Rate the Unit, Day 11: Mist

[PKL]

Dat Rules (borrowed/stolen from Integrity)

- Ratings are assumed to be on Hard Mode+Fixed Mode.

- Votes need some explanation regarding their gameplay performance to be counted. If somebody else said what you want to already, quote them explicitly.

+/- ≤1 point extra regarding personality/appearance is encouraged, but no more. If you exercise your bias privileges, please do so explicitly.

- Numerical votes out of 10, or something proportional to it. Make it easy to calculate for my sake.

- Every ranking phase ends whenever I get out of bed, between 0700 and 0800 EST. Do the math for your timezone, Brits.

- I will insist you do not use the "Not X" reason on any character, where X is another unit. If you do, your vote will be thrown out.

- "Recruits X" or "takes you to X chapter" arguments are explicitly banned. C'mon, people, this shouldn't need to be a rule. That's not gameplay performance.

- Assume that the character in question is being recruited.

- Similar to the "Recruits X" rule, do not use "she brings a Knight Ward to the team" as an argument.

- BEXP is free to be used in any quantity on any character.

- I withhold the privilege to tell you your rating is bogus and demand you revise it if it breaks any of the above. I will not throw out votes anonymously, you will be informed and given a chance to revise.

Averages:

Shinon: 3

Ilyana: 4.98

Soren: 5.152

Rhys: 5.315

Gatrie: 5.463

Mia: 5.708

Boyd: 8.293

Ike: 8.567

Oscar: 9.075

Titania: 9.91

[Onmi]

Her growths are spread too thin... oh fine.

Mist would be a much better unit if there was a wider abundance of magical swords, and she didn't have to go through 20 staff levels to get to swords, and her sword level at promotion wasn't as low as it is. Because of the way her growths are 'Balanced' Mist can oft wind up being the 'Master of None' but depending on your coin toss DERP FIXED MODE with the Sonic Sword/Runesword, she'll hit for more than her brother due to targeting Res.

4/10 with a bias point. getting a mount and being able to Staffbot helps out. especially in the Duel

Edited April 6, 2012 by Onmi

[Hawk King]

PROS:

-Amazing promotional gain.

-She gets a freaking horse!

-Supports Titania.

-Sonic/Rune swords for some good offense.

CONS:

-Pretty bad before promotion.

-Requires a significant amount of resources

Mist needs a steady supply of Bexp and will usually use a Master Seal for an early promotion. And then she will need either 2 arms scrolls, or 20 Steel Sword swings (try saying that 10x fast...) and one arms scroll to get that Sword rank to a B.

Even though she wants alot of resourses, she definitely makes good use of them so....

5.5/10 - Call me a perve, but I prefer cute, young girls over sickly, feminine men.

[Caliban of Sycorax]

She needs a lot of BEXP and babying in the beginning, and also a lot of Arms Scrolls if you want her to be any good. The thing is, she is good. She's an offensive healer, can use Magic Swords like a boss, and is a mounted staffbot--something you don't get until Elincia.

Mist rocks my socks. +1 for being a Valkyrie.

7/10

[ZemZem]

Mist is awesome.

Raising her up to a Valkyrie can be a pain, and she'll need the two arms scrolls so she can be able to use the sonic sword. But when she can use it, she wipes everything out. It's a shame it only has 20 uses. But I guess that's what the hammerne staff's for.

Oh, and she's a major help during the BK fight.

6/10, +.5 bias brings it up to a 6.5/10.

[Renall]

She's really good... eventually. Her start is slow and rocky, she wants your BExp (and so does everybody), she's a bit fragile to start, and she would really like to have Arms Scrolls once she does promote. That asks quite a lot for a mounted healer. Still, she's very good at that once she promotes, she fights well with magic swords (better than anybody else does, anyway), and she's extremely helpful in fighting the Black Knight. It's a minor thing, I know, but Rhys or your Sages can't go into that fight and Mist can.

Oh and her Mordecai support kicks all amounts of ass, giving double Water and making the beast that is Mordy even beastlier.

6.5/10

[Shadow Mir]

6.5/10 (7.5 after bias). Has a slow start and is a bit of a pain to get to promote, but hey, it pays off handsomely. Also, she has good supports (everyone but Rolf).

[OrangeCrush980]

She's a good healer who gets a horse on promotion. Her combat with swords is shaky, but fixable if you put in the effort. If you don't, she's still a mounted healer, which is awesome.

8/10, +1 bias because Valkyries are awesome for a total of 9/10

[Elieson]

An Est who kind of does it right.

5.25/10, including a full bias +1 point.

[Biabarr]

6.5/10

Mist is pretty good after promotion; before it though...yeah not really. But after promotion she becomes a mounted staff bot, so yay!

[Snapdragon]

4/10 Meh. Mist can be pretty awesome once she gets promoted. The pony makes he great for healing and the Sonic Sword allows her to demolish foes. However the getting there part is not really worth it. She comes at lvl one, barely healing anything, takes a ton of bonus exp or forever to promote, then she has to use more resources or favoritism just to use the sonic sword because, aside from mages, she doesn't kill very well without it.

[ALEXANDER]

She's the best staff user because of her high MOV and canto, and is 1 of 2 characters who can get an A or S in staves. However, she needs BEXP and/or a master seal for a timely promotion, her combat is awful without arms scrolls (1-range locked until Sonic/RuneSword), and she's fragile even with miracle (but at least big brother Ike can protect her from mean bad guys who try to critical her NOPE! Have an inconsequential crit bonus instead (edit: crit protection wouldn't really help her much anyway)). Overall, she's a mounted healer who's somewhat worth the effort you have to put into her.

6/10

Edited April 6, 2012 by ALEXANDER

[Loki Laufeyson]

Mist, Ike's sister and holder of the Medallion.

Pros:

Gets a pony upon promotion.

Uses magic swords right.

Cool supports (i love the Jill one.)

Unique class.

Cons:

Super squishy.

Bad move until promotion.

Can be tedious to level.

Mist is a pretty good unit once she promotes. But before she does, shes gonna struggle not only in EXP, but to keep up with the team. Luckily BEXP exists, otherwise she'd be pretty bleh. Like Rhys, shes the only person of her class. Thats kinda cool. While Elincia is very similar, Mist does it for much longer. When promoted, she gains a pony and her move skyrockets. This means she can heal and then canto away. Thats awesome! Even the sages cant do that. (unless someone gives one of them the knight ring...) Magic swords are kinda rare but Mist can totally destroy things with them. Thats cool. She can probably murder some stuff for levels (and weapon EXP) with a forge too. Giving her Sol is hilariously awesome. (although not recommended)

6/10. 7/10 bias because I love having Mist spam shit. Its funny.

[Exiledwolf]

Mist, your other healer that comes way later than Rhys. Can actually gain some defence but for the most part needs to be kept back. She also needs a lot of bexen she can use swords or give the arms scrolls and ripp in order to be useful later. After promotion she gains a horse and really good stat ups. Then she can use swords or be given the two arms scrolls and rip things apart with the sonic swords

7/10+ 1 = 8/10

[Lord Raven]

4.5/10, I dont see much need for her since her offense sucks until C Swords and healing isn't necessary in this game at all.

[BrightBow]

It's Mist. Ike's sister who entered the battlefield after having lost her father. She is determined to use everything in her power to protect the rest of her family.

Unfortunately said power isn't very impressive at the beginning.

But she is low level, has low bases and even a low staff rank. She heals only 14 with the only staff she can use. And of course her move sucks. Her performance is not much to write home about.

Of course, once she promotes she will get a horse and swords. With Canto and a lot of move she can reach everyone and move away to safety outshining any poor schmucks that might try to compete with her in the healing department.

She can also use Steel Swords from the get go and do some additional damage, which can be useful sometimes. She can also deal far more damage with the Sonic Sword then anyone else. Getting her rank there is not an easy task, though.

Because of this dissonance in her performance, I find her difficult to rate.

It makes it very tempting to use a lot of resources on her. Giving her BExp early is also sort of a bargain since she will keep growing just as fast, since her exp gain through staffs won't scale down on higher levels.

And she could use one of the Master Seals, though they would help everyone a lot.

Without these, though her performance is nothing too spectacularly.

She also helps in the battle against the Black Knight. He also won't attack her. But even with Mist, failing is still very possible. And I'm not sure the outcome makes much of a difference anyway.

Still, I think she deserves a good rating either way. She is still a staff user from the get go, which I always appreciate and she has the potential to get a lot better from there. I just wish she could use Mend immediately.

8/10

+1 bias for being a good character in my opinion.

Her reasons for entering battle are unusually relateable. Most of the time, children in Fire Emblem just sort of tag along but it was way better handled here.

I found the scene between her and Ike during the battle in chapter 8 quite hard to bear. A kid shouldn't look forward to dying like that, dammit.

And as a person she is very admirable. Even though she is deeply troubled herself, she is always trying to act cheerfully and help others. Even people like Jill who otherwise don't get much sympathy.

Edited April 6, 2012 by BrightBow

[Renall]

I found the scene between her and Ike during the battle in chapter 8 quite hard to bear. A kid shouldn't look forward to dying like that, dammit.

And as a person she is very admirable. Even though she is deeply troubled herself, she is always trying to act cheerfully and help others. Even people like Jill who otherwise don't get much sympathy.

Well, someone's got to provide it. They'll get none from Ike, after all.

[BBM]

Ike may be rather emotionless, but he's still done well, IMO. At least in PoR, which I'm playing right now. Probably my favourite lord, personality wise. Sigurd's kinda dumb, Celice is meh, Roy is moreso, Lyn is too gung-ho, Eliwood is kinda wimpy, Eirika is too gullible, and Ephraim is too arrogant. Only Hector's cool. I heard RD Ike is kinda arrogant though.

Haven't played HM yet, but I think I can extrapolate. She's quite good once she promotes, but she needs a steady flow of BEXP for a while, and then an early Master Seal, followed by at least 1 Arms Scroll afterwards if you want her combat to be good, preferably two. However, by the time she's promoted, most of your other guys are too, unless you dump a LOT of BEXP into her. And the thing is, the only time they really need healing is earlygame, when her healing's the worst. Once they promote, Kieran and Oscar and Jill and Boyd are running around ORKOing mostly everything while taking noticeable damage only rarely, so while it's cool that Mist can keep up with the first three- it isn't really necessary, and even with the Sonic Sword, her durability is never good enough for her to charge in with them either. She basically becomes a mounted mage. That said, I like her, so 6 + 1 bias = 7/10.

Edited April 6, 2012 by BigBangMeteor

[Sunwoo]

Mist ... what do I think about Mist? As much as I think her character is great, I think that as a unit she may be a tad overrated.

She's lucky to exist in a game that has BEXP, I'll give her that. Because otherwise, she'd be in a bit of trouble. In the GBA FE games, the foot healer showed up before the mounted one (except Saul, but he has higher magic base, growth, and starting level over Clarine, so it still balanced out). In this game, though, Mist starts at a lower level than Rhys, with less base magic, and she doesn't even start off with a horse. She must be shielded at all times in her joining map just to keep her alive. At least having two healers instead of one is good, and she's forced in chapter 9 anyway.

So ... since she shows up when BEXP becomes available, we can just give her some of that, right? Of course we can, but how much? Let's say that she got ... a level at the most in her joining map. She still needs ~900 BEXP if she wants to automatically promote and be sealed, right? Let's do that, then. We BEXP her to level 10, then seal her the first opportunity we get. At 10/1, her average magic is 12.5, so it'll be 12-13 most likely with the little nuances of fixed mode. That's ... not a lot. If she really did get a full level, then she'll probably have D staves, which ... still isn't very good. At least Mend will help her level up staves quickly. Also, I'm not sure if I even want to give her ~900 BEXP in one sitting. Marcia shows up at the same time, and she's a better investment in BEXP. Kieran shows up in the chapter after her, and he might appreciate a level or two to get him a faster start. Not to mention Jill who shows up 2 or 3 chapters later. How much more BEXP does Mist really have a claim to over the rest of your team? At this point, there probably isn't a lot of it and you have both Marcia and Jill coming in not too long after her.

Also, her combat is a joke. Unlike GBA FE valkyries, she gets swords ... when her strength base is 1 and her strength growth is 35% and she only gains +2 upon promotion. I've also heard the 2 Arms Scroll = Sonic Sword argument, but honestly? I'm not wasting 2 Arms Scrolls on a healer just so she can use a sword with 25 uses. I could give that Arms Scroll to someone else. Like one of my paladins so that they can use non-iron secondary weapons. Like one of my mages, so they can use an element that is not their starting one faster. Or maybe anyone else on my team who just isn't leveling up their weapons fast enough. Mist doesn't have sole claim to the Arms Scrolls. She's better of being a healer.

Now, the biggest reason I would want to raise Mist is for the Black Knight fight. She is the only one who can join Ike. Luna does quite a bit of damage to Ike, and Aether isn't guaranteed to activate. If we can't defeat the Black Knight before the bishops and the halberdier show up, we're either going to have to pull Ike away from the BK to kill the bishop or have Mist defeat them. If she was promoted at 10, with nerfed stats, then unless she magically reached 10/20 she's going to have some difficulty doing it. Also ... if we decide not to fight the BK and run away on turn 1, then what's the point of raising her anyway?!

Don't get me wrong, Mist isn't a bad character at all, and she definitely has her worth. But I find that she's overrated. Her combat will never be good, and she doesn't have sole claim to the Sonic Sword and two Arms Scrolls. She starts off not mounted, lower-leveled, and with worse magic than the early-joining healer. If she wants to become a mounted healer immediately, she requires approximately 900-1000 BEXP at a time when you want some BEXP to give to the two early-joining fliers who come not long after her. She's semi-forced in the Ike vs. Black Knight fight, but she needs to either be at a high enough level to kill the reinforcements should they show up (or at least survive them), and if you decide to run from the BK, then there's no point in raising her.

4.5/10, because she is potentially the only mounted healer, and she does start off as a healer. But she takes a lot of resources to make her "good" and to make her that mounted healer everyone loves talking about.

Edited April 6, 2012 by Jihyun

[Snowy_One]

4/10

I don't dislike Mist by any means of the word. I actually quite like having another healer on the team at all times. However, there are two big problems I have with Mist that cause me to want to rate her lower.

1) She's a late-joining healer. She comes at chapter 9 at level 1. I refuse to spend BEXP on a staff-user and would rather spend seals on other units, meaning it will take her quite a long time to promote. People talk about how good she is when she promotes, but that won't be happening for a long time for me.

2) SS Mist is overrated. It takes one or two scrolls to even make it work in the first place once she promotes, and when it DOES happen I get a mounted mage for a timeframe that lasts as long as the SS does. Except mages can crit, Mist does not, and mages can replace their weapon in the event of something awful happening, Mist cannot.

It takes a lot of resources to make Mist good, and I don't like the end result. It's too little for too much. Besides, SS Mia can make the sword last longer anyways and isn't screwed once it comes out.

Plus, I will admit I'm docking her a point because I suspect people will grossly overrate her and I don't want to see her leaving this topic with more than a 7.5 (the upper-limit of how good she is as far as I am concerned). If this is REALLY a issue, make it a 5/10. Otherwise I would prefer the 4.

[Mekkah]

9/10 to compensate for Snowy

Honestly, Mist is as good as you make her. If you don't invest anything, then yeah, she's probably around Rhys level. If you give her enough EXP to get her to 10 then promote her, you get a mounted healer with some very minor poking utility, but you have so much BEXP and chances are you won't need the promotion item for anyone else, so this is a bargain. Or you can invest somewhat heavily by giving her mostly uncontested resources such Arm Scrolls + SS, or more BEXP so she promotes at a more respectable level, and then you have someone who can blick almost any enemy when needed, kill weaksauce ones with leftover Steel forges, and otherwise provide heals and supporters.

You're always getting out of her what you put into her. Unless you're Crash, because Mist can't produce imaginary penises.

So more like 8.5/10.

[Shadow Mir]

4/10

I don't dislike Mist by any means of the word. I actually quite like having another healer on the team at all times. However, there are two big problems I have with Mist that cause me to want to rate her lower.

1) She's a late-joining healer. She comes at chapter 9 at level 1. I refuse to spend BEXP on a staff-user and would rather spend seals on other units, meaning it will take her quite a long time to promote. People talk about how good she is when she promotes, but that won't be happening for a long time for me.

2) SS Mist is overrated. It takes one or two scrolls to even make it work in the first place once she promotes, and when it DOES happen I get a mounted mage for a timeframe that lasts as long as the SS does. Except mages can crit, Mist does not, and mages can replace their weapon in the event of something awful happening, Mist cannot.

It takes a lot of resources to make Mist good, and I don't like the end result. It's too little for too much. Besides, SS Mia can make the sword last longer anyways and isn't screwed once it comes out.

Plus, I will admit I'm docking her a point because I suspect people will grossly overrate her and I don't want to see her leaving this topic with more than a 7.5 (the upper-limit of how good she is as far as I am concerned). If this is REALLY a issue, make it a 5/10. Otherwise I would prefer the 4.

To be blunt, I'm not really impressed by Sonic Sword Mia AT ALL. 16 mag atk at 20/1 is anything but impressive in my book when enemy resistance - get this! - doesn't suck.

[Loki Laufeyson]

I feel that she only really needs (a lot of) resources (other than BEXP) in hard mode. In any other mode, shes gonna be fine with a forge and maybe if yer impatient, promotion at around level 15. SHe may only need ONE of those Arm Scrolls.

[BrightBow]

I feel that she only really needs (a lot of) resources (other than BEXP) in hard mode. In any other mode, shes gonna be fine with a forge and maybe if yer impatient, promotion at around level 15. SHe may only need ONE of those Arm Scrolls.

But since she gains experience through staffs, she doesn't get exp any faster then hard. Maybe even slower since less healing is required.

Edited April 6, 2012 by BrightBow

[Sunwoo]

Mist is pretty annoying to level up even in normal mode. Also, I'm the type of person who hates pouring a bunch of BEXP down one character's throat, so I would personally never give Mist 1000 BEXP in one sitting. Not even my favorite characters get more than 300 BEXP in one sitting from me. Also, Sonic Sword Mist IS overrated. I already explained why it's blatant favoritism to give Mist 2 Arms Scrolls and a bunch of BEXP in one session. She can be good, but it either takes her too long to do so naturally or requires heavy favoritism. I could give any other character that amount of favoritism, and they could come out just as good, too!