The Fire Emblem Discussion

[A Black Falcon]

My most-used (and favorite) unit in Fire Emblem (7, GBA) was almost certainly Florina... 8's Pegasus Knights weren't quite as good as Florina and Fiora, but they were still good, as is Marica. Tanith definitely doesn't match up though, and joins later and high level (lv.10 Falcon Knight)... as for bows, either give them the guard that blocks against that (as I did for Florina in FE7) or kill the archers before they can attack your flying units... :) To make my opinions on this even more clear, in Path of Radiance my party in the final mission included all five flyers. And the only unit on horseback was Mist. :D For some reason, I liked Jill and Haar better than the Wyvern Riders in FE7 or FE8 and actually used them extensively...

rank 2 units: (by level, Epilogue file, didn't use any quick-promote items to skip levels)
Ike - Level 20 Lord
Astrid - level 20 Paladin
Mist - level 19 Valkyrie
Tibarn - level 18 Hawk (joins promoted at level 18)
[Nasir - level 18 Dragon] (joins at level 18 near the end. I used him, but not enough to level.) (died in last mission)
[Soren - level 18 Sage] (died in last mission)
Ilyana - level 17 Sage
Marcia - level 17 Falcon Knight
Haar - level 15 Wyvern Lord (joins promoted at level 10)
[Tanith - level 15 Falcon Knight] (joins promoted at level 10) (died in last mission)
Mia - level 14 Swordmaster
Tauroneo - level 14 General (joins promoted at level 14, barely used)
Rhys - level 14 Bishop
Bastian - level 14 Sage (joins promoted at level 13)
Lucia - level 13 Swordmaster (joins promoted at level 12)
Calill - level 12 Sage (joins promoted at level 6)
Jill - level 11 Wyvern Lord
Geoffrey - level 11 Paladin (joins promoted at level 11, never used)
Stephan - level 9 Swordmaster (joins promoted at level 8, little used, though Mia got great use out of his awesome Vauge Katti)
Largo - level 7 Berserker (joins promoted at level 7, never used)
Nephenee - level 6 Halberdier
Devdan - level 4 Halberdier (joins promoted as level 4 Halberdier, didn't use)
Titania - level 4 Paladin (joins promoted at level 1)
Volke - level 3 Assassin
Shinon - level 2 Sniper (joins promoted at level 1)

... I used Zihark enough to get him to level 20 Myrmidion, but then stopped so he didn't rank up. Similar for Oscar (level 14), etc. I wish I didn't have to use Rhys since his speed and HP are ridiculously low so he's double hit almost every time and dies very quickly (so I need to keep him away from any enemies all the time), but he's the only healer for a long time and I always need more than one healer around, so...

I know Paladins are strong, but I would rather use other units I like more -- Swordmasters, Pegasus Knights, Archers, and Mages, primarially...

Looking at my current playthroughs of FE7 and FE8 and looking at the active party for the last mission I was on...

FE8: mission 9 (Hard). Using 2 Pegasus Knights, 2 mages, an archer, 2 healers, Eirika (swordmaster-ish), a Swordmaster, an axe user, and a Knight.

FE7: misson 23 (Eliwood Normal). Hector: lv.19; Lyn: lv.18; Eliwood: lv.16; 2 Pegasus Knights, archer, dancer, 2 other axe users (one of them required for a conversation, otherwise I'd have another dedicated mage), 2 healers/mages, 1 dedicated mage. I'm trying to force myself to use Eliwood, but he's so bad... Hector and Lyn are far better... Florina is my highest-level unit of course (well, tied with recently joined prepromote Hawkeye at level 4 of rank 2).