# 5 - Florina (Blazing Sword)

                   Oh hooray! Another frail rescue-bot that was in the same spot as Karin and Vanessa in Mekkah's Top 30 Best Fire Emblem Units Countdown. If personal experience actually meant anything Florina wouldn't be on here since the RNG Goddess likes to screw me over when it comes to the FE 7 Pegasus Sisters. Despite all that Florina is still a fan-favorite when it comes to Pegasus Knights for reasons other than shipping so it stands to reason that she has merit when it comes to the game.

                  For starters, Florina has the advantage of Lyn mode, which means that her 5 base strength and 40 % strength growth won't hinder her as much as it could in theory. Florina will be able to gain levels murdering mercs and mages while also providing much needed rescue utility that is so helpful in shaving off turns. According to dondon151, Florina is also a great candidate when it comes to the stat-boosters one finds in Lyn mode. (He's talking about the Seraph Robe in chapter 6 and the Energy Ring in Chapter 10. Also, here's the dondon151 source that I'll be quoting several times in this post: http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=23766&page=5)

                As I alluded to earlier, Florina is a rescue bot so naturally her rescue utility must be taken into consideration. Dondon151 gives a great description of what her flying utility can do from that same link that I just provided:

Chapter 16: Florina, with Lowen's assistance, can drop Marcus across the cliff on turn 1.
- Chapter 17x: Florina skirts Fargus's trigger zone and can talk to him on turn 4. If she rescues someone on turn 1 and drops him on turn 3, a player can also obtain the Short Bow and one of the Sleep or Lancereaver.
- Chapter 19x: Florina and Fiora can cut across the mountains while rescuing Hector. An effective strategy is dropping Erk, Lucius, or Canas on a mountain on turn 2 and having them easily ORKO the Javelin knights near Aion on enemy phase - Kishuna does not appear until turn 3.
- Chapter 21: Florina and Fiora can more easily visit the Elysian Whip village and the Pure Water vendor.
- Chapter 23: Fliers can carry combat units and thieves over desert terrain.
- Chapter 24A: Fliers can visit the Earth Seal village in 2 turns.
- Chapter 25: Fliers can seize the east gate and visit the Elysian Whip village within 3 turns (2 if Ninian dances).
- Chapter 26: Fliers can easily visit the Hammerne village. They are also needed with any reliable armory visiting strategy.
- Chapter 27: Fliers and Rath have the most movement on the map when snowing, but Rath takes movement penalties from forests.
- Chapter 28x: Fliers traverse the water and are necessary for any sort of efficient clear on this map.
- Chapter 29: Fliers can easily avoid activating reinforcement trigger zones.
- Chapter 32: Fliers, in conjunction with staff users, are necessary for any sort of efficient clear on this map.

 To go along with all of that, Florina can rescue just about every unit that isn't Merlinus. Because of this, she can make even more effective rescue-bot since one of Hector's issues is that he's so fat that only a small number of characters can actually rescue him. Well, Florina is one of those few characters that can rescue him which is significant considering that Florina's being rated off of her performance in Hector Hard Mode.

 
                   Like any Pegasus Knight, Florina has great resistance which is nice considering all the mages that Hector Hard Mode likes to throw at you. Case and point: Cog of Destiny. In Hector Hard Mode Cog of Destiny throws 10 shamans, 5 mages, 7 monks, 1 sage, 3 bishops, 3 druids and 10 valkyries at you. Holy crap! It's the second coming of the Grandbell Empire. Some of those magic users also have irksome status staves designed to piss you off if you don't have the right tools to deal with them. Also, there are several important bosses in the later game who are powerful magic users that Florina can deal with too (Ursula, Kishuna, Kenneth, Sonia, Limstella and Nergal) or at the very least can take an actual hit from. This is one of many reasons why Florina totally outclasses characters like Heath and Vaida despite the fact that they have better defense than her. 

                      That being said, Florina does come with some major disadvantages too. As I mentioned earlier when quoting dondon151 her strength sucks and her 40 % strength growth isn't high enough to compensate for it. In addition to low base strength she also has a constitution of 4. That's low enough to suffer attack speed losses from every lance in the game that isn't a slim lance. Florina loses 4 attack speed from an iron lance, 7 attack speed from a javelin and 9 attack speed from a steel lance. To quote dondon151, Florina has a plethora of early-game offensive problems that stem from having either poor atk or insufficient AS due to her 4 unpromoted con. An example of this problem can be illustrated against an 18 HP, 3 def, 5 AS Iron Lance PK in chapter 16. 7/0 Florina has on average 11.4 atk, 12.3 AS with Slim Lance and 14.4 atk, 8.3 AS with Iron Lance. Florina doubles but misses the 2HKO with Slim Lance, and 2HKOs but does not double with the Iron Lance.

Two popular characters that I really don't like. Boy would I love to Aether their faces off.

                 
                   Also, in addition to her crummy offense, she's also pretty frail. Most enemies in Chapter 17 can kill her in 2 hits. Many of these enemies will have weapon triangle advantage over her too. Florina's growths in HP and defense are the same as Rebecca's, which I consider to be a bad thing. (I know a lot of people are going to disagree with me, but in due time I shall make my case known to the Fire Emblem community). A 15 % defense growth is atrocious and a 60 % HP growth isn't very good either. Fortunately Florina gets a + 5 HP and a + 2 defense promotion bonus that helps with these issues.

                 That being said, Florina's pros definitely outweigh her cons. I make not like her, and I probably won't use her in any future FE 7 runs but that doesn't take away from the fact that she's an objectively good unit that deserves to make this list. 

# 6 - Vanessa (Sacred Stones)

                        Yeah....Vanessa. She exists and does stuff. Not going to sugarcoat it here, there isn't a whole lot to write about when it comes to Vanessa. She seems, more or less, like Karin 2.0. Vanessa is just another early-game rescue-bot who's not that good at fighting and that seems to be all about there is to her. There's a reason why Mekkah listed Vanessa and Karin together when he made his Top 30 Greatest Fire Emblem Characters Countdown. To quote Mekkah from that same link that I just provided you, here are some things that Vanessa (and other Pegasus Knights like her that he listed) can do:

- Move a juggernaut such as Seth, Marcus, Othin, etc towards a boss or group of enemies to be killed.
- Get to a village before brigands do or before you end a map.
- Get a lord to a throne/gate to seize.
- Rescue NPCs that do things you don't want them to do, or transport the NPCs to where they need to go.

                      Vanessa does have to worry about the fact that the first few levels in her game are full of axe users so she's likely to take a few axes to the face without being able to dish out as much damage back. Unlike Karin, Mekkah also was kind enough to show us some of the applications of Vanessa's utility:

Ch2 Ross, Ch5 villages, Ch7 skip around 80% of the map
Then Tana joins so it's only half credit from here, but sometimes you can make use of two fliers.
Ch9 Eirika, Tana has an annoying starting position that makes Vanessa a better choice for carrying someone over the south sea.
Ch10 Eirika, you need both fliers to drop Seth and Eirika near Pablo.
Ch12 Eirika, you could possibly use two fliers since there's so many places to go to over the mountain ranges.
Ch10 Ephraim, not sure what strategies you can employ safely here with fliers, but I'm sure there's something.
Ch15, from here you have Cormag but there's also a desert. Using Vanessa and Tana to ferry thieves and combat units around allows Cormag to actually fight things.
I'd make a point about Ch20 if you don't have Warp but by now you have Syrene so I won't.  

 

              Personally, I believe that Karin's utility makes a bigger impact on her game, but Vanessa does have access to the Luna, I mean the Pierce skill if she promotes to the wyvern knight class so her offense does end up better than Karin's. Also, Vanessa isn't quite as outclassed in her game as Karin is. Karin has to deal with Asvel, Safy, Dean, Fin and Nanna while Vanessa's only competition is Seth, Franz, Cormag and....Gerik? Yeah, Vanessa doesn't get outclassed as bad as Karin does. This means that her contributions are a little more valuable in the long run.

              So in short, Vanessa is an early joining rescue-bot with the potential to get Pierce. There's not really much else to her.

# 7 - Karin (Thracia 776)

             And here's to our one (and probably only) dark horse candidate: Karin, from Thracia 776. Karin is what happens when you take every stereotypical aspect of a Pegasus Knight and amp it up by 11. This applies just as much to the bad stuff as it does to the good stuff and boy does Karin have a lot of flaws.

               Low defense and HP? Check. 18 HP and 4 defense is not good if you want to be able to take more than 2 hits. Low strength? Check. In fact, Karin has the worst combat ability of every Pegasus Knight on this list. Karin also has to deal with the fact that Dean exists. Who the heck is Dean you might ask? Well, Dean is a wyvern knight that's super durable, in addition to having base stats that are pretty good. When he shows up he completely outclasses Karin, doing whatever she does better than she can. Karin also has to deal with the fact that dismounting exists in indoor maps. If you recall from my Asvel post, whenever a map takes place indoors high movement characters have to dismount which limits them to 5 movement. They also have to use swords instead of their primary weapon (although she has a higher starting sword rank than a lance rank which is odd). Karin also has a measly Pursuit Critical Coefficient of 1, so she's not going to be landing crits on her second attack, which is sad considering the fact that as a pegasus knight she's going to be doing a lot of double attacking. Speaking of double attacking, Karin's constitution is not that good so be careful what weapon you give her lest she lose too much attack speed to double attack with.

Credit to the original artist / person who took this screencap: http://lparchive.org/Fire-Emblem-Thracia-776/Update%2053/

                           So if Karin has all these weaknesses, then why in the heck is she # 7 on this list? Well, like many Pegasus Knights in the series, Karin joins your army really early in the game. She's your only flier for 10 chapters until Dean and Eda crash the party. This is Karin's saving grace since she has A LOT of useful utility between chapters 6 to 13. Whether she's para dropping Leif (Thracia 776 invented the rescue mechanic fyi), visiting villages or, as the above picture shows, eliminating enemy ballistae, Karin will be put to use by the player and is very important to beating the early chapters quickly. The enemies in Thracia 776 have a love affair with ballista so being able to eliminate them quickly is a huge plus in her favor. Even dondon151 has admitted that Chapter 9 gave him trouble until he learned that Karin made it possible to beat that level in 2 turns. (This is where he said it: http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=33043) ). Karin also has great magic, which in this game also counts as resistance, so she can deal with enemy magic users while also ignoring the legion of status staff users that dominate the later chapters of the game. There are a lot of magic swords in this game so should the player choose to bump up Karin's sword rank she could make fine usage of these weapons.

                          Overall, Karin has a lot of flaws that are made up for by her amazing utility. Out of all the candidates on this list, Karin's utility is what ultimately sets her apart. It's rare for a character to be on a list like this because of things that they do that aren't combat related, but hey I'm down for uniqueness and Karin is definitely unique.

# 8 - Fee (Genealogy of the Holy War)

                     
                Fee is one of those units that's there, but doesn't really get talked about whenever Holy War gets brought up. It's understandable and I'll go into why that is in a little bit but for now let's focus on Fee's positives. Fee is basically Fury 2.0 in terms of combat. She inherits her mother's Brave Lance which is a big plus for her as it helps to compensate for her low strength. A lot of players tend to give Fury the Brave Lance that Finn gets so I'm going to assume that Fee will inherit the Brave Lance from her mother. Regardless of who her father is she'll do fine kicking butt. Fee will always have Pursuit so she'll always get to double (or if she's using her brave lance quadruple) attack no matter what.

                 Her best fathers are considered to be Levin, Claude and Noish. Levin passes down Adept and Critical while she'll have a 75 % speed growth. Noish gives her Charge and Critical, while her strength growth goes up to 40 % and her defense growth will go up to 50 %. Claude gives her a 35 % resistance growth, which is nearly 3 times as much as her resistance growth will be with most of her other potential fathers and a B rank in staves once she promotes. Levin is usually considered to be the best father for her considering the fact that he gives Fee the best speed and skill she could get while giving her an extra 18 levels of Adept (which is a bigger deal than it sounds because Fee will spend more of the game unpromoted than promoted) and the Critical skill. Levin will also give Fee enough magic to be a good healer which is something that most fathers can't do for her. True, Noish gives her better strength and defense, but her speed and skill will suffer for it.  Also 18 extra levels of Adept is much better than Charge and both fathers give her the critical skill. Claude turns her into a flying staffbot and a resistance tank, but he doesn't pass down any skills for her which will cause her combat to suffer as a result.

Why do Pegasus Knights never wear pants? Are their pegasi allergic to them?

                         As I stated before, Fee can use staves after promotion which gives her healing utility. If Claude is her father she will get a B rank in staves after promotion, which means that she can use physic staves. Fee has perfect availability for a second generation unit so she's got that going for her as well. With Levin as her father her speed and skill are really high which means that she'll be able to quadruple attack the vast majority of all enemies that she will face. Fee also has access to B rank swords with most fathers so she gets partial weapon triangle control and a viable alternative if the Brave Lance weighs her down too much. Since Fee is also a flying unit she can save villages for you and thereby net you cash and rings, which is always a nifty perk. Fee also gets the distinct privilege of being your only flying unit in the second generation until Altenna comes along. Even when Altenna comes along Fee will have already done so much for you that it's clear that Fee is the greater unit between the two.

                        Remember how I mentioned that Fee never really gets brought up or talked about when people mention Holy War? Well there's a reason for that. Fee suffers from what I call "Chrom Syndrome". Back in 2014 when I ranked every Fire Emblem lord in the series I noticed something about Chrom. Chrom is a great unit in his own game, in fact I am still of the opinion that he's one of the best units in his game, but Chrom tended to get overshadowed by several units in his game who were just better. To sum it up: “Chrom's biggest flaw is that he isn't as ridiculous as some of the units you get in this game (I'm looking at you, Avatar and Panne)."  

http://thecrusadergrant.blogspot.com/2014/08/7-chrom.html

              

                 So what does that have to do with Fee? Well, Fee's a great unit in her game, but in comparison to her competition her performance tends to look underwhelming by comparison. Let's take a look at who her competition is:

• Seliph: If I ever got around to revamping my Lords ranking, this guy would be # 2 on the list. Seliph is Mr. "I Inherit Everything and turn the entire second generation into a joke." He is clearly the best second generation unit.

• Leif: Mr. Master Knight: The Master Knight class has 9 movement, the best caps out of all your mounted units (flying units don't count although Master Knight caps are just awesome all around. See here for more details) and gets access to 99.9 % of every weapon in the game thanks to his awesome weapon ranks. Leif also caps strength, skill, speed and defense on average at maximum level while also having high HP. Leif basically has higher caps / stats than the majority of Tier 2 units in the GBA games and Path of Radiance. (Master Knight Leif has even beaten Ike's Path of Radiance version in a Deadliest Warrior battle. I'm not using this as a gameplay metric, but it does give one a sense of perspective about how awesome this dude is). Also, Leif has access to the Rescue staff which is a staff that Fee can never have. 9 movement + the Rescue staff = hilarious shenanigans that break his game into a thousand tiny pieces.

 

•   Ares: Mr. "I have a 30 - 40 % chance of 1 Hit KO'ing 99 % of every enemy unit in my game". Currently ranked # 6 in my Top 20 Cavaliers list, a.k.a. the list with the most intense competition out of all the lists I've done so far Ares also has Adept and Vantage while also having a high enough resistance to deal with the plethora of mages and status staff users that are frequent in the second generation. 

• Levin!Arthur: Remember this guy? He's ranked # 2 in my Top 10 Greatest Mages list. Arthur joins at the exact same time as Fee and with Levin as his dad, he obliterates everything in his path without getting hit thanks to the almighty Holsety tome.

                ^ See what I mean? When you're in a game full of gods like them you tend to look rather underwhelming by comparison, even if you're an above average unit. To sum it up, Fee is a great unit who fills a niche role in her game. She can fight and heal while not being uber at either of them and she joins your army from the very get-go so she's very useful. That being said, she just doesn't have the impact on her game that the other 7 pegasus knights ranked above her have.

# 9 - Tanith (Path of Radiance)

                         Next on the list is the stern, yet totally amazing Tanith. What can I say about Tanith? She totally joins Path of Radiance as an amazing unit with everything she needs from the time that she joins you. Tanith gets to use both swords and lances and she comes with an A rank in swords and a B rank in lances. Tanith basically can use every sword in the game that isn't prf ranked or the Vague Katti and she can use almost every lance at her disposal which is a great advantage for her. Tanith also joins with the rare Sonic Sword which lets her wreck flying units.

                 Her base stats are decent, but more importantly she has the same awesome Earth affinity that Ike and Oscar have. What's better is that Tanith supports Oscar too which gives them both the coveted + 15 avoid. Tanith also supports Marcia and Reyson, who happen to be some of the best units in Path of Radiance and since Tanith can keep up with them movement wise these support options are feasible for her. Tanith also has the super useful skill Reinforce. This allows her to call forth 3 pegasus knights, which can serve as status staff bait, draw ballista fire away from your units or they can kill stuff for you. In essence, it's very unique utility that Tanith has going for her.

                          Unfortunately Tanith does have her drawbacks. Her biggest weakness is her availability. Tanith joins half-way through the game, so it's not like she has bad availability, but at the same time it does hold her back since she's not contributing for roughly half of the game. Also, Tanith has the worst availability out of any pegasus knight on this list. That's not something you want to have in a list where the competition is tight. Her next issue is her growths. This is admittedly a minor issue since her base stats compensate for this, but it does hinder her to a degree. Her strength and defense are also a little on the low side too, which is to be expected for a pegasus knight. Also, Tanith has to deal with the fact that Marcia and Jill exist for a significantly longer portion of the game and outclass her too which makes her contributions seem less significant.

                 Overall, Tanith is a great Pegasus Knight whose pros outweigh her cons and is a valuable addition to this list.

# 10 - Sumia (Awakening)

                                 So if Cordelia was going to get an honorable mention it would only make sense that Sumia would be on the list. Why you may ask? Well, Sumia's biggest advantage over Cordelia is the fact that she joins five chapters earlier as the only flier in your group. This is a big advantage because this means that everyone wants to Pair Up with her since she can move them around the map. Usually it's best to pair Frederick or Kellam up with her since they give her strength and defense (which is what she wants) while Sumia in turn can fly them around from Point A to Point B and can give them speed (which is what they want).

                              As you'd expect of a Pegasus Knight, Sumia's speed and skill are overkill for her game allowing her to double attack right away. Because Dark Flier is her best class Sumia can feasibly get Galeforce in an efficient, no grind ltc run of hard mode. All of the same chapters that benefit Cordelia after she joins also benefit Sumia (see Cordelia's post for further details). Sumia also has access to some other good skills in addition to Galeforce such as Luna, Dual Guard +, Renewal and several different rallies.

                          Her support options may be limited but they do help her out in meaningful ways. As I mentioned earlier, Frederick and Kellam boost her strength and defense in the early game while Henry can boost her magic should the player decide to make Sumia a Dark Flier. You also can't go wrong with using Chrom or Robin as Pair-Up partners so she has that going for her too. Btw, do you know how Dual Strikes work? According to serenesforest.net the activation rate for Dual Strikes goes as follows:

                        (Lead & Support unit’s combined Skill / 4) + [a certain number ranging from 20 - 60 depending on the support rank of the two units] (Source: http://serenesforest.net/awakening/miscellaneous/dual-system/)

                    What does this mean? It means that characters with high skill are more likely to activate Dual Strikes. Sumia's skill growth as a Pegasus Knight is 70 % and her skill growth as a Dark Flier is 65 % so she'll be activating more Dual Strikes due to her higher skill growth. 

                           As great as Sumia is, she does have her drawbacks. Even though she has solutions to this problem, her low strength is still an issue and this tends to show around the Valm arc. Also, her durability is what you'd expect of a Pegasus Knight too. Sumia also wishes that she had more support options. Just compare and contrast Cordelia's support options with Sumia's:

Sumia's Supports

Romantic Supports

• Chrom
• The Avatar (Male)
• Frederick
• Gaius
• Henry

Other Supports

• The Avatar (Female)
• Sully
• Cordelia
• Cynthia
• Morgan (Only if Sumia is her mother)
• Lucina (Only if Sumia is her mother) 

(Source: http://fireemblem.wikia.com/wiki/Sumia)

Cordelia's Supports

Romantic Supports

• The Avatar (Male)
• Frederick
• Virion
• Stahl
• Vaike
• Kellam
• Donnel
• Lon'qu
• Ricken
• Gaius
• Gregor
• Libra
• Henry

Other Supports

• The Avatar (Female)
• Sumia
• Panne
• Severa
• Morgan (Only if Cordelia is her mother)

(Source: http://fireemblem.wikia.com/wiki/Cordelia) 

                In a game where supports tend to play a much bigger role from a gameplay perspective having limited support options is a bad thing as it gives you less chances for major stat boosts. Also, while Galeforce is great, it requires you to kill enemies and Sumia's offense may have issues around the time that she actually gets Galeforce.   
  
                 Overall: Sumia is a great unit and one of the best units in Awakening. While she may have her flaws, her positives are overwhelmingly in her favor. The fact that she's this low on the list speaks more about how tight her competition is rather than about her. Pegasus Knights have a tradition of excellence and Sumia is part of that proud tradition.  

Honorable Mention - Cordelia (Awakening)

                   So I wanted to start my Top 10 Pegasus Knights list with an honorable mention since there were so many good pegasus knights. Starting off with the honorable mention is Cordelia from Awakening. When evaluating Awakening characters there need to be some rules and parameters set up. For starters they are going to be based off of their performance on Hard Mode (unless you're Frederick who has already been evaluated), grinding and dlc will not be taken into effect and while reclassing is allowed it's assumed that you won't be doing a bunch of that. That being said, it's perfectly okay to talk about reclassing options and the skills that may ensue from that. Hopefully that makes things clear, if not feel free to ask me questions.

              It's difficult to get good information about Cordelia's gameplay performance. When most people talk about Cordelia, they usually talk about anything but her in-game performance. Cordelia joins her game in Chapter 7, after roughly half of the first generation has already shown up. She joins a little under-leveled for her join chapter and her base stats aren't as good as they should be. The good news is that Chapter 7 is still plenty early enough in the game to where she can take advantage of her good growths. Cordelia tends to gain more strength and defense than Sumia but less speed. Her magic growth isn't very good (20 % as Pegasus Knight, 30 % as dark mage and 35 % as a Sorcerer. Lame.) which is unfortunate for her considering that she has access to the Dark Flier and Sorcerer classes.The interesting thing about her reclass options is that they tend to fix her issues as a Falcon Knight. She has access to Bow-breaker, Axe-breaker, Tome-breaker, Sol and Armsthrift. Moral of the story: She has awesome reclass options.

                       Being a Pegasus Knight in Awakening means that lower movement characters (*cough* My Unit *cough*) can pair up with her and she can get them faster from Point A to Point B. It's also nice that the next few chapters after she joins are ones where her high movement and flight are especially useful. Chapters 8 & 9 are desert levels, chapter 10 has ledges that she can fly over, paralogue 3 has stupid villagers so a powerful, high movement character would be especially appreciated.

                     So to sum it up, Cordelia is great for having low movement units pair up and move from one end of the map to the other, she has great reclass options and she gets better strength and defense than Sumia. Cordelia is a great unit all around and a great way to start off the Top 10 Pegasus Knights list.

                         

The Greatest Mage in Fire Emblem History - Asvel (Thracia 776)

                  And here at last we've come to the # 1 spot. Honestly, I was considering whether or not I should put Levin!Arthur as # 1 and Asvel as # 2. What caused me to change my mind? Well both of these guys are awesome combat units in their own games, but Arthur has to deal with the fact that a Perfect Inheritance Seliph exists, whereas Asvel doesn't. Seliph is all you need to solo the second generation of Holy War. Give Seliph the best swords for him, the Leg and Elite Rings and a ton of stat-booster items and he'll break Holy War with ease. Arthur's contributions are still important, but are aren't as necessary as Asvel's and I'm about to explain why.

                 Asvel is to Thracia 776 what Rutger is to Sword of Seals. What makes this analogy work even better is the fact that both units benefit greatly from their games' crit-friendly mechanics. Rutger gets a 30 % crit bonus once he promotes, Asvel gets Pursuit Critical Coefficient. For those of you who don't know what PCC (Pursuit Critical Coefficient) is, it's basically a mechanic in Thracia 776 where the current critical hit percentage of a unit multiplies by a certain number unique to that particular unit whenever they land the second attack (it only works on the second attack). So for example, if Asvel has a critical hit percentage of 25 % and he has a pursuit critical coefficient of 3, then during the second attack that round he will have a critical hit percentage of 75 %. Yeah, PCC is crazy.

                   Asvel is the best combat unit in his game. He also shares the same title as Rutger as boss killer. The predominant reason for this is that, according to Ronaldo Villanueva, "throne or gate bonuses are even crazier here than in FE6, since they give an absurd +10 Def, +30% Avoid. It is very difficult to kill them with physical weapons, even with critical hits, but thankfully their Mag stat is usually low, which leaves them vulnerable to magic assaults. Thanks to Asvel's personal weapon, not only does he not have issues with enemy avoid, but he also goes through any sort of defenses the enemy might have."

            One of Asvel's many perks is his OP prf rank tome, Graphcalibur. Take a look at  Graphcalibur's stats:

Mt - 13
Hit - 100
Wt - 3
Crt - 40

                     Holy crap is this weapon awesome! 40 % critical hit percentage (the highest critical rate out of any weapon in Thracia 776. Yeah, let that sink in for a moment) in a game where PCC exists, that translates into Asvel getting guaranteed critical hits all the freaking time. Keep in mind too, that Asvel comes with this and he joins you in Chapter 4x of Thracia 776. So yeah Asvel has fantastic availability in his game and he's your best combat unit since the time that he joins you. According to Ronaldo Villanueva in his analysis of Asvel in his "Top 15 Greatest Fire Emblem Units of All Time" list

            "Asvel is capable to reach at base 17 Atk, 4 AS, 43% Critical, which allows him to ORKO enemies with 0 AS and low Mag. Asvel's critical hit rate is multiplied by three, which means that he can get 100% critical hit chance with Graphcalibur. Yes, all of this at BASE level."

                 Asvel also comes with a 75 % speed growth, which is just awesome. In addition to this insanity, he's usually considered to be your best candidate for the Sety Crusader Scroll which gives him a - 10 % HP growth, a + 30 % Speed growth and a + 10 % Magic growth. This means that Asvel will get a 45 % magic growth and a 105 % speed growth. This lightning fast monster will now be getting guaranteed speed level-ups in order to bolster his already insane avoid. Asvel also has Adept which relies on attack speed in order to proc so in addition to consistently double attacking everything in sight and having a ridiculous chance of landing a critical hit on his enemies Asvel will also be having a consistent chance of getting an extra consecutive attack on his enemies. 

                

                      As if that wasn't enough Asvel also benefits from another nifty feature in Thracia 776. You see, in Thracia 776 if a map takes place indoors any mounted or flying unit has to dismount. If they do so, their movement is reduced to 5 and they have to use swords, which most of the time isn't their primary weapon so they're going to be using weaker weapons due to their lower weapon level. Unmounted units don't have their movement affected by indoor maps so Asvel doesn't have to worry about a high movement character stealing his thunder. Asvel is your best indoor combatant which means a lot given the fact that a considerable percentage of the maps in Thracia 776 are indoors. Asvel starts out with 6 movement and after promotion gets 7. 7 movement is tied with swordmasters for the highest indoor movement of a foot unit in the game so Asvel cleverly avoids the issues that Levin and Sety run into in Holy War. Also, it just so happens that Asvel joins you in an indoor map and the next level after that is an indoor map as well so Asvel's going to get a lot of experience super fast.

Speaking of promotion, check out Asvel's promotion boosts:

+ 5 Magic

+ 5 Skill
+ 6 Speed

+ 4 Defense 

+ 1 Con

+ 1 Movement

                       The caps in Thracia 776 are all at 20, so for this game, these promotion bonuses are crazy-awesome high so feel free to promote this guy once he reaches level 10. Another unique aspect of Thracia 776 is that magic and resistance are the same stat so Asvel's high magic stat also serves another purpose:  

                      "An SSS Rank playthrough is usually described as “Staff Emblem”, and it is pretty accurate due to the domination of status staves and Warp. Status staves affect most physical units negatively since they depend on M Up or Holy Water to actually avoid being affected, not to mention that most units can't be trained adequately at the pace a Warpskip strategy expects. However, Asvel remains relevant due to being the main boss killer in Warpskip strategies, as well as having enough Mag to be unaffected to enemy status staves." (Again this quote was brought to you by Ronaldo Villanueva)  

                      Asvel also benefits heavily from the support bonuses given to him in his game. As Ronaldo puts it, " with the boost in hit-rates and critical hit chance, he eventually reaches enough offense so that he doesn't need Graphcalibur anymore and does the job with basic Wind tomes. The aforementioned Asvel Lv10/1 with Wind has 33% Critical with Leif support, which is increased to 99% due to the Pursuit Critical Coefficient." So basically, Asvel's offense doesn't always rely on his uber broken Graphcalibur to get the job done. 

                   Moral of the story: Asvel rocks! He's fast, he's strong and it feels like this game goes way out of its way to help him out in making him the greatest mage in Fire Emblem history.

# 2 - Arthur (Genealogy of the Holy War)

Bytheway, the chick in this picture is Ishtar, not Tinny. I know it's weird to have Arthur and Ishtar holding hands, but I thought the picture looked cool seeing as how Arthur doesn't look like some innocent little kid so I decided to use it anyway.

                         So this is one of the least surprising entries on the list so far. Arthur is the best Holsety user in Fire Emblem 4. The main reasons behind this come from the fact that Arthur manages to avoid all the issues that plague your other Holsety users. Levin, Sety and Corpul are all foot units in a mount dominated game with availabilities that are lackluster at best. Arthur, by contrast, joins your army in Chapter 6 of the second generation which means that he has perfect availability for a second generation unit. Arthur has a whopping 2 chapter lead on Sety which is HUGE in Fire Emblem 4, and by pairing Levin with Tiltyu you basically get to use the Holsety from the end of Chapter 4 until the end of the second generation. More Holsety is pimptastically awesome. While Arthur may start out on foot, he eventually does get a horse after promotion so it is in the player's best interest to get this guy promoted as soon as humanly possible.

 
As far as Arthur's combat is concerned, it's true that he's statistically inferior to Sety, but this isn't a Deadliest Warrior battle so that doesn't matter. Levin!Arthur is your best candidate for the Pursuit Ring in the second generation so naturally he's going to get it. I mean, who deserves it more than he does? Almost all the kids in the second generation inherit, or at least can inherit, Pursuit from their parents so they don't need it. The only possible competition Arthur may have for the Pursuit Ring is Leif, but then again Leif gets Pursuit (and a whole bunch of other nifty perks) after promotion so it's better to just get Leif promoted earlier and to give Arthur the Pursuit Ring, so for the remainder of this post, I'll be making the assumption that Arthur is getting the Pursuit Ring, and will therefore get the ability to double attack every enemy schmuck in sight.



                         Before I get into the numerical side of things let me ask you a question: Is there an enemy that Sety can kill that Arthur can't? I can't think of one, but even if there is such an enemy, how many of them are there? Chances are even if you can find enemies that Sety can kill that Arthur can't there won't be very many. That basically means that Arthur's combat ability is as good as Sety's, for all intents and purposes, while he comes with the added bonus of perfect Generation 2 availability and a horse. I could end the post here, because these reasons are sufficient for Arthur to have the # 2 spot on this mages list, but posts like these need numbers and I've already put the time and effort in to look up the data that Mekkah has provided so here we go. (Quote Source: http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=25746#entry1530652)

                        Arthur starts out with "40 Atk, 26 AS -- 31 HP, 2 Def, 6 Res, 62 avo
46% Continue, 20% Critical". Give Arthur a magic ring and he OHKO's the Axe Fighters of Sophara have 42 HP/0 Res and the Axe Knights with Schmidt have 42 HP/1 Res.
With these bases, Arthur "only" has a 43% chance to whiff an ORKO on something he 2HKOs. Arthur is reasonably around L10 right now if not higher, with the EXP from last chapter and the arena. I rounded the numbers a little:

10 Levin!Arthur w/ Holsety (Magic Ring, Bargain Ring, Pursuit Ring)
48 Atk, 35 AS -- 41.4 HP, 4 Def, 7 Res, 83.6 Avo
55% Continue, 26.8% Critical 

                       Bow Armors have 86 hit, so they can't touch him. Lance Armors have 96, so they probably won't hit him. Thunder Mages have 84 after WTD. Liza has 140 hit though, so you will want to KO her on player phase. Ishtor has 96 with Bolting, you can probably take him out from above or beside the castle. Why am I saying all this? Because I think Arthur can, with some careful risk management, solo Melgen. It might take some try-outs to see what works and what doesn't, though.

                From there, Arthur needs to go east to recruit Tinny. Unless you don't really care about recruiting her...but he's still very good at killing her army so that just makes him look better. Once again, his low movement is rather immaterial because Celice needs to seize Melgen and Darna. He should be able to get where he needs to be. He makes a good candidate for killing Blume. Shannan actually isn't too great at it: Blume has 46 Atk, and Shannan has 38 HP/4 Res. He does have 120% HP growth, but only 5% Res, so he probably can't avoid the OHKO. It's safer to have Arthur and his 48+ total HP/Res take him on. Aless could do it as well, of course, but he also has to visit Darna. Blume has 9 AS, whereas base Mistolteen!Aless has 8 and only 30% Speed growth. So Arthur is definitely the best choice to take him on.

                Mekkah goes on to talk about Arthur's ability to obliterate the mage sisters and Ishtar: Meanwhile, this is Arthur:

20 Levin!Arthur w/ Holsety (Magic Ring, Bargain Ring, Pursuit Ring)
55 Atk, 37 AS -- 54 HP, 10.5 Def, 10.7 Res, 92 Avo
57% Continue, 32% Critical

He can run into one of them and kill them with his huge proc rate (roughly 70% chance of proccing either of these on his first attack). Aless could try the same, but I think killing one of them might disable the triangle attack AI. Anyway, Arthur is virtually guaranteed to dodge the Thunder one (92 hit after WTD) and will easily survive two hits (27 and 30 Atk on his 10-11 Res wouldn't kill him), so he's safe.

Then there's Ishtar. He's probably the only person that doubles her other than Shannan, and like with Blume, Shannan won't survive Thor Hammer. You can also get Arthur into Wrath range for her to guarantee killing her before she can attack. There's also a large group of Javelin Lance Knights, and the Elthunder Mage Knight captain Ovo to take care of. Then there's Blume's castle full of Bolting threats he can just ignore and waltz through, countering anything in there at 2-range, etc. He's an expert at cleaning a path for Celice.

From here Arthur just proceeds to be nearly invincible, and a fail-safe mounted kill on pretty much everything. His current Atk is already sufficient to 2HKO Arion without triggering Prayer (70 HP, he does 46 damage per hit), which is ridiculous. You have two more encounters with Ishtar, there's the dreaded Earth Sword Falcoknights, etc etc. He's a beast."

             So yeah, Arthur wrecks face and makes a great usage of the resources you give him. Also, here's a final Mekkah quote about Arthur's awesomeness:
 
                "Arthur is so uber that enemies sometimes refuse to attack him due to them having 0% hit, but thankfully if you want him to slaughter those enemies anyway you can place him on a road tile. It's kind of like putting on one of those training capes in DBZ. Or like Goku throwing the enemy a senzu bean. It's just too unfair otherwise." 

# 3 - Linde (Mystery of the Emblem)

                    So here's our other dark horse candidate: Linde. Like most Archanean units, Linde shows up in the 4 different Fire Emblem games starring the Archanean cast. Linde's Fire Emblem 3 version is her best one so naturally it's the one I'm going to go with. Linde in Fire Emblem 3 is a powerhouse mage with many positives. For starters, she has exclusive access to Aura, which has the highest might out of any tome in her game (it has a might of 20 and she gets to use it right from the very start). Linde also gets to use Nosferatu which is a big plus for her considering the fact that the only other units who can use it in that game are promoted healer chicks. (For some strange reason only women can wield Nosferatu in FE 3 / 12. Interesting social commentary Intelligent Systems. The only way for a fragile woman to survive is by sucking the life out of an angry hoard of men who want to kill her. That's an empowered woman for you. Today's feminists would be proud of Linde :P ) For all intents and purposes, Nosferatu is practically her prf rank weapon which solves her durability issues.

                   Linde's skill, speed, luck and weapon level growths are also very high. She has a 70 % skill growth, a 60 % speed growth, an 80 % luck growth and a 70 % weapon level growth so she'll be fast, accurate and she's be able to use high level tomes and staves in no time (not that it really matters though because her prf rank tome is the best in the game lol). Her 70 % weapon level growth will allow her quick access to some of the most broken staves in the game: The Again staff, the Warp staff and the Rescue staff.

                       So in addition to having some really nice perks Linde's combat ability in Fire Emblem 3 is outrageous. Sagit Heim once again provided me with a wonderful analysis of Linde's abilities. All credit and kudos go to him for all the wonderful number crunching.

Linde 22 atk, 2 AS (Aura)

Palla 24 atk, 9 AS (Silver Lance)

Catria 21 atk, 7 AS (Silver Lance)

 Arran 22 ATK, 4 AS (Silver Lance)

So, Linde joins at chapter 3 with one nof the best offensive of your army. 22 atk is superior to Palla, Catria and Sirius since Linde strikes at the Resistance stat, the only problem with it is the poor 2 AS that stops her for doubling enemies.

 Even so, she OHKOs Machis's cavaliers with Aura, something that even Palla can't do. Like the Pegasi sisters, she 2RKOs the Dragon Knights, AKA the strongest enemies of the earlygame alongside with Astoria. However, unlike Palla, Linde has range 1-2, so she can attack at range and avoid a counterattack.

Linde starts ORKOing DracoKnights at level 6 while Palla needs to be at level 17 (she needs to level up 7 times). With this said, Linde is the best unit to take DracoKnights out.

Being an effective unit against Draco Knights is good, very good, but Linde has more potential as a unit. She also comes with Nosferatu, a magic that only women can use. Linde is going to be the only one who can use that tome until Malicia and Yumina promote, which is a looooong way. With Nosferatu Linde reaches 14 atk and 0 (!) AS. The AS could be an issue, but then you realize that there are NO ENEMIES with 3 AS, so Linde at BASE level is safe until Chapter 9, lol.


Linde is your MVP in indoor maps and your best bosskiller of the game. Let's use Lang, one of the toughest bosses in the earlygame as an example:

 Lang
 45 HP 19 DEF

Marth lvl 10 (Rapier)
 dmg 10 x 2, 3RKOs Lang

Palla lvl 17 (Armor Killer)
dmg 14 x 2, 2RKOs Lang

Linde lvl 9 (Aura) dmg 23 x 2, ORKOs Lang

As you can see, Linde is the best unit to take the almighty Lang out. Awesome. You could argue that Linde's utility comes basically of her personal weapon, Aura (and maybe Nosferatu). In the other side, the Hammerne staff is obtained at chapter 5 and it can only repair WEAPONS (forget about the warp staff back up), so the 5 uses of this staff can be invested in more Excalibur, Lady sword, Aura and Nosferatu.

During the earlygame, Linde is one of your best and most independent unit thanks to Nosferatu. Moreover, things get even better in the midgame.

Linde lvl 12 (from now on, I'm assuming the Leo Star shard on her)
23 atk 7 AS (Aura)
8 atk 13 AS (Shaver)
 9 atk 12 AS (Thunder)

Chapter 9
ORKOs DracoKnights and mages. ORKOs everything with Aura. ORKOs Thieves and Mages with Thunder. Linde's show. She is a killing machine that destroys everything in her way. And now she has 3 AS with Nosferatu so she can literally solo the map with no fear (fastest enemies in the chapter are 5 AS thiefs).

 I must explain one thing. From chapter 11 onwards, you're in Anri's Path. In this part of the game, Dragons are the most abundant enemies, and they're ferocious foes to face. Dragons are tanks with 40 HP and 10 of defense. Using common weaponry against them is futile. You need to use the Dragon Killer to ORKO them... or use Magic.

Palla lvl 1 Draco Knight (Dragon Killer)
Dmg 35 x 2, ORKOs Dragons

Sirius lvl 7 Paladin (Dragon Killer)
Dmg 32 x 2, ORKOs Dragons

Linde lvl 1 Bishop
Fire, Dmg 20 x 2, ORKOs Ice Dragons
Blizzard, Dmg 23 x 2, ORKOs Fire Dragons
Shaver, Dmg 20 x 2, ORKOs Flying Dragons

The three of them ORKO dragons without problem. What makes Linde special then? Well, Sirius and Palla need to dismount in order to use the Dragon Killer, and with this they lose a few points in stats and the high movement. They also need to compete for the weapons: Dragon Killers are rare and expensive while you don't have enough money to buy a ton of them. Linde, unlike Sirius and Palla just needs common weaponry to ORKO dragons without having to lose movement and stats. Linde has just become your best unit in the Anri's path.


What about the endgame? Like Thracia 776, FE3 endgame chapters are completed in 1 or 2 turns thanks to insane Warp-Again-Rescue combos. You can literally beat the rest of the game in 10 minutes.

This affects the majority of your units. Since Marth is already trained, he is going to be your boss killer, basically because the Warp staff CAN´T be repaired with Hammerne, and you need to save most of its uses. Because of this, Palla and Sirius are no longer as useful and Marth becomes your new hero... or does he?

Linde as a Bishop can use staves like Wendel in FE1, but unlike the other staffbots her Wpn Growth is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G.

 Linde lvl 12/ 7 has 20 Wpn lvl. Malliesia and Yumina need to be at level 12/10 in order to achieve 20 Wpn lvl as well, and Wendell... He never reaches 20 Wpn lvl, xDD

Why is 20 Wpn lvl that special? Well, it means you can use the Again staff and ALL magic/staves in the game, Linde is the only staffbot who reaches that benchmark with the least possible investment. With this said, the endgame chapters are easily beaten thanks to Linde with the support of Marth, Yumina and Malliesia. Too good. 



     

                So what how does one sum up Linde in Fire Emblem 3? Well, Sagit Heim's last quote says it all:


        "So, Linde has just become some kind of Monstrous-Saphy/FE1!Wendell-game-breaker that allows you to beat the rest of the game in just 10 minutes. Linde is the reason why the game is trivialized and clearly one of the best mages in the franchise. 

                Linde is basically what happens when you take Wendell from Fire Emblem 1 and give him a 20 might tome plus Nosferatu and put him in a game with the ridiculously broken Again staff and you get a monster combat unit that also has some wicked staff utility. 
             

# 4 - Wendell (Fire Emblem 1)

(Credits to Fatecrashers for the image).

This old man injects too much coke

and makes Fire Emblem 1 a joke

with a knick-knack patty whack

he'll rip off your cat's head.

This man's the reason why everybody's dead.

TA-DA! 

                   So when I originally created this list I was going to put FE 3 Merric over Soren but Sagit Heim corrected me and not only did it turn out that Soren was way better, Sagit explained that Wendell was way better than Merric. Naturally I had to bump Merric off the list and replace him with this old fellow. So you're probably wondering why in the flying crap is Wendell this high up the list?

                    Well, for starters Wendell has the obvious advantage of joining you in Chapter 5 of FE 1, just like he does in Shadow Dragon so obviously he's got fantastic availability. In case you haven't noticed, this has been an issue for candidates 5 - 8. They all join around half-way through their games whereas old man Wendell is with you from the beginning. 

                 Wendell also joins your army with a weapon level of 10 in Fire Emblem 1. What does this mean? Well before Holy War came around, weapon levels were a number with a growth like all your other stats. Also, unlike Holy War, weapon levels were across the board so if you had a weapon level of 10, it would be a weapon level of 10 for both staves and tomes. You want to know who else comes with a weapon level of 10 in Fire Emblem 1? Jagen. Yeah, the other old guy who starts the game with the ability to wield Silver Lances. A weapon level of 10 is enough to allow Wendell to use EVERY SINGLE TOME AND STAFF (that isn't prf ranked) in the game. Wendell can wield the Starlight tome (a.k.a the tome with the highest weapon level in Fire Emblem 1) from the get-go. He basically starts Fire Emblem 1 out with an S rank in tomes and staves. Wendell's Shadow Dragon counterpart, by contrast, only starts out with a B rank in tomes and a D rank in staves which isn't anywhere near as impressive by contrast. 

 

Nothing like the original am I right?

                        Wendell is considered a great warp-bot in Fire Emblem 1, which is an overwhelming advantage that he has over not only his Shadow Dragon counterpart, but over the rest of his competitors ranked below him. The real defining advantage though is that in addition to being a great warp-bot, he's also a fantastic fighter too. Sagit Heim was kind enough to provide me with a statistical analysis of Wendell's combat abilities from Chapter 5 onward. The analysis down below was all done by Sagit Heim. Feel free to take a bow Sagit Heim, you did an amazing job. Feast your eyes on this my fellow Fire Emblem fans:

Chapter 5

2RKO's all enemies with Fire/Ice tome, even the boss (2 hits per round)

Resists 5 hits from cavaliers with 13 Atk (highest atk in all the chapter excluding the boss)

Chapter 6

2RKO's all enemies with Fire/Ice tome, even the boss (2 hits per round)

Resists 4 hits from knights with 14 Atk and resists 3 hits from Silver Lance!cavalier (highest atk in all the chapter excluding the boss)

Chapter 7

2RKO's all enemies with Fire/Ice tome (2 hits per round), 3RKO's the boss

Resists 5 hits from knights with 13 Atk and resists 2 hits from Lance!Draco Knight (highest atk in all the chapter excluding the boss)

Chapter 8

2RKO's all enemies with Fire/Ice tome, even the boss (2 hits per round)

Resists 11 hits from Bow Knights with 10 Atk and resists 4 hits from Steel Sword!Cavaliers and Lance!Knights. Resists 2 hits from the boss

Chapter 9

2RKO's all enemies with Fire/Ice tome, even the boss (2 hits per round)

Wendell Resists 4 hits from Hunters with 14 Atk, resists 3 hits from Steel Axe!Pirate and resists 2 hits from Demon Axe!Pirate.

Chapter 10

2RKO's all enemies with Fire/Ice tome (2 hits per round). 3RKO's the boss and the Hero.

W1Ndell resists 4 hits from Cavaliers/Knights/Pegasi with 14 Atk, resists 3 hits from Lance!Draco Knight and resists 4 hits from the Hero. Resists 2 hits from the boss.

Chapter 11

Blablablabla kills everyone in 2 rounds with a fire tome, even the boss and the sniper blablabla resists 22 hits from the Bow Knight (LOL!), resists 5 hits from Swordies/Cavaliers/Pegasi, resists 2 hits from the mamkute

Chapter 12

Kills everyone in 2 rounds, resists 4 hits from generic enemies and 2 hits from the mamkute. GG.

Chapter 13

*yawn*

Kills generic enemies in 2 rounds with the Fire tome, dies in 3 hits blablabla just warp-skip the map.

Chapter 14

W1Ndell!IceTome kills everything in 2 rounds, kills Jiol in 3 rounds, dies in 4 hits from generic enemies, resists 2 hits from Sniper/Silver Lance!Knight/Jiol, gg.

Chapter 15

Kills everything in 2 rounds with the ice tome, resists 4 hits from mages. OP, pls nerf.

Chapter 16

Kills every-non-hero-enemy in 2 rounds, kills heroes in 3 rounds, resists 5 hits from the Bow Knights, 3 hits from DracoKnights and 2 hits from the Silver Lance!Paladin. Kills the boss in 3 rounds. GG

Chapter 17

Kills everyone in 2 rounds with the Ice tome- wtf, srsly? What kind of base stats are these? ._.

Resists 2 hits from Snipers/Heroes. Yeah, a glass canon.

Chapter 18

*sigh* Kills every enemy unit in 1 round (!) with Thoron. Resists 5 hits from generic enemies, resists 2/3 hits from the Paladins.

Chapter 19

W1Ndell!IceTome Kills everything in 3 rounds (2 rounds if he reached level 6 lol). Kills Heroes in 4 rounds (3 rounds if he reached level 6).

Chapter 20

(Base level)

W1Ndell!Thoron ORKO's Paladins and Generals. Resists 2 hits from Paladins and 3 hits from Generals.

Chapter 21

(Base level)

ORKO's Paladins/Generals/Draco Knights with Thoron. Dies in 2 hits.

Chapter 22

Kills Paladins/Draconknights/Pegasi in 1 round with thoron (Ice tome against Pegasi). Dies in 2 hits.

Chapter 23

ORKO's generic enemies with Thoron. Dies in 4 hits from mages. Resists 2 hits from the sniper.

3RKO's Garnef with Starlight (2RKO's if he reached level 6).

Chapter 24

2RKO's Bishops/Mamkutes with the Ice tome. Resists 2 hits from Snipers/Mamkutes. Resists 5 hits from Bishops with fire.

Final Chapter

W1Ndell kills Paladins/DracoKnights in 2 rounds with Thoron. Kills Snipers in 3 rounds with the Ice tome. Dies in 2 hits.


                Needless to say, the enemies in Fire Emblem 1 are a joke and Wendell makes short work of them. So to sum this post up: Wendell is an amazing fighter and an amazing warp-bot who's there with you from the beginning. This old man really is ridiculous. 

(Here's  where the above picture came from: http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=32521 Look for Dark Sage's post)