"Kagetsu is so absurdly overpowered that not using him is effectively a challenge run."
Engage, like the more recent Fire Emblem games have many ways to break the game faster than you think although considering how difficult this game is you are going to need these to make Maddening Mode bearable.
Spoilers are unmarked on this page!
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Alear and the Royals
- Alear and a good portion of the royals are exceptional units to invest in. These characters come with unique classes that are designed to take advantage of their strengths. This is how they become game-breaking:
- Alear is the best early-game unit supporter and a consistent Emblem enabler. Their personal skill, Divinely Inspiring, gives an allied unit 3 bonus damage and reduces damage taken by 1 when adjacent to Alear. Their personal sword Libération, is weak in power (which can be rectified with forging), but fills the Engage meter by 1 when Alear attacks and defeats a foe in a single turn. When promoted to Divine Dragon, Alear learns Divine Spirit at level 5, a skill that shortens the Engage meter by one step, which allows for faster Engages. Alear's growths are fairly average save for their Dexterity and Speed, but their supportive utility more than makes up for it. Their recommended Emblems are Marth, Roy, and the Three Houses Lords to capitalize on their offenses, Lucina, Corrin, Byleth, and Veronica to capitalize on their supportive aspects, or Tiki to turn them into a powerful all-rounder. All of this, mind you, is without taking into account their abilities as the Fire Emblem. More on that in the "Emblem Rings" section.
- Alcryst is a Pure Archer of nearly no equal. His personal skill, Get Behind Me!, allows Alcryst to gain +3 Str when an ally within two spaces is attacked. When promoted to Tireur d'élite, Alcryst later gains the skill Luna, with a proc rate directly based on his Dexterity stat. Combined with Alcryst's great Dex growth, he's going to be triggering Luna very often, letting him punch through even the hardiest armored enemies in the lategame. His recommended Ring Emblems are a choice between Lyn to grant him unholy synergy with a 20 range Astra Storm, Eirika to further punch through high defense enemies with Lunar Brace, or Marth to grant him melee ranged options alongside extra attacks.
- Ivy is a powerful nuke on wings with surprisingly good durability. Her personal skill, Single-Minded boosts her Hit rate by 20 if she faced the same recent opponent, which helps her consistently land hits due to her low Dexterity cap. When promoted to Lindwurm, Ivy becomes more dangerous, learning the skill Grasping Void at level 5, which has a chance based on Dexterity to steal half of the foe's Magic stat and add it to her own damage, making her a good Mage Killer in the event she faces foes with high Magic and Resistance. She also has surprisingly good durability, having average and high growths in Defense and Resistance respectively. Her recommended Emblems are a choice between Celica, Soren, and Veronica to ramp up her raw killpower with the latter also boosting her Dexterity, Lyn to mitigate her below average Speed and Dexterity, Micaiah to compound her durability with healing, or Corrin and Camilla to provide debuffs and crowd control with her mobility. Sigurd is also a decent choice with his Hit rate increasing passive and movement boosts.
- Hortensia is easily the most potent healer in the game. Her personal skill, Big Personality, grants her +1 Range with her staves, giving her great utility from the get-go. When promoted to Sleipnir Rider, she gains the skill World Tree at level 5, with a chance directly based on her Dexterity to not consume a staff usage. This is important due to how money and high rank staves are limited resources on higher difficulties, so anything that slows down using them up is very beneficial, including the S-Rank Nodus staff (if you're willing to shell out the Gold for it) which otherwise would've been Too Awesome to Use with only 1 durability point. While Hortensia's Magic growth is below average, she makes up for it with excellent growths in Dexterity, Speed, Resistance, and Luck, meaning enemy attacks aimed at her will more than likely miss, and she will usually strike twice. Her recommended Emblems are a choice between Celica, Soren, and Veronica (if you want to capitalize on offense, with Veronica also boosting Dexterity), Micaiah (ramps up Hortensia's healing to ludicrous levels), Lucina (to give her another avenue for attack and boost Dexterity to increase the chance for World Tree), or Byleth (for buffing and refreshing utility).
- Fogado is a speedy archer who can cover great distances on his horse. He is primarily built around evasion and mitigation with an incredible Speed growth, which is compounded by his personal skill Charmer, reducing his recent foe's critical rate by 10. When promoted to Cupido, Fogado also gains the use of Swords to help circumnavigate his weakness as an archer, and learns the skill Back at You at level 5, reflecting half of the damage he takes back at the enemy in the event he somehow gets hit. He also has a decent enough Magic growth which allows him to put the Radiant Bow to pretty good use, as well as take advantage of any Spirit Dusts you come across, letting him shred through high Def but low Res units like Generals. Since his unique class skill doesn't really synergize well with his high evasion and long-ranged tactics, he's one of the royals who can actually benefit from a different class instead, like Warrior to let him still use bows and act as a ranged Backup unit. His recommended Emblems are a choice between Sigurd, Roy, and the Three Houses Lords to fix his relatively mediocre offenses, Lyn to ramp up his already incredible Speed into overdrive, or Lucina to take advantage of her Dual Support passive to greatly buff his Avoid rate. Alternatively, if you're able to get the Claude Bond Ring, granting +1 range to all bows at full health, Fogado can put it to great use with either Cupido's high Mov or increasing the range of Warrior's backup attacks. The ring would turn every bow into a Longbow, and it increases the actual Longbow's range to a massive 4, all letting him snipe foes from safe distances.
- Timerra is a Lance user that is far more dangerous than she looks. There are two pieces of information that redeem her as both a powerhouse and a powerful supporter. First, her worst flaw is that she is a low-build lance user thus her Spd takes a hard hit; Emblem Hector turns this into a powerful advantage with his Heavy Weapon support skill increasing her damage boost up to +5, and this damage boost also stacks with Sandstorm * so Timerra will hit hard and accurately. The second piece of information that redeems her? She is a Backup Unit and that alone can give a lot of mileage with Lucina's Support Skills mentioned below. Her recommended Emblems are Sigurd to boost her Lance usage while also stacking advantage with Lucina's Backup skills, Ike and Hector to build up on her being a tank with the latter also giving the aforementioned Heavy Weapon, Lyn to counteract her original flaw, Lucina to put her Backup class status to great use while also boosting her already high Dexterity even further, Chrom to not only boost both Speed and Dexterity (and one shooting her worst flaw and boosting her best attribute) but also boost Giga Levin Sword even further with Sandstorm, or Eirika if you want to boost her offensive power with Lunar Brace while also taking less damage with Gentility. She grants Dexterity as well, a stat Timerra very much appreciates.
Other Characters
- Louis. Despite Louis's relatively low stat total, it's very well-optimized. With ludicrous strength and defense growth, even before receiving a promotion, many promoted enemy units can't even manage to hurt him at all. However, he's more than capable of taking off massive chunks of their health, if they survive an attack at all, and has the dexterity to make sure he can land those blows consistently. While his low speed means he often won't be counter-attacking, he won't be taking any real damage anyway. Despite having the classic armored unit weakness to magic, he also boasts no shortage of hit points, meaning that even taking two direct hits in a row from an enemy mage, usually isn't even enough to finish him off. While still weak to magic, it's a small price for him being effectively unbeatable when up against any physical enemy. His recommended Emblems are a choice between Sigurd to turn him into a long-range juggernaut, or Ike and Hector to further ramp up his sheer tankiness. He's also surprisingly compatible with Lyn, as her Doubles copy his non-HP stats to form a solid wall with his high Def (and in non-Maddening difficulties, soften enemies up without killstealing due to his low Spd).
- Jean manages to go above and beyond for usual "Villager with Aptitude" recruits, and is an excellent overall unit. Since his starting class is the Martial Monk, he can contribute very well from the start with staff utility without needing to enter combat early on. His Expertise personal skill is unique in that it doesn't increase his growths by a flat amount, but outright doubles them based on his current class, giving Jean huge potential to snowball very quickly regardless of his class. His main flaw is his poor Build stat, but the rest of his strengths compensate for it. His recommended Emblems are a choice between Leif to help mitigate his low Build stat, Celica, Micaiah, Byleth, Soren, or Veronica to capitalize on his magical capabilities, or Tiki to make him a great all-rounder thanks to her Starsphere passive.
- Yunaka is considered a very powerful unit. Her starting class as a Thief can't promote, but its level cap is doubled while having the growth rates to match a promoted unit. This allows her increased level cap to be taken advantage of leaving her with one of the highest stat totals in the army. Her daggers work as a ranged option as well as inflicting poison. Her unique skill boosts her critical rate as long as she's placed on the right tile. The end result is she can tear into the enemy and debuff any she doesn't finish off on her own. Her being much more dangerous than the usual utility character might be partially justified due to her history as a trained assassin. Corrin is a recommended Emblem Ring thanks to her enabling Yunaka to create Avoid tiles at will (as fog increases Avoid and reduces overall movement) along with granting Pair Up to negate incoming Chain Attacks, making Yunaka an incredible dodge-tank. Include a max forged Silver Dagger or Cinquedea and Leif's Knife Precision 5 skill (Grants Hit/Avo+15 when using a knife) and Yunaka will severely cripple or kill almost anything that comes her way at little-to-no risk to herself. Just be wary of trying this on Maddening difficulty, as the AI will be smart enough not to initiate on an enemy they can't damage. Another notable Emblem she can work well is Lucina because this allows her to Chain Attack with the Knives mentioned below.
- Money is incredibly useful in buying many things throughout your journey and tends to be limiting if you don't have much. * Anna is the best money farmer in Engage; her personal skill, Making a Killing, gives a chance via luck to gain 500 gold per enemy she defeats and it doesn't factor if she initiates combat. If she has Byleth or Tiki as her Emblem partner that chance increases drastically the higher the Bond Level. If she could solo maps, you could possibly make 5000+ gold every skirmish without factoring Gold Corrupted battles. While she needs to gain new proficiencies and reclass to best take advantage of her Magic growth and increase her Luck growth, her growths for Magic are the highest in the game with High Priest being the class with the highest possible max Luck of 59 (39 innate max + 20 from emblems and skills). Besides Tiki (while also making her more of a tank) and Byleth's luck boost mentioned above, using Celica and Soren will boost her attacking power and Micaiah for her healing power are also great recommendations to make Anna stronger in combat. If you instead go to the Wolf Knight route (an alternate choice for the second highest possible max luck of 57 and is also mentioned under the classes folder), Lucina is useful for Backup Knives, or Leif for the Knife Precision skills.
- Kagetsu is the first promoted recruit after Vander and sets the standard for new units starting in the midgame. On top of having the second-highest base Spd in the entire game, he has 35 HP and 14 Def which makes his base physical bulk only surpassed by the Stone Wall armor units at join time. And this is in his Swordmaster class which is historically known for its Fragile Speedster status. Because of his amazing bases, he can excel in just about any physical class and be comparable to units who join much later while having solid growths all around. With all these advantages on top of his early join time, Kagetsu is easily in the conversation for the best unit in the game. Marth and Roy are great Emblems to boost his swordsmanship and Ike and Hector are great Emblems for their Stone Wall approach. Lucina is a great choice as well because Swordmaster is a Backup class and he can have all the advantages with that class.
- If you think Berserkers and Smash weapons are unremarkable, Panette would like a word with you. She has the highest HP and Strength caps in the game and the personal skill of gaining 10% Crit Rate if she isn't at max HP. In a game where every stat point counts, this stacking of Strength and Crit Rate is deceptively powerful, and with the right refines and skills she can hit a nigh-perpetual 100% Crit Rate. Needing to take damage first can also be turned into an asset with the Vantage skill from Leif, ensuring she hits first if initiated on (which also makes Smash weapons work), and Hit+ from Sigurd can offset the accuracy issue of axes; the only sticking point is that Leif and Sigurd must be recollected in Chapter 17 before Panette can inherit these skills, but once this is done she can take on entire maps on her own. Her highest-recommended Emblem is Ike, who provides the Axe Power and Wrath skills critical to her build, and Great Aether with a Greataxe/Ukonvasara will heal herself to full and crush a whole horde of enemies in one swing. Another good choice is Veronica, as her Reprisal(+) skill adds her loads of lost HP to her damage dealt to enable oneshots even without a Critical Hit, and Veronica gives Dexterity which further fixes her accuracy.
- Seadall, is a Dancer, is already a Game-Breaker to begin with to no one's surprise, but what makes him arguably even more broken than the usual Dancer is the usage of Emblem Rings. He can utilize Sigurd to grant himself massive movement to dance allies from farther away, then reposition himself away from harm with Canter. One can also use Byleth to access the powerful Goddess Dance and dance up to four allies at once, one of which can also be Seadall himself, allowing up to six extra turns. Additionally, as a Qi Adept, he can potentially utilize Chain Guard to protect his allies from harm and still gain EXP from it. He also has his Personal Skill, Curious Dance which heals allies within two spaces of Seadall by 10% HP, furthering his Supporting potential.
- Mauvier joins the party in the late-game, and starts off with amazing base stats in all areas except Luck that let him carry his weight from the get-go. His personal growths are also incredible, with his only bad growth being Luck, making him a very versatile unit who can fit into any build the player chooses. Even if you don't reclass him, Mauvier is an exceptional Combat Medic as a Royal Knight.
- It is perhaps a case of Purposely Overpowered as she is the last unit you recruit, but Veyle is undoubtedly going to be one of your main workhorses for the endgame. She joins you in her unique Fell Child class, so she already starts strong with Obscurité (a Tome weapon with extra Crit rate) and Misericorde (a magic-based Knife weapon), and she has an S-Rank in Tomes to make use of any magic you please, including the Nova tome if your Ivy isn't up to snuff. Fell Child being subclassed as a Dragon also means she reaps the full benefits of Emblem Ring effects, but she also sees some common use reclassed as a Wolf Knight, as such Speed and Evasion on a Magic-based unit is unprecedented and deadly. Lucina is a good choice of Emblem for the same reasons as Yunaka (Backup Knives) in either class, but for Fell Child in particular, special mention simply must go to Soren: Veyle as the Fell Child is the only unit who both gets the Dragon-only Crit Rate doubler and Tome-only Life Drain effect from Soren's Flare Engage Skill, and these effects stack. With Hold Out from Roy so she can't be oneshotted and Vantage from Leif for safety, Veyle can take an attack, destroy the violator with a Crit-refined Obscurité, and instantly heal to full for the next contender.
- Zelestia is generally regarded as the overall best of the DLC units and a true powerhouse with her own balanced growths complementing her special class, Melusine, making her like a notably faster (and still fairly bulky) version of Lindwurm but replacing staves with swords. While Soulblade can reduce her damage with swords in some situations, it makes her able to deal decent damage or outright ORKO most high resistance magic-using enemies via a Levin Sword, and since the skill is always active she doesn't need to rely on RNG like Lindwurm's Grasping Void skill does. Further, her stats enable her to make good use offensively of most Emblem weapons regardless of them being magical or physical, making her very flexible as a unit.
Classes and Skills
- Armored units finally get their revenge after almost thirty years of being unable to truly play well at high levels due to their low Move, receiving a massive buff in general. The units have the same movement as normal units and are immune to Break when it comes to weapon disadvantage, making them not only capable of keeping up with infantry, but among the only units who have a regular Enemy Phase game, which is huge. Their only downsides are that Smash Weapons can Break Armored units and the fact they don't get an increase in Move upon promoting, but the former is a rare occurrence while the latter is easily circumventable with bonuses like the Sigurd Ring (see below), which actually makes them worth stacking with a Boots, unlike previous games. The only real downside to Armor Knights is that their promotion as a General is locked to a singular weapon, which can be a major problem with Sword Armor promotions, but it's overall a small price to pay for being the best they've been in years. As if to respond to this though, the late game starts throwing more and more mages at your army and they love to chip them out with backup units, thus you'd be wise to focus on a specialized Armor unit than an army of them by the time the late game rolls around.
- Backup classes (such as the Fighter classes, their promoted versions, and both Diamant and Timerra's unique classes) all have the ability to Chain Attack, contributing an additional hit to combat if they're within attack range of the enemy from their current position. This is fixed damage equal to 10% of the foe's max HP with a fixed accuracy of 80%, which might not sound like much, but by surrounding an enemy with Backup units they can be hit for upwards of 20 damage at the start of every combat, melting even multi-health bar bosses with ease. You'll get a good idea of how strong stacked Chain Attacks are during maps like Eirika's Paralogue, and you can do it just as well as the enemy, if not more so, as certain classes, skills and weapons can enhance Chain Attacks even further:
- Emblem Lucina not only allows her user to Chain Attack even if they're not a Backup class, but her Dual Assist skill also gives them a chance (from 35% up to nearly guaranteed at higher levels) to Chain Attack if they could reach an enemy by moving. The best part is this skill can be inherited, and it's fairly cheap too, meaning you can have a whole army with this... or stack it with Emblem Sigurd.
- Heroes gain the Brave Assist skill at Level 5, which causes their Chain Attacks to hit twice if they're at full HP. Already, that's 20% of the enemy's HP gone. And you can have multiple Heroes.
- Warriors are the only Backup class with access to Bows, enabling them to equip a Longbow and contribute Chain Attacks to fights they otherwise couldn't.
- Chain Attacks with Knives cause Poison just like regular Knife hits, letting you stack the debuff quickly. And since Chain Attacks are fixed damage, you can even poison enemies that'd otherwise take 0 damage from your knife units. The only caveat is that there are no Backup units with access to Knives, so the Knife-user must be the one wearing Lucina's ring to do this.
- Warrior is an immensely powerful class that is easily in contention for best in the game. Boasting some of the best growths in the game and solid caps it also adds 4-6 strength to any unit that happens to class into it and can quickly shore up that stat later in the game. This is especially powerful for units that already use bows because it gives them access to silver bows after Warrior has skyrocketed their strength stat. They also have one of the most useful combat-oriented skills unlocked at Level 5 by a generic class, Merciless, which allows them to deal 50% more damage to Broken Foes. And as above, they can equip Longbows, which combo well with Chain Attacks.
- Wolf Knight, meanwhile, is the reason why Warrior is in contention for best in the game. What Warrior has in HP and Str, Wolf Knight instead places in Res and Spd (with their latter being the second-highest in the game, beaten only by Cupido and Swordmaster), making for a class that is ridiculously dodge-happy yet surprisingly sturdy. Wolf Knights use Knives along with a Sword/Lance/Axe, and Knives deserve special mention because of how much extra Mt that refines add to them, so not only are they not wanting for damage, their Spd means they're very likely to hit twice. They also have a serviceable Mag stat for using a Levin Sword/Flame Lance to take out Armored enemies their Knives can't pierce (or if they're named Veyle, they have access to a Mag-based Knife in Misericorde). Their Class Skill, Hobble which cuts the movement of enemies hit by their Knives, is situational, but their superior movement as a Cavalry unit and strong statline makes up the difference.
- The Enchanter is one of the DLC classes, and they definitely don't disappoint. While their Strength and Magic caps are rather low, they compensate for it with the incredible utility they offer. They are the only class capable of accessing the convoy even without being next to Alear, letting them serve as a reliable item transporter. The real fun with the Enchanter comes into play with their unique skills, Weapon Surge and Item Surge. Weapon Surge adds +5 Mt to the Enchanter's chosen weapon in their inventory for all allies and foes who wield it. While it seems like a double edged sword, it's a fantastic boon for low ranked weapons, as enemies in the lategame never use low ranked weapons, making it a free huge damage boost, especially when combined with smithing. Item Surge confers a variety of strong benefits to the unit and adjacent allies based on the item usedEffects , allowing for some powerful and creative plays to get past Maddening. Its main drawback is the very expensive cost of 40,000 gold (28,000 with the Silver Card) to buy another one of its class change items outside of the free one you get for clearing the Fell Xenologue.
- The Mage Cannoneer is the other DLC class, offering their own powerful brand of damage and utility from afar. Unlike other weapons, the Mage Cannoneer's Blasts have their damage scale entirely off the Dexterity stat, making it a good choice for anyone with a high Dexterity stat but lacking in either Strength or Magic (e.g. Boucheron). There are a huge number of Blasts that can be used, each with their own unique effect; standing out in particular is the Venom Blast, which inflicts maximum Poison stacks upon hitting, for a free +5 damage boost for the whole team, and the Holy Blast, which deals effective damage against Corrupted, in a game where a huge portion of enemies are Corrupted especially towards the endgame. And they can do this from up to 8 spaces away! While the Blasts are incredibly heavy and cannot follow-up or crit, they make up for it with strong one-punch damage and being able to soften up enemies from afar for allies to finish off. Their main drawback is that they're downright prohibitively expensive to have more than one, costing a painful 90,000 gold (63,000 with the Silver Card) just to obtain another one of its class change items outside of the free one you get.
- The Vantage + Wrath skill combo, while traditionally powerful in the series, may be at its absolute best here. The combination of Lyn or Corrin's Engraves granting massive critical boosts or the high might of Smash weapons (which lose their "always strikes last" effect on the enemy phase, allowing them to work with Vantage) can create a unit who will always strike first with a near 100% critical rate, and usually oneshot the enemy. The skills can be used either by engaging with Ike or via inheritance, but either way creates a nearly unstoppable death machine. Panette is the most infamous user of this combo (see above), but any high-Strength Warrior can make it work.
- Draconic Hex, used by Corrin and inheritable, is an incredible support and anti-boss ability, debuffing all the target's stats by 4 after combat. This can be used by a Knife user to also apply Poison, or inherited on a bow user to apply it from a distance with Longbows or Astra Storm.
Weapons and Items
- Due to high Might, the low Resistance of physical enemies, and access to forging, magic weapons are quite strong in Engage, but a few stand out.
- The Levin Sword has a high might of 13 (higher than its lance counterpart), good accuracy and only requires a C rank in Swords to use. It can be obtained at the forge for only a Steel Sword, 100 Iron, 10 Steel and 1000 gold, which is possible early in the game. While its power assumes you're using it with a Magically Inept Fighter, Engage has a lot of classes with high Magic and access to Swords. On Mage Knights it's effectively a better Elfire that can also Break enemy axe users (and as late-game Warriors and Berserkers hit hard, this is very worthwhile), while Chloé can use it to turn the otherwise support-oriented Griffin Knight into an offensive juggernaut. Céline, meanwhile, not only appreciates a magical sword, but gains the unique niche of a fully magical Override with extra damage.
- The Radiant Bow is so powerful even a Magically Inept Fighter won't hold it back. Its enormous might of 19 is higher than most S rank weapons, and that's before forges, and being a bow, this might is tripled against flying enemies. Engage is a game with many dangerous enemy Wyvern Knights, and their low Resistance and bow weakness makes this a near-guaranteed One-Hit KO against them. And that's on a normal bow user. Anna and Fogado have reasonable Magic stats, making it even deadlier in their hands, and like the Levin Sword it's only C rank. But that's just archers. What about mages? High-Magic characters like Citrinne and Lindon actually appreciate a Sniper reclass for this bow alone, and can be deadly boss-killers with Lyn's Astra Storm. And while it takes a little more effort than a Levin Sword, a Radiant Bow can be obtained early through forging a Silver Bow, and many would say it's worth it.
Ring Emblems
The main gimmick of Engage, the Emblem Rings are designed to both fix weaknesses in characters assigned to the ring as well as reinforce their strengths. At level 5 bond, you can start inheriting skills that would normally only be on the user. While every ring is useful, as you can see below, some rings shine brighter than others.
- Sigurd is, unsurprisingly, cracked as all hell with the absurd utility he offers. He grants the famously powerful Canter, allowing for repositioning after attacking, and he passively provides an extra point of Movement to whoever equips him. Engaging with him provides an utterly ludicrous +5 to Movement, which synergizes amazingly well with his Momentum skill, granting +1 to damage dealt for every space moved, allowing for some incredible damage potential just for moving.
- On top of this, any horseback unit Engaged with him get an additional +2 to Movement.
- Micaiah is a fantastic healer, and allows anyone who equips her to use staves regardless of class. She also grants Staff Mastery, which significantly boosts the Hit rate of status staves and adds up to 15 extra HP healed when healing with staves, allowing even the most Magically Inept Fighter to heal a great amount. Engaging with her extends the range of staves by up to 5 spaces more, and any staves used also affect adjacent units to the target, which can be used to heal, Warp, or Rescue up to five allies at once. Her Engage Skill, Great Sacrifice heals all allies on the map to full health at the cost of reducing the unit's HP to 1, and the skill also grants a ton of EXP for using it. She is also no slouch as a Combat Medic, as she grants the use of Nosferatu for Life Drain and healing back the recoil damage from Great Sacrifice, and Thani, a strong, accurate, and lightweight tome that deals supereffective damage against cavalry and armor enemies. It's generally agreed that Micaiah is the single most broken Emblem in the game.
- Lyn makes up for her lack of raw damage with sheer utility. She bestows the Alacrity skill, which allows anyone with a large speed advantage to perform their follow-up attack before the foe's attack, letting them pick off hard-hitting enemies without risk. Speedtaker gives her holder +2 Speed every time they kill an enemy on the Player Phase, which snowballs quickly and lets her user double almost anything. Astra Storm essentially turns her holder into a living ballista, with a ridiculous 20 range on Covert classes, which can be used to kill off fliers, chip dangerous enemies, or aggro bosses from halfway across the map. But perhaps strongest is her Call Doubles ability. The Summoner class in Sacred Stones was already an infamous A.I. Breaker for its ability to create one One-Hit-Point Wonder decoy per turn, which the AI preferentially targets due to prioritizing kills. Now picture that, except you get four of them, and they can actually dodge tank and kill with the right stat build. They also contribute guaranteed Chain Attacks to the user. One downside to the doubles however, is that they can steal EXP from your other units if they're too good at their job, in a game where EXP is arguably at an all-time premium.
- Lucina may not seem like much when you obtain her, but in this game Chain Attacks are both a threat and one of your best weapons. Her Emblem holder can Chain Attack even if you're not a Backup unit and has a skill, Dual Assist, that gives a 35% chance to Chain Attack foes where your unit can reach by moving and that chance doubles with Dual Assist+. Additionally, her Bonded Shield ability is an upgraded version of Chain Guard, allowing its bonded user an 80% chance to negate damage when an ally is attacked without the risk of HP loss to the user. When paired with a Qi Adept (Martial Monk/Master or Dancer), this chance goes up to 100%, allowing the player to create unconventional tanks to protect their squishier units. And unlike Chain Guard, which can only be used if the user is at full HP, Bonded Shield can be used repeatedly as long as the wielder is Engaged with Lucina. Lucina can also provide a small Dexterity boost and many useful skills have a Dexterity Trigger.
- Byleth is a fantastic support Emblem. Once Engaged, you'll get the Instruct skill, which provides allies within 2 spaces a buff to a stat depending on the wearer's class type with the exception of Dragon, which provides +3 to all stats. His Engage Attack, Goddess Dance is a 4 tile dance, providing an Extra Turn to anyone on said tiles with a built-in Instruct to boot, making it one of the best and useful Engage Attacks in the game. It’s also possible to refresh Seadall, which is normally impossible to do on a dancer, allowing a total of 6 more turns.
- And of course, we really can't be forgetting about the last of the main game Emblems, the titular Fire Emblem Alear, who is naturally extremely powerful due to how late you get their emblem form. While using this consumes Alear's Engage Meter and prevents both them and their partner from engaging with a different Emblem, it boasts some extremely powerful passive skills, weapons, and THE most devastating Engage Attack in the game against a single target, bar none.
- First, with Bond Forger/Bond Forger+, Alear and their partner give a sizeable boost to Accuracy and Avoid to themselves and all allies within 2 spaces that are synced or engaged with an Emblem, Attuned makes it so that when one half of the pair scores a killing blow, the other gains +4 to all their stats (with bonuses for every unit type), Holy Shield nullifies unit effectiveness against Alear and their partner, making Fliers not susceptible to bows if they're engaged to Alear, and lastly is Boon of Elyos, which grants a bonus to Crit and Ddg equal to two times the number of allies who have already acted this turn, potentially allowing a devastating chain of crits if Alear and their partner are the last to act, though this last one is only usable on the character that Alear has given the Pact Ring to.
- On the weapon side, Oligoludia is a decently strong and light sword that deals effective damage against Corrupted (An enemy-type that is near-omnipresent for the rest of the game after acquiring the Fire Emblem), and Dragon's Fist is an Arts weapon that deals magical damage, allowing mages a weapon to fight up close with and deal devastating damage. But the real kicker is the engage attack, Dragon Blast/Bond Blast, which is effectively a single-target delete button, dealing two (three if Bond Blast is used, which requires Alear to be adjacent to their partner) devastating attacks to a single target. When combined with Alear's Holy Aura, which grants effectiveness against Fell Dragons, they can easily inflict grievous damage on Sombron.
- Additionally, Alear's unique engrave must ALSO be given a mention here due to the sheer quality of it, even in comparison to other engraves: at the cost of 1 might, Alear's unique engrave, Fire, grants +20 hit, +20 crit, -1 weight, +20 avoid and +20 dodge to a weapon. And all of this is on top of any utility Alear has as a standalone unit, see the "Alear and the Royals" section above.
- The final kicker is that the bonuses gained from Engaging with Alear are based on Alear's support level with their partner, meaning the Engage Bonuses and sync skills stack with the bonuses Alear and their partner gain from supports, and thus no Bond Fragments are needed to max out Alear's bonuses with a unit. About the only downside is that Alear ONLY grants bonuses when Engaged.
DLC Bracelet Emblems
Complementary to the Ring Emblems, the DLC Bracelet Emblems provide both a different utility as well as allow for your army to double up on specific strategies. For example, if one unit is using the Ike ring to boost their defensive options, than another can use the Hector bracelet for a similar effect. That being said, like the rings above, some Bracelets are far stronger than even the rings. One other thing that gives them an edge over the Emblem rings is that they aren't taken away from you during the two 2-part chapters in Chapter 10 and 11, and 21 and 22 where your rings are either taken away from and used against you (Chapter 11) or temporarily become dormant and you need to rescue all of them by invocation (Chapter 22) during the second parts.
- The Bracelet of the Three Houses; Edelgard, Dimitri, and Claude. The Combat Arts Atrocity and Fallen Star are a major boon even before unlocking the other weapons; if your character uses a sword and a Bond Level of 15, being Engaged allows you to have all weapon triangle advantages, and not even distance can save your opponent because of Failnaught. They also come with innate boosts to Str and Dex, Weapon Sync (which all increase damage for the same weapon type or is automatically applied when Engaged), and Lineage (20% increase to EXP gain and it costs 150 SP to inherit). Their Engage Attack, Houses Unite, bestows an Extra Turn to the user if used while adjacent to Byleth, which can be combined with Raging Storm for two additional actions (and that's before Goddess Dance or Seadall gets involved).
- The Bracelet of the Ancestor, Tiki, is busted in a few ways. First, Engaging allows you to transform into a Manakete form which greatly boosts your stats and can give a Divine Blessing to any adjacent ally to prevent death. But the most broken effects by Tiki are her Inherited Skills: Starsphere (Grant unit enhanced stat growth when leveling up, a transferable Aptitude) and Lifesphere (Restoring HP and status effects when you Wait without attacking or using items, which also gets stronger the higher the Bond Level). Tiki also has innate boosts to HP and Lck to make your character more durable than you think; put her on a character who is already tanky and even a weapon effective against dragons will have trouble killing them.
- The Bracelet of the Doting Sister; Camilla, can essentially be considered a mix of the abilities of Corrin and Sigurd. From Corrin, she has the same Dragon Vein mechanic to allow her to alter terrain, and from Sigurd, she grants the wielder bonus movement when engaged. While the movement bonus is not as extreme as Sigurd's Engage Skill (and she doesn't grant bonus movement otherwise), engaging with Camilla will also grant the user flying movement without any of the drawbacks of actually being a flier (so no weakness to bows or wind magic, and they can actually take advantage of Terrain bonuses. You don't have to worry about negative terrains, either: those turn into healing via Camilla's Groundswell skill). However, Camilla's Dragon Vein has slightly different terrain choices than Corrin's: While the effects for Backup, Armored, Mystical, Cavalry and Flying units are the same, Covert units spawn smoke that decreases the defense and avoid of enemies (as opposed to a smokescreen that raises avoid), and Qi Adepts spawn an ice floor that boosts movement (as opposed to ice pillars that block movement). The Qi Adept effect is especially potent, as the ice spawned further increases allies' movement, letting them get across the map faster.
- Fliers get 1 additional movement from Camilla's Soar skill, while Cavalry get 2 additional movement.
- The Bracelet of the Brash General, Hector, is an incredible tank in a similar vein to Ike. He grants several great skills like Quick Riposte, which guarantees a follow-up attack in the Enemy Phase, Heavy Attack, which adds up to +5 extra damage if the current weapon's weight exceeds the unit's Build stat * , and Impenetrable, boosting the unit's Defense and Resistance by 30% when attacked, with an additional 20% boost to Def or Res if they're armored or flying, respectively. His Engage Skill, Storm's Eye, readies a stance that makes the unit unbreakable, denies all enemy follow-ups, and guarantees a follow-up for the unit for a turn. He also comes with excellent and versatile weapons, like the Wolf Beil for crushing cavalry and armors, the Runesword for ranged Life Drain, and Armads for raw killpower.
- The Bracelet of the Lonely Princess, Veronica, is exactly as broken as you'd expect a highly-invested Heroes metagame unit to be. She comes with an absurd number of skills that are all game-changing, the most obvious of which is her Engage Attack, Summon Hero, which quite simply gives you an extra unit to control as long as the Engage is active (or the summon dies). These summons aren't cannon fodder either, being every bit as strong as your regular units and gaining extra effects depending on the summoner's subclass, to say nothing of summoning an Emblem complete with all of their skills. Veronica also has a refresher skill in the form of Contract, her Engage Skill, albeit one where the target ally can't move from their tile. She's also a fearsome combatant with Reprisal to add 30% of her lost HP to her damage dealt, Book of Worlds to add stacking effects to her next Player Phase attack the longer she Waits (and she can stack them faster if she gets Danced), and powerful Engage weapons in Hliðskjálf (an uncounterable magic attack), Fortify+ (a staff that heals everyone in 7 range, while not being limited by durability like regular Fortify is) and Élivágar (strips all stat buffs from the target for a turn). If all of this weren't enough, so also has Level Boost (spoofs an extra level for each kill of a higher-level enemy, up to +3) and SP Conversion (gives 20 extra SP per kill) to give your underlevelled units a chance to catch up.
Bond Rings
While the Bond Rings are relatively minor boosts compared to the Emblem Rings, there are several that stand out.
- Olwen S grants the Dire Thunder passive, which allows the Thunder tome to strike twice when attacking. Normally, Thunder can strike up to 3 spaces away, but cannot make a follow-up attack to balance it out, so this ring turns the tome into a shockingly deadly Brave weapon that can snipe enemies from afar. Add some forges and you're good to go!
- Claude S (not to be confused with the Three Houses Bracelet above) grants the Wind God passive, giving all bows an additional +1 range if the user is at full HP. This means all bows now have the 3 range of a Longbow without the dangers of stat drops from insufficient Bld, and the Longbow itself now has 4 range. It gets even better if you have a Warrior, as they are the only Backup unit that can use bows, and the range increase still applies to their Chain Attacks; strap Claude S, a Longbow, and the Dual Assist skill onto one for a fun time.
- Ryoma S has the Bushido passive that gives the wearer Crit +10, +2 outgoing damage, and -2 incoming damage during combat if their level is above the enemy's. This seems Awesome, but Impractical since enemies will eventually be at the level cap of 20, making it impossible to use... or is it? The Thief, Dancer, and Fell Child classes instead cap at level 40, so unless the enemy is another Thief, Bushido will always be active on these three. Thieves in particular love this ring since they tend to need Crits to deal with the beefier enemies and that +2 outgoing damage ensures that your foe is poisoned.
Mechanics
- Smithing in older games was aimed to boost the strength of weapons without needing rare ones, but because of durability, they would most likely just break anyway, possibly before even being able to get it repaired, and was viewed as not worth it. Here, weapons don't run the risk of breaking. Fully upgrading a weapon is expensive, but more than pays for itself. With the exception of staves, any weapon can be upgraded, including the unique legendary weapons in the late game. When combined with the new smithing mechanic to engrave weapons with emblem symbols, even common weapons become able to outpace some of the strongest, to say nothing of taking already powerful weapons and buffing them through the roof (You improved a killer weapon? Enjoy having a consistent 50% or superior critical attack probability!). Engraving also only costs a thousand bond fragments each, which is not especially hard to gather and while they can only be used on one weapon at a time, between all twelve emblems, that's almost enough for your entire party on any given map to wreak havoc without the risk of ever wearing them out.
- The simple Arena is more helpful than you may expect. Besides limited Level Grinding, there is Emblem Bond Level training. No matter if you win or lose your fight against the Emblem you're reaching the Level you paid with Bond Fragments and Bond Events are automatically viewed making this a massive time-saver. With the recent update that allows you to learn Emblem skills at the Arena, it became more convenient on even more time-saving.
- The Ancient Well is busted by having it being the way to obtain books. Books are useable items that allow the character that uses them to gain SP without combat in increments of 100, 500, or 1000. Some luck is needed if you sacrifice enough items that increase the rank to 5 stars but if successful you can gain 1700 SP worth of Books after every battle.
