Berwick Saga Character Guide: Flawed, but Still Useable

 This next section of the character guide for Berwick Saga will consist of characters whose flaws are a bit more numerous than the previous tiers, but who are still useable. One of the strengths of this game is that virtually everyone here can be used and can contribute in some way. So let's begin:

Alvina

Pros

- Prf Rank Brave Lance.

- Shieldfaire gives her bulk whenever she has a shield equipped.

- Has Adept, which means that she gets to attack consecutively.

- The Mercy skill is helpful for capturing enemies.

- Joins with a horse that gives her extra movement. Her movement is high, even for a Paladin.

- Joins the player for free.

Cons

- Poor Availability: Joins after Chapter 10, which is very late. You only get to use her for less than half the game.

- Questionable Hit Rates: Sure she has a prf rank brave lance, but it's unlikely that every hit will land. 

Conclusion: Alvina is a solid filler unit. If you haven't trained a mounted unit, then she'll act as a solid replacement. She's easy to use, and doesn't disappoint. 

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Faye

Pros

Great Skill Set

- Adept: Gets to attack consecutively and will frequently activate this skill.

- Sunder: This skill boosts her critical hit rate, and is a command skill. This combos well with swords that increase her crit rate.

- Parry: Sacrifices weapon uses to dodge a hit from a non-magical weapon. 

- Iaido: Every time she dodges a hit she can counterattack with an increased critical hit rate and accuracy.

Great Promotion Perks

After Faye promotes, she gets Astra. Astra is the same in this game as it is in other Fire Emblem games: She gets to attack 5 times in a row. The difference here is that it's a command skill with a 7 turn cooldown. Faye is the only character in the game who gets access to Astra. Nobody else gets Astra, not even Volo. She also gets access to blades, which will increase her ability to deal damage. 

Recruiting Her Means That You Get to Recruit Faramir

Remember this guy back in A tier?

The only way to permanently recruit Faramir is to permanently recruit Faye first. Once she joins your army, Faramir will join pretty soon after her. Considering how powerful and useful he is, that's a pretty compelling reason to use Faye. 

Good Prf Rank Weapons

Faye joins with exclusive access to a weapon called the Cutlass. It's a weapon that gives her decent accuracy, and boosts her critical hit rate. It also gives her an extra consecutive attack. Later on in the game she'll have access to a powerful sword called Vitra, which can negate the damage reducing effect of Chaos's sword. Chaos is a powerful endgame boss who can be annoying to kill if you don't have a specific strategy to take him down. Faye + Vitra is one way to take Chaos down (at least in theory). 

Great Availability + Decent Promotion

Faye joins the player at Chapter 2, so you have plenty of time to use her. She's not that hard to promote either. Her weapon rank growth is 90 %, so it's not hard for her sword rank to improve.

Cons

Poor Base Stats

Faye's base stats leave a lot of room to be desired. 4 base strength is pretty bad, even for a game with deflated stats. Faye has to rely a lot on her Cutlass in order to get kills during the early portions of the game. Her base defense of 1 is even worse. Faye is a fragile unit, and will always be fragile throughout the game. Her sword rank growth is great, but her base sword rank is low which means that her accuracy might be shaky at first if she's using a sword that isn't the Cutlass.

She'll Still Have Issues Killing Chaos, Even With the Vitra

Didn't you just get done saying that Faye can kill Chaos with her endgame Prf rank sword? Yes I did, but it's not the strategy most players use to kill Chaos. FE Wiki summarizes this better than I could:

"It is worth noting that if you do permanently recruit her, she's forced in Endgame where she can obtain the Divine Sword Vritra which has 16 might, 8 precision and +18% crit, along with negating the effect of Chaos's Divine Sword Vajra. She can, however, still struggle to kill Chaos because of her reliance on her shakey strength growth - at base strength plus her promotion gains, she deals 1 damage per hit, 3 with the Giant's Brace equipped. If this is a problem in your mind and don't quite know how to handle Chaos otherwise (Dean with Wrath, Ouro with Deathmatch and Grimhild, etc), it might be worth to throw the Strength Potion her way just so she starts doing significant damage."

Source

https://fireemblem.fandom.com/wiki/Faye_(Berwick_Saga)#Overall

The most reliable strategy to kill Chaos is Volo + Powerful Sword + Miracle Charm + Deathmatch. Faye's strength is so low that she'll still need help dealing actual damage to Chaos. That's really sad.

She Eats Through Weapon Uses

Faye's skillset makes her quickly burn weapon uses. Adept, Parry, and Astra all take up weapon uses to use. Keep in mind that her low strength means that she may not even kill her target, which will require her to burn through more weapon uses. This can get expensive if you're not careful.

Conclusion: If Berwick Saga were played by more people, I get the feeling that Faye would be a divisive character when it comes to unit discussions. She's a growth unit that starts weak, but eventually gets stronger after promotion. There are plenty of players who like raising units like Faye, and will feel satisfied watching her get powerful after putting effort into using her. 

Other players who prefer speed and efficiency will not like using Faye. She does require effort and babying to use, and units like her rarely ever make it very far on tier lists for that reason. I'll end my writing on her with this little blurb from FE Wiki: "Just like with almost all Berwick Saga units, use her if you like her, as at the end of the day there are no truly unusable units in the game."

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Adel

Pros

- Vantage: Adel is the only character in the game who gets access to Vantage. If his Attack Speed is higher than the enemy's attack speed, he gets to attack them first even if they initiated combat. Remember that in Berwick Saga, combat normally ends once damage gets dealt. This means that Adel can aggro enemies and prevent them from doing anything to him.

- Great Availability, and Joins for Free: Adel is a member of the first group of characters that you get in the first chapter of the game. If you're going to use him, then you get to use him for the entire game. He also joins for free, so you don't have to spend money hiring him.

- Access to a Horse: Higher movement is a plus, even if it's not as big of a deal in this game.

- Supporter: Adel and Leon have a skill called Supporter, which boosts each other's hit rates when they're within 3 spaces of each other.

- Shieldfaire and Lances after Promotion: Once Adel gets to Level 7, he gets Shieldfaire. This increases his rate of using shields whenever he gets attacked. This skill improves his durability. After he promotes he gets access to lances, which are a weapon type that increase the amount of damage that he does for every hex that he moves. Lances deal a lot of damage, so that's a neat plus.

Cons

- Lol at Promoting This Guy: Here's what FE Wiki has to say about Adel's promotion:

"However he probably isn't even reaching promotion. The requirement for his promotion is 30 spear and 20 small shield. While his small shield requirement isn't too hard to hit, as he has an 80% growth for it, the 30 spear requirement is nearly unreachable with his 4 base and 30% growth. To put things in perspective, Elbert has huge problems promoting with the same growth and nearly the same base, the difference is he only requires a 20 spear rank." 

Source: https://fireemblem.fandom.com/wiki/Adel#Overview

I can confirm that Elbert is a pain in the butt to recruit. His promotion is easier than Adel's which makes me shudder at the thought of using Adel.

- Vantage gets less useful as the game goes on: Vantage only works if the following conditions are met:

1) Adel's Attack Speed is higher than the enemy attacking him.

2) Adel actually hits the enemy attacking him.

3) Adel actually deals damage to the enemy attacking him.

The thing about Berwick Saga is that the enemies get significantly stronger over the course of the game. Some of them will have higher attack speed than he will, which means that Adel won't get to activate Vantage. Others will be so bulky that Adel won't be able to do any damage to them at all. And finally, Adel's low spear rank will mean that he'll have trouble actually hitting the enemy. It's disappointing to think about, but as cool as Vantage is, it won't help you for forever.

- Accuracy Problems: Adel's accuracy gets worse as time goes on. His low spear rank and low spear rank growth make it difficult for him to hit enemies. After a while, he pretty much has to have Leon nearby for a chance to actually hit enemies.

Conclusion: Adel starts the game as an appealing unit to use, but gets worse over time. Every positive that he has going for him depreciates over the course of the game. If you want to use Adel, then you should also use Leon. Those characters have the skill Supporter, which boosts each other's hit rates when they're within 3 spaces of each other. 

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Ruby

Pros

- Promoting Her Will Result in Permanently Recruiting Clifford: Clifford is one of the best units in the game. If you want him to permanently recruit him, you have to promote Ruby. Honestly, this is the biggest reason why anyone actually uses her.

- Paragon: She gets more experience every time she kills an enemy. Yay! 

- Gets Adept at Level 17: Even if it takes a while for her to get, she will eventually be able to attack consecutively. Hooray!

- Great Availability: Ruby joins the player on a side quest before Chapter 2. If you're planning on using her, you get to use her for virtually the entire game.

- High weapon rank growths: If you're trying to promote Ruby, you have to get her weapon ranks up to a certain point. The only way for that to happen is for her weapon ranks to increase via growths. Ruby has great growths in each weapon rank. This also means that her accuracy will improve over time.

- Axebane: Whenever an axe wielding enemy attacks Ruby, she gets the chance to force that enemy to re-roll and forces their accuracy to have at most a 33 % chance to hit. Basically, Ruby is untouchable when facing off against axe wielding enemies. 

- Access to a Horse: Higher movement is a plus.

Cons

Poor Start

"Although her base stats are on par with those of Reese, Leon, and Adel, her starting weapon skills are horrible and she lacks an excellent starting skill that they have; Ruby's strength is rather low, both in base and in growth, which can cause her to run into damage issues throughout the game." 

Source: https://fireemblem.fandom.com/wiki/Ruby#Overview

She's a Hassle to Promote

Ruby's sword and spear ranks aren't a problem, but getting her shield rank to 20 is a pain in the butt. Axebane, but dodging axe-wielding enemies makes it harder for her shield rank to increase, which makes it harder for her to promote. 

Conclusion

Every Fire Emblem game has to have that one unit whose base stats are poor, but their growths are high. Ruby is that character for Berwick Saga. You could argue that other characters fit that title, like Faye or Enid, but this is definitely true for Ruby.

Realistically speaking, the main reason why people use her is so that they can permanently recruit Clifford. Even if you promote Ruby, she doesn't really stand out from all the other mounted units in this game. Heck, Alvina can pretty much do everything that Ruby can do, but requires no effort to use. My recommendation is to bench Ruby immediately after Clifford joins your group. Even as a casual, I found using Ruby to be an exercise in frustration.