Tier List! -- Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light

With the recent release of the original Fire Emblem game, Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, on the Switch, many people have been playing it for the first time. This is my personal ranking of the characters and a recommendation guide for who you should use to make your experience as fluid and easy as possible! But, still use trash characters for memes because memes are fun and fun is good (or for casuals, although I don't know who would've ever said that.

[@hycolm5899]

"Jaegan is one of the best units to give stat boosters to" So you're meaning to tell me that I shouldn't give all my the stat boosters to rickard? That's madness, I say, Madness!!

[@Mekkkah]

oh no i have competition

[@JustsomeKid93]

Hi :)

[@windmage01]

Step up your game then.

[@BlueOysterWizard99]

You're going down!!! 🙂

[@Bincle]

Quick,make your own FE1 tier list!

[@robleon6368]

Someone make a tier list of fire emblem tier lists.

[@edfmed1080]

Gordin is such a good unit, Kaga made him FOUR times!

[@jeremyelkayam]

FIVE POINTS!

[@McBurn86]

Nice!

[@sermartinlaw]

Marth is also an enemy magnet, I feel like that's extremely useful to exploit

[@OOKIEDOKIE]

Yeah that a.i always targeting marth is so great. Don't have to worry about things such as Caeda not having canto to get away from archers, or having injured units on the frontline.

[@ricardogarcia7808]

Very Exploitable if you have a tanky Marth

[@Bold_Bulma]

Ngl that reminds me of someone

[@silvertipstudio9622]

Yeah since he’s a game over condition the ai will start chucking javelins at him

[@Azari64]

the sheer power of the comedic timing of abel's death in the bg footage

[@carpediem6841]

I have a few big disagreements, and I'll try to go over them in order. My first disagreement is with Cain and Abel. You say that Abel's higher base speed matters compared to Cain's base strength, but I find that early on it's the opposite. Outside of the few hunters early on against whom Abel has a slight advantage (neither kill, abel does more damage since only he doubles, most units combine with either for a kill), most early enemies have either no speed or are theives. From my experience, the bigger deal is the extra strength, especially since against level 1 axe bros, against which you face quite a few, Cain is only 1 strength off from killing. Cain will be significantly more likely to kill them early on and snowball than Abel. For reference, with 2 levels Cain has a 51% chance of ORKOing axe bros while Abel has a 16% chance. Being much more likely to get this increase in combat, as well as being more likely to ORKO hunters (60% speed vs. 40% strength) makes him much better early on, and is enough IMO to make him the better one, despite Abel's other advantages My next disagreement is Jagen While he is pretty good in this game, I'd sooner switch his spot with a lot of A tier units than the other way around. For most enemies his base offense is on par with Cain's base offense, but with significantly worse growths, notably in speed, where Cain will catch up very quickly, and Abel is in a similar situation except with less time on speed and more time on strength. For refence, against the level 1 axe bros I mentioned earlier, where level 3 Cain has a 51% chance of killing them and level 3 Abel has a 16% chance, level 3 Jagen has a 19% chance to ORKO, and Abel will quickly gain on him. While he can use the Silver Lance to compensate, -20 hit is a lot even with his skill, and he has a real chance to miss even 0 AS enemies, around 70% to miss once with a double attack. And you get your first Silver sword right before you get Hardin, who has a better Strength base and an equal speed base, and significantly better growths in both. While his good defense and +1 move base gives him something on these units, It's hardly enough to put him a whole tier above, and considering how tough enemies can get later on, I'd honestly probably consider him worse overall than all the good cavs (I.E. Cain, Abel, Hardin). And he can't just get statboosters to fix his long-term problems, that shit is contested, and he probably gets none of it optimally. He can make decent use of them, sure but it's nothing close to free Cord>Bord. Both can use Hammer (Devil axe is only 4 wlvl axe which is bleh cause of weight), but Cord can double shit without it, and Iron axe Cord is objectively better than Hammer Bord at base against anything that isn't an armor, since Cord has equal attack, more hit, and more AS. The big reason I think Cord is better is because of the hit lead between iron axe cord and hammer Bord, and that Cord can double enemies without a hammer, but neither are good. Lena doesn't have anywhere near exclusive access to warp. As soon as you get Wendel, that shit is probably going right off of her, since Wendel has +1 move and better stats, which gives her exclusive access to warp for all of 2 chapters. Hammerne is still great for being able to repair warp, but it can't repair legandaries (I believe Regalila + Excalibur and Aura). I don't necessarily disagree with her placement for theoretical warp potential and Hammerne being great, but I don't agree with what you said about her. Ceasar is hilariously high. He can't use any of the good swords at base, and has a shitty wlvl growth. Sure he can promote earlier than Radd, but 1, that's comparing him to fucking Radd, and 2, if he doesn't get the Chapter 10 Hero crest he's promoting at the exact same time as Radd. I can see arguments for him being above Radd despite the wlvl (which matters a lot!) but C tier is insane. I feel like Roger is a little low, at least compared to Bantu, who you rated 2 tiers above him. He can do similar stuff to Bantu in Ch. 9 and 10, and can wield levin swords to do some shit in Ch. 13, which Bantu can't. He's not good, and the extra point of move Bantu has does matter, but I'm not seeing the big difference. Macellan is in my opinion worse than Jake and Beck, near irredeemably bad. Can't kill anything, not even armor knights with an Armorslayer, dies quickly to anything that can pierce his defenses (which at the point in the game he joins is a lot of shit), can't get more than 1 attack speed, and can't use any good sword. At least Jake and Beck can do decent damage to Wyvens, which sometimes charge you in a way that lets even them do something (Think Ch. 16/21). Even if it's bad, which mind you it is, Macellan can't even do that. Tomas does not belong in the F-tier. All bow users that can use Parthia need a manual, and it's by far the best use for it (It's the one with the least redundancy). With a manual/Parthia, Tomas can do some real damage, and can leverage that to get to promotion. There are even reasons to give him the manual over Jeorge and Wolf, since he can use the orions bolt to get better bases than Jeorge, which can help him be more effective against enemy heroes and Snipers, and unlike Wolf doesn't need growths. You can even meme and have him kill Michalis for just the cost of a manual, which is more than a lot of other units can do. Not a great unit, sure, but better than the trash in F-tier and honestly better than a lot of the trash in D-tier. Boah under Maria is literally unjustifiable. I'm not going to give a reason because TBH it's obvious why he's better. He probably belongs in A-tier because of staff shit and the fact he can kill Gharnef with Starlight + Geosphere 100% of the time. D-tier Midia is super cringe, I mean you put Matthis in B tier and you can't even buy the good weapons he can use until after you get her. You mention being good off the bench, so compare her to Matthis, Roshea, and Ceasar and tell me that she's not a ton better than any of these units, especially Roshea and Ceasar, who might not be able to use Levins or Silvers by the time she joins. And look at the difference between her and Astram. Sure his +5 speed and +1 strength matter but she can do a lot more in Ch. 13, especially with levins, and has +3 move. I think Arran also has similar points in his favor, especially since as no investment unit he can do fine, but I'm more fine with him there. Tiki is mad high for a unit that has terrible offenses against anything that's not a Manakete. She has 15 base attack with the divine stone. Jagen has better attack and speed with a Silver sword. Her defenses are good, sure, but there's only so much use for a transportable Wall, especially considering some of the maps left. She does no damage to Generals, Ballisicians, and Dracoknights at base, and like 4 to Paladins. There's only 2 maps left with enemy Manaketes. She's awful in Ch. 23 in particular because magic sucks for her. She also needs 4 stat boosters to kill the most important enemy manakete for her to kill in the game (right in front of Medeus, mandatory, same stats as Medeus but with demon-stone, Tiki needs +12 strength from base and +3 speed from memory to kill, which is 3 energy rings and a speedring from base. She cannot make up for the strength with growths). Not exactly a stellar unit and definitely feels undeservingly high unless you grind her. Those are my biggest complaints about the list. I know it's a lot but I hope you look over them.

[@silvertipstudio9622]

Have you ever thought of writing a book?

[@megakoopa2361]

A lot of people like to dunk on Vyland, and granted, so do I, but I think Sedgar is the worst out of the Wolfguard. Vyland has more weapon options being swords and lances, and will eventually grow out of his poor base weapon level of 4 with his 70% growth, unlike Sedgar with his 30% growth. Vyland also has the benefit of having a promotion which will bring him up to 11 speed and 10 weapon level, and 10 move. I also kinda find Wendell better than Lena, Lena only really has Hammerne over Wendell and with the Hammerne staff being so meh on FE1, you're only really using it on warp, in which you get a ton of uses already. (also, fun fact: Gotoh and Elice have the same growths) One thing about Radd, something cool about him in this game and in FE3 book 1 is that he has really high growth rates, so you can get him up to snuff relatively quickly compared to someone like Caesar , and I'd say that the fact that he promotes makes him better than Darros, Bord, and Sedgar. IS realized how overwhelmingly powerful Radd was in these games, because he was nerfed substantially in the growth rate department in Shadow Dragon. If you look at his FE1 growths and his FE11 growths side by side, it's the most depressing downgrade ever. I'd say Tomas is at least better than units like Roger, because of his hilarious base level of 8. Since you get the Manual, Parthia, and Orion's Bolt all in his join map, what a lot of LTCs do, since they usually skip Jeorge, is that they give him the manual to use Parthia right away, get him those two extra levels, then promote him right away, and he'd have better stats than Jeorge, which I personally find really funny. I wouldn't say Beck is the worst unit in the series, that honor still goes to FE12 Bantu who gets one shot immediately because of the reverse lunatic mechanic, gets doubled, has low hit in a game where hit rates are generally high, and doesn't even do a ton of damage, has nonexistent growths, has limited uses because of his Dragonstones being rare, isn't needed to recruit anyone and makes chapter 8 a lot more difficult. Also, Lorenz can't even use Gradivus, Generals are locked to swords in FE1. Weirdly enough, Generals and Thieves can't use Levin Swords either. Also, nice list, FE1 tier lists are so far and few so I'm glad to see would people rank some of the units.

[@DarkOfLight42]

you're really really awesome, i hope you know that! great video as always - so interesting to hear your experiences, opinions. and perspective

[@qlip_]

Darros deserves to be S tier, he does become Sail after all.

[@just-mees]

pirate promotion tree: sea dog -> pirate -> sail

[@gamerkyle2402]

I'm glad to see a good tier list for FE1, but the only thing that bugs me is that despite the constant praise of both the Paladin Class, and a high base weapon-level stat, Midia and Arran are in D tier. This puts them below scrubs like Bord, Roshea, Caesar and Doga, and on par with mega scrubs like Radd, Juliian, Darros and Gordin despite coming as pre-promoted Paladins with great weapon-level stats. Even if their availability isn't as good as the units above them, Arran in particular, I found them both to be rather handy units right off the bench, especially in an Ironman where a few of my higher-tier units were dead. They deserve to be mid C tier, or at LEAST above Roshea since he needs to eat a Knight Crest to get up to their level.

[@lyrefan6035]

Booty bopper makes the best thumbnails

[@topazlight1586]

Some things to be aware of! -Lorenz CANNOT use Gradivus because Generals are swordlocked in FE1, which is bizarre but nevertheless important to remember. They also can’t use Levin Swords for whatever reason, so they have no 1~2 range whatsoever. -Wyvern Lords have a whopping 14 base Defense, so any Pegasus Knight can gain solid durability just for promoting in addition to the Strength boost. -No unit EVER needs more than 9 Weapon Level for ANYTHING besides Parthia (13) or Gradivus (14). Bishops have… I BELIEVE 10 base Weapon Level so just promoting into a Bishop enables a magic-user to use any tome or staff that’s not locked to another character. -Mercurius, Excalibur, Aura, Hammerne, and Aum are all personal gear in FE1, so they can’t be used by anybody except their intended wielders.

[@MakoShiruba]

Promotion is RARE in this game, because Promotion Items don't actually come until close to taking Altea. However, quantity is never a "concern". You get 4 Paladin Honor, way more than you need(Cain, Abel and Hardin all use one...what's the last one going to? Matthis? Roshea?), 2 Orion Bolts(again, why, Hunters can't promote and you are never going to use both Gordin and Tomas), 2 Hero Crests, two Guiding Rings and two Dragon Whips. Now, here is the deal, is that the three earliest items you get are Hero Crest, Orion Bolt and Paladin Honor at Chapter 10 and 12 for the last two respectively. You don't actually get any other relevant Promotion item until Chapter 18, from which you start getting every other item. The only other odd one is a Hero Crest in 16. So yeah, Promotion is kinda limited. But you do get many of them. Is just that it comes pretty much at end game. So PrePromoted units in this game are kinda required to beat this game with any sort of confort. Otherwise you just turtle...

[@shadedhydra6674]

Zuki Oh damn Hunters can't? I've been training Castor since earlier join time and the two Horseman's bases were much worse, I mean luckily I'm coming up to recruiting Jeorge but that sucks that I've been giving kills to him cause I thought he'd be a better Horseman when trained. Worth picking up a Low level Gordin for Castor or just keep both benched?

[@MakoShiruba]

@@shadedhydra6674 Castor and Gordin have similar endgame stats, what changes for them is the Movement early on and later on. Hunters can traverse Hilltops, Forests, Forts and Bridges no problem, but Snipers can traverse shallow water. It's up to you to decide which is better. Honestly running both Castor and Gordin/Jeorge is nice. Just keep in mind Parthia sucks dick in this game because it requires 13 Weapon Level, way more than you will ever get in a normal playthrough unless you hunt a Manual in Chapter 24 in the Secret Shop.

[@shadedhydra6674]

@@MakoShiruba Considering I’ve put all that effort into him it would be a waste to drop him and maybe he could be decent with dealing with some Wyverns late game? May as well use him on my first run before I never use him again.

[@MakoShiruba]

@@shadedhydra6674 FE1 actually has wyvern maps so using archers and high def units is ideal, unlike FE3 where Wyvern maps were very limited until Book 2.

[@shadedhydra6674]

Zuki Ah good, there's some use for him then.

[@metalmariomega]

There's three main things I want to make note of that I don't think some of the comments in the tiering reflected. First off, all the axes have an extremely low wlev requirement, at worst one of the axemen might need a point to use the Devil Axe(if you're crazy enough for that). It should not be an issue for any of them to make use of a Hammer at all, aside from maybe Darros' poor hit rate. I don't think that affects their current ratings all that much though. Second, with how late you get the Gradivus and flier promotions, wlev and flier base levels are pretty much never going to be an issue for making use of either of those things for most characters. Just tossing javelins at the mage reinforcements in Khaedin while waiting for Gharnef to go away in order to nab the chests there can easily get Catria and Palla to 10 by itself, though there's enough terrain in most later maps to make it easy for fliers to dive in and out of combat at various other points for easy exp, especially with their good weapon levels to make use of everything from Silver weapons to Levin Swords immediately. And after handing one of them the Talisman, they won't have to wait for Barrier staves or waste a slot on Pure Waters to take on future Mages. I actually think the sisters should be closer to Caeda for actually being able to add to their Str and bulk more reliably after promotion, though she can stay higher due to all the bulky bois she can recruit(which gets you the items they come with even if you don't use the guys), even if she's stuck using a Levin Sword to do reliable damage for about 80% of the game(I found those immensely useful and they're buyable for a good stretch of midgame at the same time as Silver Swords). Third, there appears to be some odd bug where Ridersbanes don't do effective damage against Paladins, upping the utility of the class more than I was initially aware of(and making the Str requirement to one shot Camus for 42 damage with a Triangle Attack annoyingly high, the Triangle Attack being another thing unmentioned in there. You'd need 17 str with a Silver weapon, 12 with the Devil Sword. The Dracoknight promotion sets Str to a minimum of 9, and a Power Ring for 4 gets you 13 for a requirement of 4 str levels, which can take any promoted Whitewing 8-10 more levels on average, though if you're not in a rush promoted Dracoknights with a Res boost and their 14+ Def are unbeatable in the Arena and you can use the Starsphere to keep weapons from breaking, and a second Power Ring is an option if you are. That gimmick and handing Marth the Mercurius right before joining are the two main forms of utility Est provides in this game, though I don't know if that's enough to justify putting her over Wolf or Tiki). I'd probably bump Midia and Arran up slightly just for not having to put up with weakness weapons. Also gotta give big props to Manaketes for only needing to ever make use of 1 item slot, making them great intermediaries for swapping around items. I'd probably give Bantu a bottom B just for that since he's around so long to do it in, even if it's just a quality of life thing.

[@metalmariomega]

And if anyone's wondering why the huge rant in parentheses about Triangle Attacking Camus, he's easily the most dangerous boss in the game thanks to having Gradivus and enough str to instantly crit someone to death with it, and he comes right before access to the first set of buyable secret shop stat boosters, with enough HP to survive getting doubled or crit(but not both) by Excalibur or Thoron(and enough speed to avoid getting doubled by Aura). Triangle Attack is easily the most reliably way to take him out instantly without a chance of counterattacking, as long as you can manage a base damage of 14 unaided, the Triangle Attack auto crit will kill him instantly, but the mt requirement is pretty high. That threat level is something worth noting for things like Ironman runs where you might have to risk sacking someone if you can't do the thing.

[@ryangallagher9723]

marth also has a really useful niche as an enemy magnet, since enemies in FE1 will ALWAYS prioritize attacking him if given the chance. because of this, fragile units can survive better on the front lines if marth accompanies them. plus, once he gets the falchion, he basically becomes invincible to everything except manaketes, snipers, javelins, levin swords, and mages for the last two chapters (falchion seals all 1-range non-magical attacks from human enemies). yeah, i don't know the justification for that, either. i thought falchion was supposed to seal dragons, and yet they're the only enemies besides mages and bishops that can actually attack marth from close up when he has it. i think shouzou kaga was on acid when he designed this game.

[@luckyc4t110]

I found that Roger outpaces Draug at the time he joins. As far as the niche of Holding The Backline goes, a necessity that appears most notably in chapters 4 and 10, Roger becomes better at it when he joins in chapter 8. In fact, on Roger's joining map, he's better at holding the choke point in the mountain ranges than Draug. Draug definitely gets points for much better avaliability, but Roger is better at it for a longer time. Then again, Bantu blows them both out of the water, and is available two chapters earlier than Roger. So Draug is alone in the niche for the first five maps, and when Roger joins, he's one of three with the niche and the second best.

[@dargonthedrgn1424]

I just want to point out that despite the existence of generals, armor knights do not promote in this game

[@The_PolterGhost]

Important to note: 1. Cord and Barst are both capable throughout the game if they pull off speed growths, since a single Speed up allows them to start doubling. This does not make them great, but they are serviceable for the entire first half of the game, moreso than the Wolves in terms of survivability and damage output. 2. Tomas is level 8 when you recieve him. Assuming he has 0 growths when you promote him, he gets HP+2, Skill+4, Wlev+5, Spd+9, Def+1, Move+2. He can keep up with your army and double basically anything as soon as he gains an Orion's Bolt. He's got mildly better growths than Jeorge, putting them roughly equal if you're willing to invest 200 xp. 3. Maria exists in a post-Wendall world, and just briefly before Boah shows up, and has no unique staves to herself. She can use Physic, but when are you realistically going to use her?

[@RobotGuy405]

By the time I got her I had long made Lena my dedicated staff user. Imo it's the same unit, except one comes much earlier with a Warp staff, and than in that same chapter a Mend staff.

[@ryangallagher9723]

@@RobotGuy405 just use wendell bro (or boah if he's dead). healers are bad in this game and will never get a chance to promote unless you repeatedly expose them to danger. (i think kaga was on acid when he designed this game's mechanics.) if you want a staff user, you might as well use one that also has some offensive potential in addition to healing and warping utility. wendell and boah both have a weapon level of 10, high enough to use every single tome and staff in the game (not including personal ones like excalibur, aura, hammerne, and aum) with zero investment. they're also both stupid fast, with 14 and 15 base speed respectively in a game where all non-HP stats cap at 20, and since luck and resistance are non-existent on enemies in FE1, they'll hit hard and hit often, usually one-rounding or at least severely damaging most generic enemies. there's nothing wrys, lena, maria, or elice do that the prepromoted bishops can't except for repairing weapons and reviving dead units.

[@CottonCandyCrisis17]

You: put lena in S tier Me who let her die to recruit naverre: *sweats*

[@ryangallagher9723]

why the fuck do people in the youtube comments write everything like it's a script? can't you just say "wait, you put lena in s tier? boy, i sure was stupid to let her die to recruit navarre instead of moving her away from him like a normal person!"?

[@TheMangoMovement]

Why let any unit die honestly, it's not that hard, especially that chapter

[@silvertipstudio9622]

@@ryangallagher9723 it’s a format dude calm down

[@genuineangusbeef8697]

22:59 Maybe Serenes is wrong, but if the Hammer has a Weapon Level of 2, both Axe Bros can use it at base. 31:18 Wendell, Boah, and Maria can all warp at base. There's a decent amount of opportunity cost to do so, but it's by no means exclusive to her. Hammerne is exclusive to her, but aside from Mercurius and Gradivus, there isn't a lot to Hammerne here.

[@vincevodka9679]

Actually Hammerne can't repair the regalia weapons (Parthia, Gradivus and Mercurius) and both Excalibur and Aura

[@genuineangusbeef8697]

@@vincevodka9679in that Case, Hammerne sucks. Nothing is really worth repairing.

[@vincevodka9679]

Well, to be fair Hammerne can be really useful to repair items that you would not get later on, like Physics if you didn't buy a lot in the secret shop, as well as Warp despite you get like 3 of them.

[@MakoShiruba]

@@genuineangusbeef8697 Hammerne can repair Staffs in this game, since Staffs are "weapons" and not items. Thus you can repair Warp, Physic and Fortify. That's about it, though.

[@genuineangusbeef8697]

@@MakoShiruba alright, Hammerne is top tier

[@mitchellepstein9956]

Shadow dragon is fun but a fe8 randomized iron man with fun is for casuals run plaid in stream would be even funerer

[@rellim10]

Axe users are my favorite dudes, so I wish they got some more love in FE1, but I mean at least you get to use them once or twice unlike gaiden.

[@fouronetwo813]

I think you can use one throughout the game. I'm about to start a playthrough using Barst the whole time. I think hammers make it viable. I'll let you know if it goes to crap

[@rellim10]

@@fouronetwo813 Barst can hold up for a long time (easily the best of the bunch). He definitely falls off lategame for sure, but he can probably still pound some dudes anyway. The lack of axes really makes it a pain to keep using him though.

[@fouronetwo813]

@@rellim10 When he starts falling off I'll give him the Devil axe. Let him go out in a blaze of glory 😂 Might be a waste of XP but the games not super difficult. Marth is worth like 2 or 3 characters.

[@bongosmcdongos4190]

​@@fouronetwo813the best part about this is that his luck growth is high enough that one goddess icon will cap him. His devil axe will only have a 1% backfire chance. It genuinely lets him have that one last blaze of glory before you need to bench him

[@prodkwop]

I would say Sigurd is the strongest lord in his respective game but Marth is definitely up there

[@MythrilZenith]

Paladin move is 10 but cavalier move is 9 so the one point difference is less impactful than what you mentioned, but I digress. I feel like Jagen gets over and underrated in this game for all the wrong reasons in this game particularly. You made a good point that his class is good and promotion is rare. That is probably his biggest selling point, 10 move and good enough stats. What is best about him is that his stats are just at the right thresholds to hit everything you need. He doubles with swords, he leaves starting enemies at 2hp with an iron sword (or kills with literally any other weapon), he has the wlvl to use any weapon you want, his 10 move gets him places you need him, and his bulk is decent enough to take a few hits. People love to bring up that the exp system doesn't punish level or promotion and give that to Jagen's favor, but that doesn't matter. His growths will almost never proc. Even the 10% growths I think never proc because of a coding thing so it literally can never roll? Either way, don't ever consider Jagen as gaining any stats above what he starts with or what you give him with boosters. I would argue the first speed ring is better used on Minerva, who needs it to reliably double and has by far better bulk and mobility. Jagen is still good even into the midgame and with stat boosters he can continue into endgame but you discount the fact that after like 3-4 levels Abel, Cain and Hardin will be meeting or exceeding his stats in everything but maybe wlvl and the fact that Jagen is a paladin. As such I'd say Jagen can be whatever you make him but because he relies on those boosters that have at least one other candidate who really needs them I can't rank him S tier, but that's just me.

[@MythrilZenith]

Coming back and going on unit feel, too, Jagen just gets 1-rounded by promoted enemies. Granted, when you encounter your first enemy sniper and hero they will 1-round almost anyone, but Jagen gets perfectly 1-rounded by snipers with his 8 defense and 20 hp, and can't avoid doubling even by holding a silver sword since sniper speed is so high. So that's another point against him.

[@kai_824]

Looking at this tier list, Mathis REALLY needed to he moved lower. Sure his availability is better but overall Astram or Catria are so much better then him. Hes at least above Barst.

[@MakoShiruba]

Marth is gonna carry the early game when he face tanks Cavaliers and wrecks them with Rapier. After that, yeah, he kinda does nothing until Mercurius comes in, but by that point Marth is gonna just destroy everything with the Spheres and the Sword. He is an early game unit that carries better units into the midgame, where he will then take over once again and carry any other unit left behind with Falchion/Mercurius. He is fine as an S Tier. Maybe not like Best Unit overall, but he is deserving of his tier.

[@kai_824]

@@MakoShiruba matthis not marth

[@MakoShiruba]

@@kai_824 Do'h. Lapse of time. Still, Matthis ain't bad, he is tanky and gets huge SPD and STR lvls with promotion. He is a decent fourth pally. Just no space to ever use him with Midia, Arran, Jagen, and the Early Game Pallys.

[@bongosmcdongos4190]

One thing you missed with Est is that not only does she have a high weapon rank, she has triangle attack so shes trivial to train (unlike later Est's like nino). You can even triangle attack in the arena because the code for this game is wierd. It counts you as being in the space you moved from as well as the space youre attacking in. This means you can also triangle attack with only two whitewing sisters so long as you move the second one into position before you attack. If you 20/20 her she statistically should cap every combat stat (besides defense), which is a rarity in this game.

[@matthewcurcio2923]

So apparently I’ve been reading and saying it as “psychic” all these years when it’s not

[@ryangallagher9723]

my god why are ballisticians so awful in this game there are a lot of levels that seem designed for them having 3-10 range, like chapter 11 which begins with you zigzagging upwards through a mountain range with ballisticians on the other side and chapter 13 where there's a fuckton of enemy ballisticians facing you down, but they only have 2 range they're just bulky archers that can barely move

[@jackryan2952]

Sigurd is better than FE1 Marth

[@longsocks7798]

Bro idk he falls off kinda hard tho

[@AdamWithFED]

Falls off in the mid game. Bad unit.

[@lunaproc4913]

His res ain’t too good

[@conradcooper2710]

Yeah man, Sigurd is lit!

[@RobotGuy405]

See here the difference is that Marth is fire proof

[@soulmate5589]

yo this casual dissed kaga. take away his gaming license

[@bongosmcdongos4190]

I think you're definitely underrating tomas. He starts at level 8 and is the only real option for using the orions bolt. Promoting him makes him equal in stats to jeorge, but he has better growths. So basically you get a better jeorge for a 200 Xp investment

[@oofley8346]

My favorite activity in this game is putting marth in front of a bunch of goons in the late stages and watching them spit themselves on his sword

[@dimik6745]

I can get behind this tier list

[@printility9602]

“Swords are such a good weapon type” Never thought I’d hear that. Maybe that’s why they suck in other games, IS got scared

[@blaineb4145]

I had an only swords run (ds) where I gave all stat buffs to Marty and ended up with speed and strength maxed I meant Marth

[@ChoiceSnarf]

Whoa, Marty from FE5? Is he a secret unlockable? How do you get him?

[@blaineb4145]

Choice Snarf motherfucking autocorrect

[@astracrits4633]

@@ChoiceSnarf No, the one from Back to the Future. Marty from FE5 is version-exclusive to the JP version of the game. They replaced him with McFly in the US version to appeal to Western audiences. PAL players got the best deal, though; Marty O'Donnell shows up and unlocks the OST for the entire Halo trilogy.

[@basedgebby5820]

@@astracrits4633 it's memes like these that make me hate copyright laws.

[@astracrits4633]

@@basedgebby5820 As a fellow hater of copyright laws, I feel you.

[@MrMrphelps]

Having a chump like Matthis (whom is doubled by the generics he appears with) in B tier triggered me to no end throughout this video. Especially when better (though imperfect) units like Castor got stuck in C or D >:(

[@Aeddy35]

Cavaliers have 9 movement in the archanean games, not 8.

[@ericbumbarger7001]

I will never understand Kaga's massive bias against axes (excluding Thracia). One thing that I don't see mentioned often that is another issue against them in FE1 is the game just outright stops selling axes pretty early on with very little opportunity to get more until very late in the game in chapter 20. Not promoting is not the end of the world because of low stat caps and how promotions work but on top of the limited selection of axes if you didn't stock up very early on your axes users will become unusable for much of the game because you simply don't have weapons for them.

[@MakoShiruba]

Bows are kinda garbo in this game because you don't need the extra chip damage in this game. Every Axe user has 0 SPD and every Cavalier can be oneshotted by Marth with the Rapier(especially since Rapier is a common weapon brought with common money on common shops). Not a reason to use chip damage until the Mid-Late Game where Dracoknights are more common. Whenever or not Gordin gets to that point is up to debate. He then can get some use because he can use the Dracoshield and just eat damage from Dracoknights and bait Javelin Dracos. Parthia sucks ass, 13 Weapon Level is ridiculous. Either Gordin gets to 15/10 Lvl and BARELY gets to it or Jeorge gets to Lvl10 and barely gets to it too. Using a Manual is not worth for it too. But you might just use it just "because" and because not any other character uses it besides maybe Julian to give him a Killer Edge. I say Jeorge is the "best natural archer" followed by Gordin. Don't ever use more than one archer, you can clean Dracoknights with Magic better than bows.

[@aussakagamine8862]

I'm so confused Every other tier list, list jagen as bad. Every.other.list.ive.seen.

[@ProfessorBopper]

A lot of people reflexively say Jagen is bad because of his growths, but his growths do not matter at all. Everyone has a 0% res growth and 0 base, his weapon level is already high enough for him to use silver sword and levin sword, and luck is a completely useless stat (it doesn’t give critical avoid or regular avoid. All it does is give .5 crit and 1 point of magic avoid). He also gets access to the paladin class and it’s 10 base move for the entire game and he has perfect availability. No one else comes anywhere close to that (you don’t get a knight crest or another paladin until chapter 12). He’s going to be your best combat unit until Minerva + speed wing unless you get pretty lucky with Cain/Abel/Hardin’s level ups. And even if their stats begin to pass his, he still has paladin move over their cavalier move. Ridiculously good unit and only begins to fall off around the time you can begin warp skipping most chapters anyway

[@aussakagamine8862]

@@ProfessorBopper thanks for taking the time to explain all this really appreciated.

[@averageman7769]

@@ProfessorBopper Is jaegin really ever a better combat unit then Hardin? Hardin has 2 more strength over Jaegin for 1 defense, and that's at base. I actually find Jaegins strength kind of lacking in general. After chapter 5 most of his utility comes as a 10 move 9 defense tank.

[@Bincle]

Baffled by how you say Bord is better than Cord because he has better weapon level growth considering the highest axe weapon level is the Devil Axe at only 4 according to Serenes Forest. I've been using all of the fighters, Cord has 4 weapon level right now and can use hammers. I'm not sure if he could at base but oh well.

[@ProfessorBopper]

With Bord and Cord, I got my wires completely crossed with FE11, which I knew would happen at least once even though I had all the growths and bases and weapon stats pulled up lol. I gave as much thought to the axe bros as Kaga did

[@Scarcelynifty]

Hey I’m deep into the game and am stuck. I need to open a door and the only item I have to open it is the master key but it does absolutely nothing… is this a bug or something? Does anybody know?

[@ProfessorBopper]

Only the thieves Jillian and Rickard can use the master key. Other characters can only use regular door keys

[@Masood.Wafayee]

I hate hate hate that they made some units share portraits. That only tells me you created that unit to be a filler. Create characters we fall in love with. Making them all be the same with the only difference being swapping their color swap isn’t going to work!

[@bongosmcdongos4190]

Hardin is basically just jaigen with growths. Imo easy S tier, the +1 move on jaigen just isnt that relevant in this game. You only need it in a few places if you arent warping, and if you are warping then, well, you dont need his move for time sensitive objectives. Personally id switch them, but maybe im crazy. Id also bump barst up a bit. Good list overall!

[@jayck7686]

Was Rickhard origunally a female in fe 1 and 3 or his artwork only makes him look like that?

[@MakoShiruba]

It probably was meant to be a really femenine dude.

[@jayck7686]

@@MakoShiruba also in the original akanea senki in the mision of the robery at achanea's palace the game shows you some images with texts of the characters and things that happened before the "chapte" and the first image shows how rickhard and lena knowed each other and rickhard looks completely as a female

[@jayck7686]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/jXymdZeGadSGi6c

[@MakoShiruba]

@@jayck7686 Sorry, it doesn't look female. More like feminine dude. I'm inclined on this because in FE3 it seems Rickard develops a crush for Julian and Julian is TOTALLY not into him. If Rickard was a female, then he wouldn't have never fallen for Lena.

[@blankblank6214]

I gave Lorenz a basic lance and he couldn't use it so how does he use gradivus if he can't use lances

[@ryangallagher9723]

he doesn't. generals are swordlocked in FE1. i think he said lorenz could use gradivus because he was remembering his appearances in the remakes (FE3 book 1 and FE11) where he CAN use lances (particularly FE3 where armoured units are the only lance users in indoor chapters, making lorenz almost mandatory if you wanted to make use of gradivus in the last few chapters) and just assumed it was the same as in the original.

[@blankblank6214]

Is it fair to boost the tier of units that can kill gharnef because it lets you get faultchion

[@ryangallagher9723]

no. that's one chapter. their performance throughout the rest of the game is far more important.

[@Seloliva1015]

I gave jake the boots in my first playthrough, it was too funny

[@vincevodka9679]

Ok, so Bord hits hard and Cord is faster and that's about it. They are mediocre but at least Cord has a bit of an edge because Hammer is the lighest axe in the game, which allows Cord to actually double and can be help you if you are not using Barst. Also, Devil Axe requires a weapon level of 4 to be used, no 1, and Cord can actually use all axes but Devil. I also have other gripes about the tier list but I need to make a separate comment for that.

[@silvertipstudio9622]

Hardin has story importance therefore he must be good -kaga probably

[@blankblank6214]

I just finished FE 1 and just saw this video castor caped strength and ceada caped everything but strength and res

[@sergiosandres]

I am pretty sure Roger is better than Draught overall or at least I feel that way in my playthrough.

[@drunkensenseiii]

I like seeing your opinion on all these units. The only thing I disagree with is Jagen, I refuse to use him in any game he's in, right along with frederick in awakening. Lol. I ruined one of my playthroughs because they sucked up too much xp away from the rest of my units on maddening

[@imagiknight47]

Still haven't installed Dolphin yet. Looks like I'll be starting with the GBA games. Don't worry, I saw your video, dodge tanking bad (except on GBA).

[@joaquinkhourysilvestre2530]

Go to 2:36 to skip the intro.

[@starryslight7095]

Peeking in on this now that I've started fe1 myself 👀 gonna disagree up front and say screw Jagen because mine died on ch 1, bad unit !!! (i overextended him and threw him at the boss LMAO 1 too many axe dudes got to him before I'd unlocked Wrys)

[@starryslight7095]

OGMA!!!! I fell in love with him the moment he did his attack animation. He does that giant moon jump and it's cool!! Also he STRONGK!!!!

[@starryslight7095]

Ok... my matthis killed himself on Marth after crying for his sister... so uh........ who 😂 I did Not notice he was a named unit until he had 7 hp left whoops ! And Lena couldn't warp herself over to him so yeah we yeeted him, dont tell her

[@starryslight7095]

I'd argue that Wolf is really useful for chip and he killed some really scary wyvern riders for me, but he proceeded to get annihilated by a devil axe so,, uh ! Which was really funny after the earlier chapter Darros had a devil axe and missed 4 times in a row. Eyyy don't juke on my homie Radd! On the horrible chapter he joins he distracted some archers for me. Then managed to kill a guy who had 2 hp left. Then I benched him bc I still have Ogma and Navarre. He's... he's great 😂

[@starryslight7095]

Is... is my Hardin stat screwed,,?? He keeps getting doubled by cavs and his silver lance isn't getting it done and he's hit sub 5 hp multiple times, I feel like I'm using him wrong or something AAHH

[@starryslight7095]

"Minerva is the best unit to give the speedwing to" Me who JUST blew it on Cain this morning: :,D

[@ulkifan9022]

Were is the ulki

[@ryangallagher9723]

he's not in this game. ulki is in fe9. this is fe1.

[@coonrat1]

Lorenz can't use the gradivus

[@ryangallagher9723]

you said marth doesn't get weighed down by swords. this is false. he always gets weighed down. he just gets weighed down very little because swords are so light. nevertheless, he still suffers a penalty to his attack speed (not a very large penalty, mind you, but a penalty nonetheless). if a weapon's weight stat is higher than 0, which is 99% of weapons in SDatBoL (as far as i know, only the basic fire tome lacks any sort of weight), it will reduce the wielder's attack speed. there's no way to negate those penalties in fe1 like in later fire emblem games.