Soren vs Mia

Reposting in a new topic so it's easier to keep track.

This time I'll be bolding the funny parts or some new things.

Soren > Mia.

6/0 Soren
Wind
11.0 atk, 9.3 AS, 128.0 hit, 5.1 crit - - 25.0 avo, 20.3 hp, 2.8 def, 9.8 res, 6.5 critavo - - 10.75% Adept

6/0 Mia
Iron Sword
12.0 atk, 13.0 AS, 116.0 hit, 4.8 crit - - 32.0 avo, 21.0 hp, 7.0 def, 2.0 res, 6.0 critavo
Steel Sword
15.0 atk, 8.0 AS, 101.0 hit, 4.8 crit - - 22.0 avo, 21.0 hp, 7.0 def, 2.0 res, 6.0 critavo

On offense, def/res gap means Soren does more damage, except maybe if she uses steel sword, but she still loses att to the enemies with a high def/res gap such as knights, and she's slightly slower (although with 40% str/60% spd that doesn't last long). The important factor is how many enemies Soren is doubling.

For chapter 7, here are the number of enemies whose AS values fall within a given range...

0-5: 27
6-9: 5
10+: 1

So Soren doubles 27/33 enemies, and with more att than Mia he obviously wins offense.

Want to reduce Soren's level by 1 or 2? Okay. His AS drops to ~8. Which means he no longer doubles 5 AS enemies. However there are only 5 enemies who have 5, one of them being a priest so no one really cares anyway. He loses 1 att, but still wins raw damage per hit unless Mia uses a steel sword, where Soren would STILL win vs knights and merely tie versus enemies such as fighters. SO he'd still win offense anyway.

And he even has adept. As unreliable as it is, it's better than nothing.

On defense... well, it takes ~13 att to 2HKO Soren adn ~14 to 3HKO Mia. Most enemies here have at least 14 att, so that's how it is.

Now, for Soren however, he has constant 1-2 range, which means he takes far fewer player phase counters.

Mia has avoid and vantage. Neither are very significant, however. See, even with winning avoid, Mia's avoid is not terribly reliable (ignoring the hand axe fighter who IS obviously reduced its stats for, the lowest hit enemy Mia faces is a steel axe fighter who has 34 displayed hit on her even with her WTA. Unfortunately it has 19 att, so 11 damage to Mia since WTA, which is still a 2HKO). Unfortunately for her, there are only two fighters in chapter 7 (one being the lolweakened one, the other being that steel axe fighter). THere are however, 21 lance enemies, 8 being knights.

Vantage is reliable, but the problem is that at this point in the game Mia is extremely unlikely to OHKO anything. Chances are it's only going to help against enemies who were weakened severely on player phase.

Soren has a large res lead anyway.

Soren wins both offense and defense so he's winning.

So now I'm going to take a quick look at chapters 8-12 before doing more stats at ch 13.

In ch 8, Mia is generally only going to attack if she displaces another fighter at a chokepoint, a fighter that is going to be better than her (Boyd/Oscar/Titania/Ike). Soren attacks behind a frontliner so he doesn't displace anyone. Replacing someone superior to you <<< not replacing anyone, so Soren is better.

Chapter 9, the beach does have axemen, but there's several mages as well, and if she uses iron sword to keep her avoid up, she might actually have issues 2HKOing some of the stronger fighters.

Chapter 10, stealth probably, so whatever.

Chapter 11, lots and lots of tanky enemies. I clearly remember the middle (where most of the action is) having lots of lance wielding cavs and knights. IN fact, prog's enemy stats gives me 11 lance cavs + knights (there are 3 soldiers, but I think they were in the back with Jill. Ditto on those wyverns). This leaves us with a bunch of vigilantes we're not supposed to kill, two mages, two myrms, two thieves, two priests, and the boss.

Now who wins offense against the cavs (8 steel lances, 3 steel swords, 1 iron bow)? They have 11-12 def and 4 res (one has 5, meh @ that one). They also have 7-9 AS (one has 6 and one has 10, meh @ them too). Mia with C Rhys using a steel sword would need to be level 11 to double the 9 AS ones, which is doable, but with only 19 att, and 18 vs the steel lance ones, that's maybe double 7s or so. Soren at that level with Wind will double the 7 AS ones (12.5 AS with Wind), which is double 10s. Alternately he can go Elthunder and nuke once for 15.

The steel lance cavs will also have little to no trouble 2HKOing Mia, which is very bad news. The weakest steel lance cav (only one) has 19 att, so 20 vs Mia. This means it will 2HKO her until 13/0 (leaves her with 1.3 HP). The other 7 steel lance cavs will 2HKO her until 15/0 (leaves her with 1.1 HP). The knights are even worse, because the steel lance ones have 22 att after WTA on her, so they'll 2HKO her until 17/0 (leaves her with 0.9 HP). The iron bow cav has only 16 att, but it'll love to attack Mia because she can't counter it.

Sure, Soren doesn't do any better at tanking them, but with 1-2 range, he has an easier time staying out of their range by being behind a tank like Kieran or something, and he doesn't need to be healed every single turn after attacking something.

So Soren wins here too.

Chapter 12, Mia with the laguz slayer needs to be 16/0 to double 14 AS ravens. Unfortunately 15 and 16 AS ravens are fairly common, which means Mia needs to be ~18/0 to have 20 AS with the laguz slayer. This is so ridiculously unrealistic it's not even worth talking about.

And if Mia is supposed to be at this level, then Soren just stomps all the other chapters with offense that bests everyone except the prepromos. No, he won't double chapter 12 ravens, but a 14/0 Soren will have ~13 AS with Wind, as well as ~16 att, which means those 7-9 AS cavs in chapter 11 will have ~4 HP left after he attacks them. At this point they're so weak, ROLF of all units can finish them off with a forge, and everyone else on the team can kill them with any weapon they want.

So now we get to chapter 13. Since I've already done the numbers in my previous post I'm just going to leave this as is and add more at the bottom.

12/0 Soren, C Ike
Wind
14.6 atk, 12.0 AS, 136.4 hit, 6.8 crit - - 39.2 avo, 22.9 hp, 3.6 def, 13.1 res, 8.3 critavo - - 14.05% Adept
Elwind
16.6 atk, 11.0 AS, 126.4 hit, 6.8 crit - - 37.2 avo, 22.9 hp, 3.6 def, 13.1 res, 8.3 critavo - - 14.05% Adept
Elthunder
19.6 atk, 7.0 AS, 111.4 hit, 16.8 crit - - 29.2 avo, 22.9 hp, 3.6 def, 13.1 res, 8.3 critavo

12/0 Mia, C Rhys/C Ilyana
Iron Sword
15.4 atk, 16.6 AS, 134.1 hit, 6.1 crit - - 41.9 avo, 24.0 hp, 8.2 def, 3.5 res, 8.7 critavo
Steel Sword
18.4 atk, 14.0 AS, 119.1 hit, 6.1 crit - - 36.7 avo, 24.0 hp, 8.2 def, 3.5 res, 8.7 critavo

Same as ch 7, I'll take the number of enemies whose AS values fall within a given range to determine who wins offense. I'll assume this is ch 13.

0-7 (Soren doubles with Elwind): 10
8 (Soren doubles with Wind): 7
9-10 (Soren doesn't double, Mia doubles with Steel sword): 1
11-13 (Mia doubles with iron sword): 15 (most of these are ravens)
14+ (Mia doesn't double): 4

Against things Soren doubles, he wins against Mia, as he has more att due to def/res gap.

For things Mia doubles that Soren can't, that's usually using an iron sword, and Soren can simply switch to Elthunder for a nuke (granted, he has to make sure the enemy can't attack him or else he'll get doubled). Against such an enemy, like a myrm. 6 def, 3 res. This means Mia would do double 9s or 10s, while Soren hits once for ~16. Since myrms have ~25 HP, neither ORKO, and both will leave myrms in killing range for anyone else on the team.

Durability is about the same as earlier. Mia gets 3HKO'd by ~16 att and Soren gets 2HKO'd by ~15, so with Soren taking fewer counters and a big res lead he's the one arguably better at surviving.

BTW, want to assume higher levels for them? Go right ahead. I'll just let you know that it's more beneficial for Soren, however, as Mia's AS is already overkill, while Soren's AS helps push him above higher thresholds, and Soren has a much higher att growth (60 to 40) while having comparable durability growths (45 HP, 15 def to 50 HP, 20 def).

Mia can ORKO Ravens? She'd have to be at least 15/0 to do that since laguzslayer weighs her down and she has 17 AS at that point (note that some ravens have more than 13 AS). If Soren was 15/0, he'd have 18.4 att/12.35 AS with Elwind, which means he's actually borderline ORKOing soldiers, and ORKOs archers with relative ease. Mia with a steel sword at 15/0 has 19.6 att, so she falls short on them aside from a few archers.

Considering the ravens rarely even attack you in ch 13 while these soldiers and such do, I consider these enemies more threatening than ravens.

Down the line some more... chapter 18. I'm going to take Soren as 20/2 since this gives me whole numbers in all his stats (rather than 20/1 which gives me decimals everywhere), and likewise I'll make Mia 20/2. I'm pretty sure that by this point in the game, any level lead Mia had will be gone.

20/2 Soren, B Ike
Elwind
24.0 atk, 18.0 AS, 143.0 hit, 10.3 crit - - 62.0 avo, 31.0 hp, 7.0 def, 20.0 res, 11.0 critavo - - 21% Adept
Elthunder
27.0 atk, 15.0 AS, 128.0 hit, 20.3 crit - - 56.0 avo, 31.0 hp, 7.0 def, 20.0 res, 11.0 critavo - - 21% Adept

20/2 Mia, A Rhys/B Ilyana
Steel Sword
26.0 atk, 22.6 AS, 150.3 hit, 24.1 crit - - 58.0 avo, 32.5 hp, 13.0 def, 8.8 res, 12.8 critavo

I'm too lazy to pull enemy stats, but I'm fairly certain Soren's 18 AS doubles everything except the fastest enemies like SMs and maybe an occasional cav/paladin, which means being able to switch to a heavier weapon to 2HKO tankier, slower enemies is in his benefit. In other words, he ties Mia with Elwind, and situationally wins with Elthunder. So he wins offense.

On defense, similar case as earlier, although with higher crit rates Mia's vantage is a bit more relevant. Soren has staves now though.

Again, want to increase their levels? Again, it will benefit Soren more, as his AS with Elthunder is at a more critical level than Mia's, so more levels will let him double more enemies with this stronger weapon, in addition to having a higher pow growth.

Want to throw Mia wrath? It's still not going to change much. Her durability against 1-range enemies is substantially better, but it's substantially worse against enemies too tanky for her to 2HKO as well as enemies she can't counter. It increases her offense as well, but I can simply throw a forged tome onto Soren and let him 2HKO more or less everything anyway and with 1-2 range he doesn't take damage on player phase either.

And then once Soren's supports finishes, his avoid is actually fairly decent, which means he's durable enough against low hit enemies. Which means Mia with wrath would only win durability against high hit 1-range enemies (since it's not really going to matter against the low hit ones). Like here...

20/10 Soren, A Ike/B Stefan
Elwind
29.8 atk, 21.2 AS, 164.2 hit, 12.4 crit - - 82.8 avo, 34.6 hp, 8.2 def, 24.4 res, 13.4 critavo
Elthunder
32.8 atk, 18.6 AS, 149.2 hit, 22.4 crit - - 77.6 avo, 34.6 hp, 8.2 def, 24.4 res, 13.4 critavo

20/10 Mia, A Rhys/B Ilyana
Silver Sword
34.2 atk, 27.4 AS, 166.1 hit, 25.9 crit - - 71.2 avo, 36.5 hp, 14.6 def, 10.8 res, 16.4 critavo

To show how Soren's ~83 avo stacks, enemies with 100 hit only have 5.95 true hit on him. If he's 3HKO'd, that's a 0.021% chance of dying in 3 hits. At 8 hits he still only has a 0.94% chance of dying.

Switch over to Elthunder and 100 hit enemies have 10.81 true hit on him. Still assuming he's 3HKO'd, 0.13% chance of dying in 3 hits, and 1.07% chance in 5. Which is still not bad.

But in reality, enemies in ch 23 actually not only have issues 3HKOing, but reaching 100 hit in the first place. The only enemies who actually even break 100 hit are the SMs, snipers, the wyverns, the laguz, and a few enemies here and there using iron weapons. The first two can't even 3HKO, the last ones are a joke, and the wyverns only barely break 100. The laguz are scary, but then again, Mia can't even OHKO them with a killing edge crit anyway (aka wrath isn't really helpful here).

In fact, there's a tiger in ch 25 that can actually OHKO Mia if she's at half HP. It has 34 att, which means Mia at exactly half HP doesn't stop getting OHKO'd until 20/15, and she'd be left with 0.1 HP. It also has 49 HP and 20 def, so Mia is not OHKOing this.

On a side note, this ch 25 tiger actually resembles a tiger from FE10 3-6 HM, even though it's still worse overall.

In fact, here's something interesting to chew on. Let's say Soren is using Elwind, and him and Mia are up against low-middle range hit enemies. Let's say this enemy has 100 hit. So Soren would face ~17 hit (5.95 real) and Mia would face ~29 hit (17.11 real).

Now, let's say Mia gets wrath. Now her crit jumps up to ~76. Let's assume enemies have 6 lck so her crit drops to 70. This means that Mia would effectively face 5.133 real hit (17.11 * 0.3), which is only ~16% lower than Soren's hit rate, only he doesn't require wrath.

Which means that unless Mia uses a killing edge, her durability WITH WRATH against these low-middle range hit 1-range enemies is only marginally better than Soren with nothing. And she still loses against the tanky enemies and 2-range. Soren only loses against the high hit enemies, but these tend to be the laguz which Mia has trouble OHKOing with a crit anyway.

If Mia with wrath is not even clearly beating Soren in durability, and Mia's durability with wrath is apparently supposed to increase than if she didn't have wrath, then even without crunching any numbers I can infer that Mia without wrath loses durability to Soren very handily.

I'm tired so I'll stop here. but Soren wins at more or less every point in the game. So someone explain to me how Mia is winning.

Now there are a couple of other factors that skew this even more into Soren's favor as well. Namely, favoritism that Soren can obtain which has little to no competition for, or forms of favoritism he does better with. These aren't critical (you can more or less go the entire game without giving them one) but are more just icing on the cake.

- Spirit dusts. These are in extremely low demand, as the only units who may want them are Ilyana, Tormod, and Calill. An att boost is highly relevant as this can allow him to use lighter tomes, which keeps his AS and avoid up. The AS is extremely helpful earlygame as his spd isn't overkill, and the avoid is extremely helpful lategame as he wants enough avoid to be a dodge "tank".

- Master seals. Technically these aren't in "low demand" since people could use master seals at level 20 or something, but Soren is one of the few units (Ilyana and Tormod being the others) who would greatly benefit from an early seal, such as level 15 or so. This is because they not only get nice promo bonuses, but earlier access to staves, which gives them a much larger exp pool, as well as the innate usefulness of healing. In the case of Soren vs Mia, you could give Mia a master seal as well, but her overall exp gains decrease, while Soren's actually increases. Of course he level caps earlier, so his performance in the last few chapters weakens, but then again so does Mia.

- If we want to consider bands, Soren's much more likely to benefit. This is because he benefits from anything that gives str (less AS loss from tomes), mag, spd, and/or def. Since Mia already overkills spd, and really has no need for mag, she'd only significantly benefit from str or def. This means we're more likely to be able to give a band to Soren without anyone caring as opposed to Mia, since Soren can choose from one of 8 out of the 11 bands, while Mia is fighting for one of 4. Basically you'd have to argue for 8 units to take those 8 bands before Soren can't get a band (one that'd help him at any rate), while you'd only have to argue for 4 units to take the 4 bands before Mia can't get one.

- Forges will increase Soren's offense significantly more than Mia's in earlygame chapters. This is because he goes from using a 2 mt Wind to a 9 mt thunder with boht having 1 wt (or he goes with Elwind which is 1 more AS loss and still has 5 less mt than forged thunder). Mia, on the other hand, can only use forged iron until... chapter 14 or so IIRC, which is 2 more than a normal steel.

I'm assuming Int might respond to your post now that it has its own topic. In the mean time:

Narga_Rocks wrote:For the record its entirely possible this list could still undergo some major shifts. The way I see it now, though, is that Mia only goes down to Mid if she takes Stefan and Zihark with her, though Zihark would likely stay above Mia. As for Soren, if you can convince Int and me that Soren > Mia, he either moves up into upper mid above Mia or Mid would have Zihark > Soren > Mia > Stefan at the top of it.

As for Lethe, when I asked on SF what got Stefan above her someone said crits, or something like that. It's entirely possible if the swordmasters drop to mid Lethe could stay at the bottom of upper mid.

Comments? You can't simply make a comparison and not state your goals. Is Soren upper mid? Are Stefan/Mia/Zihark mid? Even if we ignore Mia's advantages (including any potential level lead she could have) like you want us to and accept Soren > Mia, Mia isn't dropping below Soren by herself.

There are so many problems with this analysis that you can't even get to the end of it, because the prior issues invalidate the subsequent match-ups, and conclusions derived from them.


Chapter 6 Soren is basically wishful thinking, because it requires five level-ups in three chapters. Yes, smash, we all see your bolded disclaimer, but that's not a rebuttal since you fucked up the stats anyway.

Ch. 4: Soren's debut chapter is over in four turns or less, because it's a Boss Kill that's basically Titania's (she's both the easiest to do it with and benefits the most from it, which is a slam-dunk in my opinion). Literally the smartest thing for her to do is just charge at him, since she has WTA and 90+ hit rates even with a Hand Axe. Easy 2RKO, with a non-negligable chance of crit ORKO.

This is good for the army, because they get rushed immediately by Lance-wielding Solders, and all you have for tanks to protect Soren/Rhys are Gatrie (who is good), Shinon (who just eats damage for free), and Ike (who does really poorly here since he's level WTF and faces WTD). Unfortunately it sucks for Soren, because this chapter is over in a heartbeat and he can't tank for shit.

Soren is level 1, with 7 AS. He can double a decent number of units, but only the Soldiers matter since he's unlikely to fight anything else. He can't ORKO any of them, even with an Adept. There's one guy that he 5HKO's. Someone needs to weaken for Soren to get a kill. Problem here: Shinon sucks at weakening because he has 21 listed crit and doubles goddamn everything, meaning he accidentally kills 38% of the targets he was supposed to weaken even when you sandbag his offense with an Iron Bow. Ike sucks at weakening because hit mt against Soldiers is lollerskates, he might not double, and he's getting 2-3HKO'ed at crazy hit rates so probably can't even afford to take the counter. Rhys can't even attack. Your best weakener is Gatrie, except he kills anything that he doubles so sometimes you have to put a Steel Lance on him and risk a miss.

Shit, man, sometimes Soren can't get a kill at all because the firing spot exposes him on Enemy Phase, never mind any of that other shit. This chapter is not conducive to training, and you're better off just Easy Buttonin'ing the thing for efficiency's sake with Titania.

Ch 5: Oh joy, it's a Fog of War map where you never know what's coming out of the darkness, Soren starts having trouble doubling, he can't handle archers or people with javelins, and getting kills is a dicey proposition since our frontliners are not tough yet and Soren is better for weakening than killing, to prevent counters to the likes of Boyd and Oscar. Oh, and the map is over in 6 turns, don't blink or you'll miss it.

Ch. 6: This is an Arrive that's over in 9 turns, and Soren starts so far away that you cut it close if you aren't using his full 5MV every turn. He can't venture too far out of the forest on Turn #1 because he's 2HKO'ed by almost everything (OHKO'ed by a couple things, hey at least he's immune to mages) and you don't have enough people to clear space sufficiently on Turn #1. You can't afford to heal him with Rhys, you can't afford to have Ike/Boyd/Oscar take too many counters, self-healing takes away his PP attack opportunity, etc. Yet another level where Soren getting much EXP is a miracle.


So now we're at Ch. 7. What's Soren now? Level 3, maybe level 4 if everything went your way? God help you if Soren got the least bit screwed, like having a ~20-33% chance to be stuck at 7 AS in this chapter, now you lose the 4 AS enemies as well, until he levels (maybe).

And then there are the environmental factors. For instance, the group gets bum-rushed by Soldiers from the south as soon as the level starts, so Soren is mostly forced to assist Oscar and Boyd, unless you give up ground, run away, or tap Titania to help. But Titania can go northwest to clear the Hand Axe Fighter, grab the chest key, and head west to clean house after leaving the Armourslayer chest to Mia and/or Ike.

And that's the other thing. Remember how you said that Mia can't OHKO anything with Vantage, so it's not that useful? Take a close look at the Knights in this level: if Titania messes with them using a Steel Axe, as she's running through, she leaves them at an HP level where Mia OHKOs them with the Armorslayer, at 90+ list HIT even with WTD, since they can't dodge crap. They are a very effective Knight-killing combo, which is an efficient way to clean up this map (might as well have Mia do something).


This is not to say that Soren loses to Mia in this chapter, because 2-range weakening is still useful for Oscar and Boyd, and Soren does do decent damage against most targets. But the point here is that his win isn't what you might think it is, and more importantly he has a level deficit going into Ch. 8, which is where Mia starts beating him.

That's why it's silly to say "oh, but Soren wins Ch. 7 at level 4 anyway" because you used his inflated level going forward, instead of his likely level.


Anyway, at Ch. 8 is where your analysis goes into cardiac arrest and never recovers. Ch. 8 is efficiently cleared as follows:

- Get the good people to decent levels. Usually means level 10, could be more or less depending on luck and circumstance.
- Forge Boyd an Axe.
- Boyd covers the East with his forge. He ORKO's basically everything he touches, Armors included. All you have to do is keep him alive and/or occasionally Canto in and preemptively kill an archer.
- Titania covers South, with a Hand Axe (optionally uses Short spear, but that's a bit of a waste if she's gotten enough STR by now anyway). She ORKO's like everything but one beefcake who has WTA and extra HP/DEF (she finishes him off on Turn 2 Player Phase).

We've got everything covered now but the West. Who do we send there? Mia and Ike of course, since there are two facings here and they can support each other. Mia has gotten a BEXP boost now, she is 3HKO/2RKO on the Armors, and she has her choice of a 5 or 8 or 9mt sword depending on the circumstances. When Ike and Mia have appropriate levels instead of pointlessly being thrown into the wolves at base, they do really well here together, despite WTD, and can plow their way to Ilyana and beyond.

Soren can't plug holes because he's still 2HKO'ed by almost everything, so he's left with PP kills and weakening. That leaves him and Oscar to float around and help whichever side is needed (Rhys as well), plus Titania later when she kills the boss on Turn 3 or some shit. But Mia does really well. The Armor AI fears her such that they will attack Ike w/Regal if given the choice.


Anyway, obviously the comparison breaks down thereafter. A properly-levelled Mia is ORKO'ing axe-faces and mages both in Ch. 9. She's not soloing it, and in fact pairs well with Soren there, but she does well regardless.

In Ch. 11, she can solo the southwest if she has to, grabbing the house and killing off the guys down there. OR staying back and helpign with the soldiers.

In Ch. 12, she's part of the fastest Rout of this chapter, ORKO'ing a Raven on Enemy Phase to prevent further reinforcements from spawning.


It doesn't follow that giving Mia levels means that Soren is awesome. He's really nice offensively, but still extremely fragile (levels won't do much for a 15% DEF and 45% HP growth, given his bases), and still moving at a 5.

For example, you can get him to ORKO the Solders near the start of the map in Ch. 11, but he's so fragile that if you don't kill all but one of them, he can die on Enemy Phase as he's 2HKO'ed. Mia's likely 3HKO'ed, and she 3HKO's back, meaning Vantage makes her invincible to a Soldier as soon as she hits him twice.

And if you did do that, he's out of the chapter forever, because he's never going to catch the Cavs that are curb-stomping their way to the Arrive square. You might as well use him to visit a house (which is hard to do, because he gets 2HKO'ed, durrhurr), because 5MV is useless at this point.


So your levels are totally whacked, you're underplaying Soren's defensive and movement issues, and you're ignoring environmental factors like the Ch. 12 clear. There's no point in even continuing. It may be that Soren is better than Mia overall, and that they need to be shifted, but it's not something that your half-assed comparison could show.

Paperblade wrote:hurr durr

No, I'm serious. They stand adjacent and help each other out. They aren't support partners, if that's what you thought I meant.

Anyway, fun fact about Ch. 8 west side, since you posted: Mia, properly leveled up, can be positioned to survive two Armor attacks on the first turn. She counters with Armorslayer, and leaves them both in OHKO range, letting you chop off the most dangerous part of the West Side on Turn 2 Player Phase.

Amazing the things that you can do when you spend BEXP and try to win.

For anyone who thinks MIa's vantage is still not totally useless against knights, do remember that we have to actually GET the armorslayer first, which is like in a fukkin chest. By the time we get it, half the chapter's going to be done already.

And, the armorslayer will drop her AS to 3, so she's completely useless against everything else. In fact, there are a few enemies which will actually DOUBLE her if she uses armorslayer. Which means it's only going to be useful during the last half (or maybe last 2/3rds of the chapter at the very best), PLUS the only enemies within range are armors that Titania already weakened.

Which basically means only one single knight, as Titania can only attack one thing on player phase, and if Titania did her weakening on enemy phase, then you should've killed them off on the next player phase rather than leave them alive for another turn.

Pretty sure we can ignore this whole point.


And now, due to popular demand, I'm going to do actual stats for chapter 8.

Since everyone loves throwing several levels of BEXP onto Mia, let's do the same for Soren. Assuming 4/0 Soren and base Mia in ch 7, and gaining ~1 level from those chapters, we have 8/0 Soren and 10/0 Mia.

8/0 Soren
Wind
12.2 atk, 10.2 AS, 130.8 hit, 5.7 crit - - 27.4 avo, 21.1 hp, 3.0 def, 10.8 res, 7.1 critavo

10/0 Mia
Iron Sword
13.6 atk, 15.4 AS, 121.4 hit, 5.7 crit - - 38.6 avo, 23.0 hp, 7.8 def, 3.0 res, 7.8 critavo
Steel Sword
16.6 atk, 12.0 AS, 106.4 hit, 5.7 crit - - 31.8 avo, 23.0 hp, 7.8 def, 3.0 res, 7.8 critavo

Like ch 7, here are the number of enemies whose AS falls within a given range.

0-6: 30
7-8: 6
9-12: 1
13+: 0

Then three priests, boss, and Ilyana.

Note that 21 enemies use lances. lolwtd for mia. And there are only 3 axes.

So Soren doubles a massive amount of enemies in the chapter already. Sure, Mia with steel sword can do the same, and with 4-5 more att vs hitting res, their raw damage is about the same except against cavs (which are concentrated in the south) and knights. The difference is that Soren's damage doesn't have to come at the expense of replacing a frontliner, while Mia does. In addition, Soren can contribute more often, since he doesn't have to heal himself nearly as often as Mia, since Rhys can't be everywhere at once and Mia will be spending lots of player phases spamming vulneraries.

BUT MIA CAN TEAM UP WITH IKE TO DEAL WITH THE LEFT SIDE. Cool story bro. Except Oscar pairs with Ike better (if Boyd is getting the east and Titania is getting the south), because wtfmassivedurabilitylead, wtfcanto, wtfbetterweapontype, and he actually supports Ike, unlike MIa who can't because this isn't FE10 where we can baby Mia by letting her take Ike's earth affinity. So I'd rather have Ike + Oscar roflstomp the west rather than Ike + Mia. Soren again provides backup for the east or west, most likely the west side (Rhys goes to help Boyd, loltitania). This is why Soren is better than Mia, as he doesn't have to displace someone superior to him to do anything.

To prove my point, let's say we have to plug a chokepoint. We have two frontliners, A and B, and unit C, who is a backliner (a sage or archer, or whatever). Suppose unit A is better than unit B at plugging this chokepoint. Obviously, unit B would be my worst unit, as putting unit B into the chokepoint over unit A loses efficiency. Meanwhile, unit C can still attack with unit A at the chokepoint.

Or expand it some more. Suppose we have three frontliners, unit A, B, and C, and a backliner unit D. Suppose unit A and B > unit C. Unit C is still our worst unit, as unit C will have to replace unit A or B. And again, unit D can still attack while having unit A and B at the chokepoint.

This is the exact same situation as chapter 8, except replace unit A/B with Ike/Oscar, unit C with Mia, and unit D with Soren. It doesn't matter if Mia can block a chokepoint better than Soren, as Soren doesn't even need to block a chokepoint to make himself useful. That would be like saying Mia blocks a chokepoint better than Rhys. Except Rhys doesn't need to block a chokepoint to be useful.

Unless you're saying Mia > Oscar as a frontliner, and glhf with that.

BUT MIA CAN 3HKO KNIGHTS. Only with the armorslayer, except it drops her AS to 7, at which point she doubles a grand total of 6 non-knights. Granted, there are 4 cavs with 4 AS (Though they might be in the south, so w/e), and 2 myrms and an archer also have 4 AS. So she just gets lolpwned in offense by everything, and BARELY beats Soren's damage vs knights. 8.6 + (8 - 1) x 2 = 22.6, since WT is factored before effective mt. Soren has 12.2 att. Knights have 13 def, 3 res.


Anyway, that's it for now. I would cover more chapters, but since no one has ever touched anything from chapter 18 or beyond, I think this is enough.

[...] do remember that we have to actually GET the armorslayer first, which is like in a fukkin chest. By the time we get it, half the chapter's going to be done already.

Armorslayer is in the chest right near where Mia arrives on the map. The guy with the key will probably attack Titania and die. It's actually pretty easy to pick it up.

And, the armorslayer will drop her AS to 3, so she's completely useless against everything else. In fact, there are a few enemies which will actually DOUBLE her if she uses armorslayer. Which means it's only going to be useful during the last half (or maybe last 2/3rds of the chapter at the very best), PLUS the only enemies within range are armors that Titania already weakened.

Which basically means only one single knight, as Titania can only attack one thing on player phase, and if Titania did her weakening on enemy phase, then you should've killed them off on the next player phase rather than leave them alive for another turn.

There are only four people with 7+ AS, and one of the is the boss. Who doesn't move. One is a thief who will never fight her. the other two are generics that can't kill her even if they got to her and doubled.

Also, Titania can kill something, Canto to park herself next to two Armors, counter them on Enemy Phase, and then run off somewhere else to kill another enemy unit. No need for Titania to kill the Armor on PP, and no need for me to use other units to do it, since I can just send Mia there and she'll clean house. Some call this... an efficient use of resources.

Since everyone loves throwing several levels of BEXP onto Mia, let's do the same for Soren.

We love it because it's so terribly efficient.

So Soren doubles a massive amount of enemies in the chapter already.

Again with the blatant ignorance of the environment. Do you have any idea how many of those units are ones that Soren is likely to face?

The difference is that Soren's damage doesn't have to come at the expense of replacing a frontliner, while Mia does. In addition, Soren can contribute more often, since he doesn't have to heal himself nearly as often as Mia, since Rhys can't be everywhere at once and Mia will be spending lots of player phases spamming vulneraries.

Oh lord, you have no idea how to efficiently clear this chapter at all, do you? Let me give you a turn by turn for the initial push.

Turn 1:

- Send Titania south with Hand Axe or Short Spear. Block choke.
- Send forged Boyd just to the west of the east passage. Put Oscar next to him.
- Put Mia in the west passage, Armorslayer equipped, in range of both Armors.
- (optional) Put Soren next to Mia, on her right.
- Rhys/Ike: doesn't matter.

Enemy Phase: Titania blicks the Paladin bomb, Boyd insta-blicks the Armor that attacks him (probably dodges too, they have like 20-30ish listed HIT on him). Both Armors run into Mia, and she leaves them with single digit HP.

Turn 2:

- Titania finishes off the scrub who didn't die (assuming she didn't miss the others), and Cantos near the boss witha Hand Axe in hand, ready to counter him.
- Oscar can run up to poke an Archer or something wih a Javelin, or he can take a kill out west. Player's Choice.
- Boyd runs up and kill another armor if he's healthy.
- Soren or Mia curbstomps one of the wounded Armors. Rhys heals Mia (Mend usually not even required). Mia or Ike curbstomps the other Armor. Whoever is left attacks the nearby Archer, who will get ORKO'ed if Mia or Ike got a little blessed.

Congratulations, Mia just castrated the most dangerous units on the west side, and all it cost you was a heal. Obviously, at this point it's a piece of cake to push up to Ilyana. Use Soren to help, or Oscar, or Mia, or any combination, have fun.

Oscar should probably stay near Boyd, though, for their Bond support. +10 crit helps Oscar considerably since his STR is too low to reliably ORKO here, even with a BEXP dump.

BUT MIA CAN 3HKO KNIGHTS. Only with the armorslayer, except it drops her AS to 7, at which point she doubles a grand total of 6 non-knights.

Yeah, let's just leave the Armorslayer equipped and randomly attack non-Knights. That's an awesome idea.

Oscar should probably stay near Boyd, though, for their Bond support. +10 crit helps Oscar considerably since his STR is too low to reliably ORKO here, even with a BEXP dump.

what the heck? The only people ORKOing are Titania, and Boyd vs certain enemies (saying he ORKOs with a forge means squat because I'm sure everyone will ORKO plenty with a forge in this chapter). And your reason that Oscar wants to stay near Boyd is because he needs crit because he's not ORKOing when most of the tema isn't either?

I'm not saying Boyd can solo the east by himself. He probably wants help. But he doesn't necessarily need Oscar. He can use Rhys for healing while Oscar goes somewhere else, like near Ike because they're likely to have a C support and +10 avoid does wonders for their durability. Or, Oscar can even tackle the south if he's level 9 and got a forge, because he can take a hit from all 6 cavs and not die, and ORKO most of them back. Why assume Boyd's getting the forge?

The main point is there are multiple ways to tackle the chapter, and giving one extremely specific example does not counter anything.

In other words, maybe you can get a strat where Mia can contribute just as much, or more than, Soren in a given chapter. But if Soren's contribution is greater in a larger variety of strats, why is Mia the winner?

Your strategy using Mia involves having forged Boyd + Oscar tackle the east, Titania solo the south, and everyone else going west.

But that's not the only strategy usable to beat the chapter. What about a few others here?

- Do the same thing you did, except Ike just blocks the chokepoint by himself.

- forge Boyd + Rhys tackle east, Titania solos south, everyone else goes west. Unfortunately Mia is pretty obsolete here as both Ike and Oscar are better at tanking than her, while Soren isn't obsolete because he has an easier time hiding behind Ike and Oscar while still attacking.

- forge Oscar solos the south, Titania tackles east, the others go west. Again, since we have Ike/Boyd as tanks, Mia is likely out of a job and Soren isn't.

- If Ike got def blessed he could even tackle the south with the regal sword. Titania takes the east or west and everyone else goes the other way (optionally one of them could go with Ike).

Why limit yourself to only one strategy? Fire emblem is flexible enough to allow different strats to tackle a given chapter. Mia's problem here is that the only strats she's really useful for are ones where a chokepoint she's not at has two of Ike, Oscar, or Boyd, and even then you can still just simply block the chokepoint Mia's at with the third unit (Titania takes the third chokepoint), since that unit is going to be better than Mia at plugging the hole, removing the need to use Mia at all. Soren can more or less go to any chokepoint, with any combination of units with him, because he doesn't get in the way as much.

Regardless, this is still only one chapter out of many, and I've noticed you, smash, and a few other people here dwell too much and put too much emphasis on a few chapters which don't represent the units' performance over the whole game. Maybe it hasn't gotten that bad in this topic yet (though given how smash is acting like an idiot and only bothered to cover chapter 7-8, that might happen, since you let smash troll you too easily), but in previous [s]flame wars[/s] arguments that's been the case. The whole thing would just boil down to flaming each other over 1-2 chapters in the whole game.

Comments? You can't simply make a comparison and not state your goals. Is Soren upper mid? Are Stefan/Mia/Zihark mid? Even if we ignore Mia's advantages (including any potential level lead she could have) like you want us to and accept Soren > Mia, Mia isn't dropping below Soren by herself.

I liked your order the best. Zihark > Soren > Mia > Stefan, with Zihark spearheading middle tier. Well, personally I think Stefan is better than Mia, but that would be nitpicking since even if Stefan did rise I don't see him being upper mid (I don't like his durability or the mono swords), or even being above Zihark, so I can settle with Mia > Stefan.

the great haar wrote:

Oscar should probably stay near Boyd, though, for their Bond support. +10 crit helps Oscar considerably since his STR is too low to reliably ORKO here, even with a BEXP dump.

what the heck? The only people ORKOing are Titania, and Boyd vs certain enemies (saying he ORKOs with a forge means squat because I'm sure everyone will ORKO plenty with a forge in this chapter). And your reason that Oscar wants to stay near Boyd is because he needs crit because he's not ORKOing when most of the tema isn't either?

I'm not saying Boyd can solo the east by himself. He probably wants help. But he doesn't necessarily need Oscar. He can use Rhys for healing while Oscar goes somewhere else, like near Ike because they're likely to have a C support and +10 avoid does wonders for their durability. Or, Oscar can even tackle the south if he's level 9 and got a forge, because he can take a hit from all 6 cavs and not die, and ORKO most of them back. Why assume Boyd's getting the forge?

The main point is there are multiple ways to tackle the chapter, and giving one extremely specific example does not counter anything.

In other words, maybe you can get a strat where Mia can contribute just as much, or more than, Soren in a given chapter. But if Soren's contribution is greater in a larger variety of strats, why is Mia the winner?

Your strategy using Mia involves having forged Boyd + Oscar tackle the east, Titania solo the south, and everyone else going west.

But that's not the only strategy usable to beat the chapter. What about a few others here?

- Do the same thing you did, except Ike just blocks the chokepoint by himself.

- forge Boyd + Rhys tackle east, Titania solos south, everyone else goes west. Unfortunately Mia is pretty obsolete here as both Ike and Oscar are better at tanking than her, while Soren isn't obsolete because he has an easier time hiding behind Ike and Oscar while still attacking.

- forge Oscar solos the south, Titania tackles east, the others go west. Again, since we have Ike/Boyd as tanks, Mia is likely out of a job and Soren isn't.

- If Ike got def blessed he could even tackle the south with the regal sword. Titania takes the east or west and everyone else goes the other way (optionally one of them could go with Ike).

Why limit yourself to only one strategy? Fire emblem is flexible enough to allow different strats to tackle a given chapter. Mia's problem here is that the only strats she's really useful for are ones where a chokepoint she's not at has two of Ike, Oscar, or Boyd, and even then you can still just simply block the chokepoint Mia's at with the third unit (Titania takes the third chokepoint), since that unit is going to be better than Mia at plugging the hole, removing the need to use Mia at all. Soren can more or less go to any chokepoint, with any combination of units with him, because he doesn't get in the way as much.

Regardless, this is still only one chapter out of many, and I've noticed you, smash, and a few other people here dwell too much and put too much emphasis on a few chapters which don't represent the units' performance over the whole game. Maybe it hasn't gotten that bad in this topic yet (though given how smash is acting like an idiot and only bothered to cover chapter 7-8, that might happen, since you let smash troll you too easily), but in previous [s]flame wars[/s] arguments that's been the case. The whole thing would just boil down to flaming each other over 1-2 chapters in the whole game.

@bold:

Interceptor wrote:
Ch. 4:

Ch 5:

Ch. 6:

So now we're at Ch. 7.

Anyway, at Ch. 8
- Titania covers South, with a Hand Axe

in Ch. 9.

In Ch. 11,

In Ch. 12,

It may be that Soren is better than Mia overall, and that they need to be shifted,

Titania solos the bottom for a few reasons:

1: hand axe to double the 1-2 range enemies and KO them so they don't hang around to mess with us later
2: lets her be in position to KO the boss quickly and thus help out elsewhere later

Boyd gets the forge since it lets him ORKO armours. Honestly, they are a bigger issue than making a forge so that Oscar can do what Titania already does only he is still worse at it since some of the things have 2 range. And given how there isn't just one enemy per turn I think it is worth having two units capable of offence in the east. At which point either Mia goes east and Oscar goes west or vice-versa (Soren still lacks durability). Boyd already deals with the armours better than Mia, and chances are that Mia and an armourslayer are helping more on the armours in the west than Oscar and his weapon.

Oh, and there may be multiple "strategies" to complete a chapter, but they aren't all equal. There are flaws in each of your alternate options. And why send Ike alone when you can clear it out faster with Mia and Ike, get more exp, and recruit Ilyana earlier? How is that not superior to Ike standing on a square self healing while chopping at one enemy per phase?

As for Oscar and bonds, the fact that Mia/Ike/Soren aren't ORKOing does not make it any less of a good idea to increase Oscar's chance at it. In fact, it may even make the idea even better.

I liked your order the best. Zihark > Soren > Mia > Stefan, with Zihark spearheading middle tier. Well, personally I think Stefan is better than Mia, but that would be nitpicking since even if Stefan did rise I don't see him being upper mid (I don't like his durability or the mono swords), or even being above Zihark, so I can settle with Mia > Stefan.

And if Soren can be proven to be better than Mia, sure we can try it. Though I wonder where Ilyana ends up in the whole thing. I didn't mention her in the first place since she isn't part of the swordmaster block and she isn't Soren himself. But if she stays below Soren and above Rhys then there would be three possible locations for her.

I'm not going to get into the specifics for different strategies in chapter 8, but...

@bold:

Regardless, this is still only one chapter out of many, and I've noticed you, smash, and a few other people here dwell too much and put too much emphasis on a few chapters which don't represent the units' performance over the whole game. Maybe it hasn't gotten that bad in this topic yet (though given how smash is acting like an idiot and only bothered to cover chapter 7-8, that might happen, since you let smash troll you too easily), but in previous [s]flame wars[/s] arguments that's been the case. The whole thing would just boil down to flaming each other over 1-2 chapters in the whole game.

Boyd gets the forge since it lets him ORKO armours. Honestly, they are a bigger issue than making a forge so that Oscar can do what Titania already does only he is still worse at it since some of the things have 2 range.

You can say exactly the same thing for Boyd, since even with a forge he's worse than Titania. Less durability and mobility.


But okay, now I have a question. It pertains to everything, not just this who gets the ch 8 forge between Boyd and Oscar/anyone else. I know the philosophy around here is to give a given resource to the unit that benefits the most. My question is, what counts as "benefits the most"?

For example, suppose Oscar in chapter 8 does not ORKO anything with a normal iron lance while Boyd is already ORKOing 75% of the map with a normal iron axe (I don't know what the real ORKO numbers are, but that's not the point). Now with a forge in hand, Oscar ORKOs 75% of the map, while Boyd with an iron axe now ORKOs 95% of the map.

If we go with a... maximum increase, Oscar benefits the most. Going from 0 to 75 is a much bigger jump than going from 75 to 95.

But if we go with a... maximum peak, Boyd would benefit the most, as his performance with a forge is still better than Oscar's with a forge.

I would think the former would make more sense from a "benefits the most" standpoint, but given how Boyd is still getting the forge here, it would seem that the latter is what's true of this philosophy. Can you clarify for me?

the great haar wrote:And your reason that Oscar wants to stay near Boyd is because he needs crit because he's not ORKOing when most of the tema isn't either?

Oscar has 8MV and Canto, so his most useful function tends to be a floater that makes himself availible where it's needed. But by default, his C support with Ike (if Ike even supports him at all) isn't enough to make Ike stop fearing WTD or anything (wonders for durability, I think not). I think that the Bond support is more efficient as a default strategy, since giving Oscar a ~20% chance to cap something that he couldn't before is pretty useful. At level 10, he doubles basically anything ith an Iron lance.

I'm not saying Boyd can solo the east by himself.

Boyd actually can solo the east, but it's a huge pain in the ass. Once he kills the 1-range Armors, now he can't counter any of the archers, the javelin-Armor, or the mages (and once the mages arrive, it gets sticky). So it's really nice to have Oscar there, who can run in, ORKO or severely injure someone, and then Canto back into a good position (either behind Boyd, or next to him). He can take Rhys, but Rhys is going to be endangered by all of the archers over there, and now healing is a bit trickier.

Boyd has 36 HP and 7 DEF at this point, so he's actually fairly beefy anyway.

Why assume Boyd's getting the forge?

Because I only have one forge, and giving it to Boyd is objectively the best for the army in a lot of situations.

The main point is there are multiple ways to tackle the chapter, and giving one extremely specific example does not counter anything.

I'm sorry, but the number of retarded stratgies in this game outnumber the intelligent ones by about infinity to one. This is an efficiency tier list, so if I lay out an efficient strategy for Mia's army, surely you can see how it's entirely germane to the argument.

If we were ranking an "average" playthrough, you would have a point, but we are not, so you don't.

All of your alteratives strategies are worse than the one that I laid out. Feel free to try proving otherwise, maybe you'll hit on something, but I'm pretty confident that mine is very efficient. I mean, Mia has the second-most consequential Enemy Phase of the entire chapter, Titania blicks the Paladin-bomb all by herself, the Boss is dead on Turn 3 Player Phase, Boyd kills off two of his own Armors, etc.

the great haar wrote:But okay, now I have a question. It pertains to everything, not just this who gets the ch 8 forge between Boyd and Oscar/anyone else. I know the philosophy around here is to give a given resource to the unit that benefits the most. My question is, what counts as "benefits the most"?

For example, suppose Oscar in chapter 8 does not ORKO anything with a normal iron lance while Boyd is already ORKOing 75% of the map with a normal iron axe (I don't know what the real ORKO numbers are, but that's not the point). Now with a forge in hand, Oscar ORKOs 75% of the map, while Boyd with an iron axe now ORKOs 95% of the map.

If we go with a... maximum increase, Oscar benefits the most. Going from 0 to 75 is a much bigger jump than going from 75 to 95.

But if we go with a... maximum peak, Boyd would benefit the most, as his performance with a forge is still better than Oscar's with a forge.

I would think the former would make more sense from a "benefits the most" standpoint, but given how Boyd is still getting the forge here, it would seem that the latter is what's true of this philosophy. Can you clarify for me?

It's situational. In the generic situation, one would think that Oscar makes the most sense for the forge, because he gets the greatest increase and we're assuming that he gets used.

But environmental factors change everything. Suppose that the 20% boost that Boyd would get repesents him ORKO'ing the most dangerous enemy types on the map, ones that nobody else could ORKO even with a forge. It is still the case that Oscar is still going to benefit the most, but it is necessarily the case that the army benefits the most with the forge going to him instead of Boyd? That's a horse of a different color.

What happens in Ch. 8 is that nobody has a prayer of ORKO'ing the Armors except Boyd with a forge. He only barely makes it, too. Oscar is running at a 5mt deficit behind Boyd because of STR, weapon type, and WTA. Never gonna happen. Titania is best used elsewhere, she can take the whole Paladin-bomb without dying and actually kill them in reply on top of that.

Hypotheticals are fine, but the actual game environment is where the rubber meets the road.

the great haar wrote:I'm not going to get into the specifics for different strategies in chapter 8, but...

@bold:

Regardless, this is still only one chapter out of many, and I've noticed you, smash, and a few other people here dwell too much and put too much emphasis on a few chapters which don't represent the units' performance over the whole game. Maybe it hasn't gotten that bad in this topic yet (though given how smash is acting like an idiot and only bothered to cover chapter 7-8, that might happen, since you let smash troll you too easily), but in previous [s]flame wars[/s] arguments that's been the case. The whole thing would just boil down to flaming each other over 1-2 chapters in the whole game.

Boyd gets the forge since it lets him ORKO armours. Honestly, they are a bigger issue than making a forge so that Oscar can do what Titania already does only he is still worse at it since some of the things have 2 range.

You can say exactly the same thing for Boyd, since even with a forge he's worse than Titania. Less durability and mobility.

Titania's got a job, though, the bottom. Obviously you could send her in any of the 3 directions, but the bottom is just the best for if we want to clear space. She's not really stopping Boyd from being the best for it.

But okay, now I have a question. It pertains to everything, not just this who gets the ch 8 forge between Boyd and Oscar/anyone else. I know the philosophy around here is to give a given resource to the unit that benefits the most. My question is, what counts as "benefits the most"?

For example, suppose Oscar in chapter 8 does not ORKO anything with a normal iron lance while Boyd is already ORKOing 75% of the map with a normal iron axe (I don't know what the real ORKO numbers are, but that's not the point). Now with a forge in hand, Oscar ORKOs 75% of the map, while Boyd with an iron axe now ORKOs 95% of the map.

If we go with a... maximum increase, Oscar benefits the most. Going from 0 to 75 is a much bigger jump than going from 75 to 95.

But if we go with a... maximum peak, Boyd would benefit the most, as his performance with a forge is still better than Oscar's with a forge.

I would think the former would make more sense from a "benefits the most" standpoint, but given how Boyd is still getting the forge here, it would seem that the latter is what's true of this philosophy. Can you clarify for me?

Well, I'll assume this is an A and B thing, since you admitted to not knowing the real numbers.

It's a circumstantial thing. Considering you can have a new forge every map, you can almost focus on the use of a forge in a specific map. Unless of course the following chapter desperately needs 2 specific forges in which case you have to worry about it early.

Regardless, sometimes it will be better to take Oscar from 0% to 70% because having two units over 65% is sometimes better than having one at 0% and another at 95%. Sometimes that's not the best thing for efficiency. It's chapter by chapter and there is no hard and fast rule that will let you know precisely what we will declare the best option.

If Oscar indeed ORKOs the cavaliers in the south with a forge, or most of them anyway, then he's hurt by Titania doing better with a hand axe and thus better overall because of the 1-2 range enemies down there. And since the armors we want Boyd to KO are in the east, he's not hurt by Titania's existence. Even if it only improved Boyd on armors, he could still perhaps be the better candidate based on circumstances alone.


Like nflchamp said, it all comes down to efficiency. Though to attempt to prevent certain complaints from some:
Maximum efficiency with the chosen team. Stating we are going for maximum efficiency does not prevent the tiering of lower tiered characters. We are trying to see what they can do for our efficiency when they are in play.



(Sherlock gets this round)

And that's the other thing. Remember how you said that Mia can't OHKO anything with Vantage, so it's not that useful? Take a close look at the Knights in this level: if Titania messes with them using a Steel Axe, as she's running through, she leaves them at an HP level where Mia OHKOs them with the Armorslayer, at 90+ list HIT even with WTD, since they can't dodge crap. They are a very effective Knight-killing combo, which is an efficient way to clean up this map (might as well have Mia do something).

I believe the Hammer is available at this point for Titania to use. So I don't think any armours are going to be left alive by Titania.

But the point here is that his win isn't what you might think it is, and more importantly he has a level deficit going into Ch. 8, which is where Mia starts beating him.

Note that even with a 2 level advantage, I'd say that this is reduced to 1 from the bexp alone, and after a few chapters, they should both be at the same level, though I though level 13 for Soren/Mia is more plausable.

What happens in Ch. 8 is that nobody has a prayer of ORKO'ing the Armors except Boyd with a forge. He only barely makes it, too. Oscar is running at a 5mt deficit behind Boyd because of STR, weapon type, and WTA. Never gonna happen. Titania is best used elsewhere, she can take the whole Paladin-bomb without dying and actually kill them in reply on top of that.

If Boyd makes it to level 12 (1.2 levels per chapter + 4 levels of bexp), he can use a hammer instead of a forge to ORKO 3/4 of the knights. Then we can give Oscar a forged lance, and he can ORKO all but 1 of the cavalier bombers at level 12 (1 level per chapter + 4 levels of bexp). Heck, it might be less if he proc'd 10 str/11 Def sooner.

Oh and if you're wondering, this costs us 832 bexp, leaving a nice amount of 818 bexp for other units. For referance, this can make Soren get from level 4 to level 8 Mia from level 6 to level 9 and we'll still have 148 bexp left for Ike or someone. If Oscar held onto Gatrie's knight band for a little while, we could probably save on an extra 108 bexp.

Considering the good ol' doritos argument, this leaves us with 3 units 3RKO'ing (Boyd + Oscar + Titania) and still helps other units like Mia and Soren.

Kirsche wrote:I believe the Hammer is available at this point for Titania to use. So I don't think any armours are going to be left alive by Titania.

Hammer isn't really a good weapon for killing non-armors. She gets weighed down by it, and doesn't really benefit from the CEXP anyway. I like to have her kill something, and then Canto next to the Armors in the central corridor (there are two). Next turn, she can continue west.

Note that even with a 2 level advantage, I'd say that this is reduced to 1 from the bexp alone, and after a few chapters, they should both be at the same level, though I though level 13 for Soren/Mia is more plausable.

What you say doesn't really matter. The player is God, and Soren will be ahead of Mia or behind her as the situation dictates. Strictly speaking, Mia generally gets more CEXP, owing to how she fights.

If Boyd makes it to level 12 (1.2 levels per chapter + 4 levels of bexp), he can use a hammer instead of a forge to ORKO 3/4 of the knights. Then we can give Oscar a forged lance, and he can ORKO all but 1 of the cavalier bombers at level 12 (1 level per chapter + 4 levels of bexp). Heck, it might be less if he proc'd 10 str/11 Def sooner.

Again, Hammer is not a good weapon to have against non-armors, and additionally the Hammer rapes his avoid and he has bad accuracy with it. It doesn't help things when he whiffs one of the two hits on an Armor. No chance of that wit ha forge.

Oh and if you're wondering, this costs us 832 bexp, leaving a nice amount of 818 bexp for other units. For referance, this can make Soren get from level 4 to level 8 Mia from level 6 to level 9 and we'll still have 148 bexp left for Ike or someone. If Oscar held onto Gatrie's knight band for a little while, we could probably save on an extra 108 bexp.

I can get Oscar, Boyd, and Mia to level 10, and have more BEXP left over than you just did. Mia uses the Armorslayer, Boyd gets a forge, and Oscar can use more or less whatever the situation dictates.

Considering the good ol' doritos argument, this leaves us with 3 units 3RKO'ing (Boyd + Oscar + Titania) and still helps other units like Mia and Soren.

Mine's still better. Oscar can get his forge in Ch. 9.

Hammer isn't really a good weapon for killing non-armors. She gets weighed down by it, and doesn't really benefit from the CEXP anyway. I like to have her kill something, and then Canto next to the Armors in the central corridor (there are two). Next turn, she can continue west.

The only enemies down the right hand side which Titania doesn't double with the Hammer are the two mages, and that's if she, beign level 4 that is, suffers the misfortune of not having an extra strength or speed (32.5% chance of happening). The other 67.5% of the time, she can ORKO pretty much every unit down that side. Considering her superier durabiltiy on top of that, having her deal with teh right hand side seems smarter to me than letting Boyd do it.

Mine's still better. Oscar can get his forge in Ch. 9.

Having Titania deal with the right with the Hammer, Oscar the south with his forge and Boyd/Ike the left with a steel axe/regal sword respectively seems much more efficient and less dangerous, also.

I can get Oscar, Boyd, and Mia to level 10, and have more BEXP left over than you just did. Mia uses the Armorslayer, Boyd gets a forge, and Oscar can use more or less whatever the situation dictates.

Problem is, Oscar using whatever the situation dictates isn't really as useful as him having a forge whilst Boyd and Ike rape down the left. You may save some bexp, but 256 bexp isn't too shabby - it's essentially 2.5 levels for someone. Unless you can show how that extra bexp can really make a difference considering the extra bexp dump after chapter 10, then I can't see how you're method is better.

Kirsche wrote:The only enemies down the right hand side which Titania doesn't double with the Hammer are the two mages, and that's if she, beign level 4 that is, suffers the misfortune of not having an extra strength or speed (32.5% chance of happening). The other 67.5% of the time, she can ORKO pretty much every unit down that side. Considering her superier durabiltiy on top of that, having her deal with teh right hand side seems smarter to me than letting Boyd do it.

You are talking about Chapter 8, and I was talking about Chapter 7. There is little reason for her to use a Hammer on the center Armors in Ch. 7, since the kills don't do anything for her and it also forces me to use a Hammer on enemies that I might not want to.

Having Titania deal with the right with the Hammer, Oscar the south with his forge and Boyd/Ike the left with a steel axe/regal sword respectively seems much more efficient and less dangerous, also.

I don't agree. Titania in the south can kill the whole Paladin bomb, guaranteed, and be in position to deal with the boss on Turn 2. She is undeniably the best person for this job because of the boss, in my opinion. There are no wasted motions, and the speed with which she deals with the South allows her to help anywhere else (flexibility ftw) once she's done.

Problem is, Oscar using whatever the situation dictates isn't really as useful as him having a forge whilst Boyd and Ike rape down the left. You may save some bexp, but 256 bexp isn't too shabby - it's essentially 2.5 levels for someone. Unless you can show how that extra bexp can really make a difference considering the extra bexp dump after chapter 10, then I can't see how you're method is better.

It's not as useful for Oscar, but this song's not about Oscar, it's about the army. There is only one forge, and it's better for the army for Boyd to get it. Titania is the only other person who can deal with the Armors like Boyd can, and having Boyd handle the east frees up Titania for her best performance.

Titania can obviously handle the east side, that's not in dispute. The issue now becomes that Oscar cannot handle the South as well as she can. We give him a forge, but with the forge he cannot counter the enemies with 1-2 range, meaning he has to kill them on Player Phase and wastes a lot of time doing so. He's also a 3RKO on the boss wit hthe forge, which is a real problem since the boss counters him every time and 3RKOs Oscar in return. Basically, unless he avoids like Jet Li, Oscar is going to have to heal himself a lot, and the boss is going to be a real dance-off. He could use a Short Spear to kill the boss, but now he's a 4RKO with only ~76% listed HIT and needs to land 7 hits (one out of eight can miss, otherwise we're 5RKO+ territory, never mind that there's a priest there who will heal the boss).

Meanwhile, Titania with a plain Hand Axe is an easy 2RKO on the boss if she has 14 STR, and has almost 80 listed HIT. Bad case, she's 3RKO like Oscar with a forge, except she's countering on Enemy Phase and can easily switch to a 1-range weapon like a Hammer or Steel Axe and finish him off on Player Phase to turn it back into a 2RKO again.


Basically, I don't see how using Oscar in this way is good for the army. Remember that Mia on Turn 1 has the second-most consequential Enemy Phase in the chapter (most consequential is Titania in the south w/a Hand Axe), because she can easily cripple both Armors in the west. Once they are out of the way, it becomes much easier for Ike/Mia/Soren to handle the rest. Oscar can flit back and forth between east and west to handle things as needed (most likely he stays east to help Boyd with the mages and archers).

Your method will clear the chapter, but mine maximizes the kills aka CEXP. All of the GMs in this chapter are better-positioned for later battles when you can do a scorched-earth here.

Interceptor wrote:You are talking about Chapter 8, and I was talking about Chapter 7. There is little reason for her to use a Hammer on the center Armors in Ch. 7, since the kills don't do anything for her and it also forces me to use a Hammer on enemies that I might not want to.

Kk

I don't agree. Titania in the south can kill the whole Paladin bomb, guaranteed, and be in position to deal with the boss on Turn 2. She is undeniably the best person for this job because of the boss, in my opinion. There are no wasted motions, and the speed with which she deals with the South allows her to help anywhere else (flexibility ftw) once she's done.

It's safer for her to fight the knights on the right because of her superier durability. The flexibility is superfluous and unneeded. With Titania heading South to cream the boss, we have Oscar, Boyd, Ike and Mia to all guard the 3 entrances, yet only 1 of these 3 will be under heavy fire. Heck, only 1 of these three might be under fire at all after Oscar cleans up those paladin bombers. After killing the boss, there might be some reinforcements for Titania to kill, so she's not necessarily wasting turns twiddling her thumbs and doing nothing.

Oh yeah, and with 3 units covering it, even the third one might be barely crowded. So what's Titania doing when she comes back? Lolnothing. Way to go, we just risked Boyd's life for a grand total of nothing.

It's not as useful for Oscar, but this song's not about Oscar, it's about the army. There is only one forge, and it's better for the army for Boyd to get it. Titania is the only other person who can deal with the Armors like Boyd can, and having Boyd handle the east frees up Titania for her best performance.

I covered the army: 3 units ORKO'ing, 2 Raping face and 1 good potshoter. With your method we have 2 ORKO'ing, 3 Raping face and 1 good potshoter. And you can't improve ORKO'ing. Sadly, enemies don't die just by being looked at. Your method doesn't save turns. Your method doesn't keep the team safe. I must have missed the seminar where we were told that risking a unit's death for absolutely nothign has any purpose whatsoever.

Titania can obviously handle the east side, that's not in dispute. The issue now becomes that Oscar cannot handle the South as well as she can. We give him a forge, but with the forge he cannot counter the enemies with 1-2 range, meaning he has to kill them on Player Phase and wastes a lot of time doing so. He's also a 3RKO on the boss wit hthe forge, which is a real problem since the boss counters him every time and 3RKOs Oscar in return. Basically, unless he avoids like Jet Li, Oscar is going to have to heal himself a lot, and the boss is going to be a real dance-off. He could use a Short Spear to kill the boss, but now he's a 4RKO with only ~76% listed HIT and needs to land 7 hits (one out of eight can miss, otherwise we're 5RKO+ territory, never mind that there's a priest there who will heal the boss).

Oscar doesn't have to fight the boss just by covering teh south side.

Meanwhile, Titania with a plain Hand Axe is an easy 2RKO on the boss if she has 14 STR, and has almost 80 listed HIT. Bad case, she's 3RKO like Oscar with a forge, except she's countering on Enemy Phase and can easily switch to a 1-range weapon like a Hammer or Steel Axe and finish him off on Player Phase to turn it back into a 2RKO again.

Which is exactly why Titania should fight the boss. Whcih I never contested, I might add.

[quote]Your method will clear the chapter, but mine maximizes the kills aka CEXP. All of the GMs in this chapter are better-positioned for later battles when you can do a scorched-earth here.[quote]

Maximises kills? Who dies in your run that doesn't in mine? Boyd? Yeah, I just lot ~800 cexp. W00t?

Kirsche wrote:It's safer for her to fight the knights on the right because of her superier durability. The flexibility is superfluous and unneeded.

No, what's superfluous is her superior durability. Boyd is in no danger of dying in the east. Look at the stats. He got 36 HP and 7 DEF. Everything on his side 4-6RKO'ing him, and in the case of the Armors that he has WTA on, they have really bad hit rates (Javelin dude has ~34 listed, never mind that 7 damage from a connected javelin is a 6HKO on him anyway). Your argument would have merit if Boyd was getting 2-3HKO'ed at high hit rates or something, but he's not. Maybe you were thinking of Mia.

So there's no huge reason to be sending Titania here. Boyd can handle himself, especially if Oscar is helping, and in the worst case scenario you either burn the odd Player Phase with a vuln, or you have to pull Rhys for a heal. BFD.

Oh yeah, and with 3 units covering it, even the third one might be barely crowded. So what's Titania doing when she comes back? Lolnothing. Way to go, we just risked Boyd's life for a grand total of nothing.

Problem is, Boyd's not at risk unless you're a fool taking too many chances.

The usefulness of Titania being free after killing the boss is that if things should go sour due to the RNG, she can pick up the slack. I mean, she's already heading back there by Player Phase Turn 3, if things go well.

I covered the army: 3 units ORKO'ing, 2 Raping face and 1 good potshoter. With your method we have 2 ORKO'ing, 3 Raping face and 1 good potshoter. And you can't improve ORKO'ing.

You didn't cover the army, you just stated what people can do in a void and ignored the relative differences between them. It's not useful to boost the number of ORKO'ers if they are mostly overlapping kills, it's inefficient because I have multiple units doing the same job. Allowing Boyd to ORKO Armors (and by extension, everything else, since he gets weighed down by a Steel Axe even with his monster STR) allows me to do something that only Titania could previously do, freeing her up for something that's more efficient than using her for Armor-clearing.

Every south Paladin dies. Every single one. Poof. Turn 2, she can do whatever she wants, which is probably to go kill the boss since everyone else has serious problems and she wants the CEXP from the kill regardless.

Your numbers are wrong anyway, since Soren can ORKO in this chapter if you buff him sufficiently. It's just not terribly useful to do that since he can't safely take more than one hit.

Sadly, enemies don't die just by being looked at. Your method doesn't save turns. Your method doesn't keep the team safe. I must have missed the seminar where we were told that risking a unit's death for absolutely nothign has any purpose whatsoever.

See above, your claim about risking death holds no water.

Oscar doesn't have to fight the boss just by covering teh south side.

But now he's the closest to the boss, and Titania is further away. This is poor positioning.

Which is exactly why Titania should fight the boss. Whcih I never contested, I might add.

You never contested her fighting the boss, but you also made it so that her killing the boss means that she does less.

Maximises kills? Who dies in your run that doesn't in mine? Boyd? Yeah, I just lot ~800 cexp. W00t?

All of the enemies die. Every single one. The only ones that live are the ones that arrive as reinforcements on the last turn, since those will never actually attack anyone. No player characters die, that's absurd.

But now he's the closest to the boss, and Titania is further away. This is poor positioning.

It doesn't matter either way.

All of the enemies die. Every single one. The only ones that live are the ones that arrive as reinforcements on the last turn, since those will never actually attack anyone. No player characters die, that's absurd.

No, what's superfluous is her superior durability.

Lol, you chose the lowest hit Knight for that example, and then claim that enemies have trouble hitting him? Either way, it'll build up. The Archers and Mages have decent hit rates on him. He has a ~70% chance of losing 16HP from the Steel Bow!Archer and one mage alone, but after facing the steel lance knights, the Javelin!Knight the Longbow!Archer and the other mage, Boyd can easily lose his remaining HP.

You mention yours helping in the case of RNG screwage from the left hand side, well, for one thing, the chance of that happening with ~3 people guarding it is in the decimals probably. But the chance of Boyd's death over on the right hand side is >>> greater than that, probably. Especially after the 2 extra reinforcements that appear not long after he will be finished.

All of the enemies die. Every single one. The only ones that live are the ones that arrive as reinforcements on the last turn, since those will never actually attack anyone. No player characters die, that's absurd.

Yes, but how is that different to mine? The argument isn't whther your strategy will completely clear the map, it's whether it's > mine.

Kirsche wrote:It doesn't matter either way.

It's obviously more efficient to have Titania closer to something that we're going to have her kill. It's the difference between having her kill the boss by Turn 3, and not.

Lol, you chose the lowest hit Knight for that example, and then claim that enemies have trouble hitting him?

I chose the guy that's going to be harassing Boyd, because he has 2-range. The other Armors walk into Boyd and die, so they only get to make a single attack anyway. A Steel Lance is only 10 HIT better than a javelin, and Iron lances do the same crappy damage as a javelin when they do manage to connect.

Either way, it'll build up. The Archers and Mages have decent hit rates on him. He has a ~70% chance of losing 16HP from the Steel Bow!Archer and one mage alone, but after facing the steel lance knights, the Javelin!Knight the Longbow!Archer and the other mage, Boyd can easily lose his remaining HP.

Sure, Boyd will die if you're a moron and never heal him, or if you expose him to like 4 attacks at once. What kind of retarded argument is this? The worst case scenario is that you either give up a Player Phase to patch him up a little with a Vuln, or you pull Rhys to top him off completely. You can even put Oscar in front of him to spread out the load, which is actually a pretty good idea since it allows the both of them to take advantage of Bond supports.

The mages don't even move towards Boyd until he gets further out. You have to be pushing your advantage in order for them to even be a threat. If they are attacking him, it means the Armors are toast and you've dealt with the archers, aka you're kicking ass.

And it's not as if Oscar is Neo. If you have him guarding the south, he's likely to be getting hit, which means you'd have to heal him (just like you'd have to heal Boyd). Titania can't be leveraging her durability in two places at once.

You mention yours helping in the case of RNG screwage from the left hand side, well, for one thing, the chance of that happening with ~3 people guarding it is in the decimals probably. But the chance of Boyd's death over on the right hand side is >>> greater than that, probably. Especially after the 2 extra reinforcements that appear not long after he will be finished.

RNG screwage applies to both sides, not just the left, so I'll thank you not to be putting words in my mouth. Under ordinary circumstances the boss is dead by Turn 3 Player Phase, and Titania can be on her way back to help out with the east side if you're really getting stomped over there despite Boyd/Oscar/Rhys doing their best.

Yes, but how is that different to mine? The argument isn't whether your strategy will completely clear the map, it's whether it's > mine.

Like I said: it's more efficient, costs less in real terms, and Oscar ends up getting his forge in Ch. 9 anyway. Titania is maximally effective in the south, there are no wasted motions, and it leaves her in the best position to assist with any RNG-related adjustments to strategy.

Giving Oscar the forge in this chapter affords you no real advantages. Boyd is objectively the best person to bestow with a forge, here, assuming he's being used seriously.

As much as I like stuff actually happening on the PoR board on this site, since not much does anymore, I have to say:

While I agree with Interceptor that his strategy is superior (mostly since Titania ORKOs with a hand axe and can take out the boss on turn 2 or 3 and then help elsewhere because the bottom is clean. Oscar has to play around with ranged enemies for too long and so you have less units doing stuff elsewhere and Titania needs to march to the boss by way of the east and there are still enemies present in the northeast. It just seems far more efficient to just finish off one section quickly and then have more units in the other sections) I have to say that there doesn't seem to be much point in the direction this particular topic has taken.

If you are using Mia, since you are ranking her, then a strategy that is at least as good as any other but involves using her more fully seems like a good plan. Maybe when ranking Oscar you can argue for him getting a forge since Mia may not be a unit the player intends to use much longer and the strategy that doesn't involve Boyd getting a forge can work, but when ranking Mia it seems like a strategy that is at least as good as any other but actually, you know, uses her would be the superior decision.

I could probably come up with decent strategies that stop using Titania as fully after a certain point in the game (not entirely sure when that starts) and argue that she isn't as good as she really is because there is another strategy that doesn't let her kill any bosses but still clears out the chapters in the same number of turns and thus she won't be as strong against enemies. Interceptor has already pointed out that she needs boss kills to maintain her level of pwning along the way, even as early as chapter 8. By coming up with another strategy that finishes certain chapters in the same number of turns but gets less exp for Titania, suddenly she isn't as good anymore. She's still good, but probably not her own tier because she does less. But that's ridiculous because the point is that a good strategy, arguably the best strategy, involves using her more fully, and thus she gets enough exp along the way to continue pwning. Now, while Titania is in her own league in this game and the other units can't really compare, that doesn't negate the parallels between my example and what is going on here: Using a strategy that specifically weakens a certain character despite perfectly valid strategies existing that don't.

And like Interceptor said, he gets a forge the next chapter anyway.

It's obviously more efficient to have Titania closer to something that we're going to have her kill. It's the difference between having her kill the boss by Turn 3, and not.

Which does what exactly? Okay, so if things go badly she can help, but I'd argue things are more likely to go badly in your one as Boyd is facing multiple attacks (and yes, it is multiple attacks, the knights come in a wave of 4 and then there are the 2 archers to worry about on top of that.) and it takes longer to get the full focus on one side. (Titania can clear that area completely by turn 3 player phase, really. And Once Oscar's finished with the paladins around the same time, we can have 4 units (Oscar/Ike/Mia/Boyd) just focusing on the left whilst Titania deals with the boss). So by turn 4 player phase, we have no boss, and only one side in threat, which is being guarded by 4 units. In your run, we'd have no boss, but the left side is only being dealt by Ike/Mia (And Soren as back-up, I suppose), whilst the right by Oscar and Boyd, the latter of which should have low HP. Now it's hard for Rhys to heal as he struggles to go from one group to the other, which means people are more likely to die, and we can't chokehole anyone on the left off by extra units if someone takes an unlucky hit or something.

I'm sorry, but there's no advantage in killing the boss earlier than when he ides in mine. The chance something goes wrong in either scenario seems so tiny that it's probably not worth thinking about. So I will compromise: Our strategies are equal and neither are more efficient than the other.

RNG screwage applies to both sides, not just the left, so I'll thank you not to be putting words in my mouth.

Well, there's only 1 side to worry about in my strategy.

If you are using Mia, since you are ranking her, then a strategy that is at least as good as any other but involves using her more fully seems like a good plan.

Not if she gets put in danger more, thanks to Rhys not being able to reach her. Though I'll stop here, and if Int doesn't accept the compromise, I hope he can pull enougth numbers out to show that it's more dangerous for Oscar in my strategy than it is for Boyd/Mia/Ike in his.

Kirsche wrote:Which does what exactly? Okay, so if things go badly she can help, but I'd argue things are more likely to go badly in your one as Boyd is facing multiple attacks [...]

Boyd is not going to be in any serious trouble. The most dangerous enemies are either nowhere near him (mages, he can deal with them on his own time), tink him (archers), or can't hit him reliably (30-50% listed hit rates on the guys that actually 4HKO). Plus, he has Oscar to bodyblock for him, vulneraries to chew, and Rhys for emergencies. Boyd is actually manly enough to Hand Axe a bit himself, too.

The worst case is that he cannot avoid anything, which means you spend more time pushing Oscar in front of him, giving up PP for healing, or pulling Rhys away from the west, all things that slow you down. Except, Titania is on her way back on Turn 3, so if this happens it doesn't even matter, she's got you covered.

So by turn 4 player phase, we have no boss, and only one side in threat, which is being guarded by 4 units. In your run, we'd have no boss, but the left side is only being dealt by Ike/Mia (And Soren as back-up, I suppose), whilst the right by Oscar and Boyd, the latter of which should have low HP. Now it's hard for Rhys to heal as he struggles to go from one group to the other, which means people are more likely to die, and we can't chokehole anyone on the left off by extra units if someone takes an unlucky hit or something.

Yeah, and here's the other thing: the west side gets curb-stomped. Mia counters both Armors on Turn 1 Enemy Phase, needing only a heal from Rhys to top her back off. Mia, Ike, and Soren can all finish off these two weakened Armors without even taking counters. Congrats, it's Turn 2 Player Phase and the most dangerous units on the west are already toast. Same situation applies over here: we have vulneraries for minor healing, Rhys for emergencies, and Soren can take one hit safely in a REAL emergency.

The worst case is that Ike/Mia cant avoid anything and/or miss important attacks, which just slows things down, it does not endanger them. Rhys still exists, remember, and Oscar is close enough to be pulled at any time.

I'm sorry, but there's no advantage in killing the boss earlier than when he ides in mine. The chance something goes wrong in either scenario seems so tiny that it's probably not worth thinking about. So I will compromise: Our strategies are equal and neither are more efficient than the other.

The idea is that all of the enemy units die, CEXP is maximized. You are using Titania less efficiently, which seems to me like it would constrain your ability to scorched earth clear since she spends more time not killing things.

So unless it can clear, I don't see how they could tie game.

Not if she gets put in danger more, thanks to Rhys not being able to reach her. Though I'll stop here, and if Int doesn't accept the compromise, I hope he can pull enougth numbers out to show that it's more dangerous for Oscar in my strategy than it is for Boyd/Mia/Ike in his.

The point of "danger" is not that units die, it's that you have to change your strategy to protect them or otherwise hold back their offense.

If the whole point of your nitpicking is to prove that Mia is being used inefficiently, you've failed, since you're not even talking about her.

I said I wouldn't speak up again, but you don't seem to think my strategy will get the map cleared (Please correct me if I'm wrong). Why do you think this? I'm having 4+ units chargind down the left on turn ~4, Oscar clearing the pally bombers by the end of turn 3 and Titania killing the boss by the end of turn 3.

I really don't see how either idea is better ATM. Both of our strategies have Titania not killing things for 2 turns (Yours in turns 2 and 3, mine in turns 3 and 4), both get every enemy killed (having 4+ enemies chargind down the left hand side makes this really easy) and both are subject to RNG screwage (Mia is hardly durable, so saying it doesn't matter if she gets hit is lolable).

Edited out a lot of insults and fixed up some formatting. I'll give some input later.