Are Advanced Classes META?! Advanced Reclassing Guide - Fire Emblem: Three Houses

[@Nawor1996]

i'm still so annoyed only hubert can make use of dark bishop, they really shouldn't have genderlocked it to men when the only other dark magic users are women

[@LinkKing7]

Agreed, Lysithea would've liked it too!

[@dgmojojojo]

And on top of it Hubert cannot be recruited into another house. The audacity!

[@bardw.1542]

But Dark Bishop doesn't actually help out dark magic users . . . unless you want 20 Miasma spells. You get it to master the Lifetaker ability, which almost any male can make use of.

[@Comrade_Dolphin]

@@bardw.1542 It's better than the absolutely useless Black Tomefaire and Black Magic Uses x2 of Warlock

[@bardw.1542]

Dark Bishop is Hubert's best Advanced class, yes. Lysithea's best Advanced class is Bishop.

[@demonicgamerazazel9866]

Mekkah: "I like growths, I just like bases more."
--from Path of Radiance Maniac run with Mangs

[@LinkKing7]

Which, of course, I totally agree with in the context of playing the game skillfully! But there's just something about seeing how far you can push a unit to reach max potential that really draws me towards that side of the game too, which is where I like to study growths.

[@arieloliver3219]

@@LinkKing7 dude when he said growths no matter is for efficient, optimal play lile ranked runs or LTC, growths are nice but remember you can beat some games without gaining a single level, now the rules are a bit different in 3 houses since you don't really get units that surpasses your avarage level so i would say growths matter more in this game than others but at the end of the day they are not crucial to beat the game

[@trueheropon6518]

​@@arieloliver3219 even the diffrences in growths provided by classes dont mean anything really. you really only level 40 times if you arent actively trying to max out your characters (at which point you'll stomp over any enemies anyway , so talking about that scenario isnt productive). with only 40 level-ups averages mean nothing ,its too small of a sample group. growths are nice because having high growths on a unit can impact their reliability - but -10% in anything wont really impact that reliability within such a small sample size of level-ups. class bonuses and abilities are much more impactful and should be the bigger factor when choosing a class.

[@arieloliver3219]

@@trueheropon6518 yeah, that too

[@elroliz9442]

i think that bases are still more important than growths, however, in the newer games growths are more important than before due to you no longer get units after the first half of the game. Before awakening you used to get units like pent, hawkeye,etc. Now thats not longer the case. Especially in three houses where you get most of the units that you'll use in chaopter 1 lvl 1.

[@FerdinandvonAegir]

I am Ferdinand Von Aegir!
Only *true* nobles keep me as a Paladin.

[@LinkKing7]

As I did in my LP, of course!

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

I'm a Galaxy Brain Noble that gave you the dancer certification and then made you a Wyvern Lord.

[@-memoria-2136]

@@AkameGaKillfan777 Is Dancer Ferdinand actually a good idea? Tempted to make him one for the meme.

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

@@-memoria-2136 You can make whoever you want one, as long as your charm stat is high enough.
I did it just to make him an avo tank, and it was incredible. He also did pretty well with offensive Gambits too.

[@StarfallMudkipzGirl]

Why should we stay as a Paladin when we could be a fantastic great knight?

[@goettia6429]

Imagine being genderlocked from the hero class
this post was made by the Echidna gang

[@janehuskmann1914]

Whatever you say, Knuckles.

[@duetopersonalreasonsaaaaaa]

@@janehuskmann1914 underrated comment

[@ammonil1261]

this is like the dumbest part of hero being gender locked. echidna is also like really good

[@StarfallMudkipzGirl]

My goal is to unlock the unarmed combat skill for Dimitri and just have him punch everything to death.

[@catchthecat4699]

Or you can get the unarmed combat skill for Caspar, make him a Wyvern Lord, and watch as he jumps from his wyvern to punch his enemies bare-fisted. It was an accident the first time I did it, but it made me laugh so hard I kept it on him since it was such a Caspar type of thing to do.

[@janehuskmann1914]

Dmitri with great punching-out potential would be excellent. Also, I would've liked to have my waifus be able to punch people out, such as the introverted Bernadetta.

[@rinnnnnnnnnnrin]

@@catchthecat4699 oh shit....I need this when i start ng+

[@MineNAdventurer]

@@catchthecat4699 Was this on auto battle or did you dismount to do this?

[@arcanekitsune4202]

Sounds OP, Dimitri has the highest strength cap and growth.

[@yamiookami]

"Hero has no mastery skill"
Defiant Str: Am I a joke to you?
Me: YES

[@derekmaullo2865]

You are a joke

[@derekmaullo2865]

Yes you're a joke

[@derekmaullo2865]

Yes you're a joke

[@ffttossenz]

Advanced > mastery cus canon outfits
Gimme that timeskip Mercedes bishop

[@LinkKing7]

That too!

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

Are you sure that everyone's cannon outfit didn't have a dragon under it?

[@joshua5946]

me to

[@goettia6429]

Still forever salty that Ingrid keeps her pretty outfit in cavalier and pegasus knight, but not paladin

[@svvansong]

ok but holy knight mercedes with a sword awoke things in me i didn't know existed.

[@banriswirl6414]

Sniper is a crit class, and crit is based on both luck and skill.

[@somethingsomething7993]

You shouldn’t rely on crits that’s why I benched Bernadetta

[@noeld9364]

Ferdinand Von Aegir i was about to argue, then i saw who said it. my apologies, sir aegir

[@banriswirl6414]

@@noeld9364 Bernadetta is much better as a cavalry class. I think that's where most people mess up. Even if you want her primarily as an archer, Paladin is still better than Sniper.

[@somethingsomething7993]

I benched Bernadetta for Leonie and I didn’t regret it

[@deemac3470]

@@somethingsomething7993 😂 Bernie was so annoying at first I wanted to bench her too but I ended up liking her. Fe3h is my first fe game, I only kept Bernie cause I was playing in classic and right away let Ferd and Thea die 😭.
I'm such a noob

[@yukiizura]

You always articulate everything so well, I definitely agree that people can place too much emphasis on everyone being a Master Class - my Swordmaster Byleth, Bishop Linhardt, Warlock Dorothea, Sniper Cyril, Assassin Shamir, and Paladin Sylvain have been some of my best units. I just wish that the developers had decided whether they wanted Master Classes to be upgrades or sidegrades - in my opinion, you can't place Wyvern Lord, Falcon Knight, and Warmaster, classes that are clear upgrades, in the same category as Dark Knight, Gremory, and Mortal Savant, which are more sidegrades than anything and (generally) offer a bit of utility over actual combat effectiveness.

[@LinkKing7]

I agree, they're terribly balanced. We'll have to see what the DLC ones bring, but the ones we have are kind of divided right down the middle between good and bad.

[@fredv7349]

Yea I really hate how your physical units will either be using a bow or axe. Honestly if they made GK actually good and an upgrade to both FT and paladin then maybe lances could get play.

[@Underworlder5]

in my opinion, there are too few master classes compared to advanced classes. sword users have no choice but to stay in an advanced class, go to mortal savant or forgo their sword specialty altogether. male lance users have to train equally in riding and armor or go magic (no classes require training armor and riding together, meaning you have to think ahead if you want a great knight). male mages have to train in riding or swords if they want to promote. in these cases, you are better off not promoting to a master class at all
my suggestion is to have more master classes that can fill the void. here are some ideas:
gold knight: lance A. riding A. sword C
sentinel: lance A. axe A
duelist: sword A. gauntlets A. axe C (so hero can get a direct promotion)
master of arms: sword A. lance A. axe A
archsage: reason A. faith A (male equivalent of gremory. a pure caster class is too important to gender lock)
general: armor A. axe A. lance A
any thoughts on these? any other suggestions? as you can see, i prioritized infantry classes, as the only master infantry classes we currently have are mortal savant (known for being underwhelming and has conflicting requirements few can fulfill) and gremory (female only)

[@Archangelglenn]

I would add a few more. I would favor adding something like an Archbishop or a Saint class for casters who have weaknesses in reason like Manuela. I would also include a pure mage one like say Archmage for pure reason Casters and of course your suggestion for a Gremory equivalent. I would replace mortal savant with Trueblade which was the natural progression for Swordmaster in the older games.

[@maverick5169]

I hate how Hero fell during the series
They were pretty cool in gba games, probably the best infantry class. Deke, Raven, Harken and Gerik were chads
In Awakening they were also nice but nosferatu was way too dominant.
In Fates the class had a nice with Sol Xander and Corrin, but every other infantry classes was better since hand axe couldn't double.
In 3H? Holy Sothis...

[@A2ZOMG]

Hero I feel is a situationally effective class for raising Sword skills mostly. It's slightly easier to promote to that class than Swordmaster in comparison, so you can use it as an intermediate step towards a lategame Swordmaster.
But yeah it's not especially useful otherwise.
Running a Swordmaster Raphael here personally. It's pretty hilarious. I also liked the part where Raphael suggested during lecture that the Hero class is really cool.

[@LinkKing7]

I agree, the Mercenary/Hero line was on of my favorite to use, probably because of how cheeky the mercenary crit animation was in the GBA games, but also how cool Hero was!

[@Shalakor]

​@Steve Murdock I think a good way to go with Hero would be add +5 Def Growth alongside Weight -5 as a Class Ability just to be thematic toward using heavier weapons. MAYBE replace Vantage with Axefaire, or just remove Vantage, if only to give any incentive at all to train as a Mercenary going into Hero. Less fancy Ability-wise that way, but more practical.
On a similar note, remove Weight -5 from Fortress Knight. Although someone like Hilda (or "the second coming of Hector" as I like to call her in that class-line) can technically benefit from it, it's not particularly fitting for the specialization of the class. Suitable replacements might be just adding Pavise as a Class Ability, leaving the Mastery for taking it into other classes with, or something simple like trade Vantage over to it, to emphasize its roll as an Enemy Phase class. Or give it Lancefaire. ...If adding an Ability not currently in the game would be an option, the perfect fit would be one that draws targeting toward the unit, as the reverse of Stealth. Armor Knight could potentially gain this as well, though probably not. (I thought about Wary Fighter, but somehow it doesn't feel like it fits in to Three Houses alongside Quick Riposte. Not to mention the class changing flexibility means it's viably possible to make someone an Armored unit that's reasonably capable of doubling even with the class penalties in place, but you can't just opt out of a Class Ability in this game.)
If we DO go the route of putting more Faires on Advanced Classes, could replace Paladin's Terrain Resistance with Swordfaire (assuming one doesn't just add Aegis to it to mirror Fortress Knight if following that scenario).
But, on the opposite side of that coin, replace Assassin's Swordfaire with Death Blow to pigeonhole its especially Player Phase focused niche a bit more, making it more even in damage with Bows alongside its Swords, and removing a lot of incentive to go through Brigand.
Now, for possible Master Class balances.
Mortal Savant is a tricky case. Most would automatically want to jump towards removing the Speed growth penalty, but I'd rather work around it. For Growths, add +10 Res. For class change bonuses, increase HP and Str one point. Now, the main issue, Mortal Savant is the only Master Class that doesn't use all three Class Ability slots. My vote, add in a spell-granting Ability like the earlier magic classes have, but with an intermediate level or class-exclusive spell. For existing spells in the game, Sagittae would be the most obvious, having high uses, easy to execute Might/Hit/Weight ratio, and its status of not falling into one of the elemental groupings of spells. But, more fitting would be something like a reworked Ginnungagap spell, that reduces the unit's own Mag until after they've attacked again. It would be nice and gimmicky so as to promote a playstyle where they're more "intended" to alternate between magical and physical attacks. Could also give them a Mastery class-locked Mag-based Combat Art that that scales Might based on Str (I would say a Str-based Combat Art that scales with Mag, but that's the Sword of the Creator's thing). Really embrace the mixed attacker role. ...Would it be more optimal? Not necessarily. But it would be a whole lot more interesting and fun, which would make it more worthwhile.
Now Great Knight, make the Def/Res Growths either +15/0 or +10/+5, and class change bonuses should have one more Str and one or two Res (which would maybe be an only while mounted bonus). It's such a hard class to train for that it should have fewer losses from either route to get into it, and the limit of three Class Ability slots and Canto taking up one of those has me stumped on any changes to make there.
Despite the complaints people have about Master Classes being a mixed bag, those are the only ones that really want for tweaking. I guess if you really hate Terrain Resistance and don't want to play fair to Dark Knight, you could give Holy Knight White Magic Uses x2
Some more changes that would probably make a lot of people happy:
Make all the move 4 Advanced Classes move 5 instead, which in turn could make Great Knight's unmounted move 5 and Gremory move 6.
Add the "can wield some magic” like Noble or Commoner have to Emperor, Great Lord, and Barbarossa so that they aren't a waste to any class progression you may have put your Lord character through, but without being able to lean totally on magic. Claude casting Silence from atop his unique mount just seems so right to me, beyond the obvious of Edelgard's class outright having a Mag growth bonus and her having a very unique spell list. Could also add Dark (or Black to support her crit plus Budding Talent Ability) Tomefaire to Emperor and Swordfaire to Great Lord.
Enlightened One could use the addition of +5 Growth in Dex, Spd, Lck, and Res, and improve Cha to +10. Also give it White Tomefaire, or a spell-granting Class Ability of some sort, since it's entirely possible to have no spells by the time you get the class playing blind. Maybe Restore or Rescue, or even Ward to kinda go along with how Byleth blocks spells with the Sword of the Creator in cutscenes? Definitely not Physic, Fortify, or Warp. ...For an exclusive spell idea, Purge (as a single use per map, single target, 3-10 range spell) could be a lot of fun. Or Thani, though maybe only effective against Armor, so as to not overlap with Dark Spikes Τ's Calvary effectiveness.
Okay, that's an unreasonable amount of text nobody is going to actually read. About all I could think of. No need to balance the Intermediate Classes and below, I feel.

[@gabrielwilson191]

@@Shalakor We need you on Intsys team

[@craigyeah1052]

@@Shalakor Good suggestions to make things feel better, Weight -5 would go a long way to helping thematic preserve the Hero I remember, but blades aren't in this game so it's less useful. If I could only take one, please... give me magic for Edel, and yes Silence Barrabossa sounds awesome. Right now I'm making Edel into a Mortal Savant and I wish I didn't have to.
As for Master Classes, I am of the opinion they are not meant to be better than advanced classes because there are so few options. I feel like they should just be utility based classes, since advanced has plenty of good specialized classes. AKA don't buff the bad ones, nerf the overpowered ones. I don't know why there's a specialized gauntlets class and a specialized axe class if they both demand to go into the same far superior class.

[@Aogami20]

I have literally NEVER had lethality activate in this game

[@scottallen2966]

i have had it happen alot more than i think. i didnt even realise it activated sometimes as it has no special effect like it did in fates (the persona-esque blood splatter)

[@Aogami20]

@@scottallen2966 I assume it just pops up where a crest activation would, above the stats but again I wouldn't know because it has never happened over two complete playthroughs. Assassin is still a great class tho

[@scottallen2966]

it happens more than you think. it pops up where the combat arts are listed if it activates. But other than that, its just really underwhelming. I mis slike the flicker assasins did on the gba version, the red splatter from the ds games etc. It just added nice flair.

[@Shalakor]

I mean, lets be honest, the Mastery doesn't really matter, since chances are the unit is killing with base damage or crits anyway.

[@scottallen2966]

or you just give an assassin a rapier to deal with armored units with their high dodge chance

[@shiny9690]

Still wondering why on earth they gave Edelgard's personal classes magic growths
Also Linhardt should be a gremory lel

[@illusionofquality979]

I made her a Dark Knight. No complaints there.

[@dillydel2252]

I wish you could have death knight like attacks and use magic while holding a weapon

[@snow0w120]

@@dillydel2252 you mean counter attack?

[@riossaleem]

Anyone else Notice that Bowfaire was spelled 'Bonfire' on the Sniper Class?

[@taylorhill3604]

lmao i was like "wtf is this skill ive never heard of"

[@tiron3218]

To the sniper class: I just beat maddening (blue lions) and sniper Shamir basically carried me hard in a lot of occasions and I‘m not even overstating my point. In a difficulty where you either always double or come nowhere close because all enemy units are min-maxed having the ability to guarantied double an enemy get two chances to crit AND get +1 reach for your attack she teamed up for me with lysathia and lorenzes +2 magic range staff to get rid of any leftover units from a safe distance or snipe and take out units behind walls etc before they even could come close, thus cheesing parts of maps entirely. I can safely say that I would have struggled much harder without this bit of extra range and especially the guaranteed two hits cause I found myself cornered a few times in maddening and the additional bowknight movement wouldn‘t have helped the other cornered units as much as sniper shamir being able to double and take out certain threats in dire situations

[@LinkKing7]

That's also because Shamir is best waifu

[@joho4430]

Imagine having a class specifically made for you and no one else to use

[@Jorge.Painkiller]

First, the only viable Holy Knight in the game is Marianne
Second, Gremory was made for Lysithea, since she has a brutally high Magic Growth she doesn't need the Faires to murder half the map
Third, it's good to have a combination of Snipers and Bow Knights, Snipers are are great to destroy monsters easily with Hunter's Volley combined with Killer Bow or if you're in a precarious situation to easily destroy a threatening unit, Bow Knights are great to hard counter mages, since they're not that fast you can double them with an Iron Bow and defeat them

[@bardw.1542]

Manuela works decently as a Holy Knight, where the increased movement helps her out tremendously (as she doesn't get any ranged Physic/Fortify). Her high speed means that she can work as a Nosferatu tank, and appreciates the added power that Holy Knight affords. Her sword rank means that she can get Vantage without much effort, which complements this build well.

[@Jorge.Painkiller]

@@bardw.1542 yeah, you can make Manuela work, but almost everything Manuela does, Marianne does it better, you can give Marianne a Levin Sword, she's a better healer, has Aura, the only thing she doesn't have is Warp. And in this game, Warp is very situational, it's not as good as in other Fire Emblem games

[@bardw.1542]

I agree that Marianne is an overall very good mage. But I don't see any reason to have her go Holy Knight, as she has a better offensive black magic spell list. Manuela's better speed and better defense means that she's arguably the best Nosferatu tanks in the game, and Holy Knight is the best class for that. It is very niche, yes, but her strengths do allow her to do some things that other mages would struggle to do.

[@Jorge.Painkiller]

@@bardw.1542 my bad, I was going to say that Vantage is very situational, not Warp

[@Jorge.Painkiller]

@@bardw.1542 but I honestly don't like how Manuela works, but at least she can compete with Ingrid on whi is the better Falcon Knight

[@isssma0]

Bases vs growths don’t work in three houses, as basically, everyone starts at level one and is carried by their growths.

[@begselwalch5742]

I'm surprised this was ever up for debate. I think it's only logical that if you can't become one of the following: wyvern lord, falcon knight, bow knight, gremory then you're better off as a swordmaster/assassin or bishop. Dark knight is also ok for a select few if they can't become a germory and you want more movement.

[@sa_to_96]

dark knight is good if you are lorenz and come from paladin (he surprised me at maddening mode)

[@oscarduron6606]

i think that growths matter a lot in a game like three houses, where you get all the units you are going to have for the rest od the game rather early. mekkah on the other hand refers to older fire emblem games when saying that bases matter more since in those games you would be getting new units throughout the entire campaing making their joining stats a lot more valuable if you wanted to use them and compare them to your current army. it didn't matter that some late game units had horrible growths if their bases could carry them to the end of the game.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

For the most part, I think the argument for this game is personal growths over class growths.
Making Raphael a mage or priest isn't going to make him a good mage. Over a unit's life, we might be looking at like, +/- 5 points, tops, assuming you can't correct your stats with a class' bases, and +/-5 doesn't really matter that much, except maybe in speed.
I think picking the most utilitarian classes is the way to go here. You don't make Raphael a priest to patch his Res, you make Raphael a priest, because you really need to have a healer on the front line for some reason.

[@ammonil1261]

while you do get a lot of characters early, theres a decent amount of characters that you dont get quite as early, like seteth and jeritza, who could easily replace a unit if you wanted them to. also, i think mekkah’s arguments dont change in 3h much. you can still beat the game on 0% growths. imo, other stuff like combat arts, and magic learned are more important. what a characters boons and banes are are more important or at least could be. what class a character starts out at could be way more important (ex. shamir starting as a sniper) also, it kinda seems like youre proving growths arent that important if they dont make much of a difference when replacing them with a different unit (it carries to 3h still, most of the late game units are better and doesnt have much to do with growths). id also argue in 3h growths matter even less than in other fe games. you can easily get a stat booster every time you visit the monastery (at least when your professor level is a little high, depending on the stat booster) and you can make somebody get abilities to help them, such as weight -3/-5, pavise, quick riposte, speed +2, or rally them

[@saturatedphat9409]

I have to say I dont like how unbalanced the classes are in this game. Some of these advanced classes aren't bad compared to their master class options but compared to other master class options they are garbage. My first playthrough I had a swordmaster petra and honestly she wasnt good. I was excited to see this games version of trueblade. When I saw that my only option was mortal savant I was pretty dissapointed cause it's a downgrade from swordmaster in my opinion. Five movement is a crime for that class. And it has decent stat modifiers but swords are so weak she still couldn't 1 round a lot of enemies. I know it's a meme to just make everyone a wyvern rider or bow knight. But to me it's most fun to give a character a class that will make it the best it can be. And I cant justify making anyone except magic users somthing other then bow knight or wyvern. Maybe I'll throw in a war master they aren't bad. Also if you ask me fare skills on every class was the dumbest design choice ever. Should have made them exclusive to paladin, swordmaster, warrior, sniper, grappler and mage. Look at wyvern lord. It needs c rank Lance's but Lance's are useless because an axefare iron axe has the same might as a silver lance and it will waste a slot to have lance prowess. Also just give all advanced classes 6 move. There is no reason they should be stuck in the corner doing nothing cause they cant catch up. I just really hope dlc gives us a good sword class and lance to maybe. If you read this whole rant thank you cause I probably wasted way to much time writing it for 1 person to read the first 2 sentences.

[@LinkKing7]

I read it ;) I agree with most of what you said tbh

[@bolthead437]

dont know about you but my arm really hurts

[@seizalez8096]

thunder cross split attack

[@SharurFoF]

"Growths do matter"
I think the relevant argument is not so much that growths as a thing don't matter, but that marginal differences in class growths (5-10%) don't matter, particularly when you're only in the class for ~5-10 levels, or it's a late game class and you're gaining levels slowly (which is to say, this covers every class in the game, probably).

[@dragames]

i just started this game this week, but for Ingrid, I sort of had to care. Her Strength growth was so godawful I needed her as a fighter to get the +2 to strength and I'd like to think that extra boost is why she has the strength she has now to at least tickle the opponents.

[@stuntmankelp3198]

One quick thing, I know it's hard to promote into but Great Knight does have lancefaire. As goofy as it sounds I did look and I'm sure it has it

[@wesnohathas1993]

It makes a small amount of sense when you consider that Armored Knight and Fortress Knight give a bonus to lance skill.

[@laggalot1012]

Which is largely what makes the class both feasible and attractive to Ferdinand and Sylvain, even if you have them go through cavalry for the most part, with both having Armour and Riding proficiency and still letting them utilize Swift Strikes and in Sylvain's case the Lance of Ruin to the fullest.

[@MrLuizilla]

I like Hero, honestly. Balthus makes great use of it as a monstrous Vantage/Wrath unit
Also he ROCKS that look

[@droog681]

The Hero mastery skill is defiant str, in the vid you said they didn't have one, just wanted to clear that up.

[@zer0vision891]

I think me meant that there was no Combat Art mastery in that Swordmaster and Assassin get Astra and Assassinate while Hero gets none.

[@Phase4TheProphet]

Re: the importance of tomefaire, I think for Lysithea specifically her mag will already be so ridiculously high that the extra 3 from faire is pretty negligible. There's also the fact that with Thyrsus at her disposal, I think the additional move from gremory and potentially the range+ abilities from reason/faith S just gives her too much utility as a mobile magic artillery unit. Having an effective attack range of 10 is just ridiculous.

[@AsianRailgun]

You get even more move as dark knight and keep tomefaire (plus dark knight is the only class that has dark tomefaire), the fact that class exists makes gremory pointless.

[@Phase4TheProphet]

@@AsianRailgun If she didn't already have access to Thyrsus I would agree, but honestly I prefer the double magic uses to the extra move, and like I said her magic is already so high that the tomefaire is kinda superfluous. I'd also take the 10 dex growth of gremory over 10 strength for Lysithea every day of the week.
Plus, if you really want the tomefaire that badly it's not unreasonable to think she'd hit S+ rank even in a non-NG+ run because of her personal skill, while double uses can't be obtained outside of gremory. The only thing DK really has that sets it apart is Canto, but since you're attacking from 4-5 spaces away already that also feels kind of unnecessary.

[@CrabKFP]

Well both Dark Knight and Gremory Lysithea are good. My first playthrough in GD I had her as a Dark Knight because everyone in that route was so mobile (Claude and Hilda on wyverns and Marianne, Lorenz and Leonie on horses) so I needed a mage unit aside from Marianne (Lorenz was a bow knight) that could keep up with most of my units so I had to go with Dark Knight. Also canto can help her retreat when she uses her magic and is in a desfavorable situation (and those situations aren't rare because she is a glass canon).
Now if you already got covered a mage and a healer that can be mobile (like Sylvain and Marianne for example) then having a Gremory Lysithea isn't bad at all thanks to the punch she can pack and can fill a support role until the Death Knight or other mounted units appears

[@ammonil1261]

i thought faire gives you +5? and two faires give you +10 right?

[@Alex-oq3wx]

Hunter's Volley is great in maddening because a good portion of the time, your units aren't doubling anything, Brave Bow is less consistent compared to Steel Bow and sometimes against enemy assassins, like Petra, you really, really want the extra hit.
This is especially helpful against things like endgame falcon knights and their rediculous speed.

[@ammonil1261]

i know that not every enemy is a flyer, but being able to one round every flier is so nice. i dont think any fliers (with the exception of bosses or if any enemies have that ability that makes effective weapons not effective) can survive one round against hunters volley with a decent weapon

[@StarforceSF]

Kinda sad about the Hero Class, it was my favorite untill TH

[@Rain_Ruru]

So i beat Crimson flower maddening mode and i can absolutely say that Sniper was almost essential for maddening. Hunters volley was absolutely incredible for killing crucial targets who were unbelievably tanky and speedy. It basically increases range, power and turns ANY bow into a brave bow if youre slower.
I firmly stand by the fact that if your archer isnt as strong or ready for Bow knight then i can totally reccomend Sniper as a permanent stay. Hunters volley is THAT good imo.

[@fakesmile172]

You should probably just have a discussion with Mekkah. If you want to debate though, go ahead.
Fortress Knight would be somewhat decent if it didn't destroy your speed. (I mean the -6 promotion modifier)

[@LinkKing7]

Depends on what people want to see, I'd be more than happy to do either 🙃

[@pro2firez]

Fortress Knight isn't that bad if you're playing hard mode or under but maddening it's adjutant fodder. Its defensive is highly lackluster there.

[@rggrill3588]

@@pro2firez Guard Adjutants are the best ones so you might as well make people you bench into Armors for that

[@bladedusk5337]

With the right lineup and decent RNG (and some ambrosia), fortress knights can still be pretty insane in maddening, especially if you get them into warmaster for quick ripotse (then turning back into fortress knight).
I got my rapheal to 54 PRT by grondar field post timeskip (mostly with the help of consumables), and he was basically invurnable to all nameless non-mage enemies. He wasnt useful in all maps, but there is often something he can do (like holding a whole area on his own), and when there isnt (in any map) he is a great adjutant.
But of course each ambrosia is 1 less speed carrot for another unit. I still had enough to get both leonie and Claude to double most enemies in final few maps tho.

[@rggrill3588]

​@UCkziidygTsZiW8GQAiPD-IA The fact that Fortress Knight needs such an investment (and luck) actually speaks against the class imo (you pretty much said that Fortress Knights in Maddening are suboptimal and inconsistent). Along with that using a single case of personal experience isn't really an argument for (or against) the viability of a certain build.
While Fortress Knight does have ludicrous physical tankiness, it suffers greatly from the Siege Magic that you can see running around in late game maps (cough cough BL Finale) as well as a serious case of "Can't enter a mage's range in general even if their life depended on it" and Warmasters can put a strong dent into pretty much anything the decide to punch
And the build of Fortress Knight->Warmaster for Quick Riposte->Fortress Knight again seems kind of gimmicky at best, as Wyvern Lord and War Master can serve as decently reliable shields (altough not to the extremes of Fortress Knight) with their high avoid/self healing respectively while also serving another role [War Master is a walking delete button that can also take a hit with healing focus while Wyvern Lord is busy being the best frigging class in the game]

[@Cadillac1862]

Grappler: if I have a unit that's going down the brawler path, I actually like Grappler over War Master in many scenarios because of Fierce Iron Fist and the unencumbered movement like an assassin.
Sniper: The luck is probably added because it's luck x .5 for crit
Warlock: Edelgard learns some Black Magic spells too. Also, considering the units that realistically make good use of Warlock, I agree that it does have that extra OOMF over Gremory. Still not sure which Lysithea I like most though between, Dark Knight, Holy Knight (probably the best Holy Knight in this game) and Gremory.
Always a fan of your videos!!

[@LinkKing7]

Yeah Fierce Iron Fist is pretty nuts! I did bring up Edelgard in that analysis so yeah, Warlock isn't good for her either, she'd want to go Dark Knight as well!
Glad you enjoyed the video!

[@Cadillac1862]

@@LinkKing7 Sorry I should have been more clear: I was commenting on you saying that Edelgard gets no use out of the faire and uses from Warlock, but I agree she would generally fare better as a Dark Knight than as a Warlock

[@tyxant5919]

Another thing about Grappler is that it's better for future War Masters in the long run due to the Dex growth especially in maddening since axes miss pretty often there. Though, axe crit +10 is pretty tempting tbh.
Also it's actually (Dex + Luck) / 2 for crits, just to make it clear.

[@emblemwarrior11]

My takeaway on the Gremory topic is pretty simple. I'd rather cast more high power spells (ex. Fimbulvetr, Excalibur, Agnea's Arrow, Abraxas) then less slightly more powerful spells. Also, the freedom to switch from healing to dropping nukes at the press of a button, while having more of everything is too good to pass up. It's really quite simple, which is better? 6 Fimbulvetrs and 4 Abraxas, or 6 slightly more powerful Fimbulvetrs and only 2 Abraxas?

[@louiesatterwhite3885]

Personally, I prefer dark knight for the extra movement and canto.

[@noishfanboy1141]

yo but like mortal savants got warding blow and a single point of movement more like come on they gotta be the best right

[@theoverpreparerlamenters3r436]

@@noishfanboy1141 yeah, but if you don't look at an all class display, it is extremely out of the way.

[@eckersl1969]

Edelgard has both black and dark magic. Making her the only unit to have both.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

It triggers me that more females get access to dark magic, but the dark magic specialist class is male only

[@TheOmegaDragon]

@@aprinnyonbreak1290 Because if Lysithia had access to lifetaker and Poison Strike she'd destroy existence itself with all that power.

[@quantumhornet211]

TheOmegaDragon neither of those would be good for lysithea

[@Auxified]

Cuz she's clearly evil.

[@cjsomebody2625]

I think Sniper can be an option over Bow Knight for maddening since you won't always be moving your max distance due to sheer enemy strength, and I think Hunter's Volley outmatches basically anything the Bow Knight has for offense. Doubling can already be a struggle, and when you hit the timeskip it's pretty much more true than ever that your rate of doubling enemy units will be based on their class. Coupled with the ridiculous HP everything ends up getting I think it can be worth staying in sniper since hunter's volley enables bow flexibility(HV Killer Bow, Magic Bow, etc) as alternatives to burning through brave bow uses to reliably kill anything. I know for sure that my spd screwed Leonie would've been pretty much worthless by the end if I didn't abandon the Bow Knight route to hard spec into bows for double faire, crit +10, and spamming of HV Killer Bow.
I'll submit however that canto and bow range +2 make bow knight very useful for getting aggro on some enemy groups with safety while sniper needs outside help from like Flayn rescue if they're being threatened after picking something off. I think both classes are very useful in their own rights, while I think Bow Knight completely eclipses sniper on lower difficulties maddening makes the choice significantly harder in my opinion.

[@shiroshnur]

Hunter's volley is a class mastery skill. You can take that with you into bow knight. Bow knight also keeps bowfaire from sniper, changes +1 to +2 range and gets canto. Specifically for leonie, she also gets point blank volley at A bows, so she doesn't need to go down the sniper route to have a consecutive hit move since you need A bows for both sniper and bow knight. Point blank volley is also better than hunters volley in might, effect, and cost, with the only downside being it's a 1 range move, but in maddening 1 range is useful because extra range drastically decreases hit rate. For any other bow user, it's useful to master sniper and move on, but leonie and cyril can go on without it.

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

@@shiroshnur No you can't. Combat Arts you get from class mastery can only be used if you stay in that class.

[@shiroshnur]

@@AkameGaKillfan777 Ah, ok. I mean, that's not true for all combat art because I know for sure that re-positioning CA's and Triangle Attack stay with you as you class up, but I haven't taken the time to master too many classes that don't have mount's. Still Leonie does better as a Bow Knight since her point-blank volley will act the same as HV.

[@cjsomebody2625]

@@shiroshnur Point Blank Volley while powerful almost defeats the purpose of going into bow knight. Compared to HV you use more mov(effectively the mov you gain from promoting to begin with) giving less opportunity to canto to safety if you need to. Not to mention you're more prone to counter attacks if you miss or just can't kill.
Also as far as I'm aware it's only combat arts from advanced classes that end up being class locked like fierce iron fist and astra.

[@MacZephyrZ]

I used Ignatz in my Maddening playthrough and changed him between Sniper and Bow Knight depending on the terrain of the map, and Sniper definitely preformed better between the two. His crit rate when using Hunter's Volley with a Killer Bow really came in clutch at times, and having low movement isn't so bad when your range is so good.

[@takarahayashi4124]

Just throwing it out there, Bow Knight is overrated, Sniper is Better. I'll expand upon this. Hunter's Volley is locked to sniper, it guarantee's a double with increased +1 range, Hit and ATK. Basically you turn every bow into a Brave Bow, without the need of a brave bow. Snipers are more accurate and hits harder than Bow Knight. And if your sniper happened to be fast, they won't get their speed gimped like with Bow Knight. the extended range of Bow Knight is completely unreliable. in Maddening there's an additional 10 hit penalty above 2 range to the already existing hit penalty that was present in HM. The only thing Bow Knight has over Sniper is move and canto. but horse move gets gimped constantly where the extended move almost doesn't matter. If you want high move, use a flying unit.

[@jackalvonstone250]

I agree. Making Shamir a Bow Knight for one battle was a huge mistake for me. I didn't get as many kills as I did as a Sniper. Her Support with Cyril is no lie. Her Hunter's Volley literally made her MVP in my Final Blue Lions battle.

[@ihavenoidea8368]

If you use a Bow Knight with high dexterity and equip all accuracy bonus skills, you‘ll have almost always 100% hit at any range (except for enemy assassins or peg knights of course), so the penalty isn‘t tragic and the added mobility is really good

[@lsrrr3857]

But no flying unit get bow range +2? If horse movement gets gimped you can dismount, so Bow Knight will have same movement as sniper for a few maps, and much better movement in most maps.

[@RushAnthem69]

This is only true for maddening. On Normal or Hard the extra range and movement is way better. But the slightly better growths and hunters volley are better for Maddening.

[@arcanekitsune4202]

Cyril and Bernie as bow knights worked stupidly well for me in BL (my first run where I made stupid mistakes, for example, Dimitri has really bad res and I did nothing about it). But, Bernie with a magic bow was no mistake, with her high movement she could easily snipe enemies and canto back. Cyril and Bernie needed that range to do x2 and x4 attacks.

[@jayroach2]

In my experience having completed 2 non NG+ runs for maddening, Snipers > Bowknight unless your Bernadetta, Ignatz or Leonie. Hunters Volley giving guaranteed doubles is critically useful because maddening enemies are fast. Hunters volley with a killer bow lets you ORKO most of the game with a crit too. The main reasons the aforementioned 3 prefer bowknight are because Bernadetta appreciates the extra range for Encloser, Ignatz can debuff from longer range, and Leonie has her own bow double art (Leonie is probably still better as a bow using flier class either way)

[@LinkKing7]

Good to know, I'll have to give those all a spin and test it myself! Thanks for the feedback!

[@brandonjuno]

HV > PBV

[@jayroach2]

@@brandonjuno I agree. Only thing is it can only be used as a sniper and Leonies 60 speed growth is great for a flying class while still having a double combat art. Idk which is best for her though honestly.

[@brandonjuno]

@@jayroach2 I left her as a Sniper. She can ORKO any enemy unit every turn while staying out of range in Enemy Phase. Can't really ask for more than that. I did consider BK but she can't ORKO reliably in that class without PBV, which leaves her open in Enemy Phase.

[@jayroach2]

@@brandonjuno As a flier she can ORKO while also evasion tanking on the enemy phase thanks to 60 speed growth.
Maddening enemies have around 110-120 hit with high hit archetypes having 130. Flier Leonie can have an avoid of around 100 at lvl 20. Leaving most end game enemies having 10-20% hit on her even if she stayed lvl 20 all game. That's without terrain.

[@deuxexkane2659]

Linkking vs Mekkah
"Let 'em debate!"

[@SharurFoF]

Why does Paladin have a negative speed growth? Easy: Canto is OP, this is balance. But what about Wyverns, you ask? Why, they have a bow weakness, which is clearly sufficient to balance out Canto & flight!

[@shiny9690]

But Wyverns (and Pegasi, for that matter) get Alert Stance, which you can use to just solo an entire group of enemies XD

[@Zero-gl2ou]

what about galeforce?

[@louiesatterwhite3885]

@@Zero-gl2ou galeforce isnt really in this game, besides the combat art that Edelgard gets with her relic.

[@mr.cloudy1004]

I remember hero being my favorite class in past games and how it is portrayed in this game makes me sad

[@magiv7573]

Just started but 1 thing I wanna bring up about the growths thing
This is one of the few games in the series where growths>bases because all the students have the exact same starting point
Even later recruited units scaled their bases off of personal and enwmy class growths
Only really church units consider growths to be more relevant but even then the lates church unit you get is still halfway into the game
The games.action economy as well is entirely based around investment into units, where as mekkahs point about bases>growth is centered around immediate utility without investment
Though imma just shut up and watch the rest
Maybe comment later

[@magiv7573]

Also imma guess now
Hero: lmao, go back to GBA
Swordmaster: actually solid, easy to obtain, has no real upgrade in master classes but is still viable
Assassin: also solid, reason to use over swordmaster but vice versa, basically just another sword option
Sniper: inferior to bow knight in.most categories bur still a competent combat class and proficient with the best phys weapon. Hunters volley is also really damn good
Warlock: probably fine alone but no real reaso to use it over gremory or dark knight
Bishop: the best class for healer, gremory can peovide.a bit more utility but those like mercedes and marianne should stay in bishop
Wyvern rider: fine but wyvern lord exists
Paladin: really should be a master class tbh, good stats, aegis is great, 8 move, 1 of 3 classes with lance faire. Falcon is fem locked and this games rendition of great knight should be deleted
Warrior: honestly similar pros as swordmaster and gives wrath as its mastery, completely viable, wyvern lord exists tho, also warmaster but thats male locked and like, cmon, wyverns.
I think i covered everything there
Well time to finish it

[@LinkKing7]

You pretty much got it!

[@magiv7573]

@@LinkKing7 nice
Though I missed brawler and fortress knight
Though aid hate to agree with what tiu said on those 2 as well
Lowkey ita fun to play this game in advanced classes

[@guestusersomething4340]

This video is very well done and informative. Most of it reflects my own opinions too. I will say that I disagree with your assessment of sniper specifically though. Unless the character in question gets point blank volley (cyril and leonie), hunter’s volley is a very good reason to stick with sniper over bow knight on maddening. You’re giving up one strength, and three movement for a combat art that guarantees a follow up attack before the enemy can counter and adds one might and ten crit to each attack. Since you will rarely double late game enemies on maddening, I think this is very useful for cutting down falcon knights. Also I think snipers have high luck because higher luck increases your base critical chance

[@imaginarymatter]

I prefer Hunter's Volley... I mean Snipers to Bow Knights on Maddening because the guaranteed double hit is always relevant on that difficulty. I don't think Bow Knights and the class progression leading up to them have enough Speed growths to reliably double-hit the average enemy. This will lead the average Sniper to easily out damage the average Bow Knight just because they can always double hit -- even if the Bow Knight has a Brave Bow equipped (since Hunter's Volley can be used with a higher base Mt weapon or crit weapon).
Additionally, Snipers require less investment than a Bow Knight who will need training in lances and riding; when Snipers can just focus on Bows.
Canto and the increased range are good on Bow Knights, but I think the damage Snipers can deal makes them great.

[@amanasd26]

This, staying too long in bow knight can cripple your unit's growths. Sniper is excellent

[@sasukeuchiha998]

Or just be Wyvern Lord and screw with everyone. Solo with F! Byleth Wyvern Lord with training sword on maddening.

[@shiroshnur]

Hunter's volley is a class mastery skill. You can master sniper and take Hunter's volley when you promote into bow knight.
Edit: I'm being told HV can't come with you. Doesn't matter for Leonie and Cyril because they have point-blank volley. I can see why Bernadetta and Shamir would want to stay there, but they're the only one I can think of.

[@shiroshnur]

@@amanasd26 you're over emphasizing growths. From sniper to bowknight, the difference in growths for strength, dex and speed (probably the most important for archers) are -5%,-20%,and-5% respectively. On average, that's 2 point of difference in dex for every 10 levels, and 1 point of difference in speed and strength for every 20 levels. That's what you would be trading for +1 range in comparison, canto and 3(?) extra move. I don't think the trade in utility is worth the 3 stats you'll gain between lvl 30 and 40.

[@generalginyu8594]

@@shiroshnur What "maddening mode bonuses" are you talking about? Also, you got the numbers wrong: From Sniper to Bowknight, it is -5% Strength, -20% Dexterity, -5% Speed, -10% Luck. What stat is "skill" supposed to be? Are we talking about the same game? I made the exam for Bow Knight with Bernadetta and it is clearly the more powerful role, but I switch back to Sniper in battles where Bow Knight's boni are not needed.

[@theoverpreparerlamenters3r436]

Mostly.
Then there's wyvern lord and War Master.

[@survivorlast1171]

Hunters Volley is amazing on Maddening especially during the CF final chapter to take care of those pegasus reinforcements

[@TheDJGrandPa]

Interesting. As someone who is very novice at strategy rpgs (still beat it kind of easily on hard/classic), I always felt like a lot of the advanced classes seemed better than the masters. Cool to see i wasnt completely thinking out of my ass

[@keithstotler5653]

getting strong Datto vibes. Job well done. Watching your videos with the breakdowns and concise opinions on the ins and outs of everything has been helping me shape my first playthrough with less anxiety about permadeath.

[@LinkKing7]

Glad you enjoyed it and found it helpful!

[@derkuchenmacher1455]

Finally someone who also says Bishop is the best endgame healing class. Ive had so many discussions with people that told me that they needed their holy knight movement in exchange for healing+10 and white magic uses x2.
Also I really feel like there is no reason for swordusers to promote into a master class. Assassin is really good and swordmaster works just fine too if you want a bit more strenght. And I agree that people underestimate growths. I think since Mekkah started the whole growths vs. bases debate, a lot of people who agree with him started neglecting growths, which is a pitfall in its own.

[@LinkKing7]

Yeah, extra movement for healing didn't really help too much, especially for units with Physic and Fortify, at least in my experience!
And yeah, I don't mean to knock Mekkah at all, I'm just playfully bantering. His view is definitely valid under the context in which he presents it. Growths are nice, but not necessary and so they shouldn't be OVERemphasized. But they sure are fun as hell to mess around with. I may or may not have done that once of thrice... And that may or may not become a video at some point...

[@A2ZOMG]

I mean to be serious, mounted advantage in general is stupidly huge in this game when you factor how much it helps you do things like abuse unit repositioning combat arts, manipulate the enemy phase to your advantage, and built supports efficiently. Barring extra uses of Warp, double white magic uses also tends to be overkill in normal gameplay.
It is however ideal to have access to both classes for any unit going that route.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

One thing I like to note, as someone who has way too much fun spamming horses and wyverns, the movement of non-mounted classes is only really a problem if more than one or two units are mounted.
An argument can always be made that you'd rather be there than here, but unmounted units really only "suck" when everyone else is already mounted. If you don't have any mounted units, or you maybe have one or two as a firefighter or objective stooge, that support your team instead of, y'know, being your team, then your walking units do just fine.

[@derkuchenmacher1455]

A Prinny Slacking Off no I think the healers are a special case for being unmounted. A Warlock is way worse with 4 move than a Bishop. The Phyisc range in this game is insane, so you can have a bunch of mounted units that charge ahead while your healer can still support them.

[@TabularConferta]

I know this video is 3 years old, I wonder if the negative speed growth is because the character isn't running around themselves, they are sat on the horse most of the time. So they figured they won't be as used to using their own legs if they dismount.
Thank you so much for all the excellent videos.

[@ShadowOmegaXis]

Hunter's Volley is pretty darn good. Going a crit build with any archer makes it close to 2 guaranteed crits (my Shamir in Maddening gets to 90% crit with frauldarius batallion and killer bow+) and it's effectively a brave weapon. It gives pretty good damage output, and can trump some of the more troublesome classes (Assassin/Falcon Knight with it's +15 hit), and as long as you aren't going for LTC, you don't really need high Mov since most of the times overextending an archer will get them killed. I can't really think of a good reason to use it if you aren't going crit build though.

[@rucession5760]

War Master vs Grappler is a more of a trade-off rather than a straight upgrade. Grappler has a better player phase with Fierce Iron Fist/unimpeded movement while War Master has a better enemy phase due to consistently higher attack, crit chance, and possibly quick riposte.
The same can be said for Snipers vs Bow Knights, since Bow Knights are a more utility-based class (longer effective range, lower damage output) while Snipers are a more damage-focused class (lower movement/range, but guaranteed doubles with Hunter's Volley).
The trade-offs are especially noticeable on Maddening since the most dangerous enemies are also the ones with the highest AS, and being able to guarantee a kill on these types of enemies on player phase is sometimes worth a reclass from the above master classes to their advanced counterparts.

[@LinkKing7]

Yeah I can definitely see that attack speed argument coming in to play here. That is definitely true!

[@evansmith2832]

Growths do matter, but especially for master classes, they don't matter all THAT much. assuming you get to level 40 in the endgame after promoting to a master class at level 30, a 10% difference in growth will only yeild a 1 stat difference at the very end of the game where that one stat point barely has any time to make much of a difference.

[@Icynova]

One battle to master Vantage for mercenary?! What battles are you doing? Or are you using broken weapons and healer cheese?

[@LinkKing7]

Using a Knowledge gem, you can do it in an auxiliary battle by just unequipping your weapon and tanking for 25 rounds or so. It's pretty easy tbh.

[@Iceblade269]

Finally someone pointed out the problem with Gemory. The loss of faire is noticeable and the balance of both faith and reason are not too much better than Mortal Savant’s sword and reason.
Dark Knight in most cases is better. It gets canto, buffed damage, and make gopd use of Frozen Lance.
Bishop and Holy Knight should be the only faith based classes you go into. Bishop gets you healing +10 and Holy Knight grants white tomefaire and mobility. And frozen lance!
Though in regards to Holy Knight, only people with strong white magic or recover should take it. Anyone with Physic should be relegated Bishop instantly and Recover nulls the loss of Recovery + 10.

[@dragames]

don't you get Faire back if you have an S rank in them?

[@robertweston3874]

Growths are definitely important in 3H, for example the highest base for speed is 20, but by time skip most enemies who have decent speed and strength will have speeds exceeding that. As a result, good growths are ideal as it increases the chances of out preforming the enemy and ultimately living. Yes, bases do have a big influence on how the character stats look. However, good growths are also required to stay at a somewhat comfortable position in relation to the enemy.

[@MrMarinus18]

7:05
The big thing is that they do get affected by terrain in contrast to flyers which combined with their stealth skill can allow them to get in positions for link attacks.

[@ammonil1261]

from my understanding, what people get wrong about mekkah’s point about growths, is not that growths are completely irrelevant, but that little changes in growth rates, such as 5-15%, dont really matter, and that the difference in bases is usually more important, and so is almost every other factor (i.e. classes, weapon ranks, etc)

[@xakuray5522]

Actually it make sense for cavaliers to have reduced Gr in speed, and it should be the case for all mounted classes (minus maybe the pegasi), they don't use their legs much and it would need both the rider and its ride to get more agile for the unit as a whole to really be faster. And I totally agree with you, armored classes should give you a speed GR increase (only the class modifier should lower the speed stat), it would make the classes much more interesting too.
One last thing, Paladin's modifier for instance is actually +1spd not -1spd, but its mount comes with a -2spd modifier. so if you dismounted, you get rid of that speed penalty attached to the mount.
It's also the case for flying mounts but those instead come with bonuses (+2 in str and spd for wyvern lord). it is important to note, considering how exploitable the ability to dismounted is in this game.

[@volterion6317]

Imo it is actually debatable if grappler is obsulete because of war master simply because fierce iron fist is so strong. Also you get a bit more speed and Dex than warmaster which is helpful. Also i am pretty sure than grappler doesnt slowed down because of terrain like forests

[@LinkKing7]

It really boils down to what phase you prefer, but War Master IS incredibly powerful

[@bkebradley]

Move will always be the most powerful stat, never forget that

[@SharurFoF]

We still don't care about class bases? Lysithea and Marianne just both got +6 Def from promoting to Advanced, while Raphael got +6 Spd, don't tell me they don't matter!

[@joeyjon825]

Not quite sure what you meant by assassinate being unreliable (it's a combat art) unless you were referring to enemies that block that sort of thing. Lethality is the ability based on dex/4 which is very unreliable (bit of a gimmick but it's fun) and can also get blocked by some enemies anyway.

[@LinkKing7]

Pretty low proc chance on assassinate is what I was referring to.

[@Nagrom]

I thought I that I over thought optimising my units while I was playing maddening, finally I found somebody more sad than me :P
I wish these videos would've been on RUclips a month ago, beating maddening would've been less of an RNG fest.

[@gustavovillarreal4039]

For me the only 2 characters that should go to sniper are Bernadetta and Ashe because they really benefit of that 20% extra dexterity and range +1, this just because they have dead eye (for me one of the best arts in the game) which really lowers your HIT rate (20% each extra tile). However each big fight I switch them to bow knight because of the range +2 and extra mobility/survivability

[@elgatto3133]

Tbh both of them appreciate other classes more, ashe begs to be a bow wyvern, and bernie makes a good falconknight

[@l.n.3372]

@@elgatto3133
I concur. Wyvern Ashe and falcon Bernadetta are my go to for those units now. Flying bow units are excellent. And sniper doesn't help their mediocre strength at all.

[@Akamuaru999]

Handy. Succinct. Useful information and nice editing. Stayed for the Hubert fashion show. ♥

[@LinkKing7]

Thank you very much, glad you enjoyed it!

[@LuriTV]

I think you underestimate the sheer weight of full plate armor on your body and on your horse. The speed loss for Fortress Knight and Paladin are completely justifiable

[@Paaaarl]

Without a doubt Sniper is one of the best ranged options for maddening. 2 things however that need to be said.
1. ALWAYS TAKE POISON STRIKE! When using an archer, as said they typically suffer from strength penalties. Using poison strike on maddening especially near the end where enemies have 60+ hp can be godlike for using less units to take out one enemy. This can also be used to train weaker allies by feeding the exp to them since poison strike doesn't kill.
2. if you are suffering from too much from strength penalties or are worried about future growth, you can master the brigand class skill for death blow which will boost your strength by a whopping 6 on your turn. It may not activate on an enemies turn but honestly you shouldn't be allowing them to get hit in the first place.

[@bluegem8582]

There is actually ONE thing to dislike about wyvern lord
It makes all your units look like turkeys with its armor

[@drewbabe]

3 damage is absolutely a worthwhile trade for 1 mov. Mov is the most important stat in FE. Oh and the extra range on spells like Physic doesn't hurt. Gremory is most certainly the better endgame class for healers and is easier to get into for most of the girls than Dark/Holy Knight due to their difficulty learning lances.

[@drewbabe]

Oh also you should unlock the master classes even if you don't plan on using them if they will provide the stat bonus. I know stat boosters are really common in this game but it's only a couple thousand gold for what is sometimes like a +5 to two stats.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

@@drewbabe addendum to that.
If your mage is going for DK/HK, don't forget to certify for Paladin along the way. It has a much higher base str of 17, which means less slowdown from heavier magic

[@LinkKing7]

Dark Knight has one more move AND 3 more damage than Gremory.
Gremory also really suffers in terms of healing strength in general. So sure, have the 1 more move, and have more uses, but you're literally healing half as much as you normally would. If it works for the way your team is structured then that's fine.But as a standalone, it doesn't do the job better than Bishop does.

[@AsianRailgun]

@@LinkKing7 2 more move

[@elgatto3133]

Most people who are talking about the bases vs growths thing are missing the point... the whole discussion revolves around units like nino or Amelia or est, who have wildly strong growths, but generally really bad bases so they have to be babysat to rack up damage.... in the same game as Seth, Sirius, or Marcus, who will stay above your team throughout the game. FE3H bases vs growths is less of a discussion since most of the units have level 1 bases, although some units will always have better bases and to this extent means that their earlygame viability is always better. Take Sylvain (out of BL) and Leonie for example, who start with great bases and will stay on par for the rest of the game, meanwhile someone like caspar will only begin to catch up to the team at about level 20. Why use him then, when you can use Felix who starts good and will always be good, or catherine, who starts strong as hell and ends up good.

[@washada]

Assassin was my favorite class back in Blazing Sword and I was happy to make Beyleth one for most of my playthrough. I ended up not using Lethality/Assassinate much, but the huge movement let me exploit terrain as much as possible, and he ended up as a ridiculous dodgetank that would solo most of the map in latter chapters. I haven’t played Maddening, though, so I’m a filthy casual.

[@ammonil1261]

was this hard or normal?

[@l.n.3372]

Excellent video overall! Also the Hubert fan in me appreciates all of the excess Hubert in the video xD
2 quick points:
1) Quick case for Bishop Lysithea being a great stepping stone for gremory Lysithea. Obviously as you discussed, she gets virtually nothing from warlock, which is hilarious as it's her canon class based on her outfit. Considering that people want warp 2x, bishop is a great stepping stone to gremory as she waits until level 30. Lysithea will usually have A rank dark magic and white magic around level 25 or earlier anyway, so she can use bishop for about 5 levels before gremory. This gives her 2 uses of warp, while also increasing her healing potential if you need a spare healer for whatever reason. Definitely agree that bishop > holy knight. But I think you undervalue gremory a bit as well. I use bishop and gremory Mercedes/Marianne/Annette usually as well in addition to Lysithea. Obviously Linhardt gets screwed by the gender locked gremory class, but every other female mage can make use of gremory as their final class because they don't need tome faire built into the class since S+ black or dark magic will give you tome faire anyway.
2) I think you undervalue hero as well. But I'm not surprised because everyone does. I'd much rather have hero than warrior or grappler on average because those 2 will just be replaced with war master. You really only want wrath and tome breaker to pass onto your war master: you never really care about warrior or grappler themselves. As end game final classes, hero might not offer much skill wise but it's fine as an endgame class in terms of growths since there's no better master class for swords. However, the downside is obviously that assassin and swordmaster are simply more useful. Hero has great growths but swordmaster is better, and assassin just has great movement utility albeit worse strength. I use swordmaster for all my sword end game unit classes. I've never used assassin TBH but I'd probably use hero more often if it wasn't gender locked. I think that they really screwed up by not making hero the master class for physical sword units. And they especially screwed up by making it gender locked for no reason at all, given that Echidna was a hero all the way back in Binding Blade.

[@darklordxerinic]

The reason Paladin has a low speed growth was Int Sys idea of how to nerf the Paladin class. Since Paladin is often broken and there is no reason to ever not be in that class. I remember in some of the older games, they had the same defense cap as Generals which meant there was 0 reason to ever be in that class since Paladin did that and did it better. This game decided to try to nerf Paladin a bit so that it wouldn’t be as broken as it so easily becomes.

[@elgatto3133]

But that doesn't make any sense... wyverns are usually equally good... and they got BUFFED in this game

[@darklordxerinic]

El Gatto Well, buffed in terms of pure stats yes. But you have to take into account the buff of Archers in this game as well. Yes flying units have been buffed to be better dodge tanks than Swordmaster’s. But even still Archers now have the ability to snipe them out of the air outside of their attack range. You can dismount to avoid this, but unlike Horses, dismounting a flyer gives you no benefit other than the removal of Archer danger. But you sacrifice pretty much all your stats in the process. Not to mention with how powerful magic is in this game as well, a good magic hit will really hurt them if not one shot them.

[@elgatto3133]

@@darklordxerinic yeah but the thing about that is that fliers have 9-10 total attack range, and snipers have 8 at most. Meaning that if both are advancing, the flier will attack first... and the dodge tanking element too, not to mention that many fliers will just outright live bow attacks. And the stat loss from dismounting is not at all significant in the grand scheme of things. Mages have it worse with only 6 attack range. This means fliers will always outmaneuver archers, not to mention the myriad ways of avoiding damage (damage gambits, essar research group miracle gambit, just dodging, impenetrable wall)

[@quickpawmaud]

I think the negative speed makes sense, speed is essentially you ability to make follow up attacks and on a horse when you are lance charging people that is not exactly easy to do as well as being an easier target for a sword master to strike twice for example. Not saying it should be this way but logically it makes sense that someone on foot has more control over their movements to strike faster. Although by that logic Falcon knight should get negative speed so idfk.

[@UniGya]

Two years late and not in the master class video but I still think Gremory is a better class compared to Dark Knight for at least 1 character, that being Lysithea. Her magic growths are already so high that you don’t really need the faire for her to be killing and having double Warp and extra casts of her stronger dark magic is amazing. You can also make an argument it’s better for support white mages like Mercedes, especially ones who get ranged healing spells, over White Knight since having additional movement isn’t that important when you’re already able to heal from across the map and you don’t have offensive white magic other than Nosforatu. Staying in Bishop is also reasonable but honestly I’ve never found use for healing +10 given most of the time your magic stat is so high you can heal everyone but the tankiest characters for full

[@sirus0s]

I know I'm a good three years late to this discussion, but that's not gonna stop me.
I think Gremory is an awesome Master Class for Lysithea specifically. She already does an absurd amount of damage, so she doesn't really needs faire. And while she wouln't be upset at the extra movement of Dark Knight, thanks to Thyrsus being utterly broken she can live without it. And since most of her damage output comes from low-use nukes, Dark Spikes with 3 and Luna, Hades and Abraxas with 2 (plus the utility "nuke" that is warping someone to the middle of the enemy), I believe that she benefits more having 2x uses than the extra damage of faire, especially considering that she can't get class faires for both her magic types

[@prankstermona1485]

Sniper, in my opinion, is really good (and in some cases more preferable than Bow Knight). Sure, they lack the movement and range like Bow Knight does, but Hunter’s Volley is just a really good combat art. Give a Sniper a killer bow and a Crit ring, you’re pretty much guaranteed to at least proc one of your critical hits.

[@cameronhaas1843]

a 10% boost in class growths is 1 point over 10 levels. When it comes to master vs advanced class, that's probably 1 pt over the remaining game. Moreover, boosters to stats like str/spd literally grow on trees, whereas boosts to movement are extremely limited. That's why outside of some niche circumstances (like Bishop Linhardt being his best final class), almost everyone gains from going a master class unless you're specifically going for weaker builds. Modifiers are more important than growth differences, but those too can be annulled by abundant boosters. Also anyone who tells you that wyvern/bow knight offense isn't good enough on maddening is straight up wrong, relics and brave weapons exist and are abundant enough unless you insist on routing every map.
TLDR: boosts to stats like str/spd are super abundant, boosts to move are extremely uncommon, and move is the best stat

[@battlecarrier]

I think the luck bonus is because a sniper is meant to be super accurate, and luck factors into the critical hit formula.

[@IzraelGraves]

"CoMmOn SeNsE, INteLliGenT SysTeMs"
Its clearly you that has no common sense. Weight based training and indeed, the most well-known anime training trope of them all, weighted clothing, does practically nothing to increase your speed, and in-fact puts more strain on the body than anything. This causes it to hinder far more than it helps.

[@TheIvoryDingo]

I honestly have a soft spot for Hero (but then again I don't care if I don't play optimally).
I also don't think that Bow Knight is strictly better than Sniper for EVERY unit due to it's piss poor growths (mostly because the characters I wouldn't really consider for Bow Knight don't have good enough growths to make up for Bow Knight's lack of good growths).

[@LinkKing7]

That's fair, this all eventually will comes down to how RNG has treated you in your playthrough as well at the end of the day.
I also have a weak spot for Hero, loved using them in the GBA games, but sadly it's just such a bad class here I really wish it was better!

[@nitez2730]

@@LinkKing7 gba hero feels like the wyvern classline in 3h when you fight with them

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

Why, oh why, must the cursed garbage archer units return in 3H, when you can make them immediately redundant by giving a bow to a unit who's actually good?

[@luukjansen4221]

Sniper is good because of hunters volley, my Petra now can use silver bows like if it were a brave weapon without the weight so she will still dodge every enemy. (And yes I play on maddening crimson flower and Petra is easily my best unit)

[@luukjansen4221]

And I dont do bow knight because I want Petra in her own outfit XD

[@fer447]

why do snipers have higher luck?? I don´t know but it helps with their crit rate and I love them just for that

[@Robin-mo4ls]

In this game, your own luck stat is also part of the formula for scoring crits, so that might explain the boosts of the archer

[@chocofrisbees]

Sniper can be good if you build solely around dex/crits for units like Ignatz and Ashe who have trouble reaching BW (if recruited late) and have bad strength with very high dex. Hunters Volley is 2 hits with +10 crit and if you focus on bows you can also pick up Bow Crit 10 from S rank pretty easily. Killer Bow + is available early and you can get huge crit values on them that consistently kill (or at worst, chip)

[@MrMarinus18]

Paladins having low speed actually makes sense. With 'speed' they don't mean movement speed as that is a seperate stat. They actually mean agility. A horse is large and heavy so they are not going to be able to dodge attacks or quickly change positions.

[@UltraV6565]

I always use Holy Knight Marianne because it lets her use Blutgang more effectively and she has a boon in riding

[@moonmelons]

Growths definitely matter more in this game than any other game in the franchise. In older fire emblems, a strong promoted unit with strong bases is going to be really useful with zero input, so even if they have bad growths it doesn't matter.
In Three houses you're getting most your units at level 1 and they can get as high as the 50s in the endgame in a standard playthrough, opposed to the max 38 level ups in most FE games (and most units didn't even get that many regardless). Growths absolutely matter a lot in 3H compared to any other FE game.

[@user-zb1bh9ss2f]

Let's hope DLC's are going to give us Trueblade, Gold Knight as a master classes.

[@Sy-row-work]

Hopefully the malig knight makes a return

[@shiny9690]

@@Sy-row-work so we can toss Edelgard into it to make use of her weird magic prowess

[@lukasgosdzik2547]

I Think there can be an Argument Made for holy knights for healers that don't have ranged heals (physic, fortify) since it gives you more movement and canto to get out of range after the heal.
BUT why are you using a unit without physic as a healer in the first place?

[@MoostachedSaiyanPrince]

When I played through the Yellow Dear path, I made Lorenz a Fortress Knight before making him a Great Knight. The end result was a Tank with high enough defense and resistance to shrug off almost anything, the speed to get multiple hits on almost every enemy tank, a bolt axe made him tear them to shreds even when he couldn't get that follow up, and his movement let me put him right in enemy territory to draw enemies in to fruitlessly seat at him until I ambushed them all with the rest of my units once it was my turn. He wasn't my MVP, but he was a damn useful wall to throw up in enemy territory to give them a hard time.

[@imperiallarch7610]

I think the class modifiers to growths look a lot less meaningful if you contextualize "+10% to stat" as "+1 stat per 10 levels." Like, it's not *nothing*, but if you plan to reach the end of the game around level 40, then a +10% growth boost from an advanced class that you enter at level 20 amounts to, on average, 2 points spread over 20 levels. When viewed that way, I find it hard to get excited about them.

[@iammaxhailme]

It's also worth pointing out that for someone built to be a paladin (like sylvain, ferdinand, lorenz), going from paladin to great knight is basically a straight up downgrade in stats. Fort to great knight? Probably, but arguably, an upgrade. Paladin to GK? Screw that.

[@LinkKing7]

Yeah, Paladin is the go to end game class for physical mounted units. Great Knight is the path from Fort Knight, if you can even level up the requirements enough by then. Its definitely an odd class that's for sure!

[@rggrill3588]

A little nitpick but both Sylvain and Lorenz aren't completely geared to Paladin: Sylvain's Budding Talent and Lorenz Boon imply that the devs built them to be Dark Knights (While Sylvain's magic stat itself might be lackluster his Spell list is decent and Lorenz has decent magic and an ok spell list)

[@iammaxhailme]

@@rggrill3588 That's true, I used full-magic Lorenz and dark knight Sylvain on a run and they turned out okay. But you could say nobody is really built exactly for paladin... Ferdinand could be argued that he should be a great knight, Leonie could be a bow knight, Ingrid could be a falco, etc. But some of these characters are the closest

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

As much against the grain as it probably is, the terrain immunity and extra stash of emergency healing spells of the Holy Knight tends to make it my "why not" progression from Paladin if I have tutoring to burn.
Added bonus, if the unit has an even barely passable magic stat, Nosferatu is a neat option to at least have.

[@rggrill3588]

​@@aprinnyonbreak1290 In that case i think Dark Knight would still be the stronger choice [Assuming that the "why not" progression applies to the likes of Sylvain,Ferdinand,Ingrid and Leonie] (TL;DR all the way at the bottom)
(Disclaimer: Any stats will be averages based on the assumption of your Lv 30 unit having gone Soldier->Cavalier->Paladin without going into other classes for a bit)
Units that wouldn't already go Holy/Dark Knight and stay Paladin probably won't have a magic stat above the base of those 2 (17 for Dark Knight and 15 for Holy Knight) which means that Dark Knight will have a magic lead of 3 points most of the time (base is 2 higher and the class change modifier of Dark knight is 2 compared to holy knight's 1) which makes the healing spells slightly more effective and the reason spells pack a lot more punch (we're talking 8 points more) [Nosferatu only deals 2 less damage on average]
And for most units where Holy knight would be a "Why not", Faith experience past C rank isn't really useful: Sylvain/Ingrid only gets Seraphim after C, for Leonie it's Restore but she already has Physic which should be good enough to patch up your units a bit (14 ranged healing is nice as "emergency healing") and Ferdinand is probably the only one where Restore is really useful because that's his only healing spell outside of Heal
And while their Reason Spell lists are only servicable, most of them justify going over C Rank Reason: Ferdinand gains the accurate and lightweight Bolganone (for an average of 32 magic damage per hit with 19 AS) at B for the times where he needs to conserve Thoron; Sylvain has Sagittae at B which is nearly identical to Bolganone (with 31 average magic damage with 20 AS) and he as well as Leonie get Ragnarok at A for nearly 40 magic damage with 17 AS to shred some of the more bulky Armor Knights; Ingrid gains Fimbulvetr which can also put dents into Armored Units or Warriors with 36 Damage on basically a magical killer weapon (although its low hit means you'll need to leave a skill slot for Reason prowess Lv 4/5 to give it 80+ hit at base)
If you're wondering why I'm listing all this: Going for a high Faith Rank doesn't improve their spell lists by a lot most of the time whereas a high Reason rank in addition to D+ or C Faith gives them an additional niche in dealing with some low Res high HP/Def enemies if your magical powerhouses are preoccupied while also having that emergency healing you talked about at pretty much the same level as Holy Knight
And lastly: Terrain Resistance; it's a pretty niche skill that only negates the damage that dangerous terrain deals, but to my knowledge that kind of terrain is already not good for Mounted Units most of the time (The burning ballista thingy in a non BE Gronder, Ailell's lava tiles or Arianrhod's traps) so you can just have them avoid said terrain (unless there is a map i don't know/recall)
TL;DR Holy Knight's advantages over Dark Knight are niche or marginal at best (slightly stronger Nosferatu & Terrain Resistance) whereas Dark Knight has much more noticable advantages (More Magic, More Damage on a lot of spells and marginally more healing/range on white magic) so I would suggest considering Dark Knight Dark Knight as the "why not" progression if you wanna have a somewhat more optimal path in that direction

[@ness6099]

The luck thing with bows might have been a reference to Genealogy, being that Ullur blood was the bow blood and it gave a 30% boost to luck (60% with major blood).

[@lovabletroll2212]

Because most units are recruitable at a low level (super early in NG+), growths mean more in Three Houses than basically any other FE game. Base stats are more important when units have a finite level cap and limited promotion items. With the fluid class system and high expected level (even without grinding), growths can play a much larger role in how units progress.

[@bardw.1542]

Grapplers don't have a movement penalty through forest tiles, but War Masters do. That and the special Combat Art means that the class isn't entirely outclassed by War Master.

[@CidAghast]

I think they say "Growths dont matter" because the logic in it is how much is that unit helping like right

[@LinkKing7]

I believe it is more of a reference to the fact that they are seen as unreliable and that a couple of stats here and there might not make a difference in comparison to good strategy and maximizing what you have to work with in terms of bases and weapons.

[@sun9708]

TL DR: 5-15% between growth rates doesn't really make that much difference, since it's only around 1 or 2 extra stat points per level. In Modern FE, the games are considerably more growth-oriented, though that doesn't mean growth rates are inherently more important and the class growth rates in Three Houses aren't important as they're only very small increases or decreases that ultimately don't amount to any significant difference in stats.
Let's assume there's a unit with 25% growths in all stats, with base stats of 5 in each. If they join at level 1, then they should be gaining 1 point in each stat roughly every 4 levels, going off of general probability, meaning that come level 10 - The optimal level for promotion in most cases - They should roughly have 7 in each stat, give or take 1 to RNG.
If you increase these growths by 5%, you're still going to end up with roughly +2 to each stat. With +10%, you're only gaining roughly +1 extra to each every 10 levels, which makes very little difference in the long run. If enemies have an average AS of 6, and this unit has 7 AS, than gaining +1 speed isn't going to suddenly make them start doubling. Additionally, if they aren't one-rounding enemies, then gaining +1 Str isn't going to make them suddenly start one-rounding.
What's more likely to make a difference, however, at least in older fire emblem games is +3-+4 to these stats upon promotion. If this unit promotes to say, Swordmaster, which grants +2 Str and +4 Spd in this scenario, then they *are* going to suddenly start doubling, and potentially even one-rounding.
This is more akin to what people mean when they say "Growths don't matter." There are, additionally, other factors in these games that mean growth rates aren't important.
For example, look at the Pegasus Knights in a lot of early Fire Emblem games. For the most part, their raw stats aren't too impressive, with low HP, Str and Def, but high Speed and decent Res. However, they make up for this with the ability to fly over terrain and, in some games, having the ability to carry other units. This makes them extremely useful in a multitude of scenarios, whether finishing off enemies in awkward locations, chipping enemies from locations they cannot reach, or by skipping sections of maps in their entirety, and allowing your other units to do so too. In this regard, it doesn't matter how low their growth rates are, because they'll always be contributing through some means.
The phrase itself is, admittedly understandably, often misinterpreted. It's not the players saying "Growth rates don't matter - Period," but rather "Growth rates aren't nearly as important as (people make them out to be) other factors surrounding those units." While a unit with a 50% Mag growth may look more appealing than a unit with a 35% Mag growth, that doesn't mean much if their base Mag is worse, they join considerably later and underlevelled, so on and so forth.
This, however, is not nearly as prevalent in modern FE games, where you often recruit most your army either immediately (3H) or before the first half of the game (Fates, Awakening-ish) (which means you'll often only use the units with the best growth rates, because however small the extra longterm gains are, they're still gains none of your other units will acquire) and have access to infinite EXP (Birthright, Awakening, technically 3H) (If every unit in the game has access to infinite EXP, it means you're only better off using the very best units.) or farmable statboosters (3H) (Just pump up your best units to the point where none of your lower-growth units can ever hope to compete.) because these changes, along with the excessively bloated growths of Awakening and Fates, have made modern Fire Emblem considerably more Growth-oriented.
However, I think in three houses people vastly overestimate how much the class growth rates impact a unit's overall performance. In general, a lot of the units in 3H are very linear in terms of what they can do. Despite how much the game makes it seem like anyone can do anything, each unit is clearly geared towards *something.* Sylvain is very clearly oriented to being a Paladin, with reclassing to a magic class being possible but less outstanding. Lorenz is clearly intended to be a Dark Knight, Lysithea is clearly meant to be a mage, so on and so forth. In this case, the class growth modifiers aren't going to change anything because their character growth rates are already so geared to these roles. Even if Lysithea promoted to a Warrior, for whatever reason, she'd still have a Magic Growth of above 50%. Even if Sylvain lost 10% Speed to promoting to Paladin, he'd only be missing out on 1 point of speed every 10 levels, so why should you consider class growth rates as a serious measure in how good they are? Fire Emblem games have never been about maximizing your units in their optimal stats, anyway. Having *enough* stats is all you need to be successful, and you often have to make some unnecessary sacrifices if you *do* want to max a unit's stats.

[@aprinnyonbreak1290]

@@sun9708 this.
The classic example is Dorcas/Bartre. One of them has a noticeably higher base speed, the other a noticeably higher speed growth.
On average, it takes like, 16-23 levels for the better growth to overtake the better base. The better base is more helpful for longer, is reliant on you actually using the unit for long enough to get that payout and not switching them out for a better unit later anyways/losing them if you're playing an ironman.
Also, from a psychological standpoint, you're more likely to baby and give special treatment to the growth unit, sunk cost fallacy pattern. If that's your thing, that's fine, and if you want to raise a specific unit, don't let anyone talk you out of it, but that takes resources you could be giving to other units that are better, or that you like more. It also trains and reinforces the growth, 20/20, nobody dies mindset that the series wasn't really intended to be played around.
In games like 3 houses and awakening, which aren't really built from the perspective of a normal fire emblem game, where ALL of your units are growth units, and later game units are either rare or growth units themselves, this doesn't really matter the same way.

[@YarnLalms711]

War Master isn’t a Master class, it’s the Master of the Master classes. Seriously, I thought my Raphael build in my first run was going to struggle with mages, but by god he’s a dodge tank and a mobile nuke. That one moment from Green Scorpion’s FE7 Let’s play with Dart dodging everything while asleep? Now have Raphael punching and throwing axes everywhere with countless bodies and you’ve got Raphael as a War Master

[@hongjeryu698]

Through personal experience from my maddening run, I would argue sniper is better than bow knight. Having the hunter’s volley for an easy enemy deletion without having to worry about AS was much more useful than having like 1 more range that wouldn’t help much from hit rate penalties. More mov and canto would be useful, but I preferred the higher offensive power than I did the movement

[@fredv7349]

I agree that growths don't matter for master classes. Once you reach 30 your unit is mostly done and you should be close to finishing the game, unless you're grinding. In which growths matter even less since you're going to be over leveled. I think growths matter mostly for advanced and intermediate classes since those growths will dictate if your unit can do well late game. Although I still believe most of the master classes are bad minus 4-5.

[@MH_Zard]

In terms of magic, generally yes i would rather have the jack if all trades utility and the extra move so that mage is constantly doing something. 1 more move>3 more damage when on the right unit like Lysithea it doesnt matter if she kills either way.
Extra spell units is great, but i find it way more valuable for healing. Magic replenishes every map, the best mages also already have a massive spell pool that you can burn out anyways so the extra uses probably wont matter unless you are heavily relying on that one mage to do all the map wiping.