Mercedes BETTER than Linhardt?! Bruh 3H Takes Bingo

[@armourslayer8942]

Takes timestamps: 0:25 Enlightened One Byleth 7:13 Dark Knight is not good on any unit 12:25 Mercedes > Linhardt 16:43 Foul Play in the main game 21:10 3H Meta is just Wyvern Spam 27:15 Training more units than Max deployment 31:55 Not using Impregnable Wall or Retribution

[@RubyChiang]

Something about Linhardt that I really really like is that when you ask him for Mission Assistance, he will ALWAYS come with Physic and that’s always so helpful on Maddening.

[@Pmu_Sh0wd0wn]

Exactly. The moment when mercedes learn physic, you can just ask Linhardt or Marianne for Mission Assistance and they have more uses of heal and Physic

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

Ah yes so helpful in the game where you are one shot or one shot the opponent most the time and have powerful options to prevent the damage via gambits guard adjuncts to have a healing spell. Sarcasm aside the whole healing being rarely useful is the whole reason lindhart’s better ( aka Mercedes has none of the “good faith magic aka utilities like warp and rescue and seraphim ) makes that also not particularly useful.

[@readtherules7101]

@@ultimaterecoil1136the reason Linhardt matters in the specific reasons they brought up is because Lin and Marianne start with D+ faith and not D faith like Mercedes which means they have physic earlier. A deployment slot can be used for either in exchange for a unit that is planned to be benched (Caspar, Ferdinand, Ashe, raphael, etc) for healing uses at a time before tools like guard adjutants are available and when physic casts are still limited lol.

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

@@readtherules7101 at most useful for one map. Once again beyond the extreme early game most of which you can’t even get help from those outside your class aka prior to gambits being buyable you never heal because you keep people alive with gambits which guarantees their survival rather then healing a unit to full and them potentially risking them dying to a crit anyway. You just don’t take damage in 3 houses because the preventative options are so strong so a healer who heals is borderline useless in a game where you take no damage. Now a “healer” that can teleport units or do effective damage to monsters on the other hand that has value which is why lindhart’s the best “healer” is because of what he can do outside of healing. There’s only 2 units bulky enough to really even consider actually taking hits and potentially not dying to getting crit with bad rng and one of them is lindhart anyway so he can’t physic himself ( the other being balthus who is the only unit with better mixed bulk growths then lindhart since he’s got the same average res/defense growths with more hp but lindhart’s arguably got better bases. ) side note yes this means you actually wanna make a armor unit tank lindhart’s hilariously one of the best candidates though dodge tanks are better anyway. You’d obviously wanna do magic weapons for him though

[@williamdunbar2802]

They definitely should’ve brought back malig knight as an alternative to dark knight. Fates classes are pretty interesting

[@maagic2031]

I really like Malig Knight, but in a game like 3H they would just invalidate Dark Knights. At least in fates you had to do some marriage shenanigans to give Malig Knight to the people who really want it and that just isn't possible if Camilla/Beruka/Corrin are taken and they might be because they're all really good moms.

[@huntersmith1413]

@@maagic2031 Dark Knights suck in 3H so I dont see why it would matter

[@LFPman]

@@huntersmith1413 most cavalry classes in Three Houses sucks as they have terrible speed growth and stats. It’s a shame really Guess I should also say all Master Classes are all mounted of course excluding Mortal Savant, War Master and Gremory. Mekkah does make a valid point with the sudden A in riding requirement that is sudden and for any physical attacker that wants a mounted Master Class, would have to train a most likely useless skill in reason, faith or bow etc. Silly me trained Ferdie into a Bow Knight on my first playthrough

[@LFPman]

Glad to know i’m not the only one who would use Malig Knight Annette

[@_Sinduss]

@@maagic2031 disagree if only due to the lack of flying magical battalions.

[@moltz4866]

37:55 Besides baiting, Impregnable Wall can also be used to improvise a chokepoint if you don't have any dedicated (dodge)tanks, which helps a ton with chaotic maps like Lysithea & Ferdinand's paralogue or even Balthus and Hapi's if you have the DLC.

[@TempestDacine]

I used to use it to set up boss kills if I couldn't make a full map distance. Ensuring your stride user dancer boss killer and warper can all move into an enemy area without dying before going for game was really useful since I was improvising my hard run. Its very flexible even with its restrictions.

[@marcusmajarra]

At this rate, you might as well call these videos "50 Shades of Red"

[@EdgedPixie]

Only if he does a second bingo square so we can get up to 50

[@aclashoffireandice4084]

Enlightened One is actually a Master class, so getting Sacred Power is even harder than you thought. On Mercedes, she does have access to Dark Flier as something over Linhardt. Warp is still better, but Mercie's winged Canto makes her better at hit-and-run combat, I find. Also, Fortify's short range is actually a boon when considering the low-HP builds that you keep bringing up against it - it makes it easier to not accidentally heal said units. Like you said back in the Shadow Dragon guide review, the player has absolute control over where their units go and what they do. So I don't think you can say that Fortify is a negative, just that it's not as big a positive as some people think. Linhardt's still better, though.

[@kirbymastah]

Other things to note about mercie/linhardt: - mercie has the same base magic as linhardt and only a +5% magic lead. That's 2 magic over 40 levels which is +1 hp of healing which is basically irrelevant - linhardt is better at combat. Wind spells are more accurate than fire, have crit, weigh less, and linhardt also has much better luck than mercie, which helps magic hit - Mercie has a significant speed and charm lead over linhardt but lol charm on healers, and mercie's speed advantage is offset by heavier fire spells. And for maddening, speed is whatever for these units - Mercie has gremory as an option but it's basically wasted because all she can do is use fire spells and heal, so she's best as a Bishop for more healing anyways.... which linhardt can do anyways. So this isn't a point in her favor Realistically the only objective benefit to using mercie over linhardt is the option to go valkyrie/dark flier/sniper but she's not doing much special with those classes because she learns fire spells, the spell list with the least use/niches

[@exconer7912]

.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

Linhardt can also take dark mage. Poison Strike will realistically be a bigger help to damage than a few extra magic, and can be lulzy if you get him on one of those magic ballista, and make him handy for battering down monster barriers. It's a small niche, and it's realistically not worth noting... but I figure I should note it anyways.

[@moonlight2870]

But is Lynhardt a lesbian?

[@nightcloud2014]

@@moonlight2870 Aren't they both bi?

[@moonlight2870]

@@nightcloud2014 yes

[@CarbonMalite]

Whenever I think of Linhardt I think "Lysithea is better for warp and Marcedes is better at healing" and never use him. He really has nothing else in my experience. But for Maddening where you just want to put your eggs in one basket, physic and warp sounds like everything you need but on one unit

[@zachm9964]

Ehh Mercedes starts with D faith while Linhardt starts with D+ which makes getting physic way faster and having a 5-8 range warp depending on his magic is more often applicable than having Fortify. Even if you have Lysithea on your team a second warp is never a bad idea

[@tylerboie6838]

I'd actually argue that it's better to have Lysithea AND Mercie since that means in one turn (without a dancer) you can warp and heal, as apposed to only having Linhardt to either warp or heal unless you use your dancer.

[@hazelv.a.7976]

@@tylerboie6838 just use Lys and Linh. You get 2 warpers and can still heal if needed. Mercie provides very little in comparison.

[@afgcinc7206]

Agree. I think for rush plays or maps where you have to rush (Rodrigue why you try to die so much???) Fortify and Live to Serve are useful. Catnap Lin does nothing, I also agree below that you have to choose to heal or warp unless you keep dancing Lin for both. I never use Lin either since he annoys me but I get it. For both I'll take Hapi, even if she is just lower magic stat discount Linhardt, she still has much better offense and options - it just takes her a lot longer to get Warp than he does. Also I found that Lysithea's Warp was hard to choose to use because she was better at constantly just mowing down mobs. I mostly just used it with her for free Exp or to get Rodrigue/Gilbert/anybody tf out of danger since the CPU just wants your green units to dieeeeeeeee

[@LadyViolet1]

To add on to impregnable wall being good; it's also super good in casual runs. It makes it so I don't have to think as much when I structure my offense. Like I'll just move three units into range; have them take out three enemies, and then just use the gambit and next turn I can probably take out the rest; if not rinse and repeat.

[@ttarzzxz3711]

Mercedes doesn't even start with Nosferatu, she is so far behind Lindhart and Marianne. I found her to be the worst of the three by a good chunk, especially because Lindhart and Marianne not only get to their other spells faster, but they also have spells you can do when they have nothing better to do, warp is great like you said and I feel silence is underrated. Not only free exp but it basically kills a mage for a turn and it's super accurate (but they can still use magic battalions)

[@giygas9305]

Bro even now Im discovering spells I didnt even know existed, like Silence. Never saw it until a week or two ago. Then again I was pretty much a noob until this run.

[@hhhcontent3930]

I think that Mercedes is great for playing offensively, albeit in a non traditional manner. I don’t think that either are better than each other, but they’re both pretty interesting sidegrades. Fortify seems like a turtley spell at first, especially compared to warp, but it actually allows you to play much more aggressively with your frontline units. If you had to worry about counterattacks from enemies you would have to choose safer options like handaxes on player phase, since it takes an entire turn to heal one unit, but with fortify you can use riskier, more aggressive options, like attacking at one range because at the end of your turn you can heal almost every unit. This effectively negates enemy counter attacks if you position carefully. Without Mercedes you would also have to leave units out of enemy ranges for longer since you’re likely to have many damaged units at once, and you can only heal so many, even if you use your dancer. With fortify, however, you can maintain aggression even after taking heavy blows or an unlucky enemy phase. You mentioned range as well, but I never had much of a problem with it. My Mercedes was pretty average in terms of magic, and I didn’t give her any stat boosters, and she hardly ever had problems healing who she needed to. This range can also be easier to work with by using canto, and it’s especially devestating if the units with canto have stride. Losing out on warp is rough, but there’s nothing stopping you from having both Mercedes and lindhart, or lysithea, or Manuela. Having two healers, or a healer and lysithea, is a valid strategy, and 2 deployment slots for 2 incredible spells is well worth it. Live to serve isn’t that great. Semi helpful super early, otherwise I won’t bother defending it. Her crest is nice but I believe it does the same as lindharts so I won’t discuss it. You mentioned that she learns psychic late, but I’d argue this isn’t much of an issue. On Blue lions it’s a little annoying, but focusing her on faith will only get it a chapter or 2 later than on lindhart. By the time you could recruit lindhart she’ll already have it. On any route other than blue lions she’ll very likely have it upon recruitment so there is very little issue. On my GD maddening Ironman I just ended up with mercedes, lysithea, a dancer, and the rest of my army as Wyverns. It was incredible to see every single Wyvern fly out, wreck havoc, canto into positions, and then use Mercedes’ and my dancer to heal almost all of them to full. Here are my conclusions. BE lindhart is better BL Mercedes is better GD Sidegrades SS Sidegrades I always use Mercedes’ though because she’s my favorite :)

[@TheOmegaDragon]

Mercedes has excellent resilience in my experience with her. She can stall out mages pretty well and her PA can recover any loss health by using Physics/Fortify on other units. She also has access to Gremory which doubles spell usage, but Lindhardt does not. Dorothea who is in the same class as Lindhardt has access to Physics and a better PA that heals those around her. Lindhardt's PA only heals himself if he does nothing on his turn.

[@StarlitWitchy]

She's my favourite too hehe :)

[@kindred6453]

I appreciate the LOR background music. Great video.

[@BowandSvent]

I once had a playthrough where I used only flying units (as soon as they were available that is) and it ended up a lot worse than the boring cakewalk it was gonna be. Your only real options for utility and healer dark flyers end up with a nerfed magic stat from spending so much time with the crappy magic growth of the class. It also felt boring because every unit felt pretty much like every other unit.

[@gameboyn64]

Something that should be said about dodge tanking over impregnable wall is that the former only uses one unit while the latter requires two units to set up. This means that the former can continue to distract for multiple turns in succession while the latter will probably not be able to tank for a second turn. Impregnable wall also doesn't stop poison strike. Not saying that dodge tanking is better but that both have situational merits

[@jonunciate7018]

Lindhart is also great at getting your Fortress Knight in position via warp, very important on maddening.

[@biandanxious3438]

I like Mercedes more than Lin, but I wouldn't say that objectively she is better. I think that they both have their uses over the other, it just matters how your team looks. If you are using Hapi and Lysithea, you should probably use Mercedes instead of Lin. But I prefer Hapi or Marianne over them both personally.

[@pallen2645]

Sacred Power is really helpful moving into a new game+ maddening run. Being able to stand in the middle of your off-turn vanguard and help them tank and kill is great. Worth leveling up enlightened one in your first run so you can equip sacred power in the second.

[@projectmessiah]

Even if Mercedes was better than my boy, Mercedes can't bang bernadetta so she automatically loses.

[@untendohd1377]

Give her a gun and we will see…

[@projectmessiah]

@@untendohd1377 Bruh. Don't even talk to me if you don't know the fire emblem weapon triangle. Waifu ---> Gun

[@untendohd1377]

@@projectmessiah I‘m sorry. I didn‘t mean to talk bad about Linhardt. I like Linhardt. But I dislike Bernadetta.

[@projectmessiah]

@@untendohd1377 I would of forgiven you but you said you don't like Bernadetta so you now no longer have the rights to forgiveness. Truly a shame, here I was thinking that this random stranger would have the exact same opinion as me but nope. Guess that's just the motion of the ocean.

[@untendohd1377]

@@projectmessiah she hits too close to home. But still better than Flayn or Ingrid.

[@RandyNgelale]

Mecedes can definitely get physic to use in Red Canyon Dominance if you focus a lot on healing in the practice soldier battle and the mandatory seminar. Assuming they both have physic by that point, early game Mercedes crushes linhardt as a healer. Since warp is A rank in linhardt, prior to getting it he is basically just her with slightly worse mag. On a map like red canyon dominance especially, the few extra heals you can get from crest of lamine definitely is more useful that the little bit of extra healing from crest of Cethleann. Once he gets warp, then it is a different story. They aren't really comparable because they don't function the same way on a team. Note that there isn't nearly as much comparison between linhardt and lysithea since it's pretty understood that she is a damage dealer with warp where as he has both lower mag and weaker spells so that's not a fair comparison for him. Similarly Mercedes is a healer with surprisingly solid damage so why so much emphasis on criticizing her for basically not having warp?

[@RushStudios101]

I know that wyvern byleth is the obvious choice but grappler byleth will always be close to my heart

[@giygas9305]

I used War Master for the first time on endgame in my last run with an underused Balthus (Didnt know I could use 12 units) and he destroyed tons of enemies all alone no problem.

[@felixargayle8706]

This is Yesod talking about Fire Emblem to Roland and Roland just nods his head

[@everettwhitaker7829]

I definitely used to fall into the "no Retribution" camp, but then I used it to great effect in a recent Azure Moon playthrough on Endgame to Turn 1 enemy phase Myson to get rid of his nasty Bohr X spell and all of the Agarthan Soldiers, and then used it again to take care of the infamous Meteor mages. Suffice to say I'm convinced.

[@xarezarcs4125]

Impregnable wall is what carried my first maddening play through. Its so good.

[@EsmeSoSa26]

I love Dark Knight, but in my experience it only works for females, since they can start gaining riding experience from valkirie. In fact most magic females benefit from going valkirie, just for uncanny blow.

[@Aurirang]

Admitteldy, i onely ever tried to get the boys to becoem dark knigths (Sylvain, Hubert, Lorenz) and they were all awful. The girls usually end up either Dark flyer (to swoop in and out), Gremory (juicy double magic) or stay in the healing class to maximise healing.

[@EsmeSoSa26]

@@Aurirang Yeah, Sylvain is better as a Paladin using Swift Strikes. I almost never use Hubert, but I see him better as a Dark Bishop. And Lorenz could work as a dark knight, but as a Paladin using frozen lance he is good too. As for females, Dorothea benefits from Uncanny blow, so she benefits from raising Riding. Mercedes is good as a bishop, but still can benefit from Uncanny blow and riding. Annette can really make good use of Dark Knight, with the good movement, and her high Authority she can make good use of dance of the goddess. Lysithia prefers Gremory, but still benefits from Uncanny Blow to patch her accuracy. Marianne is great as a Dark Knight if using her offensively, but prefers Bishop or Gremory if using her defensevly. Hapi works well as both a Gremory or a Dark Knight. Same case as Marianne, it depends on what you want from them. Constance prefers to be a Dark Flyer, but still benefits from raising Riding, to patch her accuracy with Uncanny Blow.

[@tsf4015]

I did a Linhardt meme build of making him a tanky bishop with, A+ heavy armor for weight -5, Nosferatu, and a good shield. Does well against mages (except Luna), and when can tank while healing. With white magic range +1, white magic prowess, and 2 other abilities of your choice (white tomefaire and that ability that gives +6 mag when initiating), he can take anything on. I dumped my def, res, and hp stat boosters and he practically soloed maps until his nosferatu ran out.

[@murderedx8018]

Those 24 nos uses tho...

[@EdgedPixie]

My Mercedes is a healer tank meme build. It's fun being able to heal both her and other frontliners at once. That and having your healer politely say "I'm fine!" and "Hey!" While blades bounce off of her is a phenomenal experience

[@lonelymascot]

iv used impregnable wall on my squishies and blocked off paths to reduce enemy reinforcement movement(and by extension attack range) forcing them to move through forest to target someone who's able to take the hits, made annas paralogue SOOO much easier on maddening with all those nasty spawning horse archers

[@phoenixgemini42]

I feel like dark knight lysithea works well. It's true that Gremory works better, but lysithea is so slow that the speed penalty doesn't matter and the tome fair helps ensure she one shots. Canto essentially allows her to they retreat to safety so she can effectively kill any problematic unit a turn, especially if she Thyrsus and Dark magic range +1, granted the last one requires investment. The high movement also helps set up warps, and generally you only need one. Again, Gremory is better, but I think Lysithea makes a stronger dark knight than Hubert or Lorenz, and can definitely prove better for players who don't like finishing maps in a single turn.

[@chipbannatyne]

To add to this this is why I love Valkyrie Lysithea. Sure, it's def not going to be as strong magic wise as gremory or dark knight but with thyrsus equipped, being able to have a +5 range, 6 movement and canto I think is huge. Plus the fact that mastering it gives uncanny blow which is auto +30 hit on player phase, a massive boost to lysithea with her low luck stat

[@bencomer2339]

@@chipbannatyne This. Only reason to use dark knight on her is for dark tomefaire, which is only a few atk higher than Gremory or Valkyrie. Go Valk for offense, Grem for Warp/Effective instead

[@joeyjose727]

Enlightened One Byleth was my first playthrough class, and on my 9th playthrough I re-did it by going through Magic classes to EO. Which was fun! NG+ to unlock Riding’s Movement Increase ability > Monk > Mage > Bishop > Enlightened One. Very fun, my Byleth was gaining a lot of magic until I switched to EO. And that’s fine since Levin Sword could frequently double enemies or 1 shot them anyways

[@VallaPhantasm]

I actually really like Dark Knight on Sylvain, since he gets Black Magic Avoid when training Reason and if you trained him in Faith too, a more mobile Physic user too (Seraphim is also a pretty useful tool sometimes), and he still gets good use out of lances to use Swift Strikes. The funny thing to me about hearing "Linhardt's personal skill isn't good" is that I made a really weird build for him using his personal skill, Renewal, and Seiros Shield to passively keep his HP up to be a QR tank (yes, I did have him master War Master) to deny fast enemy follow ups and double them back (potentially with Nosferatu to, again, keep his HP up). Probably not very viable in Maddening but I don't care much for how Maddening works so I still have fun with it. It's even funnier to me when I put him in Mortal Savant to make that Speed loss irrelevant.

[@ThatNameDouh]

Yooo, Quick Riposte Nosferatu sounds so stupidly fun. I'm guessing you burn through Nosferatu charges if he faces multiple people quickly, is he a Bishop for more charges or something else?

[@VallaPhantasm]

Often enough I don't overextend him to draw too many people to attack him to where he REALLY needs Nosferatu to survive, I typically have him stick with Reason magic when QR tanking, but being Bishop to have twice the Nosferatu charges certainly seems solid! I've taken to having him in Mortal Savant with QR so his Magic is higher and does more damage in retaliation with Reason lol

[@Sines314]

I find your coverage of Dark Knight to be a bit narrow. The competition for Dark Knight itself is not much, but each has a clear niche. Gremory has the highest Magic boost, but no faires. And it doubles casts. Generally it's best for characters with very important spells that they want extra casts of. And the highest base mage improves those spells that don't benefit from Faire. Constance is a good example here, wanting extra Boltings and Rescues, and getting more range on her Rescue. Dark Flier is basically the doubling magic class. It offers no base magic boost, and no dark tome faire. So it's about having mages use light spells to double. Alternatively, it can be good for utility mages just having really nice mobility. Mortal Savant is kind of a meme class, but it does offer the best Levin Sword / Soulblade damage. I think Marianne and Yuri can be fine here. But it's not terrible, just mostly outclassed. Yuri likes the class because he's a guy, and Marianne can get good use out of it thanks to Soulblade and Blutgang, and her riding boon helps make up for the classes 'only' 6 movement. Valkyrie is a very nice temporary class, at the very least. It's got a good mastery in Uncanny Blow, and it's +4 Magic modifier is pretty hard. That and it's extra movement make it a great class for Soulblade or Frozen Lance users. The extra magic range is certainly nice too, letting you poke and canto away, but at that point of the game, poking is usually situational. Dark Knight is basically the evolution of Valkyrie. It gives up 2 points of magic for +1 movement and Dark/Black Tomefaire. If you were using Frozen Lance as a Valkyrie, then you pretty much already qualify for it. And if you had someone using Soulblade that you wanted to get there, C Lances isn't hugely out of your way, though Mortal Savant or just staying in Valkyrie does become more tempting. The magic classes are all fairly well balanced, I feel. Some are more niche than others, but there isn't a clearly best one. But the shinning part of what makes Dark Knight (And Valkyrie) good is that Magic Combat Arts are necessary to keep anyone not named Lysithea or Constance regularly OHKO-ing enemies. And units like Annette and Marianne are practically dependent on them to offer damage when their support options aren't needed. Heck even Lysithea can train up Soulblade at some point to give her extra charges of killing when they happen to be in range of her, or when she can't target someone vulnerable to her spells. If you don't mind giving up a second Warp charge, Lysithea even gets her best magic damage as a Dark Knight (+2 damage over Gremory) and being able to warp a unit, and then canto after them to stay on the front lines, is a big deal too.

[@samkeiser9776]

Respectfully, I think you’re overrating some of these classes and underrating some of the others. Though, I will say it’s true that each of the endgame magic classes has a different niche, hence why units either have an obvious choice, or have to struggle to get into dark knight or mortal savant if they want a master class. Gremory not having faire skills doesn’t really matter that much, all faire skills amount to is *some* damage. Especially comparing gremory’s magic boost to other classes, dark knight only has +2 damage with specifically reason magics than gremory. Though tbh faith offense doesn’t really matter. But Gremory extra magic gives 1.5 range of physic and .75 range of warp compared to dark knight, which is way more significant than 2 damage. Gremory’s biggest flaw is actually certainly their mov, being only 5. Dark flier is actually really good, because it’s a 7 mov magic class at lvl 20, and it has flyer movement, the certification is also really easy. Basically every unit who’s a mage who can class into it has a reason to use it, even if only as an occasional alternative to Gremory or another class. The Biggest flaw for that class is their lack of spell uses compared to gremory/the advanced mages, and their restrictions on battalions. Mortal Savant is definitely a meme class, the problem with it is that it requires swords. Soulblade is actually somewhat weak on most of the units that learn it, except maybe in early game, or it’s not worth picking up in comparison to another combat art. Lysithea, Marrianne, Anna, and Constance all learn it. Besides lysithea all of them learn soul blade at C+ swords, lysithea however learns it as her budding talent of course. Soulblade does magic damage based off strength, +30% of a unit’s resistance. So lysithea and constance actually do very little damage with it, because they both have low base strength and low base res, and also have low growths in both those stats. When enemies start having real res stats, soulblade stops doing a lot of damage. Marrianne has both a good res base and a comparatively good res growth, but she also learns frozen lance much more easily, and her dex and res growths are comparable, even if her base dex is nothing to write home about. she’d rather train lances than swords for class options and frozen lance earlier than soulblade. (maybe unless she’s the dancer, but if so she’d also like faith and riding as a dancer, because dancer actually can freely train up riding just for mov+1 and faith just gives her more utility) if Marianne isn’t the dancer, pretty much any other magic oriented class is still better for her than mortal savant. She also doesn’t need levin swords unless she somehow ran out of spells because even levin swords+ actually just have worse stats than thoron. I guess you could use a levin sword with soulblade, though idk how effective that’d be. Oh and Anna isn’t even worth talking about. Valkyrie is actually also really good, again, it’s lvl 20 w/easy certification, but more than that, the tome range is actually really nice. Anyone with a 1-3 range spell gets 1-4 range, which means almost nothing can counter them, and the enemies (bow knights) that can counter them probably will have low hit rates, but you can also stack magic range increasing items on your valkyries, if you give a valkyrie thyrsus, that valkyrie has 1-5 range magic on all of her spells, that’s more than a bow knight unless that bow knight has a long bow, in which case they won’t have very much hit at all. And then you can get S rank reason and stack tome range +1 to get a 1-6 range attacker, and if the character has a spell like thoron, they’ll have 1-7 range. Only 3 less than normal meteor. Though given S rank is far off, you won’t have 1-7 range till late game, however, 1-5 / 1-6 range is still really good. Even without thyrsus, +1 attack range means that mages have a more free range of motion as they can move to any space within 3 spaces of a foe they want to attack rather than just 2, and that can sometimes provide simple benefits, like being able to attack a monster at 3 range and avoid a counter. But it’s also just really nice to be able to do that. Yeah every magic class can use thyrsus and the S rank +1 tome range skills, but valkyries will always still have +1 attack range higher than them. So if you ask me, the move range penalty compared to dark/holy knight, is worth it. Valkyries’s biggest flaw is their speed, which is annoyingly low and cavalry mov penalties, which mean they suck at going through forests, but aside from that, it’s a really solid class which competes with the master horse classes and is honestly solidly better imo. Especially because the mastery skill is actually good, of course gremory still gives 2X spell uses though, so units will have to decide between utility and offense. Dark knight has annoying certification requirements for male units you’ve been training in reason and faith, so like just lindhart, aside from that it’s basically just warlock on a horse, idk. It’s probably About as good as it sounds, so like, it’s decent. Calling it an evolution to valkyrie feels incorrect though because valkyrie’s biggest strength is it’s literal boost to spell range, and dark knight just doesn’t have that (and it only does 3 more damage) Also, “poking” with spells like luna, dark spikes, fimbulvetr, excalibur, thoron, or cutting gale is surprisingly lethal. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t see the strength in things like soulblade or frozen lance past the early game, in my experience, they just stop doing significant damage to anything that doesn’t already have low res, it’s nearly always more effective to just, attack with magic. But yeah those are my thoughts.

[@Aurirang]

Enlightened is a pretty okay class in my opinion. It's definitely not my first pick (My first Byleth became Falcon knight) but the class is serviceable and definitely way better than mortal savant. (Which is probably the worst class in the game?) Dark knight is.. i don't know. I never had a good dark knight. I tried it with Hubert, Lorenz and Sylvain. Sylvain had the biggest damage output but that was mostly thanks to his lance. I went through Paladin on Lorenz and Sylvain and through mage with Hubert. I classed Lorenz back to his mage class as he luckily has his want that gives him range, so he doesn't have issues hitting enemies from behind lines. But generally, they all lagged behind the rest alot in terms of damage. I suppose Mercie vs Linhard boils down to playing style, as you said. I wouldn't call her better, but definitely different from Linhardt. I prefer her as i really love bulk-healing and i like my turtle movements a bit too much. Foul play on Yuri is incredibly nice. But on other Units, it's very nice. You can have a very agile unit go to the front and use foul play to put a slower unit (Armor knights!)in that spot. But it's mroe situational than anything. It's not soemthing i'd be building a team around. It's nice to have. Yeah.. Wyvern spam. admittedly i'm doing this just now. I have Dimitri, Byleth, Sylvain, Anette and Ingrid on a Wyvern. Dimitri didn't gain any stats (go figure), Byleth got a bit of speed, Anette got a shitton of strength, Sylvain didn't get anything either (he was blessed though) and Ingrid got.. pretty much everything (have you ever seen an Ingrid with more mag than str without touching a magic class? I got one.. also had 15 speed at level 20, 15!!) But the gains from promotion as well as moveability of a wyvern (Canto+) is waaay too good to pass up. For deployment.. i usually have one extra Unit that i can swap in case one unit falls off really hard (Like in that one run when Lysithea had less magic ups than Raphael? yeah, she got ditched halfways and luckily i kept somebody else on level, so the 'fall' wasn't too hard) but on any Fire emblem with very streamlined ressources, i wouldn't want to sawp out too many characters as it's way too much of a waste. I admit, i hardly ever used retribution or impregnable wall myself. I used them like once or twice and usually went for a more offensive approach of things (well, my offensive turtle formation i guess). Usually i ended up being one batallion short of breaking a monster, seing the wall one on my nearest student and usually get miffed and thought: why couldn't this have been a more usefull one? I doubt that i'll use them in the future either even if they're pretty darn good.

[@SirVyre]

Clearly they were talking about Mercedes's hair. I mean, be honest. Linhardt's hair is awful. But to authentically engage with the conversation... the units are used for different situations. Linhardt is used for single target healing and warp. Mercedes is used for single and group healing, and offensive gambits. Since Gambits rely solely on charm, this makes her wonderful if you're up against a demonic beast style boss that needs multiple huge gambits to land to break its barrier thingies. Or if you need to stun an unexpected enemy who slipped your defenses. I mean, it's true. In any situation where you can just warp a couple units to the boss and be done, WHAM BAM SLAM THANK YOU ?MA'AM? There's no contest. Linhardt is super fly. But idk, say against a huge ass dragon or turtle that you want to kill quickly but you know... it's got 18 tiles worth of protection(Basically Ashera Part 2 Electric Boogaloo)? Well, either you're going to need a lot of people or some sexy ass gambits. Frankly, when I played 3 Houses, I generally gravitate towards Linhardt, Mercedes, and Lysithea for my mage back line. The warpers, two good healers, and the tactical nuke with an emergency heal. Following the motto of Polygamy Porter, "Why have just one?" TL;DR - Neither of these units is Boyd from PoR/RD, so they're both disappointing.

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

The problem with Mercedes is that she is that healers kinda suck when you are outclassed in preventing units from dying by gambits. Like Just giving setheth that one flying impregnable wall gambit is gonna be 9/10 better then Mercedes healing capabilities and is worth the field slot considering his offensive potential. And while yes the offensive gambit use due to high charm is nice ( this is actually were most of Mercedes ability to protect your team comes from since even using a gambit is gonna be safer since not letting the enemy attack you is better then risking getting crit and planning to heal them afterwards only for them to get crit and die) it doesn’t salvage having the worst faith list of the starting faith casters

[@biandanxious3438]

I prefer Marianne over both personally. She has really nice charm and thoron and aura which can get some lucky crits sometimes. I'd say Marianne has the best offensive spell list out of the three. And she has the best charm. So that's why I prefer her personally. But objectively, I'd say all three are pretty even with maybe Lin an Mercedes being a tad bit better.

[@biandanxious3438]

@@ultimaterecoil1136 I have never used that gambit in any of my playthroughs so I personally don't see the struggle. Maybe it's cause I'm super sweaty and don't let my weaker teammates get in enemy range.

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

@@biandanxious3438 the thing is the enemy practically shouldn’t even be hitting you at all. Like there is so much prevention that you shouldn’t really need to heal. It’s part of why Lysidea’s main downside of being so frail that she straight up can’t afford to be hit is not that big a deal. If you ain’t getting hit what’s the point of a healer or even worrying about bulk? Like maybe it’s an issue for like a few monsters with counter and vantage and maybe the king of liberation is so bulky it’s a concern on maddening but that’s what wind sweep is for.

[@biandanxious3438]

@@ultimaterecoil1136 You are clearly someone who's play style is very player phase oriented. I personally like to make teams that do well in both phases so I need at least one healer.

[@Robin-234]

Honestly the last two times I used Lindhardt I made him a fortress knight because he is surprisingly bulky and strong. No joke, I like him much better as a fortress knight than a magic user. I've seen someone make Mercedes into one too, I'll have to try it out because, well I love using Mercedes. Even if I don't use her I always recruit her lol

[@EdgedPixie]

AYY! Fortress Knight Healer Gang! My Mercedes is a goddamn behemoth in my BL maddening. I'm at the second battle of eagle and lion and my Mercedes has a higher prt than Dedue, while also having insane res, and renewal. She's a great Mixed tank. And depending on the map I can swap her into Bishop to have a tanky magic user with the ability to swap into axes if necessary.

[@naiRISE766]

Not only does Linhardt gets physic at chapter 2 he also gets wind at chapter 2 if you do Hanneman's seminar since he starts with E+ reason and D+ faith. Meanwhile Mercedes starts at E+ reason and D faith

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

The bigger issue is that of the starting faith casters Mercedes has the worst spell list since healing honestly ain’t that good in this game with how much damage prevention is in the game. Someone with impregnable wall will do more effective healing or even just a big gambit stunning a whole bunch of dangerous enemies. Especially since if you are actually trying to use healing there is the potential of a crit just one rounding someone. You kinda have to recruit a out of house faith based unit if you want a good one to replace Mercedes because the main value of faith units is their utility and Mercedes has literally none unless you make her a dancer or something. Or their potential to become strong combat units by abusing the mad exp utility stuff provides and then you have a holy knight/gregomony prior to time skip that you can then transition into dark Knight ( mainly marrianne or Constance falls in this category)

[@jedimasterpickle3]

Impregnable Wall I have used a few times, but every time I've used it I needed to. I've got it on a flying gambit, and it's saved my skin every time I used it. Especially in Hunting By Daybreak. Holy hell, I needed it there. It's great when you just need 1 turn to get more people into position, and guarantees your units will survive that one turn.

[@DolphinDingus]

I need to make better use of Impregnable Wall. I just feel like it has the opportunity cost of not being able to have a different gambit equipped since it's uses are somewhat niche.

[@spacedoyster7686]

Foul Play is very niche, but what helps it work a bit better is that Trickster has Stealth. As far as I can tell, Stealth is pretty reliable in Three Houses; as long as another target is in range, then enemies shouldn't target the Stealth unit. This can help with using a glass cannon to take out a problematic enemy, then swapping them to the back with a unit that behaves like a Light Rune, as long as they have allies nearby. The real reason to use Trickster is because the casting animations are fantastic! As for Dark Knight, I guess I can see some cases for why it's not a good option, or when a unit would prefer something else. For the ladies, Gremmory is usually just better, but Dark Knight might be neat if they want more mobility and you don't have the DLC for Valkierie. For the fellas, it's arguably the best choice for offensive Magic. Warlock getting double magic uses is nice, but 4 Move is a hefty cost for it. Dark Knight has Dark and Black Tomefaire, so it sort of makes up for the lack of magic uses. However, most of the magical gentlemen have other options worth considering, if all you want them to do is murder. Hubert and Hanneman can be magical Snipers easily, thanks to their Bow Boons, so that's a nifty alternative. Lorenz gets Frozen Lance, so he can probably deal more damage by going into Paladin and spamming that. Lorenz can probably also make for a weird Nosferatu tank. It's a weak build in this game, but he's sturdier than the average mage and gets free Pavise/Aegis from Thyrsus, so he could probably pull it off for a round or two of combat, at least. Honestly, the only units I can see a benefit to training outside of your main posse would be units that can Warp, or at least heal. Faith is the most useful skill to invest in for a unit that isn't gaining experience, since it does give them something to do, however small, when they are deployed. And finally, regarding Wyvern Spam...Sad, but true. Flying is just way too good. Yet, it was the ponies that got hit the hardest in this game...

[@RubyChiang]

I nowadays opt for Magic Byleth after seeing and loving his Legendary alt in FEH, and the EO class is really good in that regards cause he can still use his swords via the Levin Sword. According to Zoran, Byleth has a good advantage in that you can always put him in other classes to get that Speed going, enabling him to double in a Magic class much easier while other Magic users fall short of it. I’ve always went back to Warlock at times just because of the limited uses of Magic but that 4 move was terrible and hence why EO is always a nice option to have for me personally.

[@cartooncritic7045]

Magic Sword Byleth is the one I advocate for the most just because it’s an extremely low-maintenance, minimal investment build that can do more than just hit things really hard and also doesn’t bloat the roster with dragons.

[@MinunRobotnik4]

I used every unit possible in most of my 3H runs, benching nobody. I would never recommend this as a strategy, but I found it fun just being able to do this. It always breaks my heart when I have to bench a character I like, just because they fell behind. This worked okay up until I played CF Maddening NG. In the last couple of chapters, I had to make the heart-breaking decision to bench Ignatz, because he really fell behind. I don't regret playing that way for my first runthrough of each house, but it objectively made everyone a lot weaker than they would be if I just chose a core group to train. When I go back to the game, I'll actually play like somebody who has played Fire Emblem before, but it'll still hurt to bench people.

[@edelgardvonhresvelg3222]

in my first ever play through I trained my Byleth in a bit of everything, I think faculty training isn't a waste of time as you may need them to raise weapon ranks u can use to recruit students or even make it easier to classify in other classes during new game plus, you can also train Byleth's weapon ranks by making them use that weapon during combat, I mean after a few playthroughs I deleted my safe file and began a new one, I went maddening, classic, online, (obviously no new game plus because it was a brand new fresh safe file) and I got my Byleth to rank S+ in swords, S+ in authority, D+ in reason/faith/ridding, C in bows (to deal with the 10 FALCO KNIGHT RENFORCEMENT+ 2 holy knights), and B in lances, as well as S in flying. so I wouldn't dismiss faculty training, and I still got my professor rank to A so... but also I've played the game for over 1200 hours so... yeah I would definitely not blame new players also sorry if I sounded mean or rude, that was not my intention Mercedes = Linhardt I personally have them both in my team, Mercie is (in my opinion) a bit better because she has access to memory, but Mercie is the better healer but Linhardt is a better utility unit, in my eyes I love both of these units and are both my favorite healers (aside from Marianne but lets be honest she is more of an offensive (sorry if I misspelled offensive I meant attack) unit) marry Christmas and stay safe!!!!

[@edelgardvonhresvelg3222]

also, petalions that grant far counter were made almost irrelevant thanks to that stone item u get if u beat cindered shadows

[@RubyChiang]

The thing with Foul Play is that it’s on a infantry unit. So if you want to swap with a flier, it’s a bit... not that practical I think cause infantry units can’t stand on walls or water.

[@uchihajunior5648]

I still think foul play is very usefull, it may not go as far as warp, but it have unlimited uses, and don't use a weapon art slot, but the best part of foul play is being linked to trickster, trickster is a awsome class that is better then mortal servant in a lot of characters, it might not have any fare but with stealth it can move along your tank without fear of baing targeted and with high speed units it can double even on maddening very consistently, and you may get a lucky 7 on str or mag wich work as well as a fare skill or you may get dex with higher crit and hit or on sp wich allow you to double an enemy you couldn't before (i know lucky 7 is not super reliable but it is pretty fun to play around it when the stat make a difference) wich is why i use it as the endgame class for byleth (especialy for female byleth with darting blow, on male byleth i went with war monk to war master on my first playtrough after the dlc) and yuri, i also use it on marianne but for totaly different reasons: 1: byleth: couse of byleth's white magic avoid + duelist blow combo wich makes byleth able to pick betwen chipping away an enemie hp without risk of being counterattacked or a double with a wo dao+ and oneshot a enemy, altough i admit i've used the dlc stat booster to make byleth walk further, also the abylity to use recover on a tank without risk of baing targeted is a huge plus. 2: yuri: fethrs of doromi... do i have to say anything else? Just kidding, i'll say a little bit more, this is the one that makes the best out of foul play, since feathers of doromi give him canto and mv + 1, he can either move and use foul play as usual but he can also foul play and then move, wich makes it work like a mini rescue. Marianne: i build her on faith trough the monk > priest > bishop rout to make her res super high an then trickster to make her soulblade oneshot without her being targeted on the frontline with the stealth plus tank strat i've talked about, i use march ring on her, that's why all my tricksters have more then 5 mv. Also, for the takes coming up, i do think wo dao+ is one of the best weapons in the game, super low weight, super high crit, high hit, it's the base of all of my 100 crit builds, i know sords in general are worse then other weapon classes but... not wo dao.

[@macmac8222]

Merci and Lin are simply for different playstyles and different maps. Sometimes a warp wins you a chapter sometimes a couple fortifies give you tons of turn efficiency. Also plz don't use Flyan's fortify as a comparison with Merci's bc Merci has way more magic giving it more healing and more range.

[@CyclonSilver]

Fortify used to be very underrated, considering the exp it gives per turn(which feeds back into better magic and better range quicker) and the fact that a stride'd Mercedes on turn 1(alongside everyone else) can keep even a scattered team within her reach for entire chapters. With that being said, the Wrath and Vengeance meta made that genuine utility into a detriment, and from that point of view... yeah she ain't too good anymore.

[@lanceareadbhar]

I loved using impregnable wall when playing on Maddening.

[@bladedusk5337]

Liked for bgm choice

[@jonboulet1614]

BS live to serve is absolutely a useful skill. Anything that saves you a heal is worth it

[@stanozoidmega7762]

Mercedes gets one rounded 99% so it won’t be saving you a heal

[@jonboulet1614]

@@stanozoidmega7762 yeah not at level one but at level 5 and above absolutely

[@OrigamiAhsoka]

I just like enlightened one because of the plus stats in each stat. Plus yeah the 6 move is nice lol

[@afgcinc7206]

I've gotten Mercedes to Physic for Chapter 2 on maddening NG, it's a pain and you have to prioritize but I did it. I disagree on playstyle; Mercedes is for playing aggressively, not Linhardt. He can't keep up with low move to attack, and when left behind he isn't warping or attacking at all unless rescued or attacking a reinforcement chasing down from behind. Mercedes at least has 1 more move in Gremory and Magic Bow+ can OHKO a lot of enemies later game. And her Res is good enough to tank some scarier mages and siege magic, and then heal herself with her personal when healing another unit. I think Linhardt out of house isn't really all that worth it if you have/recruit Lysithea. If Beagles or if you aren't using Lysithea or say, Hapi, then Linhardt gives you all you could ask, especially with Edelgard and Jeritza on that route.

[@Arbal3st]

Enlightened One Byleth is quite good tho thanks to Heal/Nos + White Magic Avoid. They become great bait.

[@ThatNameDouh]

That was my plan for Silver Snow, never used a Magic Byleth and thought it would be quite fun to do so using her budding talent.

[@Mekkkah]

if you want bait that doesn't kill anything just use impregnable wall tho.

[@RubyChiang]

It’s not that I don’t use Impregnable Wall or Retribution, it’s that I still don’t know how to really utilize it. 😅

[@xAbsolution1]

I honestly didn’t think ch. 14 of Crimson flower (Claude’s lvl) was possible without changing my Ferdinand to a fortress knight to equip Impregnable wall. Every single Wyvern would double my squad for 38 damage. It’s like Nader knows Wyvern spam is meta. (Also Sniper Bernie helped out)

[@tkpaura8926]

Impregnable wall has literally saved my ironman runs

[@RubyChiang]

I do find myself using Foul Play in the main game, mainly to reposition units to give other units support and paired with the Fetters, can also help other units catch up or something. Otherwise, I don’t see a lot of Foul Play uses on my Maddening playthroughs.

[@izanagiforsmite4365]

I like using Dark Knight Linhardt. I still get to use his white magic while getting the boon of black tomefaire.

[@uchihajunior5648]

The training more units then max deployment thing, i think it's worthit if you do it right, sometimes you nead more of one type of unit to make it trough and other nead more of another type of unit, ex: on constance and yuri's paralogue, you nead to get to count geth asap, so you nead tricksters and flyers to move it easier, especialy becouse you probablo don't have a unit with warp at this point, while on the crimsom flower chapter on the grat bridge you start on the range of a lot of enemies, making a lot of armored users to survive the first turn, or the chapter on garreg march where there are just... so... many... falcon knights, you nead about 3 archers or bow knights, i'm not saying to build every single character, but it's good to build a few niches beyond max deployment.

[@Char-93]

About the only faculty training with byleth that seems worthwhile is a few flying lessons on femleth for peg knight. Male byleth is just straight up folding people with his fists, no mentor necessary.

[@GreyWandererXD]

I would recommend some Faith lessons so you can get War Cleric. You can get +20 Brawling Avoid and just go back to Grappler/War Master.

[@wouterW24]

With deployment and training being limited in a pronounced manner in 3H, I will admit have played normal more then I actually should have with my skill level. When playing for my enjoyment Awakening/some of fates/echoes has spoiled me, and that mode offers the freedom to do it all. It's definitely a pitfall though, and more of a fuzzy feelings thing then actual rationale. Even if you through normal/month loop glitch/heavy NG+ perks train more units, in 3H specially training and supporting a unit is a lot more involved and time consuming, and with the 8 basic house units you're already debating benching units after a single recuitment. Some old games had later maps that suddenly spam deployment slots, but 3H is stingy. In 3H even with with the large *if* of enough viable units it's instead disapointment you don't have enough space to deploy cool units on hand. Feels quite different from the GBA era with units having less going on so swapping units in and out or getting bases units or particulary good growth units later to replace on your squad was commonplace. But it's not like the 3ds do whatever you want between story missions sandbox anymore either.

[@Ondas563]

I only used Mercedes once, but she was actually my best offensive magical unit in blue lions maddening (I recruited lysithea and Marianne as other magic users so she had some competition)

[@waitingforwonderland6036]

marianne also makes an excellent dark knight

[@megadesuld8904]

Retribution can counter bolting spam so i really like it

[@SirePuns]

As for the EO Byleth, IMO it's better than SM Byleth but it loses to Wyvern byleth. It's just that the question is, ultimately, would you rather invest your AP in Byleth initially or invest your AP into more meal times for your units and more activities that increase professor EXP. IMO, getting your Byleth to the bare minimum needed for a pegasus knight and then working your way up from there via combat sounds good enough until you can afford to invest some more AP into axe

[@PokeballEX]

I'd say Paladin is Lorenz's best class over Dark Knight. You can squeeze out a bit of extra damage with Frozen Lance for less investment and still have the same effective range if you're not using Thyrsus due to Paladin having one move over Dark Knight. Maybe by endgame when Frozen Lance stops oneshotting things, having spell access is better so that Lorenz can safely chip and use Ward, but you could also take the resources you put into getting Lorenz to Dark Knight and use them on a better endgame unit instead. Dark Knight is still probably Hubert's best class even if he can have problems reaching it before Crimson Flower is over and it's definitely one of Annette's better choices, but I still don't think the class itself is all that great. My actual bruh take is that I now think Holy Knight is overall a more useful class than Dark Knight.

[@crystalqueen9711]

Personally, I have to disagree with your take on Foul Play in main game, I find that mastering the Trickster class isn't much worse than mastering any other intermediate+ class, and it can help horse units deal with terrain, mainly stairs, although I can't see any good reason to use more than one

[@GreyWandererXD]

I would say it can also help units get past barricades. Let's say for instance, Bernadetta is a mastered Trickster with Pass. On some of the later maps, there is a lot of mages that have siege tomes are hiding behind some extremely tanky walls. But with this instance, yes you could use warp but that would be a waste of the spell usage. You could just use Bernadette to use foul play to put in a more offensive unit past the barricade. Essentially the Foul Play maneuvers give +5 movement to any unit AND can be used unlimited amount compared to the two usages of Warp, Stride, etc. It is great to have the combat art to get around some instances. It can be amazing and not hard for units to master the class. It sometimes can be ideal for movement around tougher situations.

[@darlhiatt8136]

Yeah, comparing Foul Play to Warp is just the wrong thing to judge it against. When compared to Reposition, or Shove, then aside from being less accessible it's so much better. Foul Play can function as pretty much any other movement combat art but better. That flexibility made it a lot of fun to use for me casually (though still on Hard). And yeah, the fact I can spam it whenever I want means I can't fall into a hoarding pitfall. Maybe it's not useful speedrunning when Warp exists, but I think it still deserves some credit.

[@onioncultistlordoftheonion8315]

My first playthrough I went pure role play and went holy knight Byleth to make him a healer on a horse.

[@Slenderquil]

Mercie was good when i used her, Lindhart was not. In conclusion, i think she's better than him. Nothing is more powerful to me than personal experience

[@selfsustainedautocannibalVampi]

I said this in the last video but Darkknight/Warlock Merci > Dk warlock Lin Greamory Merci < Bishop Lin

[@Andreaosj]

I abuse all 5 impregnable wall charges especially during aux battles to farm class mastery or weapon ranks on units that need to get them asap

[@cartooncritic7045]

I learned that tactic from Zoran’s videos and now that’s my favorite off-meta application for IW.

[@Andreaosj]

@@cartooncritic7045 yeah I was already doing a bit of it before I saw Zoran but after watching his videos I leaned in for the maximum abuse of impregnable stall (in Zoran's words not mine).

[@Patrickveech25]

Love this content mekkah!!

[@Someone-kg8cc]

Foul Play Yuri with Fetters of Dromi is just like weird rescue lol. I find it quite useful in the main game

[@ItsYuhBoyyyy]

That's a good way to put it😂

[@takarahayashi4124]

yeah if you are NOT doing NG+, you won't have enough battalions for more than probably 3 characters to be Wyvern.

[@joho4430]

Has rengor coerced you into playing library of ruina

[@murderedx8018]

Title is just right

[@Legault397]

I ended up using Mercedes at the end of CF because of everything being on fire and my units being slowed down and needing to sort of pick my way around nasty enemies but other than that I never really used it.

[@TheEeveeKing]

Linheardt is better Mercedes for sure, but she has a build that's nearly Impossible to kill: Mercedes in Blue Lions, Give her all HP, LUK, DEF Boosts you can, Master Commoner, Mage, and Preist, give her those skills, Make her a Valkyrie, Grant her the Raphael Gem, and give her Annette as a Armor Knight. Congrats, you've basically granted her immortality because of all the hoops the enemy has to jump through just for the chance to kill her.

[@davie7670]

foul play is good in challenge runs where you can only use bane skills.

[@slanax97]

Retribution is actively worse on bows than on regular melee weapons, isn't it? Since they still get long range penalties where every other weapon gets to counter siege tomes no problem, don't they? Just cuz Mekkah mentioned 'it doesn't matter if it's a Javelin, bow or regular melee weapon'

[@Mekkkah]

yeah if you're using retribution against mages with siege tomes, like hubert, you'll want to use something else like a sword.

[@sewnmind1786]

I still advocate for Yuri as Dancer.

[@blankblank6214]

Foul play works best with the canto dlc item

[@lanceareadbhar]

Casual mode with battle saves or one use save points on the map are better mechanics than Divine Pulse.

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

Divine Pulse lets you go back multiple turns. Also you can only Bookmark on Classic mode.

[@JusticeJudge]

I like EXP so I like Fortify.

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

Ok but like every utility magic gives more exp then fortify. And are also not being outdone in a game with a massive amount of prevention that renders healing basically obsolete.

[@JusticeJudge]

@@ultimaterecoil1136 What like Silence, Ward, Warp & Rescue? Those need targets, Fortify doesn't so when I don't have targets I can use it for some nice EXP suppose the healing is pretty cool to I guess. Mercedes & Flayn can easily be your highest level character if you spam Fortify when you got nothing else to do with them for the turn. Fortify should really just be called EXP magic.

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

@@JusticeJudge let’s be real a faith unit is practically always gonna be by someone so they can always use ward. There’s usually at least 1 magic unit in most maps. And fortify usually won’t be usable because there is a requirement that anyone is injured and with how much prevention is in this game that’s VERY rare even in maddening. Like at best you are either using fortify after turns you use impregnable wall which limits it mainly to maps with ambush Reinforcements or on maps with damaging terrain and then you’d be better off with heal. This is a game where you straight up don’t really take damage past early game. And fortify ain’t an early game spell for Mercedes. And late game you are either preventing enemies from hitting you ( dodge tanks gambits both offensive and defensive) or getting one rounded in a lot of cases. Like occasionally enemy phase units will be hit by units using gambits but that’s like an once every other map kinda thing. With like 15% hit chance that ain’t happening often. And player phase units are dying if they get hit in the first place so it’s just after they’ve been saved by a defensive gambit that you can heal them or they are standing in lava. And heal gives more exp if you are just gonna stand in lava and heal a unit to get exp by healing them repeatly and if you are gonna abuse lava to gain healing exp then you might as well have your attackers get a bunch of exp via attacking a bishop with regenerator with broken weapons. healing in general isnt really valuable in a game where you are usually averaging less single digit damage taken a map if you are playing in a way that’s consistent on the highest difficulty. The most relevance healing has is like the first couple of maps.

[@JusticeJudge]

@@ultimaterecoil1136 Aye let's be real who actually plays regular maddening over new game plus? Majority of people play the new games plus on maddening and the majority would agree it's much more fun to do it that way which means Fortify is an early game spell you get with Mercedes. I tend to just have my faith units lagging behind using Physic so they aren't always next to someone to use Ward. Anyhow I just said I like EXP which is why I like Fortify gives me something to spam for EXP when I can do nothing else with the unit. I'm also the guy who finds a dancing dodge tank Ferdinand very fun to use. Do I play optimally hell no do I play for casual fun I sure do.

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

@@JusticeJudge yeah but if you are playing new game plus Mercedes reason spell list isnt particularly good for a unit using faith magic to gain exp to then turn that into offensive potential. Plus new game plus just brings about healing falling off sooner because when you get access to good gambits those are just better and in a normal play through healing has some use in the early game because the good gambits aren’t available and well those are already in your inventory before any combat on new game plus. And you can also just buy authority and already obsolete after like the first map. New game plus maddening is a worst case scenario for Mercedes usage. Things do too much damage to make healing reliable as enemies can often 1 round opponents gambits show up earlier getting rid of the main time frame that healing is useful in maddening and Mercedes doesn’t really get good offensive stuff she cares about unlocking or get much value from things she has a bane in ( an example of this would be Manuela getting bolting which is a great unit for in new game plus and if we were doing a blue lions maddening new game plus a solid candidate for replacing Mercedes. Also let’s be real there’s normally more then one person hiding out of range of the enemies like are we talking two turns away because no one is being left at risk of being hit except dodge tanks and battlion wrath vantage dimitri which won’t get hit by anything except a gambit. At that range you’d also have potential rescue units if you use them siege magic users as well as anyone who doesn’t appreciate long range damage hitting them unless you are using your own long range to take out those enemies. Plus even if you were using fortify on a lower difficulty where you can more realistically be hit and heal it off Mercedes ain’t gonna be far away to hide. She’s gonna be in the center of your squad to get max value off fortify. And that would also put ward in range of being used. Plus being close by to your gambit users is safer then being far away and potentially have nothing to do about some ambush spawn you either didn’t know or forgot about gank your backline supporters that can’t fend for themselves but do provide a lot of value if you can keep them safe. So it’d be more likely that your backline is glued to whoever has impregnable wall or is at least in their range if they are a particularly high move one ( the flying impregnable wall gambit on a dodge tank for example works wonders for safety if your dodge tank doesn’t need the avoid from Claude’s personal gambit and would be kept sorta in the center of your party to provide protection whenever needed in an instant) also new game plus means no route specific gambits. Everyone can have the flying impregnable wall gambit when it’s normally just for golden dear. Heck have everyone fly and give everyone either that or Claude’s gambit and at that point you are so safe you can stall people out with venin weapons by poisoning enemies while just constantly impregnable.

[@rockowlgamer631]

If I had to choose between Mercedes and Linhardt, I'd rather have Mercedes

[@Aquariumswithty]

Linhardt is better whoever thinks otherwise hasn’t played maddening linhardt is mvp even if he doesn’t get it at the end

[@toadlover1234]

False about recovery, the best weapon in three houses is a book it has 30 might and 100 hit it barely misses, you can use it to destroy the enemy

[@yinfengfu266]

I don’t play fire emblem in English. There is a healing skill that sounds really like ‘physics’, can any one help me to figure out what it is? Is it the skill that heal the entire team Mercedes get?

[@Antichthoon]

The Physic skill is the long-range healing for a single unit. The skill that heals several units in Mercedes' range is Fortify.

[@scp7375]

enlightened one byleth: what if you dont level up at all until you unlock enlightened one? not that i think this is a good idea, its just something stupid im trying XD

[@bencomer2339]

Linhardt’s only worse than Byleth and Hapi, don’t @ me (yes I realize I’m nuts)

[@RosariaBestGirl]

Not exactly, I have to defend Mercedes a bit here, maybe it is because I started in Shadow Dragon where warp is more of an item than a healer skill but I think there is a good argument for her personal skill and crest. First of, in Maddening I always recruit Lysithea for warp/boss killing and so I just use Mercedes for pure healing, and while that is not really an argument for her being better since a unit that can do both should be objectively better, compartementalization of roles when every unit has only one action is actually better, especially early game where you don't have dance yet...and speaking of early game... You are completely throwing live to serve under the bus here, even if it is not gamebreaking, which I am definitely not saying it is, in the early game where everything doubles you and has a ton of range, not just archers and mages but those nasty theives with pass, you are going to realistically takr a hit with your healer since you can't block pass and if you want them to survive you NEED full HP, so having your healer at full HP without having to waste a turn is practically a necessity. I cannot even begin to think how annoying and honestly soul draining it must be to not run live to serve on your dedicated healer early game since you cannot realistically keep them out of enemy range ALL of the time or HAVE an extra action to spare EVERY turn. As for getting physic early It is undeniably nice and that is what probably mitigates Lindharts exposure so soon however it is a small diference since it is only one step faster and actually benefits Mercedes longer because of her crest that mitigates WM Uses, that same strat actually works longer on Mercie as a pure healer so it doesn't really make that big of a difference if Lindhart gets physic slightly earlier. Which brings me to my final point, does this make her better than lindhart? Well that depends on what you expect of a healer and how you play, if you want your dedicated healer to also warp and attack much more often then Lindhart is better. Especially after you get Dance, but since the beginning is the hardest part of Maddening, I am not too comfortable sharing my healer's actions with many other tasks all that often, although I will admit that as you get more healers her crest gets rendered particualrily redundant ... but so does everything else in Maddening...

[@TheOmegaDragon]

Mercedes is WAY better than Lindhardt IMO. She's the best healer in the game and has excellent resilience. Lindhardt is the one getting one rounded by everything. Fortify saves time on healing when you need other units to put in work here and now. Lindhardt can barely warp anyone but a few spaces.

[@msterforks]

EO Byleth: SM is usually a pitfall because Assassin exists. 2 str is not worth 1 speed, 1 move, and free movement through forests/fire. That being said, I think EO Byleth is also a pitfall because Assassin is easy to achieve, and the magic doesn't do much for Byleth. Dark Knight: Just about every magic unit in the game can find use in this class with DLC. Valkyrie is so easy to obtain that even units like Dorothea and her Riding weakness can make it. From there, units passively gain Riding exp and will eventually make it to Dark Knight. Traditional healers like Marianne/Mercedes can now give up 10 heal from Bishop to be a 7 move + canto unit that can chip, keep up with the team, and use a variety of support/offensive gambits when needed instead of being just a physic bot in the back. Wyvern Spam: Even bigger emphasis on grounded battalions. Flying battalions have poor gambits compared to the better grounded ones. Also, grounded battalions have way better stats. eg. On Maddening, Paladin Sylvain + Edmund Troops + LoR can ORKO any non boss/monster enemy ignoring enemy terrain through the end of the game. WL cannot replicate this due to accuracy issues.

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

I disagree with the strength part, especially when it comes with Sword Crit+10

[@GreyWandererXD]

I disagree with your stance on Foul Play. Misconceptions that were said: -You cannot master it through the monastery. -You cannot use Foul Play through walls. -Will not get you through tough terrain. -Comparing it towards Warp. -It puts one unit in a better position and one in a bad. -Hard to master like Enlightened One (that is a unique class with different Mastery thresholds. Beyond that, you get Duelist Blow AND Foul Play compared to Sacred Power) Foul Play is indeed a combat art of Trickster. Yes, it is tedious to enter Trickster but it is only a required certification of Thief (you should just already be able to do it if planning for Trickster. Not too out of your way). Let us understand the rules of Foul Play. You can swap places with an allied unit up to 5 tiles in any direction. This includes...through walls, tough terrain, and especially stairs for mounted units. Particularly useful for these Paralogues: Felix (Because Green Units), Marianne (thick woods), and Caspar + Mercedes. There are probably more, but those are from the top of my head. Unlike Warp, Foul Play is unlimited AND can be accessible to anybody who can become a Trickster. There are only a handful of units that can even use Warp and most instances only a limited amount of uses per map. Foul Play helps circumvent minor problems that lead to a severe tactical disadvantage. Being the difference between taking down a Siege tome that can kill another unit. Warp is superior, but has an entirely different utility than Foul Play. Foul Play is used best when swapping two units through walls, tough terrain (differentiating elevations, forests for Mounted Units, etc.) While Warp should be used to go past large distances to kill a boss. Let's also understand Trickster is a Thief class and receives movement penalties based off that. Every instances except Sand and Water, the Trickster class receives 1 for 1 ratio in movement penalty. This helps Mounted Units to get out of the forest and such. Do people want to waste Warp for just that? No, that would be unreasonable. Special Circumstances for Foul Play: -Bernadetta can get past some super tanky units and allow stronger units to directly attack backline Mages. -Yuri gets Canto from his Relic and is great overall for Foul Play tactics. -Utilizing Foul Play to get the Warp user to the unit they want to Warp.

[@SilentVinyl]

Interesting

[@LDRL1995]

I personally prefer swordmaster or assassin over enlightened one due to those classes having 20% speed growth over it. With magic being near useless if you have a physical focused byleth pre enlightened I value the speed growth

[@randalthevandal4170]

Cars are always better

[@inpax6801]

ngl Mekkah, access to Gremory and Lamine Crest justifies Mercedes > Linhardt being at least in orange for me

[@envan7865]

I really do think Mercedes is better In terms of stats, they're on par mostly, with a few exceptions like Linhardt being 5% stronger with 5% less magic, he has superior Luck, she has superior Dexterity, but given the classes they'll likely be in, Gremory and Bishop, Mercedes will have significantly higher charm, which can mean a lot for gambit use and avoidance, something that's highly present on Maddening. I don't get the physic argument, since the two of them learn Physic at the same weapon rank, and in scenarios where multiple units have to engage in battle and risk high damage, like HBD or Azure Moon's final chapter, Fortify can really allow for a more aggressive push, since her slightly magic and better magic stat modifier as a Gremory will give her immense range. Speaking for range, the slight difference of her having 5 move and him 4 can seriously affect offensive and healing efforts, since Linhardt can often be left behind by the main army. Offensively, there's pretty much the same, The only difference being he's a liiiiiitle faster something that's pretty irrelevant on Maddening, both of them get 1 rounded and get doubled by everything everything but armoured units anyways, the only thing I can think off is Linhardts Excalibur really helping again Falcon Knights, with Mercedes being a bit stronger and being quite a bit more accurate, on Maddening anyways, they're about the same offensive, with an edge to Mercedes. The really only thing he has over her is Warp, which is at the cost of a bit less magic, accuracy, mobility, fewer potential classes and thus less versatility, a worse crest (which isn't super relevant, but an extra 5 might on heals is just worse than a potential extra fortify) and having a DLC competitor in Hapi, who has the same magic, Access to both Physic and Warp just like him, significantly better offensive ability and an even better version of Mercedes crest (a 20% chance for an extra warp is invaluable) I certainly still think Linhardt is a great unit, but Mercedes beats him at almost everything but the Warp and Hapi existing gives him a direct competitor

[@davidattias1603]

All For This Way

[@jackdwiggins4233]

Linhardt and Mercedes both learn physics at C. I think they are both great, and it situational, not one over the other in all cases

[@Mekkkah]

Mercedes's base faith rank is lower though so she still gets physic later.

[@Ephraim225]

You'd agree with these takes if you actually played the game, you know.

[@benlecoyte322]

The reason why I use Mercedes over Linhardt is just the simple fact that I actually like Mercedes. I just don't like Linhardt as a character