Armor Knights: How to Make Them Worth Using in Fire Emblem

[@GamersNetworkCentral]

My opinion on armor knights has always been that armor knights should be able to take hits and dish out damage, reliably. I've always found high skill should be associated with armor knights as well, since the accuracy helps them with actually hitting the enemies and fulfilling that requirement. 5 movement is almost a necessity in my eye, because a face tank isn't useful when they're behind all the units. Obviously, you have to make the armor knights fit in the context of however you design your hack. Very good video, thank you for making these dan!

[@nadnap]

Agree! Many have low skill which hurts their hit rate a lot, especially at WTD (looking at you, Bors).

[@tdawsmp1325]

Heck yeah, I'm always down for a 40 min presentation about FE units.

[@metroidgus]

in the original Gaiden Lukas is an amazing candidate for the speed ring since in that game it maxed out his speed and granted +5 movement made Lukas an absolute beast in that game since the Knight/Baron Bases meant he could still dish out damage even with no weapon equipped and the ring patches the issues he had in speed and movement, so while Mathilda can get insane move with the speed ring she already has no issue doubling and she really wants to run at least a steel lance to patch up her low strength, kinda sucks they nerfed the speed ring in the 3ds remake

[@charlesv5h975]

I just discovered your content recently and I’m so excited. Love Fire Emblem. I remember using graph paper as a elementary school kid drawing maps and making characters. Love this analysis

[@bigsealfan9579]

In GBA FE, the biggest problem with knights might be that cavaliers exist. Oswin might be an example of a knight done well, but he's level 9. Imagine if he switched classes and growths with Lowen, another serviceable unit that joins in the same chapter but 7 levels lower, while they both kept their base bonuses. Oswin would be considered one of the best units while Lowen would almost never be used. The fact that both knights and cavaliers compete for the same promotional item doesn't help. By time you get your first knight crest, you won't be sure if you should use it on your cavalier because he's one of your best units and about to cap out at level 20 or use it on your level 13 knight so he can get a little more movement and keep up with the rest of your infantry. Most of the time when I try to use a knight he'll be arriving to the battlefield a few turns after the paladins and cavaliers have killed everything. Fire Emblem game design doesn't often reward the supposed niche that armor knights fill. Turtling is usually discouraged by mini-objectives, and although armor knights do have the highest defence it's often overkill or they are a liability because one of their many weaknesses are nearby. Sure, he can fight 5 mercs without a scratch, but a mage doubling your armor knight is terrifying, 2 mages doubling him is a dead armor knight, and even if your knight has a javelin he probably won't kill them in return. A cavalier or paladin in the same scenario might take 0-3 damage from each of the mercs and 20% of his HP from each of the mages, but with better avoid and he'll likely double the mages so they're no longer a threat. Cavaliers are also better at avoiding or eliminating horseslayers before they're a threat than knights are with hammers. Enemies usually aren't tough even to justify needing more than 20 defence. Also, knights have atrocious 16 base HP for some reason, equalled only by casters and myrmidons. Their HP growths are usually extremely high, but this is one of the big problems for low level ones- Barth gets 59 HP at level cap IIRC with his 100% growth, but his base is a comical 25. But cavaliers and paladins are the gods of FEGBA, so without them would you still use an armor knight? They are slightly better at keeping up with infantry, but a lot of the time I find berserkers or warriors suitably tanky if I need to hold a chokepoint and swordmasters can become invincible with the right terrain. I guess what I'm saying is if knights are going to have 4 move and terrible speed that leads to them being doubled, and rarely kill anything themselves because they can't double and doubling is crucial to getting kills, they should probably have higher base HP and decent resistance so they can actually preform their job of sitting in one place and tanking effectively. Enemies also need to be strong and numerous enough and chapters need to be designed in a way that such a tank is necessary. My opinion might be a bit off though because I'm in the middle of a SS chapter with a level 4 Great Knight Gilliam that has leveled speed 0 times. He has almost died to single mages like 4 times.

[@iBloodxHunter]

Always pick General over gn.

[@jordanrogers9296]

Personally, I believe if you do go the dual weapon armor knight route that you lock cavaliers to single weapon types like in the Tellius series. It helps them stand out if you make armor knights the only t1 class that can use more than one weapon type.

[@lu3829]

I really like the idea of making especially heavy weapons meant for armor knights but an issue I see with that is that armor knights are already slow so there won't be much of a difference between armor knights who aren't slowed by the heavy weapons and something like a Cavalier who is getting slowed by the weapon.

[@ferintown6628]

Fun fact Effie has a really good speed growth Also silas is tankier early on And Benny is invincible

[@justintsui2522]

Great vid! I agree with what you said about armor knights but here's something else to consider. I think that along with 5 mov and having maps and join time conducive to their strengths, another thing that could help armor knights is mitigating their Spd and Res weakness. Of course, it should be low still but not insanely so. The knight spd should be fast enough so they don't get doubled by slower stronger units since a lot the weakness of an armor knight is eating two powerful hits from a stronger enemy rather than a weaker, faster unit only having to eat one hit. Being doubled by a brigand with a steel axe hurts! Any decently fast units like Mercs can still double them though. The next point about raising Res is that by raising Res, it will make players more likely for the player to send the knight to a group of enemies that includes a mage without worrying about the knight being slaughtered by the mage. Magic should still do massive damage to the knight, but the knight shouldn't be one shot by a magic attack. Or at the very least make Pure Water easily available earlier in the game. Just some thoughts.

[@juicyjuustar121]

Personally, I give armors really good combat; high STR, high SKL, high DEF, and weapon triangle control (lance/axe for unpromoted, weapon triangle + bows for promoted), and let them manipulate enemy AI into focusing on them like how FE1 AI forces enemies to attack Marth. High SPD doesnt really make sense for a bulky, heavy tank, so I'd rather just give them wary fighter 5 MOV is an easy fix to make armor knights *good*, but imo makes them a little less unique. If you want to give them more movement, Id rather is be through movement-based skills

[@soranortthirteen561]

Watched all of it and I liked it! Totally using this to make my trash hack. /s One particular question I got is how do I handle designing fliers like Pegasus Knights and Wyvern Riders? Would like for you to have look over that topic.

[@nadnap]

Happy to help! Fliers are tricky because they can be pretty broken. It's usually a matter of preference and there's a few different routes you can take. For fliers, I generally like to lean into their utility with unhindered movement and ability to rescue. There's different approaches you can take depending on the direction you want to take the class, but my advice is that their combat parameters don't need to be great to be useful because of their utility. Where you put their stats is up to you, but I'd say in general that they should not be the strongest in any one stat relative to other units. It's a good topic and one I've thought about exploring since it is super easy to make fliers broken.

[@charleouel9012]

Hey also I most said I do think you got alot of good idea I think they are really trying to buff up the Armored knight in fire emblem in three houses they give them quite a tone of DEF like and the -5 weight make them able to carry stuff super easy they bassicly got like +10 DEF over other call (but the farder you get they do fall flat alot) I think it most come done to how the stats are calculated (+1 DEF Ø 1% DEF) so early game they are quite tanky whit like 50% more def than your other unite and by the end game they are at like 25% higher than your other unite and get hit by physical damage any way and get crit. Perso I think there alot of reason why they suck but it mostly come down to the same you said: #1 Map design rarely small and personal whit alot of chock point or thing to slow down cav and other unite makeing there slow move kinda way to bad. #2 In the same vain objective being mostly route or kill boss doesn't help them at all vs a good old Survive or Defend map make them quite good at holding a chock if they got a good healer. #3 Limitation too nombrous: a) 4 Move vs 6 or higher Mov b) Low SPD vs high SPD c) Low RES vs midish RES d) No 2 range weapon or magic (in general) vs Magic or bow. #4 Stats not growting by a % of the basse (Exemple in Three house Forteress give + 10 DEF whene classe into it insteed of +50% Basse DEF or something) If it was 50% of the Stats a unite that got like 20 DEF basse would have +10 DEF if a unit had 30 they would have +15DEF) #5 Stats vs Cav and flyers (Kof Kof WTF is those Wryven lord Stats vs the Forteress + 10 DEF - 6 SPD vs +4 SPD + 3 DEF + 4 ATK + 4 Mov) Like how 7 DEF - 10 SPD -4 ATK -4 Mov?) What they can do would be buff any of those area a bit Exemple make them able to tank Magic OR Give them Good Bow (1-2 range), OR give them good Midle SPD, OR give them 1 or 2 more mov, Or make there adventage growth whit there lvl SORRY FOR THE BAD ENGLISH

[@asmontosborne3111]

Ok, ok, so big question: Movement. How would 5 Move compare to a 4 Move armor with a skill that basically makes them fliers movement-wise (as in, no terrain penalties outside of peaks, lakes and seas). As for promotions, armored knights in my game (which will never happen but hey, discussion) would have lances and swords unpromoted; upon promotion, they would gain Axes (and maybe bows) and better physical defense or Anima and staves and better magic and huge resistance.

[@nadnap]

Anything can work if you design around the idea! Giving them limited terrain penalties would be interesting, but it'd only be as valuable as the amount of terrain they'd need to overcome. In a game where there are forest tiles everywhere, it would be valuable, much like how traditionally powerful units like paladins would be weak if the game was all desert. Usefulness in these regards depends on the nature of the game and how the maps / enemies skew.

[@kencritical8225]

Eyy, Footlocked Cavaliers!

[@SurfingKyogreNL]

This content is always very entertaining and informative. I know you already promote your stuff on FEU, but you should promote it even more. Maybe send it to Mangs, since he seems like he could both spread and improve it.

[@nadnap]

Thank you! I probably could do more to promote videos. I'll see about that - thanks for the suggestion.

[@nastyt471]

I think a knights should have higher base speed and higher skill . And I think if ur designing a hack u need to make cavs and other classes less tanky so knights feel more tanky

[@boldknock7436]

I agree with the added movement, but id still like there to be noticable movement gaps between units of different classes. Like a general shouldnt be moving at the same pace as a swordmaster for instance. One obviously is weighed down by their armor less than the other.

[@Kyrads]

Good stuff! Was good to listen to, feels like a lot of problems are solved by having stronger enemies lmao. Look forward to the next video!

[@michalswag]

i used the armoured knights in shadows of valentia because they were more handsome than other games

[@loredragonwrites7673]

I like how armors have been kinda bad forever, but then we get Engage and Louis. Probably the most OP unit in the game just because he mixes insanely well with most rings

[@joelcolegrove]

Louis consistently took no or almost no physical damage for the entire game, on hard mode, without stat boosters. Maybe I just got lucky but he was always one of my best characters.

[@jimjimson6208]

What can be said about barth is he joins at level 9 so if he gains even one level in chapter 8 he can promote with the knight crest (objectively terrible use of a limited resource btw) and gain axes to drop WTD during the western isles. That being said, axe accuracy in FE6 sucks so bad that his hit still won't be good even at neutral. He also gains 3 speed and can use literally every lance and most axes without suffering a speed penalty, so he can at least avoid being doubled by most enemies for a decent number of chapters

[@charleouel9012]

I don't think Forsyth is bad is he good probably not but his high SPD and SPD growth are kinda nice in a game whit tone of unite that can't double really well he also got quite a nice basse RES so that nice too sure he got lower DEF and ATK or HP i forgot what suck on him... But still he doesn't need it to be super high if he double things whene Lukas, Tobin or even Gray or Clive I guess? IT quite nice tho you can get screwed in SPD on him but for me I did got him whit a solid spd able to double compare to Lukas that was just there looking shiny whit his high HP and DEF but geting double and takeing like about 1.9 x more damage than him in general... Also he is force deploy and there groupe XP so he won't fall of and may just end up better than Lukas and Armored knight in Echoes aren't TOO bad (they are bad but like they got there used vs bow user), Do I think he is the best Nope do I think he got his used 100% hell I think he is better than Luther hand down (That boy suck Nice Skill and Luck growth dude too bad it useless for you outshide of hopeing to crit whit Excalibure I guess... And not doubleing) Any way I guess if you don't train him he kinda suck tho even than he doesn't suck that bad form what I played and the map are quite small overall whit alot of chock point he can hold + Warp is free so you can alwas warp him in the front if you really want to. Any way I just think he is midish tier I think Luthers is much worse than him But it depend alot on how much SPD he get if he doesn't get his SPD to double insteed of geting double he will suck for sure. it really not that hard for him to get his SPD going I fell like he got what about 30 to 40% growth in it just give him like 10 lvl and he should be good to not get double at all (hell whene he join I don't even think he get double much if I remember right) Also his Support is more usefull than alot of others since it give more Crit and Hit to the Sniper that can gain a Killer bow +

[@ScubaLuigi]

I think giving armor knights 5 move goes against the identity of armor knights. It's like making 1-2 range short bows for archers, it just makes them like all the other units instead of focusing on what they should be good for.

[@nadnap]

While I agree with you on the spirit of their identity, I think focusing more on their strength and defense stats while giving them the same move would make them much more useful. Movement is the most important stat in the game. Having 4 movement is limiting in many settings. That's not to say 4 movement armors cannot be useful, but they need excellent stats to be viable (see: Oswin). Alternatively, 4 move likely won't be as awful if the maps are really small or densely packed, so moving full move is less relevant in most scenarios.

[@JM-tj5qm]

I disagree. You need to boost the stats so much on a 4 move unit to make them worth using that is not a fun trade off. And if a unit was that broken combat wise then the player will just give them boots to compensate their weakness. May as well just make them balanced units with normal movement from the start

[@jarco1121]

​@@JM-tj5qmI think this is a bit overexagerated. First of all because you don't have infinite boots, so even if the armor knight in question had all capped stats you are still using probably the most valuable resourche in the game to boost the movement of a unit with 0 utility outside of combat to cavalier level, whereas you could have boosted a paladin, a flyer or somekind of staffer and that is a real trade-off. Also mages exist and i don't think you would ever think to give armors super high stats and also give them res. To me armor are more fun and distinct with 4 move, if you take that from them are just soldiers with different animations. Would just have a game that can accomodate them with side objectives where move is not a premium and high def is useful and give them some other kind of meaningful utility.

[@Starwars-Fanboy]

I realize giving armor knights 5 move is a really easy and effective solution to help them, but hear me out. What if we used skills to help armor knights. 2 ideas I have are this, we give an armor knight a personal skill that gives the effect of savior to whomever is rescuing them. You also give them strong enough stats to justify their use and taking the extra steps to rescue drop them into battle. You would also need to ensure every mounted unit and few unmounted characters could rescue drop them. My other idea would be to have a skill that allows support partners of the armor knight to shove them. I would also have them join alongside an ally that already has a C support so it is immediately useful. You could even allow A/S rank supporters to smite them.