Revisiting THE WORST Fire Emblem Units Ft. Mythril Zenith

[@MythrilZenith]

Can confirm the revisit was needed - I am actually a worse unit than FE12 Bantu.

[@lightbrand_]

@@JoanFarjasPastorwtf was bro trying to say

[@minervatenebrae]

The correct way to use lapis is to reclass her into sword armour/general because she has +3 to speed cap and a high speed growth, and that is very funny.

[@jouheikisaragi6075]

So turn her into Meg 2: The Dawn of the Doubling Meg

[@user-xb1lr8ds4q]

wyvern, halberdier or paladin lapis is pretty sick tbh

[@MugenCannon97]

Virion was always good, you just fell for his ruse, thinking him a mere archest of archers....when in fact he was a noble duke of the battlefield all along! Just as he cleverly hid his identity in the story, he has hidden his true strength from all of you as well, a masterful strategist.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

I just like that he looks like Mid-Boss/Krichevskoy from Disgaea

[@AlexT7916]

​@@aprinnyonbreak1290I thought he looked like a medieval version of Edgeworth from Ace Attorney

[@anerdwithamic]

@@AlexT7916 I don't think I'm gonna unsee that now XD

[@eaturgrns]

Idk why you’re hating on Lapis so much??? She’s really good if you invest time into importing her into FE6.

[@DaniDoyle]

Fake fan didn't read the description, it says "Lapis is actually S+ tier, the video lies"

[@RLACDC2000]

21:23 hearing the phrase "capturable maids" while having this on in the background was like a sucker punch to the gut

[@MystFox1314]

For the record, Elincia starts with A Staves in FE9 It's Swords that are at D

[@DaniDoyle]

Yes, which is why she can technically use rescue. Still doesn't save her, because of her low magic base 😔

[@szarkuwu]

​@@DaniDoyleyou could say it doesnt come to her Rescue

[@kylebennett789]

She could use Sleep and Silence. But Mist could do that too. Mist usually has Recover, Physic and or Ashera Staff, Rescue, and possibly something else like Fortify. A lot of people bring Elincia into Endgame just because she's a second healer when it's sometimes needed. And she could be a good Ashera Staff user if your Mist bites the dust in an Iron Man. So I think Elincia ain't the best unit in the world but she's ok at what she does and is a decent filler unit for Clash and Endgame

[@GameAW1]

@@kylebennett789 Hard agree. Just by being a staff user, and a high-ranked staff user alone makes her very useful if you choose to deploy her. Being a flier only makes it a bonus for her since they're the easiest units to get around. She's not gonna be the pinnacle of units in the game, but she's far beyond simply being a meme.

[@CidemNK]

I have no idea what the hell they were thinking with Bunet's personal skill. They had to have known that giving him a luck-based gimmick would doom him to being garbage.

[@DaniDoyle]

It's not even just that it's luck based is there other characters with luck based personal skills that are fine (Luna etc) it's at the skill is so situational and even in those situations it's not guaranteed and even when it happens it's low impact

[@NarrowSpark96]

Luna isn't a gimmick skill though. It's an offensive skill. And it technically isn't personal either.

[@samkeiser9776]

⁠​⁠@@NarrowSpark96it technically isn’t personal but it is only accessible by one unit so it literally is by irl definition personal counting alcryst as a person. Its just not a personal skill in in-game terms.

[@CidemNK]

@@DaniDoyle You're right, I should've specified that he has a luck based gimmick which is both unreliable and incredibly difficult to utilize. Anna has a luck based gimmick but hers is great because it's almost always viable to trigger when she is being used well.

[@DaniDoyle]

I would disagree with that assessment of Anna's skill actually...her luck stat is quite low, and the impact of her proc is less than you might expect.

[@kingdyste5289]

I decided to look up the whole deal with Elincia in the penultimate PoR chapter, and apparently the ingame reason is that the trek to this tower is basically Ike taking a small strike force on a detour while Elincia heads up the main army in preparation for the final battle. Of course, this doesn't explain why people you'd think would also be required to remain with the main force (Like Tanith), or should stay by Elincia's side (like her retainers), are allowed to come along, heck, even Tibarn joins you for this and he's one of the main leaders of the overall army at this point. So, yeah... stupid reason to not allow Elincia regardless.

[@shadow-vaderserpenryu3851]

To be exact, the detour is to rescue Leanne due to the information given by Ena. They won't really care about the tower if Leanne wasn't involved. Elincia is asked to stay behind to prepare the army for the Crimean Castle siege. Tanith is just there to command the Royal Guard not the whole Begnion Army, considering you can reinforce, she definitely brought the Royal guards. Tibarn's troops doesn't exactly have to prepare, Just talons and their keen eyesight. Tibarn mentioned they can't see in the dark, either he brought his army as well or just there to justify having to fight in the afternoon. Elincia's retainers should not been deployable, I'm willing to accept that she commanded them to not come back without Leanne. Let's be real, even with that, Geoffrey isn't exactly dirty work guy like Bastion or Lucia. By the least, they should not let us deploy Geoffrey, he is the face of the Crimean Army.

[@shanemiller1182]

I just played that chapter of PoR for the first time yesterday and I thought I was going crazy because Elincia was randomly gone from my army and I couldn’t find anything online about it (I only looked for like 5 minutes tho)

[@DjingX]

I think Inigo deserves a mention over Brady since getting him Galeforce requires you to give up your only dancer. His paralogue is also way harder so your units are likely further ahead of him statswise.

[@Bongyes]

You are wrong about one thing definitely. I would watch tierlist of all units made by you two, sounds like good fun! (even if it would get a little repetitive i suppose)

[@largerthanaveragedragon4145]

Saying that you fixed the Robert portrait but replacing him with Kane instead is so fucking funny.

[@DaniDoyle]

I'm glad someone appreciates it 🤣

[@teleshar]

I played Awakening Lunatic once. I needed a guide to beat Chapter 1, and I got completely stuck at Chapter 2. Needless to say, I won't be touching it again.

[@elivcdxv1852]

old comment but hitting lunatic+ turns it into reload central, love that game tho kellam squad represent

[@slashspade]

Im really glad that Wolt and Virion got moved up. I think that archers get slept on because they dont have 1-2 range and that means that they are bench fodder almost immediately. Call it lizard brain or whatever, but I bring an archer with me at almost all times because they have 2 niches that they fill - Accuracy and walling. Now, I don't have the most experience with all the games, so maybe take this with a grain of salt, but having a good archer lead the charge is a good thing. They can't attack everything that gets in their face, so they can choke up a point really well. If they get blessed with good defense and speed, even better for them to tank attacks. And when they do get to attack, they get to hit with very high accuracy, even against the unholy thrones and gates of the GBA games. Packing a 70ish hitrate against Hard mode Kel/Gel in Sacae is a LOT better than 40-50 and facing critical retaliation

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

I think what kills archers is actually Sniper. If Archers promoted into Warriors, they'd be... "fine". Or even if Sniper was just a Bow/Sword unit. The problem isn't that bows are necessarily bad, it's just that they're extremely limiting in a system where things usually aren't. Look at 3 houses; when anyone can equip a bow, EVERYONE who uses physical weapons at all probably has one. Archers actually kinda share the flaw of Armor Knights, in a drastic loss of versatility that never really gets better. And just like how Armors are absolutely fine, and not unbalanced if they had standard infantry movement, Archers would be perfectly fine and... probably not unbalanced if they at least promoted into something with the option of melee combat.

[@moccaroon]

I was really glad to finally see some Virion appreciation too! While he wasn't my team carry(Robin is just too powerful for anyone to compare lol), he was definitely one of my stronger units. Took him to the final boss and everything! I'm honestly a little surprised that people don't like archers very much, they're my favourite class to use in all the games I've played. Maybe it's my play style? I like to go for massive crit units, like swordsmasters and snipers tend to be, over anything else. They're just so satisfying to use, and bows are a godsend against flying units. Takumi especially is always an absolutely INSANE unit for me, he outcarries even Ryoma on all my Fates teams. Alcryst hard carried Engage for me too, alongside Kagetsu. Ashe also consistently becomes one of my best units in 3H, and I usually make him use bows! I just like them bows a whoooole lot :)

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

Wow, small world, I sometimes look at Dani's FE tier lists, just yesterday I was looking at old resources for the game Mordor The Depths of Dejenol and found MythrilZenith's vids, and this collab tier list pops up on my feed today!

[@szarkuwu]

Manuela getting Warp means she can still get a use and a deployment slot on some maps just for existing which is more than Mercy has for herself. Blue Lions final map comes to mind where having that one extra warp user is geniuenly useful

[@DaniDoyle]

Warp is great, but you have 3 other options who all not only get warp sooner (and with less investment) but have greater warp range. Before DLC, manuella had the niche of being a free recruit who can warp, but now even that isnt exclusive to her. Her range is short enough that often times it does not make a functional difference to a clear, especially since shes the fourth option for it. If she had warp at base that might give her a legitimate niche in being a low effort warper, but she's not even that.

[@szarkuwu]

@DaniDoyle the thing is I dont think Mercedes has even an early game niche anymore with DLC either. In DLC you get Yuri who can and should join you as soon as Chapter 2. He has D faith at base just like Mercy and a Boon just like Mercy, he also gets E+ Reason and a boon just like Mercy but has over her Authority and Sword ranks. Now Yuri has wind spells to Mercedes fire spells which are much better early game because they are more accurate and weight less allowing him to double some enemies, he has combat arts at base and a decent personal skill. Most importantly he comes at level 3 where Mercedes, unless used in Chapter 1 mock battle will be at level 1. The only thing Mercedes offers over him is her access to Physic at C but at chapter 3 you can get Hapi who will join you as a Monk and automatically get D faith; same for Constance. Physic at this point has pretty low range and with so many units having access to Heal you wont be hurting for Physic that much. In the end both Manuela and Mercedes are horribly outclassed due to DLC but I think Manuela having more preDLC niche is more valueable because not everyone paid for it and I think even small warp is better than a unit that loses her niche on chapter 2 inhouse.

[@DaniDoyle]

Does non dlc Manuela offer more than non dlc Mercy? 3rd warper is also usually pretty unnecessary (less so than 4th to be fair), especially with her low range.

[@szarkuwu]

@@DaniDoyle personally I would say so there are a few maps where she is relevant in my experience even with small range especially when 1 turning them where every movement counts but I will try not to rely on that too much. Shambhala has your units scattered in 4 different corners, Enbarr has you split in two groups happens on 3 out of 4 routes and putting Manuela on the map nets you Dance of the Goddess battalion so you are already incentivised to use her (or Dorothea). On top of my head I also like it on last map of White Clouds so you can more easily kill all the thieves with stones and endgames for Azure Moon, Verdant Wind and Crimson Flower

[@azurefrontline5426]

Hey so this is how I found out that Maneula gets warp-

[@judethomas6400]

Surprised to not see Ewan here, specifically Eirika route Ewan. He joins with bases that are godawful to the point where you might actually need to use the Valni Tower to get him up to speed. Also, the enemies in his join map have an easy time getting around terrain, so there's nowhere for him to hide unless you box him with your units or purposely delay recruiting him. You can't really bring up the staff usage argument since when he promotes, he gets E staffs when Moulder, Artur, and Natasha have at least C. Also Saleh either joins at the start of his joining map or three maps later in Ephraim's route and he outclasses Ewan tenfold. There's not even a convincing argument for Summoner Ewan since Knoll joins in a few maps and can promote by walking to the house north of him.

[@DaniDoyle]

i actually talk about ewan in my trainee video, if you're curious on my thoughts on him: kzbin.info/www/bejne/oqXEnWqKn5qertU

[@jerbear8884]

One point going in Setsuna's favor is how she has the best speed growths to pass down to the child units in Fates.

[@OkMakuTree]

Agreed on the Flora re-tiering. She's definitely one of the weaker units in your army but she's got just enough stats and just high enough of a rank to Staff Bot decently if you don't have any other options. She's the only recruitable unit in Conquest who joins with B staffs so she guarantees you can use Entrap if you need it for a particular strategy like yanking Hans in c26 or doing a Takumi Skip in Endgame. Flora's staff true hit rates after tonics and/or a rally are in the 70's - 80's, so even at base she's fairly reliable. Since you can recruit her as early as Chapter 19 there's also a lot of time to improve Flora's stats if you're deadset on using her over a capturable unit or training up an earlier staffer. Is Flora outclassed? Absolutely. But she's not unusably bad.

[@sohn7767]

On Brady, he is an extra staff unit with an actual magic growth, hence he will be useful immediately with rescue. This will also train him quickly without combat, compared to other child units he is useful from the get go and earns his own exp regardless if his parents are a combat pair or not. These characteristics also only get more extrapolated the higher you go in difficulty

[@DaniDoyle]

Rescue is E rank. If you do not have enough rescue users by the time you get access to Brady I'm not sure what to tell you. It's also just legitimately not true that he gains experience faster, the staff experience formula is so bad in awakening, and staff units level much much slower than combat units as a result. In fairness this is true of most fire emblem games but it is especially true of Awakening.

[@Hiiyapow]

@@DaniDoyle You can never have enough rescue users. It's like saying "I have too many paladins so let me deploy an armour knight instead". Rescue is overpowered and having more of an overpowered thing is extra overpowered. Sohn is also right about the experience thing. Firstly, any exp from healing is still better than no exp, which is what any unit that doesn't kill any given enemy gets per turn. Secondly, rescue gives 40 exp on use. That is far more than most units are going to get through combat, and once again, it is in addition to any combat exp other units get. So Robin and Vaike trying to get exp on a map will split it between each other, but brady has his own unlimited source. With awakening being very generous with gold, and rescue being a relatively cheap staff, and being infinitely buyable, brady can spam rescue every single turn just to get exp, should he so wish (or twice per turn if Olivia ever dances for him). This causes him to level at a dramatically higher rate than most of your squad. Only a juggernaut that takes like 70%+ of all kills on a map is really going to level faster because they're getting not very much exp for kill

[@RedPointRadio]

I'm not done with the video yet but your discussion on why Awakening doesn't get as much content creation is fascinating to me as someone who (1) has Awakening as their favorite game and (2) actually tried to get into Let's Plays and video creation when they were much younger and then dropped it. Really I'm in the camp where I say "I like these funky little guys! Go unlock your supports and desolate armies!" like the friend you mentioned who plays casually haha. It did attract a huge audience of people who enjoy art and writing more than the metagame, to the point where even with the Three Houses boom I see a decent amount of Awakening art and fics being made to this day. I think that's where the content creation really is for Awakening, and not necessarily the stuff related to gameplay.

[@RedPointRadio]

Alright, I've finished the video and I wanted to give some more thoughts. Lapis - I find the Lapis v Diamant debate really funny because they really are the same unit in a different font (and because I'm using both and finding them very useful for me. Though I'm playing on low difficulty, I'm a baby casual and I can own that). "Everyone in Engage is usable (other than you [Bunet] not you)" god mood. sir you can be in the kitchen but not the battlefield. Brady - Thank you so much for the galeforce discussion. I'll be honest even as a baby casual player who doesn't mind grinding, the grind to get Galeforce is usually just.... not worth it. It's an incredible skill but it's so much goddamn effort for something I really don't need (again, playing baby casual in one of the easiest games in this series). I feel like I'm in the minority for that, cuz even my fellow casual friends will go out of their way for galeforce, and that's fine for them but does not jive with me. So this was pretty validating. Anyway I enjoy actively avoiding galeforce and breaking the game anyway lol. Although I might reconsider for my next playthrough because the galeforce retreat run sounds hilarious. Actual hit and run tactics. Incredible.

[@wazzledog1007]

Regardless of unit viability, L'arachel is definitely a fun meme. I dropped FE8 before beating it, but her genre blind cut scenes were my favorite part.

[@josephmulkern8601]

Manuela makes an excellent War Monk. The class's base stats fixes her low defense and hp, with easy access to rally charm and warp makes her busted for support. She can get some easy chip damage in with pnuema gale and bolting if you get her reason high enough.

[@averageman7769]

He’s already in not actually bad, but sage Lindon is a pretty great filler. If your doing the strategy where you train ~5 core units and the rest are filler, then Lindon is probably the 4th best filler after like Citrinne, Pandreo, and Hortensia., meaning he’s pretty easy to fit on a team TL;DR Lindon is a pre-promote sage in engage, and that makes him actually good and optimal with certain strategies (low-manning).

[@SharurFoF]

"Everyone who goes into the swamp (in 3-6) dies." No way, you can totally play aggro on that map. That's even how I played it on 0% growths. The thing is that the transformed laguz can only move one tile at a time in the swamp, so if you focus on killing the close-to-transforming laguz (who can move a little farther) you can keep your exposure to attacks to a minimum. If Fiona could full move in the swamp, she could combine with Jill to move the yellow Halbs around, which would actually be pretty dope, since they're among the strongest units you have there. She's still useful for doing this during the early turns, but it doesn't take long until she's basically irrelevant, although she can help slingshot BK forward when he shows up.

[@weepingdalek2568]

To speak to the impact of just being around for the early game, in my recent Tellius draft, Ike ended up being my #2 in PoR specifically because he was one of two units I had for the first 10 chapters

[@naotoueda2838]

I love Wolt, and the Ice Ice support with Marcus is another good thing about him. Their double Ice C is fast to get, good defensive bonus for Marcus (Marcus drop Wolt in range) to deal with enemy phase. I like Virion as pair up bot after the early game because for some reason he gives +4 str, skill and DEFENSE with A support

[@DaniDoyle]

Archer Defense is a kaga reference, he wanted them to Frontline

[@Zoeila]

Theres a lot of units on here i use on a regular basis because i do female heavy runs especially Sophia being a rare female Shaman but im shocked Roy isnt on here. I dont think ive ever used a worse Lord

[@fourthknower9831]

I guess because Roy is mandatory?

[@antonykun9940]

​@@fourthknower9831 FE11 Marth is on the list, which makes no sense since there far far worse characters than him.

[@JustsomeKid93]

I can think of one unique utility for Bunet…. And that is that IF he gets put in the kitchen in the somniel, he frequently cooks S or higher which give more stats… so he can be a stat backpack without having to be deployed and if RNG selects him, which is pretty sad but it’s happened to me a couple times

[@shanegiorgio4713]

To be fair, you can repeatedly go to bed to shuffle the people around the somniel, but it could still wind up being very tedious

[@neog8029]

New strat: Kill off every other units that you aren't committing to your team so Bunet shows up more frequently in the kitchen.

[@evelyn64sev]

I'm a little curious on Manuela and Hanneman. Granted I have never used either of them of them but Manuela has warp and silence which warp alone is warp and silence has its uses. She's a worse warper than Linhardt, Lysithea, and Hapi but still warper. Rally charm is useful gambit accuracy/might. Hanneman I really don't know enough about to judge but he seems like roughly Lorenz

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

Hanneman is probably the best user of a siege spell in 3 houses (one of the DLC chars might be better, I never got it so idk), though debatably Dorothea or Hilda use it better for its primary value, scamming link attacks, due to their better supports. He's kinda limited besides that, too slow to really do well with other spells, too frail to really work as a hybrid, but not *quite* strong enough to strike terror like Lysithea, but if you want to smack someone with Meteors, he's your best bet. He can work a bit better if you extend his magic range, but he'll never not be Lysithea At Home for any use beyond Meteor. He's not the worst at going hybrid, but, I wouldn't put stock in that for anything but memes. Manuela... is... bad. Not like, unusably bad, she has good spells, I don't even think she breaks the bottom 5 characters as a result, but, she doesn't really have anything unique going for her. She's just the worst of several options for great support spells, which isn't the worst. Trying to really get anything out of her is rough, but she's not a lost cause. If you felt like it, you could probably swap out Linheardt or Mercedes or Dorothea, or maybe Anette for her, and probably not really notice a difference in terms of basic performance. I don't know spell lists by heart, so I imagine there's some unique combination of spells you might actually want that she alone has, but frankly besides Warp, I kinda don't care.

[@maximeminassian6002]

About the Manuela and Hanneman being worse than Mercedes thing, I think it really depends on the context. If it’s an out of house playthrough, I’d say they’re absolutely better than Mercedes because they virtually take 0 investment to recruit, whereas for Mercedes you’ll probably want to recruit her through supports since on of the requirements is magic which is… questionable on Byleth. And both Hanneman and Manuela have some tools that can make them somewhat stand out. Manuela has warp, which even with her pathetically low magic is still something nice to have, and she has relatively easy access to peg since she starts with D flying. Hanneman has rally magic which you never complain about as well as some nice ranged spells with Thoron and Meteor. These things alone make them more worthwhile than Mercedes on a BE or GD playthrough imo. However, if we are considering BL, than MAYBE, you could say she’s better because of the early utility that she provides.

[@DaniDoyle]

Just wait till i release the Manuellafesto (its probably my next big project)

[@duplicitous0169]

Lindon is also pretty good as a Sniper. He has 2000 SP at base, so he can inherit Draconic Hex to debuff bosses from 20 squares away using Astra Storm, which can be nice to have, since bosses in engage can get very bulky in the late game. It’s great for warp skips. He also has enough magic at base to OHKO fliers with a radiant bow if that’s something you care about.

[@duplicitous0169]

The base SP is notable for that point in the game, since the long term units that could have 2000 SP at that point in the game would probably have already spent it on Canter or Spd+3.

[@SJtheMFZB]

1:33:22 The way people still talk about Awakening, no one has tried using Robin, even. "But if I use Robin, I can't use Vaike!" 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@greenstat1c]

Lindon is actually a really good unit in Engage. He's not Pandreo, barely anybody can be, but the fact is he's still a prepromote that scales well for the rest of the game, joins with a lot of SP to play with, and is a nice choice for a magic unit. Top 3 magic units in any order are Anna, Chloe and Pandreo, but Lindon is actually only a tier or two below them, just being outclassed by Ivy and Hortensia. This means he's not top 5. However: He is top 6. I am extremely comfortable saying that he is better than Citrinne or Celine

[@Sashitoge]

Clanne found crying in corner after reading this

[@greenstat1c]

@@Sashitoge Clanne is the one who chose to start in a magic class despite being a physical unit. I don't make the rules I just enforce them.

[@Sashitoge]

@@greenstat1c He still performs the best with a Levin sword in my experience. But yeah, a better mag would go a long way.

[@greenstat1c]

How? Griffin Chloe is 10x the Levin sword user Clanne could be

[@Sashitoge]

@@greenstat1c I was saying that Clanne is best off for himself with one, not that he's the best user.

[@StardustSauce]

I would LOVE to hear y'all's thoughts on Roy. I would've expected his notorious promotion to be grounds for inclusion on this list on its own, but my ears pricked when you mentioned Roy being "slept on," cause I don't disagree, but I'd love to hear why.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

Not them, but Roy is actually one of the few sources of reasonable accuracy in early FE6, making him a reliable closer. His growths are overall pretty good, meaning he can hold his own decently around early midgame if he's used to get these kills, and he's basically the only character with halfway reasonable supports. He's not a power unit by any means, he probably can't handle being swarmed on enemy phase, but he's a quite good "extra" unit to throw on an objective, and he's far from being useless, or even the worst Lord. He ain't no Hector or Ike, but he's probably proportionally to his game more useful than Eliwood, Erika, or debatably even Alear (Alear has fantastic options for utility though, I mean as a raw combat unit).

[@StardustSauce]

@@aprinnyonbreak1290 Interesting notes! I am gonna throw out there that I went through the grueling and extremely unwise process of getting him all the way to level 20 post-promotion in the what, five chapters you can do that? His growths are indeed not bad at all, and I had a great time with getting him over the wall.

[@israel120298]

Bunets proficiency is actually swords which is notably worse than axes

[@crestfallenhussar895]

The funny thing about Brady, especially mine who had Donnel as a father, is he can reach over 50 luck without limit breaking and do so before level cap. So, to that end he is a very funny and efficient unit to build just to send out to auto battle things with legendary weapons because he has 100% armsthrift. Is it good in normal gameplay? Not really. Although I guess he could be made to use glass weapons or something earlier on. He's fun and economical though! Many Risen have fallen to Brady with Helswath.

[@DaniDoyle]

thats so funny!

[@wriggletime1412]

Looking at their bases, I think the gap between Diamant and Lapis is a little bigger then you made it sound. They certainly don't have the same bulk like you said, Diamant having 6 more hp and 3 more defense while only being 1 level higher (I don't know how much of that is his personal class though.). Also notably, Lapis starts with 500 SP and Diamant starts with 800. They are still pretty similar, but there's a reason it's Lapis on this list and not him.

[@DaniDoyle]

Check their personal stats. Diamant has +3 HP and +1 defense if they are both in the same class (and as both are units who's base classes suck, they both want a reclass). Diamant's SP lead is real but not super impactful in a post well meta. Lapis's +1 strength only matters in LTC, though her extra chapter of availability is real.

[@israel120298]

Def think manuela is better than mercy. Mainly just cause of utility with warp and easy availability in all routes. Mercy is a better at combat and healing than Manuela but mercy is still not great at combat and healing is in abundance in 3h. That being said still like mercy cause she gives nice older sister vibes and I will use both of them.

[@israel120298]

I feel like lapis and diamant have a couple key differences. She feels like the best option as a second flier after Chloe since she comes at level 10 right when u get a master seal. Having another good flier also feels really good on the next map where diamant is still stuck in base class. I also think they both favor different weapons. Diamant likes axes a lot more because of his build while lapis wants swords like folkvangr to not get weighed down. So even if they are both wyverns there is still some difference. So I don’t think lapis is actually bad. I also just don’t like taking the royals out of there special class 🤷‍♀️

[@DaniDoyle]

Diamant is also level 10, and only joins one chapter after lapis, meaning he can also go flier with your early seals. There is nothing stopping them from going into the same class/role or using the same weapons. The only differences are 1 point of Strength on Lapis, 1 chapter of availability on Lapis, Lord Access on Diamant, and different personal skills.

[@Arawnnc]

Thank you so much for defending Virion, my beloved. As someone who has played a crap ton of Awakening Lunatic, Virion is one of my favorite units because he's a bow user. 2 range is great for early game, and the fact that Awakening throws Wyverns early on helps him because he can do enough damage that someone else can easily them off without risk of taking a massive hit. Overall though, Awakening is a game where the best units are the ones that offer more than just being able to solo the game, because everyone can basically do that easily.

[@halcyon_echo42]

I love a lot of these cute duds, but Fiona specifically could've had so much more utility in any other game or with availability in even just a few more chapters. I forged her some Steel Lances and fed her so many kills & she finally started being decent in third tier with Sol. But it's nuts that sword armor Meg is genuinely easier to use than a cav with free skills that passively heal, allow for free rescue drops, along with lances rather than swords. Lavenga, her father, one of the Four Riders, also would've been a cool character to fight in FE9 or get in FE10 mid to late game as well.

[@SJtheMFZB]

1:29:23 No! The Awakening fans still sleep! How could you? 😭

[@TuskyBaby]

Nah I gotta defend my boy Callion. Being a Cavalier with bith lance and sword access on horseback, 4 FCC, and earlier join time makes him MILES better than the other 3 you get shortly afterwards. I just treat him as Fergus 2.0.

[@snivy400]

1:20:00 the thing is Lapis doesn’t want Axe power. She wants sword power which is actually notable cause you don’t get Roy back until chapter 19 which puts her in a pretty unique position cause she can get sword power 3 super early. This is the reason why Chloe is super good because she gets sword power 3 levin sword super early. Lapis and Diamant are the physical versions of that which leverages the difference between them and Kagetsu stat wise because they have access to that skill long before he does Also a small note on the Lapis vs Diamant discussion is that Lapis is basically Diamant if his dex wasn’t awful which in my opinion makes her slight better because she doesn’t require hit fixing but *shrug*

[@johnvenrick5893]

I got a better impression of Lapis than Diamant because i reclassed her to Wolf Knight and stupidly kept Diamant on his personal class line. I found Amber so annoying that they immediately made it to the bench.

[@user-xb1lr8ds4q]

lindon is by far the best of the best here, crit engrave + olwen ring and thunder +4 is amazing on him (even vantage crit builds)

[@crystalpokedude4329]

One thing to note with Lapis is that if you use "intended" classes for units, she has C Axes upon promotion to Hero while Diamant's personal class lets him reach A Axes, meaning he can use tomahawks and Lapis can't (he can also use S Swords in that class while Lapis is stuck at A.) Basically, Diamant's personal class is the reason they nerfed Hero.

[@Sashitoge]

I will still strongly maintain that Bunet is nowhere near "worst-of-the-worst" tier, honestly, I think there's less than ~5 units released after FE12 that could be argued for a tier like that. It's not that he brings anything that someone else doesn't or that he wasn't the worst unit in the game, but he's only worse than your average units by a relatively very small margin. The difference in power level between a top 5 and a middle-of-the-pack unit in nearly all FE games is as large if not higher than the difference between the best and worst unit in Engage. As such, I also strongly believe that no Engage unit should enter a hypothetical "best of the best" tier. Edit: Thinking about it, my main issue is probably just the tier name. With the way this list is formed and talked about, it should probably be called something like "truly bad/actually awful" or similar. Would solve the "achually these are not the very very worst" nitpick I have.

[@DaniDoyle]

I mean, if a unit offers you nothing AND comes at a time when deployment slots are very tight, i think the placement fits them.

[@Sashitoge]

@@DaniDoyle Yeah but, in my opinion, "worst of the worst" needs to be an almost active detriment, bottom 50 units in the series level of terrible. Bunet is worse than the people around him, but you can make him work, while some mooks like Lyre and Wendy make the game more difficult if you try to use them, someone like FE1 Wrys can be replaced by a vulnerary without much gameplay impact, and FE4 Arden, outside of the bridge in ch.3., requires you to change the way you play the game for him to even see combat. There are units so bad in the series, that "disappointing but workable" unit in a tier like that seems out of place to me. Also, like you were saying at the end, super bad units are fun in their own fascinating way, but Bunet is shockingly boring as a unit.

[@floris1111]

Are we ranking FE9 units based on hard or maniac? Elincia is fantastic with canto physic in maniac clash and final

[@DaniDoyle]

They are ranked according to hard (the hardest available English difficulty) but I can say from experience she's not good on Maniac either

[@TheTopRat]

I didn't have the grinding DLC in Awakening when i played it in high school. Grinding skirmishes was HELL. You get chip exp and it's terrible.

[@bluemoss9831]

I’m curious, how would you rank Lapis (and, by extension, Diamant who is the project I choose lol) if, like, Kagetsu didn’t exist?

[@DaniDoyle]

I don't think they really move. If Kagetsu didn't exist, you would just have Merrin fill his role (they have very close to identical stats) and if both didn't exist you'd probably just lean harder on the Amber/Pannette high strength core, or Ivy/Pandreo. Like, if you remove enough units they do eventually become the best option for your carry, but thats true of everyone (for what it's worth I think Ivy is the best cary, followed by Pannette, followed By Amber, followed by Kagetsu, followed by Merrrin, but also you should use all of them)

[@lagspike7763]

Thank god Virion got the respect he deserves. Real talk the Elixir that Virion joins with is better than half the midgame units that join way too late to be good (Cherche, Say'ri, Flavia and Basilio, etc) lmao (Also bows on luna+ fuck and longbow super fuck)

[@swiftbuizel]

You were kinda cooking but you burnt the food dawg 💀

[@DaniDoyle]

Flavia and Basilio are easily top tier, and definitely better than Virion

[@lagspike7763]

@@DaniDoyle Maybe I'm just too lunatic+ pilled

[@seasaltsky]

Basilio joins with great bases right before two maps with a bunch of fliers, including a Dark Flier boss ... and is one rank away from being able to use a Brave Bow. Basilio arms scroll Brave Bow go brrrrrrrr

[@DaniDoyle]

No because basilio and Flavia are incredibly good on lunatic plus specifically they're actually worse on lower difficulties so I would not say this is a consequence of you being too lunatic plus pilled

[@justanotherweirdo11]

I didn't see the value of Virion until I played Lunatic and especially Lunatic+.

[@DaniDoyle]

In fairness I think hes bad on hard but good on lunatic/lunatic +

[@BardsForEver]

Just a quick note: fiona can be deployed in 1-7: A gathering hope. It shouldnt change the tier she is in, as that level is inside and thus lowers her movement. However it does make her leveling slightly easier, because not all units destroy her there.

[@DaniDoyle]

Fiona can be deployed in 1-7 and 1-E, but not for free (it takes a deployment slot) so her first free deployment is in part

[@BardsForEver]

@@DaniDoyle Ah I missed that part. Thanks for clarifying!

[@Zoeila]

Lapis is one of those units for me like Heather always seems to be str blessed in my runs

[@DaniDoyle]

have you seen this? kzbin.info/www/bejne/n37XXn-Zg8lkY7M GBA Lapis

[@Zoeila]

@@DaniDoyle very cool

[@McKayla24798]

You mentioned L’Arachel not being able to use barrier in chapter 14 and i was like ,, ‘wait, what the fuck are you talking about i mashed barrier on her that whole chapter to level her up’ then i remembered on my last my playthrough (and first ever Ironman) i spent her entire join chapter grinding staff rank, exp, and support with eirika because they’re my favorites.

[@DaniDoyle]

haha based

[@slanax]

re: Bunet, I think one of the biggest missed potentials in Fates and Engage gameplay-wise is that while you have those cute little things where every character can staff the mess hall or the item shop or whatever and they all have unique effects for it, it's just completely random rather than something you, as the commander of the army, can schedule. Like there could be a fatigue system for this so you don't just spam the one that's best at it, or maybe the unique effects are balanced a little more so there isn't just one character who's the best at it, but I think it'd be a great opportunity to let players actually involve their benchwarmers into a playthrough rather than half their army being freeloaders that hang out in your camp and contribute nothing and you're only occasionally reminded they exist bc the RNG said they're on cooking duty even though the whole army knows they'll set the kitchen on fire. A mechanic like that would be a great place for Bunet who maybe doesn't have the stats or skills for anything but does have a good in-universe reason for why he'd be someone you'd want to have around in an army. (and on the topic of Galeforce and grinding in Awakening, the dedicated grinding DLC is actually terrible for grinding after like the Plegia arc bc the enemies don't attack you, they run away, and they have annoying skills like -breakers and Counter that makes the grind a lot less quick and mindless than you'd want it to be. The rout maps with fifty random goobers on them (and even just the first set with just the 10 or so unpromoted lords) are much better for powerleveling as soon as you have enough numbers to solo them, bc while the individual kills give much less EXP, you get that fifty times per map and just for hitting End Turn on whatever Fort tile is closest to the deployment area, rather than having to manually chase down Entombeds for probably less total EXP. Would recommend the third map of each set as soon as you can handle it, bc at that point you're minmaxing how fast you can click End Turn and maps 1 and 2 have NPC phases and death quotes)

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

I was especially annoyed by the services on the Somniel where the person standing there changes... but then we fade to black to use the "main" person for it. Like, what's even the point? It's literally more effort to do that than it is to just make them launch the activity.

[@viviansnowfang]

re: awakening DLC grinding, ironically the DLC where you can get paragon is also the best one for exp due to the free village + early fort and the massive enemy spam, once you can survive it with just two goobers of course

[@SonicTheHedgedawg]

I still don't *really* understand how Brady’s galeforce axefaire war Monk meme build isn't “fun meme build” but Karla is instead of “worst of the worst.” I'm not flaming, I just literally don't understand what the tiers are supposed to represent in that case.

[@DaniDoyle]

Personally I don't consider gale force to be a fun meme build because something like 3/4 of the cast are capable of getting it meanwhile I consider Carla to be a meme because the idea of training a bad unit in order to get the reward of another bad unit is inherently funny to me but at the end of the day this is subjective so if you disagree then that's completely understandable. To explain my criteria for the tears fun meme-tier are units who are bad but make me smile worst of the worst are units who are bad but make me sad

[@SonicTheHedgedawg]

@@DaniDoyle thanks for that. It's like the old Latin proverb, “There's no accounting for taste.” I guess, to me, Karla is so bad and not fun to use in the actual game, that the meta-meme of being given a garbage unit as a reward for a really unusual and un-rewarding recruit requirement isn't worth it (i.e. getting her is the meme... But actually using her is just painful), but personal preference is personal preference.

[@DaniDoyle]

I mean she's unrewarding generally but she is at least functional at base (I've seen both zero and negative growth playthroughs were she contributes for a few maps) which to me is better than brady (or most of gen 2 ) on lunatic

[@SonicTheHedgedawg]

@@DaniDoyle it might be just because I view, well, *all* of the child units in Awakening as end-game for-fun project units because of the whole “customize their lineage” conceit. Maybe that's coloring my perception because I think of all the kids as “for fun” units as their purpose. I don't know.

[@thorscape3879]

Grinding 35 levels for Galeforce is not fun. By the time you get there you may as well not recruit Brady and just beat the game. Maribelle has to go through E rank hell in addition to the 35 level grind.

[@NevarKanzaki]

I think that L'arachel and Marisa may in some ways be asking you to grind tower but I think your opinion of them may be more representative of a quicker run through. I didn't really tower grind but I never felt as though I had difficulty raising either. Sacred Stones on hard still isn't that hard. If you're rushing through maps then yeah, you're not going to get them anywhere. But if you take about one map at a casual pace, they'll catch right up to plenty usable levels. The trainees I feel require more babying than either. L'arachel is definitely slower than Marisa in this regard but she's also a healer which means you can get a good bit just by healing when you don't need it and cycling in some units that will take a hit instead of rushing in with the ones that won't take damage. I'm not saying she's great but I don't think it takes a lot of effort to get her going. While she's not going to blitz her way to promotion, she's still able to be a healer with a bit better mobility and a rescue dropper, allowing her to be useful in the meantime. In other words, she's a unit that provides some value while naturally staying out of trouble. She still needs to be babysat a bit but she's also not hard to babysit since she's just healing in the backline. Basically, if you rush through the game, you won't have time for her. But if you don't let just a few units chew through the maps, in normal casual play they'll both operate just fine whether you use tower or not.

[@neongrey333]

Lapis is a character who I try to use, take a look at her, take a look at what i'm up against, screw my face up, go "why is this character so bad???" and then i bench her and replace her with a better unit

[@pksprite6401]

Wolt’s movement on this list interesting. I agree with what you said about him, early game chip is useful. And compared to Bors (who you originally tiered around the same level), who joins as early to him but is doing far, far less, Wolt stands out. But I feel you may be overrating him, almost? Like, his chip is useful, but his hit rates struggle to reach above 75% even on chapter 1 axe fighters. By chapter 4, Wolt is only doing like, 2 damage to most of the enemies with shaky hit rates, and he’s probably toast if one of the Nomads on that chapter reach him. With worse stats than Dorothy and Sue, he probably won’t be deployed after the 5 free deployment chapters, so I fail to see how Sue doesn’t outclass him. Sure, Wolt has the availability, but once they’re together, Sue has literally better stats in every area, which I think was greatly downplayed in this video. I guess they do play different roles, so that’s probably what you meant. So I don’t think I’d go as far to call Wolt a fine unit. I think if there was a fire between “greatly outclassed, some utility” and “outclassed by still fine TBH”, Wolt could fit nicely there (and as someone who defended Cath on the last video, I indeed think she should be higher than Wolt). Anyhow, great video! I loved seeing this be revisited, and even though I haven’t played all of these games (and really only comfortable with my knowledge on FE6’s unit viability), you were able to hold my attention the whole time.

[@DaniDoyle]

While it is true that wolts chip is around 75-80%, this is true of basically any non rapier combat at that point in the game, which is why I don't count it as a huge mark against him. It is worth factoring in but if it affects everyone equally, it doesn't seem like we should penalize him for it. I also disagree with the assessment that Sue out classes him because she shows up when you're actually fighting over deployment slots. The horse is definitely nice but she has close to the the same combat stats as wolt (+1 strength and +3 speed compared to base wolt, but wolt has likely gotten one or two levels, shortening the gap, and neither of them double wyverns anyway) and doesn't get 5 "free" chapters of credit. If you want to train one of them, she's the better choice, but neither of them are units who turn out especially well when trained.

[@DaniDoyle]

Regarding Cath, I fundementlally disagree with the notion of "splitting theif credit", as outside of an iron man you're not ever going to deploy the "worse" thief, but even if you do give her 1/3 credit for all treasures after chapter 12, that's less that the 5 chapters of chip wolt contributes. Obviously this is a subjective point, but i don't see 1/3 of a Delphi shield being a big deal. In draft or iron man settings, her value does go up however!

[@pksprite6401]

@@DaniDoyle Wolt being on equal footing with all non-Roy in terms of hit rates is just blatantly false. Obviously Marcus and Rapier Roy don’t meaningfully struggle with hit rates. But among the characters in chapters 1-5, Alen, Lance, Dieck, and Rutger can all use swords, easily boosting their hit rates to high 80s and beyond against many enemies. Shanna can use the slim lance to boost her accuracy beyond Wolt, and isn’t too far off with her iron lance anyways. And Lugh is of course famous for his accurate fire tome. Basically, every actual good unit you can use in the early game is not struggling with hitting things the same way Wolt is. Wolt’s chip is consistent in comparison to Lance hucking a javelin at 40 accuracy in chapter 1. Compared to the way your good units will attack, Wolt will falter (and not to mention when he does hit, he’s lucky to do more than like, 4 damage). Yea I agree Sue doesn’t outclass Wolt in the sense that they are supposed to do different jobs. Wolt can help out chip in the early game, while Sue is your first realistic option for an actual bow unit to train. You shrug off the +3 speed advantage too easily. With a nice 65% growth, fast experience gain, and the ability to double certain things at base (Soldiers are still common enough by this point), Sue is in a position to gain some speed to reach doubling benchmarks. Notably, her speed also protects her from getting doubled, something that Wolt has been in danger of for a while now. All this without even mentioning the horse. But Sue > Wolt is A) kind of obvious and B) not really all too relevant to my points on Wolt (kind of related to his long term usability and deployment competition for the wyvern map, but very few Wolt’s are long term units anyways).

[@pksprite6401]

@@DaniDoyle I generally agree with your opinions of thief splitting, and I think most do; that’s why Astolfo is viewed as the best thief, even with Chad having more chances to loot, and why Cath is even in the discussion of this video. However, it’s worth noting that at a certain point, Bolting will one-shot even Astolfo. Though even in these cases Astolfo is pretty clearly the optimal thief to bring, it’s not like Cath’s stats are letting her down all too much, if you get what I mean. My main point for Cath is that I think there’s a floor for how low thief utility can be rated, and given she is just as able at thieving as the other two, I don’t think she deserves to be knocked too hard. I think Cath has some genuine unique value to her though. Double thief strats are kinda rare, but in chapters like 16, they can work given all the thief stuff needed there. But some new Cath tech I did last time I played is that in chapter 16, you can actually forfeit using Astolfo if you hold off on recruiting Cath until this point. You can recruit her midway through the map, and she’ll be good to loot the entire castle and do thief things once the fighting is complete (with how much side work there is and the secret shop, this chapter isn’t really beaten quickly anyways), all while saving yourself a deployment slot. It’s pretty cool/fun, and a genuine W for Cath. Idk why this is the hill I chose to die on though. I posted an FE6 tier list to Reddit and I only put Cath and Wolt 2 spots apart (though a tier apart). TLDR: Somewhat redundant thief utility > early game chip. I think “outclassed by still fine tbh” is the perfect description for Cath. Is she outclassed? Definitely. Is her utility still fine? Well, yea, she’s still a thief, and thieves are fine.

[@FoxEmblem01]

Just gonna correct yall on amiti in radiant dawn, it is the most broken weapon that isn't ragnell. 15 mt 90 ht infinite uses, brave effect, def/res+3. Its stupidly good

[@DaniDoyle]

We were talking about path of radiance

[@FoxEmblem01]

@@DaniDoyle you guys said in Rd that it has 11mt and plus two to stats, just fixing that misnomer, sane for ragnell as ragnell in both games gives five defense to Ike

[@maskie4189]

The fact Bors didn't move up proves you have learned nothing.

[@DaniDoyle]

sad but true. appology video incoming

[@goros2289]

Wolt is actually quite interesting since even though Sue and Shin greatly outclass him, using them a lot will lead you to the Sacae route which IMO contains the most bullshit maps in the entire game. And I like Wolt better than Dorothy since he gets 5 chapters of free deployment to gain more levels. Besides he’s got an incredibly useful niche against the CH7 wyverns (in normal mode at least, since he’ll most likely have an edge over Dorothy in levels)

[@pksprite6401]

If you’re that adverse to Sacae, the real solution is to just use Klein and Igrene. They’re Wolt and Dorothy but without the hassle. Or just use Shanna and Thea in addition to Sue and Sin.

[@DaniDoyle]

Sue doesn't really outclass wolt tbh. She has a horse but no chapters of free deployment, and they have similar bases despite the difference in join time

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

Usually, I use Shanna and Shin a ton, use Thea for a few chapters (her HM bonuses are nice), and do not use Sue at all. This always gets me routed to Ilia.

[@alexbdagger]

math only needs 1 point of speed to not get doubled by the first boss. this makes him better than cain who needs 2 points of speed to not die to the first boss

[@hylianfelldragon1308]

Is it weird for me to say that I actually agree with your old tier list more?

[@DaniDoyle]

Im curious, what changes do you dislike?

[@nicholasstacey6146]

Small critique for Lapis. So you’re saying her and Diamant are the same unit and they’re both better than Jade. So my question is why aren’t they on this list then? Makes Lapis feel singled out for no reason

[@DaniDoyle]

As i said at the 3:00 mark, the video is already long enough without talking about a bunch of units where we repeat the same points. Lapis ended up in "outclassed but still fine" because we both think she's still fine.

[@nicholasstacey6146]

@@DaniDoyle Oh gotcha. Sorry I think I skimmed through that part. Thanks for clearing things up

[@xuanathan]

I do think its very funny that despite being worse in every conceivable way, Iucharba is actually chosen in ranked runs over his mounted counterpart because having bows means he can clear the arena more easily which translates to more exp. Does it matter in a regular run? No, but it does go to show little of a difference Iuchar having a horse actually adds to his performance, its both very funny and very sad.

[@samkeiser9776]

Engage archer, I barely know her.

[@schizo451]

My man Virion beat the bad unit allegations

[@DaniDoyle]

He's so good (I put him in A tier in my awakening tier list)

[@sargeward8184]

Hanneman gets access to Meteor, and from what ive been told by other people does it way better than Dorothea because of higher magic growth and bases. Manuela is pretty definitively bad though I'd probably agree there

[@typicalgalaxy087]

Awakening has a weird trait that it has some absurdly long and in-depth guides that are basically impossible to find.

[@_delriooo1396]

In my own experience, Jubelo was not bad at all, yes sure the base 1 magic is awful, but after a few chapters, (in my own experience) he'd became my top mage with higher stats than Linde and Merric, surviving better the enemy hits and being faster than Arlen. Also by the end of the game my Jubelo had more magic than Linde and Merric, so I guess the effort compensates, since Merric joins in chapter 10 and Jubelo early on 4. So in my opinion, it could be good with investment, it's like a trainee without being a trainee🤣

[@thespaghettimonster354]

If you do ever do a video on Manuela, please bring Original rasins, he is one of her biggest supporters.

[@Hiiyapow]

I have some longer thoughts on awakening, but diggity dangit, brady is not a bad unit and it has nothing to do with galeforce. Galeforce sucks and I agree it's probably the most overrated skill in the entire world, however brady has a number of key advantages over a lot of other units 1) He's easy to recruit- his chapter is a kill boss map you can instantly skip, unlike a brutally hard map like Inigo's or Nah's on L/+ 2) He wields a staff, and thus is capable of using rescue. Rescue in awakening is hilariously OP to the point where any unit that is capable of using it to any degree can never be bad. Brady can not only help you set up rescue chain 1-turn strategies, but even if you're playing more "normal fire emblem", he can essentially polymerization himself and another of your units into a ballista, running in to attack and rescuing them out. A unit with base staff access that is essentially free is great. Some people will say "Oh but I already have Lissa/Maribelle/Anna/Libra" and my response is yeah, now take him anyway. More staves is better, not worse, because it means more healing and rescue can be done. He's not even close to the worst unit, or even the worst gen 2 unit in awakening. Virion I'm glad got moved up because the guy is a legit solid unit. Donnel is also a shadow realm tier unit but yeah.

[@DaniDoyle]

Rescue is strong, but by the time Brady shows up, you already have far more than enough rescue users AND they all have longer range than him. You do eventually reach a critial mass where another generic staffer doesn't make a difference, since you want Fliers to escort your staffers, a dancer, and combat units. Rescue being E rank also means starting as a priest doesn't do anything unique for brady... Any unit with staff access has rescue access. This means in addition to the units you named, all units capable of reclassing to Falco, Sage, Trickster, or War Cleric has rescue access, which expands the list to include Robin, Morgan, Miriel, Ricken, Sumia, Cynthia,Cordelia, Gaius, Laurent, Cherche, Sai-Ri, and various children depending on their parents, plus if you're really desperate, edge cases like Kellum and Henry have trickster access.

[@Hiiyapow]

@@DaniDoyle Brady has far more use+range than many of those characters that you listed. Sumia has 3 base magic and a 25% Growth. Cynthia has a personal mag base of 2, so likely isn't hugely better given one of her parents is Sumia. Gaius has 0 base magic and a 20% growth, Cherche has 2 base magic and a 20% growth, Cordelia has 3 base magic and a 20% growth. Sure, I'll happily call Miriel and Ricken good (although it's unlikely you have both trained), and you'll always appreciate a falcon even if their mag sucks. But everyone else is not anywhere near on the level of Brady. Gaius, Laurent, Cherche, Say'ri, Kellam and Henry all take more investment than Brady does to be able to wield a staff and use rescue. If anything, he's the one obsoleting THEM, not the other way around, especially seeing as only Lauren't and Sa'yri (for some reason) are going to have a magic stat (and thus a rescue range) anywhere near comparable to Brady's. Robin and Morgan are far better used for combat than rescuing, and all of a sudden we can see that actually, Brady does have this niche, because he comes for free and you can simply pick him up when you need him and have him do his job. I'm not sure why rescue being E rank matters- priest doesn't have to do anything "unique" for Brady, because he already does the job he has well anyway. For chapters like c21, it is very much an "all hands on deck" situation when it comes to skipping the map. That took me 7 rescue bots (although one person's job to use rally magic, so you can call it 6 if you want), and of course the advantage of doing it this way is that it entirely pole-vaults the need for galeforce, saving you 15 levels in the burning wreck of a class that is Dark Flier. Specifically being a higher mag rescue user (and someone capable of using rally mag) makes him much better in helping out during skips. It's also worth noting that units like Ricken and Miriel, while they have good mag, if you instead swapped them out for Brady, you can now give their exp in the earlygame to someone else, because Brady doesn't need earlygame exp to be good, due to him not existing. This means you could feasibly train another unit, or further consolidate kills into your strong units, or just use Frederick a bit more to kill more things because your exp management doesn't matter as much.

[@DaniDoyle]

I mean chapter 21 is skipable in a zero growth context with only four rescue users,, but regardless my point was that having staff access it's not the saving Grace that you seem to think it is. As I stated in the video, every unit in Awakening is vaguely usable, but the children are quite disappointing and I think Brady starting as a pure staffer very late in the game is the perfect poster child for that

[@Hiiyapow]

@@DaniDoyle Disclaimer: I have a very high opinion of Topaz and their skill level, so don't think this is coming off as slander to them. Topaz's run has a Cherche with 12 effective move. It's a little different in that context, wouldn't you say? It requires boots on Cherche, rally move, and a pairup that provides +1 move, with the attacker being able to consistently ORKO algol at 1-2 range. Unless all of the above is true, you need another rescue bot. Rally Move on it's own is higher investment than Brady because it requires getting a peg to level 5 DF, something that Topaz does through water cheesing chapter 12- you're not really going to do that in a context outside of 0% growths. He also has sage anna with tomefaire with a massive amount of Mag which takes grinding Anna to level 15, which is not really done in a normal run either (Topaz does this by spamming heal in p4 for like 7 years). Boots Cherche is also fine but there's a reasonable argument they could go to anyone else. Boots on your juggernaut is obviously useful, but bootsing falco Lissa also makes life very easy when it comes to rescue skips. +1 Move comes from a bunch of classes which you might not necessarily have or want to be in. Notably, Sorc and Hero, the two classes you'd want your lategame carry (and therefore best unit to kill Algol with) don't give +1 move, so you're looking at classes like GK, BK, DK, trickster, griffon, and such. These are not bad classes, but not every carry has access to them and it means you need realisitcally 2 more rescue bots for this. Ignoring all that, you could just swap out Ricken for Brady and have him use Rally Mag. I agree that most of the kids tend to not be good, and I'm not saying that Brady is the best unit ever, but he's clearly a cut above a lot of the rest of the kids because he's capable of wielding a staff. I think it's also fair to argue that if he makes it easier to skip a map in terms of brain power (because rescue skipping is not nearly as simple as something like warp skipping), then he's got a boon there as well. Furthermore, if 2 units can do the same job, that doesn't make 1 unit terrible and 1 unit amazing, it just means that there's different scenarios where you'd pick one or the other.

[@gwillermoh1963]

iirc manuela gets warp which can be nice, hanneman idk. thoron and meteor for extra range?

[@prestonbeaulieu4379]

I'm not an expert in FE1, but from what I understand Est should probably be in fun meme tier, outclassed at best. She has decent growth rates, but she joins too late for it to matter, and her bases aren't great to begin with.

[@DaniDoyle]

While her bases aren't great in fe1, they are still workable, especially when you consider its a 20 cap game. Est folows the fe1 "replacement unit" design philosophy (ie if ogma dies navarre replaces him) and is a "worse" version of catria (although she actually has higher bases and doesn't join much later than Catria in fe1) but her class is good enough that i still think shes not a bad unit. The other iterations of est are bad units however.

[@bea_3243]

fwiw i feel like manuela + hanneman at least have access to some good spells - the absolute worst unit in 3H is CF Flayn lol

[@DaniDoyle]

I'll add her to and manuellafesto, because i agree she's really disappointing!

[@Fimbulvetr]

I still think that not counting Amelia's Japanese growths is doing her a disservice since she's literally one of the only units in sacred stones that was so overpowered she warranted a nerf. To the Japanese players, she was one of the best recruits in the series.

[@DaniDoyle]

Its 5% extra strength and 10% extra hp. those do not make her overpowered, or even good. For context, at 10/20/20 she would (on average) have +5 hp and +2 strength in the Japanese version compared to the American.

[@durma6924]

Yeah, I think engage character discussion gets a lil weird sometimes due to game design. The niches that "only one' unit can do are very small. I love your examples, lemme add one mo- ALCRYST IS THE BEST LUNAR BRACE USER IN THE GAME SO HE'S BETTER

[@pksprite6401]

I will defend Sophia, I think she’s better than Gwendolyn. Since both of them are worthless and should never be used after their join map, Sophia is superior because she can bait sleep staff uses on her joining map away from actual important units. Sophia sweep baybeeeee 😎

[@DaniDoyle]

I mean, Wendy also has fake utility in blocking the top left reinforcements or setting up a triangle attack.

[@pksprite6401]

@@DaniDoyle eh true, but anyone can block that corner and triangle attack requires the use of 2 other horrible units. I feel Sophia being guaranteed to absorb a sleep on a pretty stressful map is more valuable. Plus a shitty Druid has got to be inherently better than a shitty General. But honestly, who cares, Sophia vs Gwendolyn is such a pointless debate, despite how many ways it can be spun.

[@earthboundaddict2533]

Brady is definitely one of the worse awakening characters in the context of a standard playthrough but in the context of Apotheosis specifically he's one of the better kids thanks to being a galeboy who inherently gets good spd and mag mods from maribelle. He has almost everything he needs at base to be good in apotheosis. Sage, tomefaire, a good proc (luna) galeforce and being male he can also get aggressor which is why i think galeboys are so coveted for Apotheosis specifically. He may be bad normally but i can least inhale the copium he's good in the closest thing awakening has to a post game 😭 if anything him being bad is in character for him and i wouldn't have it any other way. I love my pathetic wet blanket of a man ❤️

[@just-mees]

I think fiona deserves credit for being a person of color in tellius who *doesn't* have a voice gimmick to make them sound stupid >.>

[@bluto5229]

If you're giving Marth credit for the villages then I feel like you have to give Sophia credit for the guiding ring and tbh I'd rather have half a pair of boots in chapter 21/promotion item for lugh or lilina than anything any other unit in worst of the worst and a majority of fun meme tier units

[@DaniDoyle]

The difference (in my view) is Marth has to go around the map for villages, intentionally moving to specific points, while Sophia only has to move with your army since the ring is at the end if the map, near the throne, and in order to stay alive she has to do anyway thanks to the brigand reinforcements.

[@sohn7767]

Virion justice let’s fucking go

[@twinkie69420]

The only generic that outclasses Flora is Rallyman and she's definitely better than Nyx.

[@twinkie69420]

@@krows-love You could make that argument for so many units though, Nyx is severely outclassed by Ophelia but she's still somehow higher than Flora even though she has a lot more utility and doesn't require training.

[@nachohangover5104]

Nyx can promote pretty easily and has a few chapters of performing well as a Dark Knight. And then transition to being a good pair-up bot. In Conquest. Rev she's just trash lol

[@twinkie69420]

@@nachohangover5104 But she's not even a good pair up bot compared to units like Charlotte or Severa... maybe on Leo but he's mid af too

[@twinkie69420]

@@krows-love Well idk because I've used her in my three conquest lunatic runs and she's been amazing every time

[@twinkie69420]

@@krows-love We're talking about how good a unit is and I'm sharing my experience with said unit.

[@Lagoon4296]

Loved the tierlists! However your Lapis and Diamant comparisons are pretty bad. You had said that Diamant's strength growth is slightly better than Lapis' and that Lapis' Speed growth is slightly better than Diamant's. That's a pretty big fallacy, Lapis has 1 more base STR and Diamant has 5% more STR growth, a 5% difference is 20 levels for a single point. Meanwhile Lapis has 2 more base SPD and 15% more SPD growth than Diamant (comparing lv2 promoted Lapis vs lv1 promoted Diamant, he recruits at lvl 11 so 1 more internal level). Late-game she has WAY more SPD than him. It's also a pretty unfair comparison to say that Lapis' SPD advantage is made up by Diamant's BLD advantage. Diamant has an abysmal 20% DEX growth, and while he does have good base DEX that carries him early-game, late-game he can't use that BLD because axes have low HIT and he doesn't have the DEX to make up for that. Meanwhile Lapis eventually suffers 0-2 SPD loss depending on what weapons you use her with, this does not fill the SPD chasm that is the difference in SPD between her and Diamant. Lapis and Diamant is a bad comparison to make, she blows him so far out of the water it isn't funny. Chloe and Lapis on the other hand is a much better comparison. Their stats/growths are actually almost identical. They have the exact same STR/SPD growths, while Chloe has 20% more HP and 5% more MAG/DEX, and Lapis has 5% more DEF/RES growth. Chloe has -1.6 STR and +0.55 SPD compared to Lapis (assuming same class), and that difference never changes as they have the same growths. Chloe is considered one of the best units in the game btw. The main reason Lapis gets overlooked is that Chloe is gotten earlier, has a the HP growth of a bruiser for some reason, and her personal skill is slightly better... and that there is a critical lack of Master Seals early on. Alear is taking one seal, Chloe is taking another seal, and then all the rest of your units fight over the scant few remaining early-game. Also in the first video you said it was much easier to fix SPD than damage. This is actually just wrong. Pre-Well I could be convinced due to Speedtaker being abnormally cheap and most other skills being out of reach. However with the Ancient Well, absolutely not. Sword/Lance/Axe power gives you +10 damage, Bravery+/Blue Skies+ gives 5 true damage, Lunar/Eclipse Brace+ gives 30% of a foes DEF as damage, I could go on (there are a lot more damage boosting skills). Meanwhile SPD fixing only has Speedtaker... and SPD +5, which STR/MAG also have. If your lacking damage and don't want to use skill slots you also have weapon forging/engraving, heck you can even trade some SPD for damage by using a heavier but stronger weapon. If your lacking SPD and don't want to use skill slots... what can you do? I don't mind that you have Lapis in "Outclassed but still fine", because that's barely kinda true thanks to Chloe (the difference is so little that it's hard to call it "outclassed"). What I do mind is that she is in this list to begin with, this is a "WORST Fire Emblem Units" tier list and most of your reasons for her being here are fallacies and disingenuous comparisons, meanwhile she blows half the cast out of the water. Sorry if the tone of my post is slightly hostile sounding, my writing has gotten pretty stiff lately (I blame university papers) I actually really enjoy your tierlists.

[@monopolyrubix1875]

Fun listen, but the background music during the Mercedes section was obnoxious. Too many wubs and pseudofart sounds.

[@DaniDoyle]

thanks for your feedback. The song is "Halffire Peaks" from Banjo Tooie, I'll avoid using it in future videos (it might be in ones ive already edited but i dont think so)

[@seasaltsky]

1:32:00 "people will defend Donnel as a dad, because he can give Pegasus Knight to his kid" wait wait wait, what? what??? I thought Pegasus was genderlocked to girls in Awakening??? quick edit: i looked it up, Donnel doesn't even have Pegasus Knight as a reclass option. are you SURE he gives it to his kid?

[@DaniDoyle]

Donnel gives Pegasus to his daughters because Fighter is locked to males

[@davidschmied667]

Yes, because he has the male-genderlocked fighter class so his daughters get pegasus knight as a substitute for that.

[@seasaltsky]

@@DaniDoyle "because Fighter is locked to males" AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

[@typicalgalaxy087]

girls will get pegasus and troubadour from donnel’s fighter and villager. in practice his troubadour will be pretty worthless because henry and gregor also give troubadour (from their barbarian) and have better stats. the girls that can get pegasus knight are kjelle, nah and noire. donnel also has to compete with gaius who also gives pegasus knight (from his fighter). noire and nah join too late to get galeforce and also have to deal with e rank lances/tomes. leaving only kjelle who has c rank lances and can inherit discipline to make the galeforce grind simpler.

[@SharurFoF]

"It's about the journey, not the destination." Journey before destination, yes, but strength before weakness and life before death. That's a 2-1 win for prepromotes imo.

[@seasaltsky]

Virion good

[@boulderfrogboulderfrog6512]

I think I disagree a bit on the lapis diamant comparison. Build is basically speed up until a point, and imo that point is when lapis can wield steel weapons without being slowed down. Past that point lapis just has better speed, and diamant will be able to maintain his lower speed with more damaging weapons. To that end, I still think lapis scales better as a damage dealer into the mid to late game than diamant does, since she's going to be doubling at lower investment than he is.

[@DaniDoyle]

It takes on average 30 levels for wyvern lapis to not be weighted down by a steel sword. By the time you train a unit 30 levels, steel swords are unlikely to be your go-to weapon

[@boulderfrogboulderfrog6512]

@@DaniDoyle I disagree. They're way cheaper to forge than silver and have at least in my experience served perfectly well until the end of the game.

[@boulderfrogboulderfrog6512]

@@waddledottz I dunno man, master seal her to hero with a weight fixed steel sword and she's immediately going toe to toe with promoted chloe for one rounds

[@thorscape3879]

3H has very interesting unit building. Unfortunately, doing that requires playing 3H which is mind-numbing and soul-crushing.

[@MayorofHopeville]

I'm starting a Virion Hater Club. Comedic overreaction to his mid-ness.

[@ohandthefracking]

dont know why Echoes Sonia isnt on this list lol

[@DaniDoyle]

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