Unit Design 101 - Armor Knights

Welcome to Unit Design 101, where we break down the overall factors that make units useful in Fire Emblem and beyond. Whether you're a romhack creator or merely interested in overall design, this resource is for you.
Armor knights are often hated on, but what really makes them seem so bad, and can they ever become good? Is it mobility? Is it defense? Let's talk about how they work.
Check out ‪@DaniDoyle‬ and ‪@akirasou‬ 's videos talking about their thoughts on whether extra mobility would work to solve Armor Knight's problems!
• Armor Knights Deserve ...
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[@EnigmaticMrL]

Also worth noting is that in GBA Fire Emblem (and FE3 I belive?), your armor knights are actively competing against your cavalry units for Knight Crest promotion items. Despite possessing more strength and defense on average, the armor units often deal less damage due to failing to double and run the risk of taking more damage if they get doubled. Add in mounted units' superior mobility and resistance and it can be off putting to raise an armor knight even if you want to meme around a little bit.

[@MythrilZenith]

Yeah, much as I appreciate the way class specific promotion items encorage a more diverse army, having both armors and cavs fighting for the same promo item, especially when you usually have many more cavs than crests anyway, practically guarantees most armors aren't seeing promotion unless they're MUCH stronger.

[@CyberDagger003]

@@MythrilZenith Early promoted Oswin is a beast, but he's the exception, not the rule. Most of the time you're going to focus on the cavalry units first, and when you get to the knights they've fallen so far behind you're likely to just bench them.

[@ndimensional15]

unrelated, but I saw that pfp and I thought I beat myself to the video ??

[@SinNun-tx5jp]

Honorable mention to fe1 best early armor unit: Bantu

[@MythrilZenith]

Dragonstone defense boosts in FE1 go hard. Promotion item glitches go even harder.

[@Anonymos185]

I think the absolutely most genius way of making Armors viable was seen in Fates: Wary Fighter This skill takes away the Armor Knights biggest weakness: Low speed leading to getting doubled, and instead forces the enemy to fight at their level. This skill really brings out what the Armor Knight wants to be: The Armor still won't do *that* much damage, they still only hit once. And the gameplay doesn't suffer from their defense stat going completely off the rails, because they still die if enough enemies attack them, just slower than other bulky units. This is peak armor knight: A unit designed for tanking and baiting out physical enemies, who excel not in their offensive potential, but in their impeccable, albeit not invincible, defense.

[@Nehfarius]

Engage making them immune to being Broken is also nice. Other units can get the weapons knocked out of their hands, but not Generals!

[@MrWarpPipe]

Your statement at 3:17 summed up what happened with my Robin in my first awakening playthrough. Defense Boon Robin as a Great Knight took no damage from anything from like Chapter 8 onward up until the final map where only the final boss could make a dent in him. I ended up thinking "Why bother deploying anyone else when Robin with a Javelin can just do it all" and that's how I ended up with an accidental Robin Solo

[@MythrilZenith]

Gotta love defense. If you can get it high enough, it just works.

[@kingdyste5289]

Armor Knights are a unit I love in theory, but in practice not every game handles them well, in large part thanks to the reasons given here. One thing I think doesn't help is that in a lot of games the early game armor knight usually doesn't have that much better bulk than some other units, especially not your prepromote; Gilliam for example actually has worse Defense than Seth at base, and Bors only has 2 more than Marcus does. Compared to say, Louis who actually has a considerable lead over everyone to start when he joins. One thing I do like having for Armor Knights are movement assist skills, like Reposition or Swap; they can help them get to the frontlines much easier to protect squishier units. Of course, the availability of said skills can be an issue, especially since the one that I feel would be the most ideal, Pivot, isn't available to them outside of Heroes.

[@MythrilZenith]

Armors are #1 users of movement skills. Swap as their personal skill in Engage has seen more use than any other movement skill in that game for me, though that might also have more to do with me not really using the classes that have the other movement skills.

[@stardf29]

I think that armor knights, perhaps more than any other class, are designed for newer/more casual players. Not only are they a reliable way to bait enemies or tank aggressive rushes, but they definitely "feel" powerful to use. Then, later chapters can throw more mages and armor-effective weaponry in order to teach those players that armors aren't the answer to everything and think more strategically on how to use them. Later maps are also likely where higher mobility is more desirable. On a side note, I like your explanation of mobility as "placement versatility". Rather than just being able to move farther, one could say that the higher your move, the more spaces you can go to in a turn, and the increase is non-linear and makes the difference between, say, 5 and 6 Move greater than the increase between 4 and 5 Move. And that's just for one turn; if you look at the number of spaces you can potentially go to across two or three turns, the gap just increases further with higher Move.

[@MythrilZenith]

I fully subscribe to "Movement is the best stat" for a large number of reasons, and I'm definitely addicted to any movement boosting ability in strategy and tactics games I can get, but breaking it down from the perspective of a unit with limited mobility was a unique challenge. Glad it seemed to make sense for you!

[@orelas167]

Late chapter stuff is right! I only played FE GBA's ginormous mage-heavy last outdoor map ONCE. I'll never forget it.

[@georgethompson913]

Honestly a "guard" mechanic where it can take damage in lue of an adjacent unit would be neat.

[@alexpowell1184]

Lieu

[@agromchung]

So... Chain Guard like in Engage?

[@danielpatterson1576]

So, Chain Guard from Engage? Or Save skills from Heroes?

[@flintlocke1344]

As someone who generally plays at a slower, more cautious pace and disagrees with how much value the community places on keeping turn counts low, I like how you describe mobility as flexibility of position and low movement meaning a unit has to commit to one area. Oddly, despite describing myself as a slower player, there aren’t many armors I use often. Probably because, as you describe, armors don’t have a monopoly on high defense. My sword/axe infantry is often perfectly competent at holding chokepoints and baiting physical threats. Granted, I rarely play games on the highest difficulty setting (I tried Awakening Lunatic and found the experience profoundly frustrating), so maybe it could just be that I’m dealing with lower stats than most folks who care about the mechanics side of FE. Oswin is great though, especially on my current run on NSO where he’s insanely Speed/Res-blessed. On an unrelated note, I find it unusual when people describe FE games as having a “meta.” That’s a term that comes from competitive multiplayer games. Like, if I show up to Yugioh locals without any knowledge of the metagame, I’m probably going to have an awful time getting OTK’d and seeing all of my plays negated. Whereas I play Three Houses with no knowledge of the “metagame,” I’ll have a good time building my students into an army of diverse units with different loadouts and strengths. I will not have a drastically worse time if I run an army that isn’t comprised exclusively of wyverns and warpers.

[@thekoifishcoyote8762]

I think armor knights should be good at area denial. It's hard to justify using them if enemies can just run past them.

[@MythrilZenith]

So something like an innate Provoke skill but better? Or maybe some version of a skill like certain D&D feats where anyone trying to get past them will get stuck or have reduced movement? That's an interesting idea to play with, and would make them a much more strategic unit rather than a big ball of stats.

[@joelkasik8409]

Or for armor knights if an enemy tries to walk past them the armor knights gets an attack of opportunity

[@thekoifishcoyote8762]

@@MythrilZenith It also keeps their flavor, which buffing movement or speed doesn't.

[@CyberDagger003]

@@MythrilZenith Opportunity attacks are a default thing that everyone can do in D&D. Pathfinder, a game that branched out from D&D, did something interesting with its second editon. It eliminated opportunity attacks as an universal reaction. Some of the more martially competent classes, like Barbarian or Champion, can learn it at level 6 onwards, but it competes with other choices. The only class that still has it by default is Fighter, and due to its exclusivity it became a core part of the class' identity.

[@spacewardtrout6977]

I'm glad for the Gatrie and Effie shoutouts, as generally (no pun intended), being useful because I very rarely use armor knights but I loved those two

[@MythrilZenith]

The first time I played RD I was actually shocked at how fast Gatrie was. He became my second tier 3 unit (first was Haar of course) just because of how much he was able to body every enemy, both doubling and taking very little damage.

[@browserjunior4707]

One thing I wished a lot more FE games did was have weapons or skills that utilize your defenses more. Engage has the Sandstorm skill which makes Timerra a very fun nuke with her high defense and skill growths. It’s a skill that I feel would be great on giving armors the power they need to contribute to player phase, as rn the most they can do for Player Phase is to throw a javelin at the enemy. It doesn’t have to be as insane as 150% Def scaling but something small like 15% Bonus Damage based on your defense would be a really unique skill to have an armor unit in a mainline FE game (Heroes does this to a lot of units, both armors and fliers and while it works in some cases it’s mostly just flavor text for bonus stats). I think what they suffer from is how FE’s are generally designed currently, with very few defend maps and those defend maps not really incentivizing long term play or war-of-attrition strategies. Usually most defend maps can be solved by routing the army or attacking the boss to stop reinforcements, and most abide by an overly generous turn limit. I think personally if they incorporated multiple objectives in defend maps like protecting a point while also having to escort prisoners or some sort to an escape point (similar to what Thracia does), it’d be more viable to run armor knights. Rn the only reasons you’d run armor knights is for the early game where they can block choke points for reinforcements and that it

I feel like I've always been blessed when it comes to armored units. I've never really had a lacking unit of that type.

[@Anonymos185]

You haven't played Binding Blade, I'm guessing, lmao

@@Anonymos185 actually, I have! It wasn't as painful as playing Thracia or Genealogy, though I definitely lost more units to bad rng.

[@KhumiSunguard]

I like armor knights, usually they are very map dependant. I think they suffer from how FE handles combat in general, 1 rounding enemies is very normal and prolonged combat never happens so a unit with high defense has to be basically inmortal where others die quickly for it to have a "niche". Effie was a good example because she has that high defense in a game with low HP bases and very unsafe enemy phases. I wish there was a FE game where maps were more like FE4 with many objectives that can be achieved at different speeds and in different areas, where you are bottlenecked timewise by the victory condition, that way side objectives can be completed by slower units. Or even Base defense playing a big role that doesnt require high move. The second part is, higher HP overall. Armor Knights have a difficult time 1 rounding because they dont double and thats an issue in games where units CAN 1 round, if no one could do it then having a bulky unit draw aggro in exchange for less damage dealt wouldnt be so bad. Battles of attrition would be an interesting gameplay change for FE or other SRPGs, turning maps like PoRs "Clash!" into more interesting challenges that dont boil down to "Delete the army before they can delete you". Armor knights would be way more fitting in a game like that. Imagine making a wall of tanky units to clash with the enemy supported by ranged allies and having the squishy melees pick off enemies already engaged in combat. As it is Armor knights are good if: They take near 0 damage/Pair up/emblems exist that can nullify lack of mov/the game is extremely player phase focused and few units can enemy phase as a result.

[@MythrilZenith]

Multiple objectives across the map is weirdly both good and bad for armors. As very solid units that can often be self-sufficient, a map with multiple PoIs can be good for them, letting them take pressure off one side while your army focuses on another front. Though it then runs into the mobility issue where once you commit your armor to one part of the map that's basically where they're stuck for the rest of the chapter. FE6's Battle of the Bulgar Sacae map has a constant stream of reinforcements from various sides, which can be completely held off by one strong armor because their max damage is like 19 thanks to short bows and slim swords. With how annoying the city itself is to take on with all the randomized reinforcements, being able to completely ignore the flank is quite beneficial, and in FE6 the only units that can realistically hit that defense are your armors or Milady.

[@Death_13TH]

I appreciate that you don't make mobility to be the end all be all answer. I've seen it happen where people get so focused on using high mobility units, that they end up accidentally throwing them into a bad situation. I think a big part of what some people miss is that while true, Armor units (especially in GBA titles) had really high stat caps. That's all it was. Max POTENTIAL. Before you could just reclass to reset a unit's level, you always had to consider "Is it worth giving this unit that level up?" That same potential could also go to other units to help better balance your army. After all, what do you do if you (for whatever reason) lost your huge super tank to an unlucky situation? Back during the DS era, I ran into such an issue when it came to Shadow Dragon, one of the first FE games I played, so I quickly learned the value of sharing the EXP equally. Though I admit, GBA Generals win my vote for aesthetics.

[@CyberDagger003]

Your idea of positioning versatility is key here. It's well understood in game design that there is a tradeoff between versatility and specialization. While one unit may excep at one role, another that is subpar in it relative to the former will have the advantage of being able to adopt a different role as the situation demands. In games a focus on positioning like Fire Emblem, positioning is a role, and armor knights are positioning specialists. What can make or break armor knights is map design. It may appear counterintuitive at first, but armor knights suffer under linear map design, and they thrive in more complex maps. If everyone's rushing the main objective, the armor knights will lag off behind the rest of the units, unless they are so good that it is advantageous to have everyone else match their pace, but then you're not making use of their mobility and that's anti-fun. And yes, armor knights should be pushed in terms of combat performance, and I will proceed to explain why in the opposite scenario. Now imagine a complex map. There's a main objective for you to reach, but other secondary objectives sprinkled throughout. Villages to visit for rewards, chokepoints to block to delay enemy advance, reinfocements to intercept, multiple routes to the main objective that the enemy can use to intercept you if you ignore them and focus on only one. Cavalry and fliers have positioning versatility here, they can change which role they are performing easily. Armor knights do not, they have positioning efficiency, meaning they should be your most valuable asset, but one that can't be reassigned easily. And not wanting to make cavalry bad units, it stands that this contrast must be enforced by making armor knights pushed combat units. You will survey the map, and you will choose which role to commit the armor knight to on the first turn, and not deviate from it. And the armor knight will make that part of the map easier simply by his presence there, so the challenge will come mostly from other parts of the map. Your initial choice of where to commit the armor knight to will dictate your strategy for the whole map. The armor knight is the lynchpin of your progression, and your choice of what do do with the rest of your units will come downstream from the choices you made with him.

[@junihitomiya3182]

Once again TYSM for OSRS music ❤❤ definitely want thoughts on Great knights... Easily in my top 3 favorite classes. But I'm a tad shocked you didn't mention fe6 bors and Barth one being quick and dodged and the other being a stone slab. Very pleased about Effie

[@MythrilZenith]

The FE6 armors are a weird case because you have 3 knights and 4 cavaliers all fighting for one knight's crest, with the second one coming on Percival, in a game with some of the best promotion bonuses in the series. I think that if you DO decide to use the FE6 armors they can do a surprising amount of good, especially in Sacae, but the number of players who are going to choose to invest in Bors or Barth over Lance or Allen is very small.

[@alfredoguzman6269]

I know this vid was about the Armor Knight class specifically and not Armored as a mechanic, but the armored tag/classification in most cases exist to only be a weakness. The actual function of the tag is almost always just "weak to some specific weapons" and "certain terrain costs more movement". FEH of all things, actually bothers to have passives that interact with armored units that isn't just "this is efective vs armor/nullify armor weakness". Engage, as mentioned in the video, then came with the Break immunity for armored units. I wish they would do something a bit more creative with them. I'm not saying to remove effective weapons, I just want something new with the tag that doesn't exist for the sole purpose of them taking increased damage from specific sources.

[@jemolk8945]

You know what I'd love to see armor typing used for? _Ineffective_ weapons. Imagine if, say, silver weapons suffered half might against armor. Or if you really wanted to go all out, maybe you could have all physical, noneffective, non-legendary weapons outright do half damage to armor.

[@rekenner]

Isn't every tag a downside? They only really exist for effective weaponry.

[@jemolk8945]

@@rekenner Mounted sometimes comes with canto, and flying comes with ignoring terrain.

[@noukan42]

Honestly, i think one of the best thing they can do for them is, counterintuitively, to bring back the Jugdral mininum damage mechanic. It is very obvious that the devs are super afraid of the scenario where the armorknight just autowin maps by taking no damage from the entire enemy army. And thus they saddle them with far too many weakness. Mostl classes have 1 or 2, armorknights have FOUR(low mov, low res, low speed, effective weapons), and they have only 1 real strenght. Defense is just this overvalued as a stat, notice how noticebly lower it is among the playable cast. A minimum damage threshold makes so you never reach godmode even with 9999 defense and they can just make armorknight as strong as they need to be in order to be viable.

[@CoqueiroLendario]

hell yeah great idea, give my tanky bois some love!

[@jemolk8945]

Funny you say this, because one of my thoughts for buffing armors was to bring back minimum damage, but have armors be exempt, so they would be the only units even capable of taking absolute zero damage. Enemy mages alone are sufficient to prevent armors from just facetanking the entire opposing army, and if there's a guy or two with a hammer in there, even the best armors will need to be careful. Honestly, overpowered armor knights are a lot less of a problem for a game than overpowered wyvern riders, but IS is so much more afraid of making powerful armor knights. It's nuts.

[@noukan42]

@@jemolk8945 see, my problem is exactly that. Magic and hammers should NOT coexist as armor coujters. One or the other is sufficent. In fact i change i would do alongside it is to make armorknight more like shuckle than avalugg(Very High def AND Res, very low HP. This is also actually more "accurate" as an heavy suit of armor would insulate from elemental attacks but also severely limit stamina, wich is represented with HP in Fire Emblem).

[@jemolk8945]

@@noukan42 Personally, I think they should have very high defense, and average to slightly above average resistance, and good HP. I don't want them getting shredded like wet tissue paper against mages, but I don't want them easily facetanking it either. In my ideal world, magic isn't a hard counter to an armor knight; it's just something that hits them about as hard as physical units hit paladins. I also don't agree with the idea that HP represents stamina. It's an abstraction of all the many factors that might cause someone to lose a fight over time, from exhaustion to blood loss to the pain from wounds taken. And I think fights with tanky units should be more tests of endurance than the "find the glowing weak spot" nonsense that they become if you can delete them with effective weapons but barely even chip with anything else.

[@ethanm2926]

You ever hear someone say something so armorphobic you just gotta hit them with the real steel-plated stare? In honest, great video again, armor chads are far and away my favorite unit type I just love the concept of big armored bulwarks of the battlefield. I really liked the part talking about stats, how defense can become so warping when you get enough of it, and why therefore they need those weaknesses. Personally imo if I were to design a game with armors I'd either give them more speed, on par with like fighters and warriors so not super fast but not giga slow, or alternatively give them powerful utility. The promoted class is called General and I'd really like to see a game where that aspect of them get explored, as in they are Generals, they command and direct the group, they lead, they aren't as mobile but they're high priority linchpins of the army. Something like leadership aura or rallying defense of other units, or even being able to protect others with some kind of cover skill. Idk I have a bunch of ideas but nothing super solid atm Regardless great vid.

[@MythrilZenith]

Rally Spectrum for general class skill would be cool. I think it's such a wasted opportunity that the only rally Generals get is Rally Defense.

[@jemolk8945]

Armor knights are really cool in that they're so different, and different is interesting. Unfortunately, the ways in which they're different also means they're mostly bad. Their bulk is usually either severely lacking or total overkill to the point where more mobile units get almost the same or fully the same benefit. The additional downside to a unit having exceptional defense that you didn't really get into is that there is a point beyond which an additional point is completely meaningless. And the point beyond which additional defense is _in practice_ meaningless is often reached by weaker but more mobile units. You need to be really precise with your balancing in order to give armors the stat niche that they require to be useful even on well-designed defensive maps with chokepoints. For example, while I quite like using Gatrie in Path of Radiance, his extra high defense just doesn't generally matter compared to someone like a trained Nephenee or a paladin. Heck, Ike outstrips his combat and has completely adequate defenses, even before getting Ragnell. At least, this is the case in the difficulties I can actually play without hacking. It's possible Maniac Mode would make it matter by further inflating stats, but not much else could, and obviously that can create its own problems if you're not extremely careful. The game where I've found armors to be the most useful (in general) that I've played thus far is SoV, and it's largely because of the way Valentia does magic. Warp and Rescue being spells you innately learn and can cast for an HP cost rather than a rare, limited-use staff is an insanely powerful mobility tool that, once you have it, ensures that anyone can reach anywhere extremely quickly if you're willing to make the effort to set it up. This is, of course, undercut by how completely overpowered the Dread Fighter line is, what with unparalleled magical bulk, high speed, and the ability to dodgetank against non-magic attacks with Valentia's insane terrain bonuses, but hey. It _does_ still help.

[@MajinMattPlays]

Well, earned yourself a sub. It's super cool to see someone take a somewhat objective look at FE Gameplay that isn't tilted through a lens of efficiency or some other kind of arbitrary idea, and looking at the actual design decisions being made. Armors are a difficult class to balance, and I think they're taking steps in the right direction with Engage. Though, in my opinion, I think Armors could be a limited class going forward that you get 1 or maybe 2 of during a game but they're borderline overpowered outside of their low MOV to make utilizing them easier and more fun. Love the vid, time to watch the Myrmidon video since it's getting recommended.

[@MythrilZenith]

Thanks! Yeah, the FE community has a ton of people talking about things from every player-side perspective you can think of, but talking from the ground-up design side was surprisingly absent, hence how I'm carving out my niche here.

[@CyberDagger003]

@@MythrilZenith I've been considering making a FE-like game as a game dev exercise, and having this design-minded look at it is extremely helpful. I think I'm going to go dig a bit through your channel.

[@kirkofhazard5359]

Honestly, why haven't we had a game where the Jeigen is a general?

[@MythrilZenith]

Great Knight video will talk a bit about that (at some point in the future) but I think more early pre-promote diversity is a huge missed opportunity, and it wouldn't surprise me if General Jagen was a popular option in romhacks. It feels like such a natural fit.

[@ludgerkres.1437]

I remember using armours when I was very young. Oswin and Gilliam (to an extent Bors and Barth as I was a GBA player) were muchly appreciated when I was still learning the game. When I got older, using cavs all the time just made more sense. Even using Marcus more and more even as a longterm unit was kinda fun. Made me appreciate the Jagen archetype. But before I could learn all that, I had to use the armour knights to get familiar with the game first.

[@deadlypandaghost]

Good analysis. I find them very effective as enemy phase specialists who juggernaut their way to either a side or primary objective(if enemies are to difficult to go faster). They absolutely need the armor to survive being doubled by multiple enemies along with access to 1-2 range. If that baseline is met they really only get improved by mobility options. IE rescue dropping, liberal warp access, mobility skills, etc. I look forward to seeing what other defensive tools they will get.

[@EnigmaticMrL]

Many people enjoy using armor knights/generals. To them I say...more power to you! I often enjoy using early game myrmidons who might double, but only deal what feels like 3 damage per hit. So I have no room to critique others' playstyles. That said, I used to often try to incorporate armor knights into my teams because I like using diverse units of varying classes. But they usually didn't contribute as much as the other members of my team and "felt bad" to use. The armor knight would be the first on my team to hit the bench if my roster was full yet someone else joined who I wanted to use. Oswin is the only armor knight I actively like. The ones I find all right are Lukas, Valbar, and Radiant Dawn Tauroneo. Effie is better than most thanks in part to wary fighter, but even then never doubling felt bad. I find Louis decent enough, but I prefer to go Great Knight with him.

[@MythrilZenith]

Armors are really fun to use in certain positions, and in challenges and draft runs I usually try to draft one just to play with them bc I normally don't. It doesn't always work out, but sometimes I'm able to create some cool situations for them that I otherwise wouldn't have come across without a trained armor.

[@mor3gan285]

I really do want to hear more about great knights because on paper, it address most people's issues, but everyone says paladins are almost always better

[@MegaPokefan97]

I like the idea of Armor Knights ignoring movement penalties from terrain. Imaging someone like Kellam plowing through a fort's wall like the Kool-Aid Man.

[@MaddMoke]

I love my Armor knights. I am way more likely to turtle up in strategy games than offensively push my squishy units out there.

[@MythrilZenith]

High defense is definitely a very cozy way to play, and I don't blame you it's real tempting sometimes, especially in a game you're less familiar with.

[@AliciaWhimsicott]

It should be noted, re: Effie that part of this is that Pair Up can negate the movement difference. Since I can put Effie behind Arthur earlygame, she can move 5 spaces at once initially, and movement in FE is more important in the earlier turns to try to gain more map control than your enemy. Effie can also reclass, with Mozu's help, to a flying class, completely flipping how quickly she can move. Her speed growth is also pretty decent, it's just that Knight does not benefit her growth at all.

[@DrakonLameth]

I enjoy armor units in general in the FEs I've played, but the advent of Casual mode being a staple since Awakening and my concern of losing a unit in case I need them later, has lead to a lot less armor units for me in Awakening/Fates (all three routes)/3Houses than I did playing 7 and ShadowDragon. In the later, permadeath listed, a wall of high defense with your archers and mages behind, slowly pushing across the field is a strong thing. In the later, you just need the unit to survive an enemy phase with a healer nearby to top them up, so "some defense but isn't an armor" is good enough most of the time. I still /used/ armors (I feel an army is incomplete without at least one "please direct all your physical inquiries to my nigh-impervious carapace" unit), but I moved from "wall of armor" to a few bulkier units. Also, as you're going over units in general with this series, you'll probably come back to this point when you reach the advanced units, but the biggest thing that changes Armors is the titles that let them promote to Great Knight; they quit being "I'll just stay here and defend this forever" or the forefront of a slow-moving wall of defense, and become part of the mobile destruction force that are the rest of the calvary, ahead of the main line (even if they're usually like, 1 or 2 move shorter than your usual calv>paladin units)

[@mitchelnall]

Short term listener, first time watcher. You got me at the osrs music.

[@MythrilZenith]

So many good background tracks it's almost too hard to choose sometimes!

[@giraffedragon6110]

Something I noticed is in games where reclass is an option, characters that start as armor knights want to get a handful of levels in their base class, maybe even promote into general (or their equivalent) and then immediately switch to another class to keep 90% of their high STR, DEF, and HP. Some prime examples I know include: Kellam- whose unique reclassing of thief or priest gives you an unusually bulky unit of either type. His magic sucks but that makes it easier to spam heal uses. All 3 armor knights/Nobles in SOV: because this is Gaiden, you get the base stats upon promotion into Noble, then use a pitchfork to make them a villager, then reclass them into whatever you want (usually Bow Knights) it takes a while to do sure, but ANYONE can do it.

[@Devmon52]

Armour Knights might not be a great style of unit, but they remain one of my favourites. It isn't optimal to spend so many extra turns to get the unit to the action, but I love seeing a unit walk through most enemy units unscathed. In future Fire Emblem games, I hope there are more defensible locations and more emphasis on splitting the army to deal with multiple objectives at the same time. Oswin guarding from flanking reinforcements always felt like a wonderful use of the unit.

[@armorbearer9702]

Armor units defense can be game warping against common foes; however, there is a simple way to prevent this from happening. Mix up the weapons enemies use. Even the sturdiest armor knights need to fear hammers, armorslayers, and heavy spears if they are available. Unless you are playing Fates, there is no penalty from equipping these weapons. To a lesser extent, levin sword and bolt axes can be effective in preventing the players from sweeping with high defense armor knights. The weapons I mentioned are usually useable around C rank so they can easily be equipped by common mooks. Alternatively, a more radical solution for modern games is to give more enemies the Luna skill. In more modern Fire Emblem games, Luna halves opponents defenses. This is enough to make armor knights proceed with caution.

[@Aereto]

And encourage more clever tactics in later games like Three Houses Combat Arts, some of which allow change in positioning, allowing more aggressive and defensive options for the armored units that are supposed to be the anchor of the army or the advancing line that prevents flanking from cavalry units through chokepoints.

[@50Kat50Giri]

Armor Knights are probably one of the classes where the ability to use mobility boosting options get the most value. Effie, while a slow unit herself, is in a game where you can tether units to others that can ferry her much farther than she'd be able to otherwise, and she'll be ready to attack on the same turn. Through rescues and pair ups or even warps, you essentially get a character you can airdrop into a position that would put them right where they'd want to be. Of course, not everyone is Effie, but it shows how effective making the most out of movement strats can end up.

[@bigtimetimmyjim6486]

I have always felt that Armor Knights were "overpenalized" for their strong innate physical stats. I think it makes perfect sense for them to have low movement and low resistance, but these two drawbacks are extremely significant on their own, since it slows the entire army down to ensure the armor knight is at the front of the action and ensures that they have a hard counter. When IS decided to also give Armor Knights low speed, it completely neutered their offense and even undermines their defense in quite a few cases, and it is no coincidence that the better AKs of the series have at least average speed. Heck, Gatrie has great speed and great stats in general, but he is by no means overpowered because he still slows everything down.

[@charsage1036]

It's also worth aying with effie she has high speed growth which can eventually get her away from getting doubled by medium speed enemies also she has sky high strength and easy access to luna.

[@Laezar1]

I think armor knight are less affected by how you design the unit than by how you design your maps and your *other* units. They are heavily specialized so if that niche isn't valuable or other units can do a similar job then they provide little value. You can't have billions of defense map but having minor objectives that are better dealt with by defending a position or a chokepoint could end up making armored knight very useful. For exemple villages favor fast units cause they are pretty much side objective equivalent of seize. But if instead you made it so a unit had to stand on them for multiple turns while they're being attacked suddenly reaching them fast isn't as valuable as being able to hold the point. You could even give them a throne like regeneration effect to make units with high defense more desirable since the regenerated health ends up having more value. That's just one exemple but point is making sure every unit has something concrete they can be useful at in most map is important. Another aspect is experience distribution, fast lethal, generalist units will naturally obtain more experience than slower, defensive and specialized units. So having ways for your units to catch up can help them not lag behind and lose any statistical advantage they might have. bonus exp can work out but it can also be used to make your units that are ahead get fed even more. Maybe a more effective way would be to have side objectives contain higher level ennemies to make them both scarier and give naturally more exp than the main path, so units that are blitzing through the main path would be losing out on a lot of potential xp (but still making enough to justify doing it ideally) and having varied types of objective and side objective would ensure that everyone gets to engage in a bit of everything. Finally for the other unit design, simply making sure that the armor knight niche isn't filled by other units, maybe lowering the defense of cavalier units to force them to make full use of their mobility to really stand out, another option can be making anti cavalier weapons on ennemies relatively common while making anti armor weapons extremely rare, it's simple but it does help the armor knight stand out in it's defensive role. Finally placing mages strategically so that they don't invalidate armor knights but instead provide a threat that mobile units can deal with or limiting them to some areas of the maps. Having mixed attackers is always going to make a unit specialized in one type of defense struggle, so making sure to limit that or telegraph it in a way that's possible to react to would be very important.

[@GreatAether58]

I think Gatrie deserves some recognition in Path of Radiance too. One of my favorite things to do in PoR is give Gatrie the skills Provoke, Vantage, and Adept. With that combo there is a very good chance he will proc Adept and kill the enemy targeting him on Enemy Phase before the enemy attacks, despite the enemy being the one to initiate combat. It's so satisfying to watch. I also like to give Gatrie the Knight Ward for the hidden +30% Speed growth.

[@cyndit9054]

I feel like sometimes it's just fun to have this tank unit who just doesn't take damage. Like, I love Draug and general Amelia. They just seem so adorable and precious to me, so I don't care if they are ideal to use or not. I mean, Draug's name is just Guard backwards, which apparently still applies in other translations, and I love that so much. Also, you should definitely make a follow up video about great knights! I feel like they are definitely one of the slightly more rare unit types, only in like FE8 and most games post-Awakening.

[@VeXJL]

I don't think I can say Fates made Armour Knights great, but they do have a couple strengths. In general, Knight and General just have big unga bunga stats in near everything outside of Spd, Mag, and Res. Knight in particular has the highest base Str of any unpromoted class and it just so happens to synergize very well with Effie and what she wants to do in the early game, and also helps Benny with his shockingly low personal base Str. In Conquest, you can take it a step further and exploit the 0 damage rule for ignore strats, in which you purposefully stack Def so high to make enemies ignore you so you can funnel them into other units with more favourable matchups. If you have Shelter (like General Xander lol), you can also just pull in units to safety. It's niche and very dependent on the map, but it does help out quite nicely sometimes. I do have to say, Wary Fighter does nothing for Armour Knights in Fates. It's hard to be doubled and actually have it matter. There's quite a bit more emphasis in Fates than other FEs to kill enemies in one round rather than let them live with skills like Seal Defense, Lunge, Poison Strike, etc. You're ideally killing enemies before they proc even these skills, in which case they won't live long enough to even get the follow up attack off. And even if they did get to follow up, it's not like they'd do noticeable damage anyways since Knight/General already has gigantic Def. You'd have to be doing something wrong in order for Wary Fighter to realistically benefit you.

[@MythrilZenith]

I fully knew someone who knew Fates better than I do would be able to chime in here on this. Turns out I'm technically right but for all the wrong reasons, figures about as much. Fates is so different from other FE games in how to think about it that I will fully admit I just am not going to get things right about it.

[@brennantmi5063]

@@MythrilZenith I am constantly surprised in Conquest how well Effie ages over the course of the game as wile her ability to take hits falls off her ability to one shot things becomes more and more valuable. Since late game is filled with units that have to be one shot else you get destroyed by their skills, her huge strength becomes very valuable. I find it fascinating how she starts off as a primarily enemy phase unit who becomes poor at enemy phase but in turn becomes amazing on player phase.

[@MrEntinen]

Being in the middle of my first three houses maddening run and having well above average amount of hours in fe11, I have grown to see armor as something that performs quite well if enemy the stat bloat has been cranked up. Usually in FE the enemies just dont pose enough challenge to want proper bulk investment. The moment you cant just bum rush with paladins, they become real units.

[@nlb137]

I think part of the problem is missing that HP is part of the defense system as well. I see not wanting to give enough defense to reach 0 damage (though I think making min damage 1 would also help), but if we convert defense + HP to "how many hits can I take", they could give armor knights a much higher number of hits taken by giving the "armored" attribute a big HP multiplier (like 25-50% extra HP). (In games without reclassing you could just make it huge growths and bases, like 150% growth). With a bunch more HP, just 2-3 more points of defense than other martials can still give you a huge edge in hits taken before dying without nearing point of Def scaling where you suddenly take 0-1 damage and are immortal.

[@BTrainStudio]

Huge fan of armor knights. Just to add on to the topic, Berwick Saga have shields that armor knights can only use. Small/medium shields for more normal sized units and large shields for armor knights. Armor knights can also use skills like guard, which will take combat for an adjacent unit and protecting your squishies and choke points. I'm personally a huge fan of how it was implemented in Berwick Saga. In FE, my favorite is Effie. Wary fighter is such a good skill that makes them do their job well. She can reasonably tank magic which is rare in FE. I personally think armor knights should have exclusive items/skills to do their job. They should also not have low resistance. If the purpose of a tank is to take hits, I'm not a fan that they are extremely weak to certain classes or situations. Their weakness should be that they can be overwhelmed, which is more of a level design than a unit design issue.

[@MythrilZenith]

Removing the low resistance on armor knights is a dangerous idea. I think it works for certain player armors like Jade or Tauroneo whose identity is more that they have high resistance and thus are better well-rounded tanks, but when it comes to enemy armors nothing is more frustrating than facing a unit that no one in your army can damage. I don't think Fire Emblem plays well on requiring effective weaponry because unless you literally give someone an effective weapon mid-chapter you can't guarantee that they have one, and even if you do you can't guarantee they'll have a unit who can use it unless you ALSO give them a unit who can in the same chapter. And at that point you are basically building a tutorial level.

[@BTrainStudio]

@@MythrilZenith That's a fair point. For me, I like it if there are plenty of effective against weapons to counter armors. However, my issue with FE game design is that effective weapons generally are only good for killing that class and nothing else. There are not much workarounds unless you have the weapon and located at a good spot to kill them. Magic and elements is an example of something I feel can be multi-purpose. An example of working around not having an effective weapon is DoT damage. I like the idea of armor knights being weak to fire and taking double DoT damage from burn for example. However, armor knights can still have average resistance against wind/lighting/dark etc. Fire tomes will have the added benefits of burn DoT on normal enemies and double burn DoT on armor. This solves effective weapons only being used for specific situations. For melee weapons, I think having weapons that can ignore specific skills on top of effective can make it useful to have around even if you did not expect an armor knight to appear. Elements is a good one, such as carrying a burning sword or a weapon that ignore wary fighter.

[@Venomdrad]

For armor knights to be good they need at the very least: Good bases that let them tank to start and good strength/def growths that insure they will keep tanking. Knights that don’t have this tend to be among the worst units in their games like Meg and Gwendolyn. If your knight can’t do their main role, why use them over other units? Adjusting their movement to match regular infantry is an easy buff. It works just fine in Engage. Future armor knights would love +1 to movement and it wouldn’t make them broken.

[@BadAtFireEmblem]

Been waiting for this one 👀

[@jierdareisa4313]

I love ALL MythrilZenith videos!!!! ❤

[@frogwhisperer4268]

I wonder why armors are nearly always lance locked. Is it too strong or too unnatural if they also have swords or axes? It would also make the transition to 3-wep GK (or just 3-wep General) more smooth.

[@MythrilZenith]

Interesting idea. I feel like the lance single weapon is there to reinforce the traditional weapon triangle matchups (fighter > knight > myrm > fighter) but beyond that and the lance being generally the more flexible weapon type it's not really clear. Traditionally, lance-wielders in the player's hands have all been either mounted or armored, but with the newfound popularity of dedicated lance infantry in the playable soldier/halberdier class line (and variants) that necessity for armors to use lances is less necessary. Speaking of which, in the games that feature those playable soldier classes regularly, like Radiant Dawn and Engage, we do see armor units using other weapon types by default, though they are still limited to a single weapon type as a deliberate balancing choice for all base classes to have one weapon type in those games. We still don't see any base class units outside of some cavaliers using multiple weapon types though, so that could definitely raise Armor stonks.

[@just_a_cabbage7756]

Fortress Knight Mercedes is really funny because "haha sweet lady is tanking a whole army with her dress"

[@agromchung]

It's telling that both games with the best Armor Knights (Effie and Louis) also have huge movement tech options in the form of Pair Up and Sigurd. Also telling that in both games, the class falls behind in the latter half of the game. Low mobility really drags them down without any kond of mitigation strategy.

[@tanphamnhat969]

One question tho, do you think some of the base game armor knight weren't even meant to be an armor knight, where they are likely an early variation of the playable soldier class?

[@MythrilZenith]

How so? Stuff like Lukas and Forsythe are definitely built like armors. Units like Amelia I can agree with though, my favorite build for her is Super Recruit even if that's stat-wise the worst of her options just because it's fun having a crit Lancer.

[@tanphamnhat969]

@@MythrilZenith spotpass version of Nephenee in Awakening is also an armor knight lol. I meant that in those game where the playable soldier doesn't exist, I guess that some of the armor knight in those game were supposedly the soldier.

[@ZachHenke]

I’m not going to say, “armor knights should/shouldn’t be a certain way,” but I will say that it would be to my taste if armors were designed in the following way: Their main weaknesses would be res and mobility. I would have their speed bases and growths be average so that they don’t double or get doubled with regularity. I want them to be combat units with little other utility, so on promotion I would want them to probably have axes and lances to control weapon triangle. As long as maps have enough competing objectives you shouldn’t worry even if the armor didn’t face much threat from enemies because you would still have to extend your other units to complete other objectives.

[@juicyjuustar121]

I'm not really a huge fan of how Armor Knights are designed in most of the series, honestly. They're usually not good enough earlygame to warrant using, and fall off infinitely worse than a Jagen does due to their lack of movement. Armors like Oswin manage to get ahead of the curve, but even then, I don't like the idea of a unit that isn't a Jagen that becomes completely useless later in the game. I'd give Armors more STR, SKL, and DEF to make them more dangerous, both on the player and enemy side of the field. It'd give a greater incentive to use effective weapons and magic to beat them. I found that FE1 did this really well, despite the rest of the game being... Unfun, to say the least. FE1's enemy Armors were genuinely quite scary if you didn't have a rapier or other Armor-effective option; the main issue is that player Armors did not have the same luxury.

[@MythrilZenith]

Armors tend to be designed far better for the enemy than for the player, in part because of how growths interact with units and in part because enemy units are allowed to be as extreme as the designers want them to be with zero consequences beyond the map they appear in.

[@juicyjuustar121]

@@MythrilZenith Yeah, enemy armors can be entire mini-bosses on their own, while player armors have to be balanced enough to not dominate the game. Problem is that usually means making them near-useless even if the player chooses to turtle, outside of the examples you mentioned in the video like Oswin and Effie

[@ultimaterecoil1136]

Engage also had great weapons which was in particular a great boon to armor knights. On player phase when using them the enemy gets their entire turn of both attacks against you their weight is massive forcing most units to get doubled even if they are fast innately and even when using them on enemy phase lacks the enemies getting their full turn just then getting their normal initial action you still need to get hit to use them. However in return they have ludicrous might. Most units like carrying a great weapon for engage attacks but armors can just use them which gives them comparable damage to a different unit attacking twice when combined with general’s above average strength. This helps solve the problem of low speed greatly limiting your offense normally because in terms of offense it doesn’t matter how much speed you have when using 40 might silver great axe max forged and with a Roy emblem and even if it didn’t limit you from doubling as a mechanic the 20 something weight would. So maybe casually have weapons approaching 50 might with heavy restrictions that are less problematic for a slow bulky unit like an armor

[@MythrilZenith]

Oh yeah hard mode Louis with Venomous just didn't care about anything except mages and chain attacks, and was still able to kill on EP because of the frankly ridiculous base mt of an S-rank smash weapon.

[@grauenritter9220]

the issue with armor knights is they aren't actually that good at combat, and having high defense is not something that was going stand the test of time. Before we had skills, armors just have high defense(which is actually a good stat) or to compare with modern design, imagine them as having average defense but with a +5-10 defense skill. But we expect our units to do more now, just having an extra number is not satisfying. The other part i don't like about armors in GBA at least is that they are too heavy to carry. letting them be easier to drop off to a key point would add more gameplay.

[@MythrilZenith]

Surviving combat but leaving your enemy alive doesn't work towards your victory condition unless you are deliberately wanting to just block a point indefinitely, which has become far less common over time. Consider FE6 or FE11 where you sometimes need to make a safe space to hold out against a reinforcement flood, vs 3H or Engage where if you aren't actively pushing toward the boss you're getting overwhelmed. The armors I listed as "good" are ones that can actually kill enemies with regulatory (at least with some builds), which does make sense. Be that by actually doubling or by having the ability to 1-shot with certain weapons.

[@grauenritter9220]

@@MythrilZenith leaving an enemy alive after EP tends to be ok, but the armor knights in the games they struggle in tend to die faster than you would like.I generally don't need them to kill if they can survive or they can get to the point I need to.

[@CoqueiroLendario]

if i like using armor knights? I literally use arden every time i can i am right now doing fire emblem 6 foot unit only run and bors is my main MVP alongside Roy, getting in chapter 8 now!

[@ungulatemanalpha]

Effie is a solid unit in Fates, but it has nothing to do with being an armor knight past the first chapter or two where she's around. Her job is to do massive single hits with her absurd strength, which you can take advantage of via the Dual Strike system. She's basically a Fighter that uses a lance, and the early game of Conquest is well set up to emphasize how good she is at that. Then she can use the friendship system to inherit Archer from Mozu and become a solid Kinshi Knight later in the game, once the limitations of armor knights become too much. Benny, on the other hand, joins right at the end of the early game, and thanks to a combination of being too high level for the stats he has, his reclass options all being Fighter, and the way Conquest changes in the midgame, he demonstrates how and why armor knights still struggle in Fates, even with their mobility issues mitigated by Pair Up and the value of bulk. Enemy composition in all three routes of Fates quickly starts involving groups of mixed enemies with good bulk, which significantly favours units that have 1-2 range while being able to double (which requires good speed, too). Armor knights are stuck with javelins or hand axes that can't double in Fates. Other bulky classes like Birthright's Oni Chieftain or Conquest's Malig Knight/Dark Knight can use tomes (or the Bolt Axe, since their magic base is much better than General's). More generalist combat units prefer shurikens or the ability to swap between bows and a melee weapon. Xander and Ryoma get to cheat. What this means is that, even with his solid personal skill, respectable bulk against both physical and magical enemies, and decent lance rank, Benny simply doesn't stand up to what the game throws at you. It's too easy for enemies to hit him at a range where he can't fight back, and the Dual Guard system means that getting doubled is compoundingly bad (for the same reason that doubling is compoundingly good for your fast units). The one situation where Benny really shines is one of the most annoying maps in the game, Kitsune Lair. This is a very stacked case - it's a map that consists entirely of unpaired melee units, they all have cavalry effectiveness to prey on the other units you have that are similarly bulky to Benny, and you can't attack them on player phase half the time. Benny with the Beast Killer is perfectly positioned to take next to no damage from them and outright kill them in return. It's probably for the best that Fire Emblem isn't like this more often, though; that map is widely considered one of the worst in the series due to how annoying and unintuitive it is. People often go out of their way to remove Xander's beast weakness via class change to Wyvern Lord so that he can handle the job instead.

[@sagegang7439]

Considering armored units usually have pretty bad movement type on top of low movement, and they took away armors having 5 move before and after promo from fe3, maps definitely have to compensate for them being so slow in pretty much every aspect. Thats honestly why i would prefer them just having regular movement and more of a focus on multiple weapon types, or something like the smash weapons in engage which could give them alot better combat even with no speed.

[@isaiahtorok7079]

The biggest issue they have for me is not being able to bait units that deal 0 damage... if they point is that they have defense for enemy phase..... it's almost bad for them to level defense

[@orelas167]

I did enjoy it.

[@ness6099]

The best examples of armor knights are Gilliam and Oswin; you either come as a slow lump who struggles to contribute and get their share of exp, or you come as an unstoppable wall who can shrug off attacks from 6 different enemies at once, generally self reliant and even able to set up kills for both themself as well as the rest of the army at times. I like them getting shove/smite/reposition, but the real big problem with them in the series is sometimes they genuinely don’t get the stats they need. All three of the triangle armors lack somewhere if not everywhere in FE6, Arden struggles to break 100 hit without the Brave/Slim sword (though he’d suffer no matter what in FE4), and sometimes even “okay” armor knights like Brom and Kellam just don’t have enough juice in the tank to justify where they start.

[@IWestrada]

Armor Knight really suffers from reclassing mechanics. Can't have them be stat sticks if they either are spammable or the character with high stats can be reclassed to Wyvern.

[@Neenscrame]

Effie is an archer in a heavy metal shell smh

[@oof5992]

Barth Gaming

[@silversunset396]

Being noticeably tanky is only extremely relevant if the rest of the roster is noticeably frail, at which point it might feel like you're tearing a hole in the game just to slap an armor knight into that hole. It's not enough for defense to be your strength: it has to be everyone else's weakness.

[@jemolk8945]

Not necessarily. If your other units can at best survive, say, a round of enemy-phase combat, but then desperately need healing before they can hope to do it again, while an armor knight can survive multiple turn cycles on their own, that's enough of a difference. Or, if there's a section of the map with a couple killing edge swordmasters with capped speed, say, then would you rather send in a cavalier who takes 6 damage per normal hit (which would normally be pretty good) or an armor knight who takes 1? If a unit's defense is high enough, it can make them capable of going toe to toe with enemies that would be extremely lethal to the moderate bulk of the rest of your army.

[@wingofshu]

armor knights should have like 20 more DEF then they have in general or just general 50-70% dmg reduction and weapons like armor slayre should negate the dmg reduction and magic is magic

[@WanOlDan]

Hold up, there's a character in Fire emblem named "EFFIE"!? WTF kind of corny-ass pun is that!?!? 🤣🤣🤣

[@TheCherryTrader]

+bump comment for good content

[@MythrilZenith]

Much appreciated!

[@jasonpark1105]

Armor knights tend to be fundamentally flawed. Their lack of speed compromises both their supposedly “high” defensive prowess and their ability to inflict damage. Additionally, being an armored unit itself causes you to take bonus damage from hammers and other anti armor weapons. While the relevancy of this weakness varies from game to game, it is still a downside that cuts into their bulk. Additionally, the armor knights in most games aren’t just in a bad class, they are bad characters straight up. In especially the older games, a lot of knights simply do not have the personal stats and growths to compensate for their lack of move. Think of the Ostian armor trio from fe6. Their personal stats are so bad to the point where even putting them in normal foot move classes hardly makes them better. I would still not use any of them if they were all Mercenaries or Fighters. Heck, even as a Cavalier, I would be very hesitant to use Barthe. Essentially, most of the armor knights don’t have the high stats needed to at least somewhat compensate for the low move. The newer games are less prone to this, but only Oswin comes to my mind as a Knight whose stats are worth the lower move.

[@cocomunga]

I like using them. However, in binding blade they are trash

[@venus4211]

Ah the class I never use

[@ryanprjgamingchannel9437]

So in other words, Armor Knights can't be rebalanced to be usable in harder difficulties without breaking the trends of their intended design. Or rebalancing a lot of other classes. Rip

[@ng855]

Dink