate matter and maybe it became trivial once I finish Ruby Olivia, but Xander really can't deal with Ike while dodging from Linde, Rein or Lyn having that closing right behind him...

Yeah I have to accommodate team especially (which involve replacing fully build +2 Azura to half finished Olivia) to counter him and can't even say it will work all that well, I am pretty lucky majority people picked Lyn over him.

Edited September 10, 2017 by Tenzen12

[Korath88]

The main threat of Rein/Lyn is that they hit really hard when they initiate, so if you don't have a dedicated counter that can bait and kill them, the only other strategy to deal with them is to hit them before they hit you, which, depending on the enemy team, is sometimes very hard to do. Of course, if you do have a counter they aren't much of a threat, but that's basically the point of a counter.

@Tenzen12 In your case it seems like the other units preventing you from getting to Ike safely are the real threat that you're facing, rather than Ike himself. I think it's more of a team comp issue. What's the full team that you're running?

[Tenzen12]

Basically Arena bonus unit/Azura , Olwen +3 (Rep/Luna/DB3/R-breaker/fort.c), Cecilia +4 (Blade/Rep/MB/CC/Vantage/hone), Xander (Swap/(not bonfire yet)/Fury3/QR2/hone) 

So yeah it's pony, which why it's troublesome, usually even without dancer (especially without dancer) for most time I can get comfortable 19 tier, but again without it Ike is even bigger trouble. Rein suicide on Cecilia, Lyn can be baited by Xander, even if he needs additional turn to destroy her. Both dies to Olwen  even without buffs if she initiate.

Edited September 10, 2017 by Tenzen12

[Hilda]

6 hours ago, Tenzen12 said:

Basically Arena bonus unit/Azura , Olwen +3 (Rep/Luna/DB3/R-breaker/fort.c), Cecilia +4 (Blade/Rep/MB/CC/Vantage/hone), Xander (Swap/(not bonfire yet)/Fury3/QR2/hone) 

So yeah it's pony, which why it's troublesome, usually even without dancer (especially without dancer) for most time I can get comfortable 19 tier, but again without it Ike is even bigger trouble. Rein suicide on Cecilia, Lyn can be baited by Xander, even if he needs additional turn to destroy her. Both dies to Olwen  even without buffs if she initiate.

 You can counter Rein and Lyn and any Blue mage or colorless unit with Cecilia + Ravenblade + Triangel adept. unless Lyn runs Cancel Affinity, which means you can kill her easy with Xander. Imho i would switch Cecilia to Ravenblade + Triangel adept + Vantage to take care of both rein and lyn and any Blue Mage which frees up Xander to deal with anything you want. yes your Olwen excells against alot of things mainly Red and Blue units prolly, also bonfire on Xander kills! I would replace Olwen with something that can deal with Red and Green mages/melees.

However Lyn will survive the attack if she is +RES IV or has a form of Fortify Cavalry +Res buff on her against Cecilia. However if you run Quick Riposte on Cecilia instead of Vantage, she will die regardless

Edited September 10, 2017 by Hilda

[Tenzen12]

That in no way help me kill Brave Ike faster though. My problem is not -everyone but Ike- but -Ike keeping me from dealing with others-. Which gives them more option attack. I actually thinking about switching Xander with BRoy as I wanted Roy x Cecilia support anyway. Cecilia herself being supported with  Kiran hopefully also might give her needed Oomph.

Both Brave Lyn and Rein are just minor nuisance at most if they doesn't hide behind big green wall...

[LordFrigid]

13 hours ago, NekoKnight said:

It should be noted also, that CYL isn't limited so it doesn't really belong in this thread.

I was thinking that initially, but the thread title is actually "...alternate heroes", which CYL heroes are.

Edited September 10, 2017 by LordFrigid

[Pixile]

I probably shouldn't have included the Brave Heroes, but I did say alternate. A lot of people really haven't been talking about anything but the Braves though...lol

[Tenzen12]

Well thing is only relevant alternate heroes are S!Camilla, S!Corring and Bridelia. All other are just while often good also easily replaceable with normal units you don't need really indepth analysis of that.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Lets be honest heres the tl;dr for every Alternate hero

Spring

SLucina - Linde but worse

Xander - Have a horse and bulk.... but the fuck you run this over Peri/Abel whose role is stronger, and Camus dumpster them all in everything anyway

Chrom - theres 90.000 other bulky Axe user

Camilla - She's literally just Cecilia if Cecilia is a flier instead of a horse. Unique aspect includes the best options flier had to an Archer counter with her Raven set, and Ranged offense in general

 

Bridal

Cordelia - Remember Takumi? A really fucking good Archer that can qualify as broken with just 32/33? Or Klein who destroys PvE with a mere 31/33? Cordelia had 35/35 welcome your new overlord, hope you enjoy colorless hell

Charlotte - Amazing stats for an Infantry Blue Lance thats about it

Lyn - The only well built healer: but she's a healer anyway so lol

Caeda - See: SLucina

 

Ylissean Summer

Robin - Roderick without a horse

Tiki - This is literally just Bartre who have Res to tank Reinhardt. But she can't survive QP Moonbow anyway so it doesn't really matter so she's just Bartre

Gaius - Since his quality is obvious(fourth or third best Archer, with an amazing C slot SI), i want to mention how much of a jebait he is when the VERY NEXT banner is Leon who is the guy he competes with for the position of the third/fourth best Archer, the next non seasonal banner had Innes who is the third best Archer that directly stomps Gaius in his "niche" with his resistance, and the next batch after that is Brave Lyn who is the best Archer who all but directly stomps Gaius on his "niche" with her resistance, and people can get her for free.

Summer Gaius: The real Jebait of IS 2017

Frederick - He is to Dagger what Gaius is to Archer. Unlike Gaius he's not a jebait, but Daggers are meh so lol

 

Nohr Summer

Elise - Competes with Nino in some cases

Leo - Effectively a worse version of Leo

Xander - His defensive specs is legitimately good, and then Ike happened. His real value comes from his SI value where FIre Boost is an alternate Deathblow while Infantry Pulse can be an insane skill

Corrin - Olwen with wings

Edited September 10, 2017 by JSND

[Tenzen12]

Well, to be fair Corrin is Olwen without brave tome, witch is pretty much mainstay for her. Thus I don't think that comparison works well. Still pretty accurate.

[Junkhead]

On 9/9/2017 at 3:51 AM, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Brave Ike was actually rated fairly poorly once his stats came out, especially from hype backlash. It was only after people figured out a set that he can abuse that he rose a bit in standings.

Kind of my point. People were putting him over Roy and Lucina, which was enough to tick me a little. I actually think Urvan's effect is pretty god, since it's basically a 1-Turn cooldown Escutcheon+Pavise...disregarding range, too. Like, what the fuck.

On 9/9/2017 at 3:51 AM, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Also, Armor Emblem isn't actually weak. Some people up on top who run Flier Emblem are forced to switch Cherche back to Hammer just to have an easier time cracking Armor Emblem.

I never said it was a push-over. But for the very sake of that one thing in context (CYL Ike solo'ing a 7-streak), having at least one mage would've meant the end of it on even, like, Tier 1, for whatever it's worth. In that very context, especially on the video of the last Arena stage, the dude was facing 3 Knights and Minerva (who was mostly Rally'ing people). It would've been a lot more oppressive if they didn't give him all the time in the word to move around freely, vs. someone like Lyn or Reinhardt who woud at least take down half his HP and force him to a corner. Stuff like that.