Robin: Mystery Tactician

[Emerson]

Robin: Mystery Tactician
             "A tactician of Ylisse and Chrom's close ally. Lost memory of her life before meeting Chrom."

HP: 40
Atk: 29
Spd: 29
Def: 29
Res: 22
BST: 149

Weapon: Gronnwolf+
Special: Ignis
A Skill: Defiant Res 3 (5*)
B Skill: B Tomebreaker 3 (4*)

Being one of the earliest Heroes released through a Grand Hero Battle, Robin is a all around average Green tome user with limited merging ability and no variable in stats. Unlike her male counterpart, Robin is unable to attempt to patch up her middling stats through merges and IVs which would otherwise allow her to perform much more efficiently. And with the advent of growing Powercreep, more units are easily able to outperform Robin with ease. But Robin does hold a small niche in being one of few units able to check both Reinhardt and Brave Lyn under almost any circumstance due to her god HP, solid Defense and passable Resistance. While she's not the best unit around, she's more than capable of working as a check in Arena Assault.

Builds:
Classic Raven (Budget)

Spoiler

Weapon: Gronnraven, Gronnraven+ ( 4* Cecilia / 5* Cecilia)
Assist: Variable
Special: Bonfire
A Skill: Triangle Adept 2/3 (4* Cordelia, 4* Selena / 4* Roy)
B Skill: Bowbreaker 3, Quick Riposte 2/3 (4* Setsuna / 4* Subaki / 5* Subaki)
C Skill: Variable
Seal: Distant Defense, Deflect Missile, Deflect Magic, Quick Riposte

A fairly standard set. Gronnraven and Triangle Adept allow her to gain massive advantage over Colorless units, and tied together with her strong Defense and HP can let her take almost anything a Brave Lyn or other Archers can throw at her. While the threat of Cancel Affinity is frightening, it's a fairly uncommon skill, although when it does show up, it halts her ability to stop Brave Lyn altogether.
If you don't feel up for upgrading her tome to +, standard Gronnraven works perfectly well without sacrificing much of her attack power, as most of her strength comes from Triangle Adept in the first place.
Her B Slot is up to preference. Bowbreaker will stop Brave Lyn and other archers from taking too much health from her before her follow-up, while Quick Riposte is able to function against more than Bow users. Bowbreaker can also allow Robin to go on the offensive, taking down Archers in the player phase rather than having to wait until their turn.
However, with the onset of Seals, more options opened up. Distant Defense is a solid option that allows Robin to take less damage from any of the things she's attempting to counter, Deflect Missile can help her against Firesweep and Brave Bow Lyn should you opt to use Quick Riposte instead of Bowbreaker in the B Skill slot, and finally, Quick Riposte itself is in the seal slot, allowing you to avoid choosing between her B slot options.
My personal preference for her is B Skill Bowbreaker and Seal Quick Riposte. This allows her to attack and kill Archers on Player Phase if needed while keeping herself valuable on Enemy Phase for still tanking non-Archers.

The Horsekiller (Hyper Budget)

Spoiler

Weapon: Keen Gronnwolf+ (Refine Gronnwolf+)
       Refine: Nullify Cavalry, Atk
Assist: Variable
Special: Moonbow, Ignis
A Skill: Death Blow 3, Fury 3, Attack Plus 3 (Klein 4* / Hinata 4* / Cherche 4*, Gordin 4*)
B Skill: Any Breaker
C Skill: Variable
Seal: Attack Plus (Or any equivalent)

A very, very budget set made to try and take down Cavalry units, which are often a pain to deal with constantly in lower and mid levels of Arena.

Her refine is really up to preference. Atk will give her a very slight 1 Atk boost which can occasionally be the call between an enemy living or dying, while Nullify Cavalry lets her get around Hone and Fortify Cavalry, which are fairly easy to come by and are likely to appear.
Her Special is a toss up between the ultra budget base of Ignis, while will occasionally allow her to take off a large chunk of an enemy's health should she somehow build it up, or Moonbow, another budget Special that can let her finish off something should she build it up, which will most likely happen thanks to it's low cooldown.
In her A Slot, Death Blow is the preferred option, as it gives her a great +6 to attack, letting her surpass 50 Atk before effectiveness and Weapon Triangle Advantage, but if Klein happens to be evading you even after his drop to 3*, Attack Plus 3 does work well enough.
Her B slot could be any possible Breaker you need on your team. Axebreaker or Green Tomebreaker can let her take down neutral Weapon Triangle foes much more easily, while her natural Blue Tomebreaker and Lancebreaker should allow her to fight and kill almost any unit of that type in the game. However, it's truly up to what the rest of your team is.
Her Seal, until the eventual introduction of a Death Blow seal, is well put in Attack Plus or any equivalent of it.

This set can work decently well as a counterpick in low levels of Arena Assault, although Raven is likely to be much more useful as you obtain units of higher pointage.

The Owl

Spoiler

Weapon: Gronnowl+ (5* Boey)
     Refine: Spd, Def, Res
Assist: Variable
Special: Bonfire
A Skill: Close Counter, Distant Defense, Fury (5* Takumi / 5* Rhajat, 5* Celica / 4* Hinata)
B Skill: Quick Riposte 3 (5* Subaki, 5* Deirdre, others)
C Skill: Variable
Seal: Close Defense, Distant Defense, Quick Riposte

A bit more expensive of a build which attempts to capitalize on her well rounded stats to use her for Owl tome usage. With proper positioning and support, this can allow her to get around her below average Speed and Resistance and utilize her solid HP and Defense to take on Melee and Ranged threats.

The refine on her tome is truly up to preference. Speed can allow her to avoid doubled with team support and possibly even double enemies herself, Defense will allow her to take even more damage from Physical enemies, and Resistance will do the same for Magical enemies.
Close Counter is a skill that's fairly difficult to obtain. While one copy of it was recently handed for all players to use in the form of a free 4* Takumi, it still has many usages and can easily be applies to other units who may utilize it better. Still, Robin certainly can use it thanks to her great Defense stat and HP, along with ally support and Owl tome buffs.
If you're less worried about Melee threats, Distant Defense is a solid option that can allow her to take less damage from enemy Archers, Dagger units, and Mages.
If neither of those expensive options are available, Fury is a very solid budget skill she can run, as the combination of her above average HP and usage of all of her stats makes it a perfect fit, although it may run the risk of putting her outside of Quick Risposte's activation range.
Thanks to Sacred Seals, her B slot is actually a variable. Guard can be run in order to prevent enemy specials, which could easily be the thing to tear her apart, even with team supports. Breakers can be useful to allow her to attack on the Player Phase, although because of her low attacking power and lack of Triangle Adept, it's most likely only going to do chip damage to opponents with even just above average Resistance stats.
The Seal itself has multiple options. Close Defense, Distant Defense, and Quick Riposte all sport benefits, and the one chosen is likely to be based around the other skills you chose to run.

The Nino

Spoiler

... It's a neutral Nino with flipped Defensive stats and more HP. Kind of pointless when... you have to sacrifice Nino in order to make it in the first place...

Weapon: Gronnblade+ (5* Nino)
Assist: Variable
Special: Glimmer
A Skill: Life and Death 3 (4* Sothe)
B Skill: Bowbreaker, Desperation, others (4* Setsuna / 4* Shanna)
C Skill: Tactic skill, variable
Seal: Speed Plus (Or any equivalent)

The basis of this set is to be an odd Nino-like Blade tome mage with a higher focus on Defense than Res in comparison to her. To be frank, this set ispretty much just for fun moreso than effectiveness.

Life and Death is the primary reason this set can even work. Without it, Robin's offensive stats are pretty much garbage for Bladetome.
Her B Skill can work with Bowbreaker to easily take down Brave Lyn, or any other option you think necessary like Vantage, Desperation, or a Chill.
In the C Skill slot, it is variable, but as a Blade mage she functions very well in Tactics teams. While she doesn't need to run any herself, seeing she'd want to gain the effects of all of them in
order to perform at her best, she can run them to buff her allies. Res Tactic and Atk Tactic are the most available of them, while Spd and Def Tactic are much harder to come by.
Like it was stated, this set is more just a novelty that Robin is able to even possibly be a viable blade mage. Attempt to use at your own risk.

Robin's really a unit who performs best in their own niche rather than attempting to follow the norm for Mages. Raven is certainly the most effective set she has, and even with just standard Gronnraven, she's certainly worth building for Arena Assault as an extra Brave Lyn, Reinhardt, or other Archers and Blue mages counter.

And while I'm at it, I might as well show off my own Robin.

Spoiler

(It's the Unit Builder because my phone's screenshots are too large of a file. Rip me.
And also I missed 2 of her rerun copies rip me again.)

 

Edited July 10, 2018 by Emerson
finally fixed!!!

[Integrity]

good job doing it after like 2 hours haha nerd lmfao

 

EDIT after i think you saw this message: i actually do appreciate the analysis because i want to build a robin lmao but i needed to get the dig in

Edited July 10, 2018 by Integrity

[Emerson]

shush go back in your hole ike

EDIT in reply to the EDIT: Honestly, I'm surprised there wasn't already a thread for her. Or any of the other Robins besides Female Grima for that matter.

Edited July 10, 2018 by Emerson

[Ice Dragon]

5 hours ago, Emerson said:

Honestly, I'm surprised there wasn't already a thread for her.

The super mediocre characters tend to not get one because no one can be bothered to write one.

 

As for my own comments:

The Gronnowl build is her "optimal" build in terms of all-round performance. I'd personally opt for Distant Def instead of Close Def because her biggest problem is the fact that she straight-up dies to most blue tomes due to their high Spd and her low Res (and Distant Def is actually enough to cover for it).

There are a few other variations you can run on the build, such as Guard + Quick Riposte or Quick Riposte + Quickened Pulse.