Sandbox / Game Breaker Fire Emblem Heroes

"Ephraim and Hector possess incredible strength. Maintain the use of Armor March and take care of all foes."

— Tactics Drills: Skill Study 23, giving players a taste of powerful Armored units

Given the large roster of characters, there are some that are bound to stand above the rest. In general, a Game-Breaker unit can usually take on many foes with ease, being so damn good at their job that they even impact the meta. These units are a great boon in the player's hands, and a threat to watch out for in the opponent's hands.

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Red Units

Melee Units

• Marth, the Hero-King, The Dragonslayer and face of Fire Emblem, fittingly has two versions that let him be a shining star on the battlefield. Brave and Legendary versions share Shining Emblem, which boosts his damage by 35% of his Spd when it activates, and it grants him +6 to all stats at the start of the turn if he's near an ally, which then get shared with every ally on the map upon activation. Both Marths also have effects that take full advantage of these buffs, and both make particularly great use of the Bonus Doubler Seal to get a free +6 to all stats, and both Marths basically become a giant statball. Aside from that, they differ quite a bit, but are both very powerful:
  • Brave Marth wields Genesis Falchion, which has -1 Special, letting him activate Shining Emblem very quickly, and when it's refined, it grants him +10 to all stats, 40% Damage Reduction on the foe's first attacks, and a further boost to his stats equal to the highest bonus on each stat between him and his nearby allies, effectively a built in Bonus Doubler that also works with nearby allies should his own buffs ever get neutralized. His weapon also provides him more combat effects depending on the total value of the buffs his allies have. If the total buffs are ≥ 10, then he gets Null Follow-Up and Guard nulling effect of Tempo, ensuring that he'll always be able to activate Shining Emblem. If they're ≥ 25, then he gets another +5 Atk during combat and he heals for 7 HP per hit, and if they're ≥ 60, then he gets Vantage, which gives him a more fearsome enemy phase. Shining Emblem provides the means to activate all these effects, allowing Marth to both support the team with his buffs and also take full advantage of said buffs. As one of the winners of CYL, he's a free unit for any summoner to pick, and often appears on lucrative banners around anniversaries.
  • Legendary Marth has Exalted Falchion, which grants him +8 to all stats when refined, and he can get a ridiculous amount of stats from it thanks to the other effects. Its base effect is still Bonus Doubler, granting an in combat buff equal to the field buffs that Marth has, so that's a free +6 to all stats with Shining Emblem. Its skill refine however, is the Unity effect, which grants an in combat buff equal to twice any debuffs that Marth has, so if he has a -5 Atk debuff, he gets +10 Atk during combat to counteract the debuff and give him 5 more Atk. What this essentially means is that Marth is no longer stopped by Panic, and simply gets even stronger because of it. With all of this, and the Bonus Doubler Seal, Marth can quickly snowball and become a gigantic ball of stats, only being stopped by effects that remove or ignore his buffs entirely like with the [Dull] effect. But wait, there's more: This Marth also comes with a unique B skill in Binding Shield II, which, in addition to its base effect of working on Dragon foes, now works on any opponent if Marth is faster than them by 5 Spd. This turns Marth into a player phase menace, because now he gets to deny counter attacks, follow up attacks, and get his own follow up attack against anyone, acting as a sort of pseudo Null Follow-Up combined with Windsweep and Watersweep.
• Seliph has two very powerful cavalry versions who share an innate Miracle effect, where he can live any fatal blow as long as he's either above 25% HP and either he or his opponent has moved at least one space (for his Brave version), or his foe initiates combat, he's within 3 spaces of an ally, and he's above 50% HP (for his Legendary version). The two play very differently, with Brave Seliph being more of a player phase powerhouse, while Legendary Seliph stands his ground on the enemy phase, but both of them can perform well on the opposite phase too.
  • Brave Seliph follows in his father's footsteps as a Sword Cavalier with incredible Mov and effects that take full advantage of it. He wields Holytide Tyrfing, which has -1 maximum special cooldown, [Canto (2)], and he gets +5 to all stats if either he or his opponent moved before combat. He also deals damage based on the foe's Def that increases the further either of them moved, improving his damage output greatly, and if he's above 25% HP, he gets Miracle, letting him survive even the strongest of attacks. He introduces a new A skill in Atk/Spd Clash, which grants more Atk and Spd under that same movement condition, and if either Seliph or his foe moved at least two spaces, he neutralizes any Atk and Spd penalties he has on him. To really charge ahead on the battlefield, he has his unique C skill in Heir to Light, which grants +6 Atk/Spd, +1 Mov, and [Null Follow-Up]. He'll be able to get past follow-up denial, and if he moves far enough thanks to the extra Mov, he doesn't have to worry about losing his Atk and Spd buffs either. With Canto 2, he can then return back to safety without much of a problem, and with Heavy Blade, he can Galeforce really well too. While this all makes him player phase focused, the movement effects can still depend on the foe moving too, so he can also let them come to him if needed, so he can be built for the enemy phase as well. His Miracle effect is also pretty unique, as being able to survive at 1 HP lets him be a perfect Wings of Mercy beacon for his allies to jump in and continue the attack, or he can use Escape Route to really get out of danger. With Canto and Null Follow-Up being taken care of through his weapon and C skill, his B skill is truly free for such skills. Other skills he can use include Desperation for consecutive attacks, or he can use Mystic Boost alongside the Seal to restore 12 HP after combat, which can let him try to loop an infinite Miracle build. As one of the winners of Choose Your Legends, he is a free pick for any player.
  • Legendary Seliph went from zero to hero when he received his refine and remix in August 2023. His reworked Virtuous Tyrfing and new Holy War's End II lets Seliph inflict up to -16 Atk/Def on the foe, lets him deal true damage equal to 15% of his Atk, allows him to disable effects that would deny his counterattacks like Dazzling Staff, gives him 8 HP healing per each of his attacks, gives him 80% Damage Reduction against mages and staffs, 40% DR against everything else, gives him the Miracle effect as mentioned, and Seliph can also perform a follow-up attack, deny the opponent's follow-up attack, and if the foe initiates combat, Seliph can strike twice. This means that he can potentially quadruple strike opponents on the enemy phase, healing his HP back up all the while, and since his counterattack can't be denied, watch out. He was once considered the worst Earth Legendary, but received everything he needed to succeed, with a bunch of effects cavalry usually don't easily or even have access to at all, and actually has become quite a threat.
• Brave Robin is a great unit for any summoner's strategies, thanks to his weapon and unique C skill. He wields Deliverer's Brand, which grants +5 to all stats, grants 40% Damage Reduction against the foe's first attack, provides full Tempo (nullifying Guard and bypassing the opponent's Special accel), and if his Special has a cooldown count of 3 or more, he can pierce through opposing DR when his Special activates. If said Special is either Bonfire or Ignis, then it also deals adaptive damage, hitting the lower of Def or Res, letting him tear through any lopsided tank. Surprisingly, he doesn't have a -1 Special weapon despite basically every other unit having that built in, but Robin is a bit unusual in that he actually wants longer cooldown Specials for the purpose of his weapon (and comes with Ignis for this reason), and he can also make up with it with his B and C skill. Robin introduces Gambit, which grants more true damage and even more DR if the unit has a longer cooldown count on their Special, disincentivizing faster Specials like Vital Astra. With Ignis, he gets 10 true damage and an extra 40% DR for more damage and survivability. He can really Tip the Scales with his unique C skill, which grants [Rally Spectrum] to himself and nearby allies, lets him warp to a space adjacent to any ally with [Rally Spectrum], and it grants him another +3 to all stats during combat. Rally Spectrum grants another +5 to all stats to the unit during combat, provides a Special charge in the middle of combat (-1 if the unit has a -1 Special weapon or can strike twice, -2 otherwise), similarly to Brave Tiki or Young Duo Ike's respective weapons, which can help units get past Guard, and can quickly charge a devastating Special, like Robin's own Ignis. Robin combines great combat capabilities, has good mobility, great support, and can manipulate Special charges like no other. He just has no Null Follow-Up by default, and has to watch out for Scowl effects that can decharge a Special during combat. Like any Brave unit, he available for free for any summoner should they choose him.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Yuri follows his regular self's gimmick of being one of the best Hit-and-Run Tactics units. Alongside his regular self's Foul Play, his Abyssal Blade grants him -1 maximum special cooldown, the standard [Dagger 7] effect, and grants him +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat, ignores skills that deny any of his follow-up attacks, deals damage equal to 20% of his Spd, and reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 30%, all which activates if he either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and his Fetters of Dromi grants him [Canto (2)], +1 movement at the start of his turn, removes that +1 movement if he is inflicted with [Stall], and inflicts -4 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to all foes within 2 spaces of him during combat. This makes him a mobile unit that can hit-and-run while being soft immune to [Stall], one of the banes of Regular Yuri, while also being a hard hitter, especially if he is near a Tome ally with his Atk/Spd Hexblade to deal adaptive damage.
• Legendary Hinoka bring a lot on the table for herself and her allies, especially if they're Flying. She has a Glass Cannon statline of 40 HP, 46 Atk/Spd, 23 Def and 22 Res, with Fujin-Raijin Yumi granting -1 maximum special cooldown, [Canto (1)], is effective against Flying and Armored units, and grants her +6 Atk/Spd during combat, deals true damage equal to 20% of her Spd with her attacks and AOE specials, ignores skills that deny any of her follow-up attacks, and if she's either faster than her foe or have weapons triangle advantage over her foe she prevent their counterattacks, all which activates if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, and her Rallying Cry grants herself and all allies within 2 spaces of her [Pledge], and gives herself and all Flying within 2 spaces of her allies [Charge], and she inflicts -5 Atk/Def/Res to all Infantry, Cavalry and Armored foes within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on her. She is a great combat unit that can snipe any foes without any fear of counterattacks outside of a few exceptions, further bolstered with her Deadeye, Atk/Spd Catch 4 and Wings of Mercy 4, as well as provide great support to her allies and mobility to Flying allies.

Blue Units

Melee Units

• Brave Chrom. The brave exalt rides atop a trusty steed and wields a lance, always ready to change fate in his favour. His weapon Geirdriful has -1 Special, grants a stat boost for each [Bonus] and [Penalty] he has active on him, he gets 40% Damage Reduction from the foe's first attack, and he gets Special accel for both his and his foe's attacks during combat. [Bonus] in this case refers to any positive status effects and not stat buffs, while [Penalty] is the same but for negative statuses and not debuffs. To acquire said [Bonus] and [Penalty], he has his unique skill in A Fate Changed!, which acts as Reposition while granting Chrom an Extra Turn, much like Duo and Legendary Chrom. After use, Chrom acquires any [Bonus] that was on the targeted ally, while also inflicting [Isolation] on himself just to prevent him from abusing this Assist too much. However, since that is a [Penalty], that does activate his weapon. The fun part is that he gets to acquire status effects that cavaliers normally cannot, and he comes with Inf. Spd Tactic for one such effect, as that grants [Null Follow-Up] to any Infantry allies near him as long as they meet the Tactics condition (i.e. no more than 2 of the same Mov type on the team). This means he can support Infantry allies by giving them Null Follow-Up, perfect for speedier units, and he can then get it himself. Another example would be Brave Seliph, another powerful Cavalier that he was introduced alongside. Seliph gets +6 Atk/Spd, [Null Follow-Up] and +1 Mov himself, so Chrom can just take that and the two Cavaliers can go to town, while also helping Seliph get closer to the action. The more [Bonus] and [Penalty] Chrom acquires, the higher his stats can go, and the more status effects that get introduced into the game, the more Chrom can acquire. From Legendary Claude's Fallen Star for even more Damage Reduction, to Scion Leif's Desperation for consecutive attacks, to quote Chrom himself, anything can indeed change. He also comes with Surge Sparrow for more Atk and Spd, while also keeping him topped off, and S/D Near Trace 3 to let him use Canto (with potentially more Mov to work with) to move around better. With the Special accel in his weapon, he can also Galeforce very well. As one of the winners of Choose Your Legends, he is a free pick for any player.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Female Shez. She's a Blue Dagger Infantry that performs best when she initiates combat, and comes with the powerful Asura Blades and the especially strong Swift Slice. Asura Blades has 8 Mt, the standard [Dagger 7] effect, grants +5 Spd, allows Shez to attack twice regardless of phase, lets her ignore any stat penalties she has during combat, and if she is faster than her foe during combat she gets +1 special charges per attack. Her unique skill Swift Slice grants her +8 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat if she initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and she deals effective damage against all weapon types if she initiates combat and she either has 20 or more Spd than her foe if the foe is a non-Dragon or Beast Infantry unit, or otherwise has 5 or more Spd than her foe if they're a Cavalry, Armored, Flying, or Infantry Dragon or Beast unit. Coupled with her default Seal Spd 4 to inflict up to -11 Spd on the foe and Atk/Spd Oath 4 to grant her up to +9 Spd on top of high mobility, and you have someone who excels at the player phase as she will be dealing effective damage against a large majority of the playable roster with an easy Spd check with her base 44 Spd, even before equipping the Phantom Spd Sacred Seal, with only the personals weapons of Sothis and her variants and Garon and his Breath of Blight only being able to neutralize Swift Slice's effective damage. And this is all before Elite Tweak kicks in; she can also inherit the Tempo skills to consistently trigger her specials, Spd Preempt 3 to be a strong Vantage option, the powerful Special Spiral 4 to give her a bit of true damage and Damage Reduction-negation whenever she triggers her special as well as start the next fight with a fully charged special, or even Lethality and Special Spiral 3 or 4 with some team synergy to ensure guaranteed KOs against many units, even if she does not initiate combat.
• Brave Gullveig is a Blue Tome Flier who can perform excellent hit and run strategies thanks to her weapon and B skill. She wields the Cycle's Turn, which has -1 Special, grants +5 to all stats, extra Atk and Spd the longer the match has gone on, lets her deal damage equal to 20% of her Spd, has full Null Follow-Up built in, and has Canto (1) built in, letting her move one space after attacking. Her B skill Gold Unwinding inflicts -5 Spd/Res on the foe, and if she initiates combat, she gets 60% Damage Reduction, and she's granted an Extra Turn to move again afterwards. Fixed Canto on ranged fliers are already rare, let alone an Extra Turn, but Gullveig can do both, albeit at the cost of being inflicted with Gravity after use, and she can't get her Extra Turn again until an extra 2 turns have passed. Still, there are ways around the low mobility issue, through her own Atk/Spd Oath 4 to let her warp away if an ally is close enough, or by having the [Charge] status granted by Legendary Hinoka or other sources. Gullveig also introduces Flared Sparrow, which grants +7 Atk/Spd, and applies the [Divine Vein (Flame)] terrain status in a line centered on her target. The flaming terrain inflicts 7 damage to the foe at the start of their phase, and at the start of combat, while also costing ranged units extra Mov to try and pass through. All of this combines to let Gullveig fly up to the opposing team, destroy an opponent, set the ground on fire, and get an Extra Turn to run away or to attack again, deterring ranged opponents from chasing her, although it doesn't affect melee units. Like any other CYL unit, Gullveig is a free pick for any summoner.

Green Units

Melee Units

• Edelgard, the peerless emperor of Adrestia, has two versions that are both Mighty Glacier Axe Armour units that are one woman armies, prevailing over their foes with their capabilities. Both have very similar stats, with basically no Spd but very high stats everywhere else, especially in Atk and Def. They play pretty differently however, so the differences are outlined below:
  • Legendary Edelgard prevails over her foes by working alone, as her entire skillset revolves around her having no one near her. Her Aymr inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe while also denying the foe's follow-up, Atk/Res Solo boosts her Atk and Res, and Armoured Stride gives her +1 Mov, letting her move around better and actually punish any foes she needs to. She can do this with her unique B skill Raging Storm, which grants her an extra turn after initiating combat while alone, and she gets a follow-up attack against Dragon or Beast foes, letting her smite them handily. It stacks with the actual Galeforce, letting her potentially move up to three times in a single turn, so that she can either ravage multiple foes, smash a single foe multiple times, or simply use the extra turn to retreat and get back to position. Her refine and remix added more effects, while also having more lenient conditions so that she doesn't have to be completely allergic to working with others. Her refined Aymr adds an enemy phase condition, while also letting her deal damage equal to 15% of her Atk, has 30% Damage Reduction, inflicts -5 Atk/Def on her foe, and grants her Special accel per her attacks (which can help her charge Bonfire or Galeforce). Meanwhile Raging Storm II has an added, very lenient 25% HP threshold condition, lets her perform a follow-up attack, inflicts another -5 Atk/Def on her foe (to a total of -16 Atk/Def), and if her foe is a Dragon or Beast, she can bypass any affects that deny her own follow-up attack. The extra conditions make it so that she can still perform the typical Save tank role of any armour if need be, but either way, these extra effects can really help lead you to victory with her Extra Turn, Omnibreaker effect, extra damage, Damage Reduction, huge Atk/Def swing, and Special accel.
  • Brave Edelgard is far easier to use, and unlike her Legendary version (until she got her refine and remix), this Edelgard simply needs to be healthy enough for all of her effects. As long as Edelgard is above 25% HP, her Flower Hauteclere, which has -1 Special, will grant +1 Mov, the Orders status ^note Unit can move to a space adjacent to any ally within two spaces, inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe, and her unique B skill, Black Eagle Rule, grants her a follow-up attack on either phase, while also mitigating damage taken from any follow-up attack on the enemy phase by 80%. You can very easily forget that this Edelgard is still an Armoured unit, thanks to the fact that she can move like an Infantry unit and warp around like a Flier, letting her stay near her allies way more easily, acting as both their sword and shield. Flower Hauteclere also got a refine that inflicts a further -6 Atk/Def on the foe, grants Edelgard extra Atk/Def/Res depending on how far she or her foe moved before combat, inflicting Guard if either one moved at least one space, and she also heals herself for 7 HP per hit, giving her even more survivability. All of this makes her into a fantastic tank, and can be equipped with either Save skill to help protect her allies too. However, her capabilities also lend well to Galeforce, thanks to her unusually great mobility for an Armour, her weapon's -1 Special, and she can either use Heavy Blade along with Black Eagle Rule as a substitute for Bold Fighter, or she can just use Bold Fighter itself. While she needs to watch out for Armour effectiveness and Null Follow-Up, Edelgard can truly do it all. She can tank, has damage reduction, can Galeforce well, and with her improved mobility, she avoids the biggest shortcomings that Armours have to face. As one of the winners of Choose Your Legends, she was also available as a free pick before September of 2022 when the "A New Future" free summon event ended, and has been accessible on some Hero Fest banners.
• Young Hector is one of the best Far Save units thanks to his kit, with Valiant War Axe grants him -1 maximum special cooldown, and inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe during combat, -1 special buildup per attack on the foe during combat, reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 30%, and if he within 3 spaces of an ally he inflicts -12 Atk, reduced by 2 for each maximum special cooldown value the foe has, down to a minimum of -4 Atk, all which actives if he is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, and Ostia's Heart gives him Distant Counter, and inflicts -8 Atk/Def on the foe during combat and restores 7 HP to him per attack he performs if the foe either initiates combat or is at 75% HP or above at the start of combat. Combined with his Vengeful Fighter 4, A/R Far Save 3 and Armored Beacon he is a rather difficult unit to take down while also hitting hard and protecting his allies from ranged attacks.
• Legendary Female Alear, an Infantry Green Dragon, is one of the best Infantry units in the game thanks to a lot of factors. She brings a Lightning Bruiser statline of 40 HP, 41 Atk, 47 Spd, 33 Def and 37 Res, as well as bringing Dragon's Fist, which is a 11 might weapon that gives her -1 maximum special cooldown, a dual phase brave effect, the standard post 2.0.0 Breath effect of dealing adaptive damage against ranged units, and gives her +5 to all stats during combat, inflicts -4 to all the foe's stats during combat, inflicts a further -3 to all the foe's stats during combat for each ally from distint Fire Emblem titles within 3 spaces of her, up to -6 to all the foe's stats, totaling up to -10 to all the foe's stats during combat, and 40% damage reduction from the foe's first attacks, including ones from brave effects, and non-Røkkr AOE specials, all which activates if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, and Dragon Blast, which is a 3 cooldown special (2 thanks to Dragon's Fist) that boosts her damage by 50% of her Spd during combat when it triggers, and if she has a support partner, gives herself and that support partner DR-piercing whenever they trigger their offensive special during combat, and reduces damage taken from the foe's next attack by 40% if she is within 3 spaces of her support partner and either her or her's foe special is ready at the start of combat or was triggered during the current combat. She also brings Atk/Spd Finish 4, Null C-Disrupt 4 and Atk/Spd Pledge to further bolster her stats and durability and consistently trigger her Dragon Blast, while also giving DR-piecing to one ally that could not normally have it, such as Flying mages and Staff units. The only thing she's really missing is a way to give her Distant Counter, but because she's a Dragon unit, she can equip the Dist. Counter (D) Sacred Seal to complete her set and be a real menace to anyone who dares goes against her, as long as she has a support partner.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Male Robin. The grandmaster strategist has quite a few masterful tactics to turn the tides of battle, as he's able to grant the [Grand Strategy] status ^note Grants an in-combat buff equal to double whatever penalty the unit's got, like the Unity skills to himself and his allies, while also debuffing them (-4 to all stats for Robin himself, -6 to the two highest stats for his allies) to take advantage of the status. It's unusual to want to be debuffed, but it means you're basically safe from and get stronger from any further debuffs you face, as long as you avoid opposing [Ploy] effects. Robin himself can put up a fight, as he's got huge stat swings on his side, can both guarantee a follow-up attack and deny his opponent's follow-up attack, he can inflict a -3 all stat debuff to every foe, he inflicts up -13 Atk/Spd/Res on the foe during combat, and he gets both the [Grand Strategy] and Unity effect, the former from his weapon, the latter from his A skill. His self-inflicted -4 to all stats effectively becomes +16 to all stats in combat for himself. His seemingly average statline now becomes a big ball of stats, and he comes with Seal Atk 4 for both Guard and an even further Atk swing, and Canto Control to put a stop to opposing mounted units trying to hit and run. He's so good that he even finds use in Aether Raids off-season because of the prevalence of debuffs, and is so flexible that he can either be support, or he can be a combatant, and can do either role quite well.
• Wind Claude is a Green Dagger Flier that has a great chance to fire off consecutive Lethalities, which not many units can survive, while he can surive non-DR-piercing attacks himself. He brings a Glass Cannon statline of 42 HP, 44 Atk, 47 Spd, 24 Def and 26 Res, with him bringing Playful Pinwheel, which grants him -1 maximum special cooldown, the standard [Dagger 7] effect, grant him [Null Follow-Up] and [Null Panic] at the start of his turn as long as he is at 25% HP or above, and grants him +5 to all stats during combat, additional +2 Atk/Spd during foe each [Bonus] effect active on him and [Penalty] effect active on the foe, not counting stat buffs and debuffs, and grants himself -X special cooldown before his first attack, where X equal the amount of [Bonus] effects he has on him, and -Y cooldown before his first follow-up attack, where Y equal the amount of [Bonus] effects he has on him minus the special cooldown he has at the start of combat, all which activate if he is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat. That means that if he has at least 3 [Bonus] effects active on him, he instantly charges Lethality on his first attack, which is also helped with his default Atk/Spd Oath 4, and lets him bypass skills that inflicts +1 special cooldown on him before his first attack like the Scowl skills, but insane part is if he has Lethality already charged at the start of combat, where his follow-up attack will instantly charge Lethality as well, and the really insane part is that if he can somehow has that and get a brave effect as well, which is accomplished by either the [Triangle Attack] status effect from Bridal Harmonized Catria & Thea, or the [Dual Strike] status effect from Winter Harmonized Cordelia & Fates Selena or Heiðr, and combined that with Hardy Bearing 3 as the Sacred Seal to prevent Vantage triggering on the foe and you got one nuker that's going to delete one unit with no effort, as long as you got the setup. Helping him is his Deep Star B skill, where it gives him [Canto (1)], inflicts -5 Spd/Def on the foe during combat and 80% damage reduction from the foe's first attacks, including both attacks from a brave effect, if he initiates combat, or 30% otherwise, if he either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and grants himself the [Deep Star]^note during the first combat the user participates in each enemy phase, grants 80% damage reduction from the foe's first attacks, including both attacks from a brave effect status effect and inflicts [Gravity] to the target and foes adjacent to that target after combat if he initiates combat, making him also difficult to take down if positioned correctly. Finally, he has Atk/Spd Prime 4 to bolster his highest stats further and gives him Close Counter if he has 4 [Bonus] effects active on him, where he meet easily with his equipped skills after one combat, turning him into a menace for the enemy.

Colourless Units

Melee Units

• Fallen Edelgard is an absolute literal monster of a unit. This Edelgard is also Armored, but is a Colorless Beast, assuming her Final Boss form from the Azure Moon path. Her weapon, Twin-Crest Power, has -1 maximum special cooldown, and if she's at 25% HP or above, she inflicts -6 Atk/Def on her foe, denies her foe's follow up attack (as well as her own, like Wary Fighter), and if she initiates combat after transforming, she gets an Extra Turn like Legendary Edelgard's Raging Storm. Since she's an Armoured Beast, she also gets Distant Counter (and +2 Atk) when transformed. She also comes with a unique B skill in Armoured Wall, which is Special Fighter, granting her an extra Special charge during combat while denying her foe's Special charge, but at a 25% HP threshold, and after combat, she heals for 7 HP, and under that same threshold, if she's transformed, she gets 40% Damage Reduction from the foe's first attack during the first combat on either phase. Her Special is Bonfire, working well off of her huge 44 Def, and she also has Atk/Def Ideal 4, which grants her extra Atk and Def if she's either at full health or has a bonus, or more if she has both, and Armoured Stride to help her move further when she's alone. Thanks to the Extra Turn from her weapon, she can function as a Galeforce machine like her Legendary version, but with a -1 Special weapon and Armoured Wall, her Special charges line up much more easily. Her base stats are your typical Mighty Glacier, with 45 HP, 42 Atk, 14 Spd, 44 Def, and 39 Res, and when you factor in every effect, you're dealing with a truly demonic beast that can effectively sport up to 75 Atk, 59 Def, 45 Res, with follow up denial, Special denial, and Damage Reduction. Try to engage her and face her Distant Counter, and try to stand your ground and she just gets an Extra Turn against you to attack again, either way, she can crush almost anything that comes her way, and heal off any attempts at taking her down. The only real thing she has to worry about is that some of her effects rely on her being transformed, which does mean you have to take that into account when building a team, and Null Follow-Up will also be a problem, although her opponents still have to pierce through all those other defensive effects. Since her release, there has been a rise in units with ways to counter her, like Brave Eirika and Legendary Male Byleth.
• Askr, as another Mighty Glacier Colorless Infantry Beast with 40 HP, 43 Atk/Def, 26 Spd and 31 Res, is another Light Mythic Hero, while not given for free, is one that is worth his while for players that summon him. His weapon Illuminating Horn gives him -1 maximum special cooldown, and if he either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, he gets +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat, a guaranteed follow-up attack, deals extra true damage equal to 20% of his Def during combat and reduces damage taken from foe's attacks equal to 20% of his Def during combat, and the post 6.0.0 Infantry Beast effects. One note is that Damage Reduction effect is immune to "reduce damage by X%", so skills like Deadeye and Lethality's extra effect will not work on him. That weapon alone makes him a great combat unit, which, alongside Atk/Def Ideal 4, Atk/Def Bulwark 3 and Bonfire, synergizes with his Mighty Glacier statline. Finally, he is also a great support unit with his Secret Art Opened Domain, which if he is within 2 spaces of an ally from a different Fire Emblem game than him (a pretty easy requirement), he grants himself and all allies, including those from Heroes the [Resonance: Blades]^note +4 Atk/Spd during combat and [Resonance: Shields]^note +4 Def/Res during combat and prevents the foe's follow-up attacks during the first combat of each player and enemy phase status effects, as well as grant -1 special cooldown to those who are at maximum special cooldown at the start of his turn. That skill makes him a walking universal buffer and Time's Pulse.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Alm. The king of Valentia can crush any foe he comes across ever since he got his remix and refine, boasting some very powerful defense piercing capabilities. He wields Luna Arc, which grants +5 Atk/Spd and deals damage equal to 25% of the foe's Def, and when refined, it grants another +5 Atk/Spd, lets him ignore Guard, and he essentially gets Windsweep, letting him deny the counterattacks from physical units if he's fast enough. He also has a unique Special in Lunar Flash II, which boosts Alm's damage by 20% of his Spd, while also piercing through 20% of the foe's Def, and it also disables any non-Special Damage Reduction effects, which basically gives him his own version of Deadeye. With Null Follow-Up and Time's Pulse in his base kit, as well as the Guard nulling Tempo effect from his weapon, he'll be able to fire off Lunar Flash pretty easily, and he can bust through even the sturdiest of walls and tanks.
• Legendary Leif. His second appearance in the game, now playing at being a Master Knight, Leif rejoins the fight as a Bow Cavalier with a nasty bag of tricks. His weapon is Meisterbogen, a dual-phase Brave Bow and a very high base Atk of 38 to take advantage of it (and his superasset is in Atk too). But what really makes him mean is his Special, Njörun's Zeal, which is a 3-CD Galeforce with the stipulation that it self-inflicts the Gravity debuff after activating. This gives him a unique role as the only ranged unit in the game - with Cavalry movement no less - that has access to Galeforce, and the self-Gravity can be removed by an allied healer with Restore. Compounding on this is the S-Drink, Leif's unique B Skill that heals him to full HP and (more importantly) gives him a Special charge on Turn 1, so it's possible for him to activate Njörun's Zeal right away. With Atk/Res Push 4 and Def Smoke also in his base kit, Leif hits as much as 58 Atk out of the box with a superasset and can capitalize on a Def-7 debuff with Njörun's Zeal, which with allied buffs is more than enough to obliterate all but the hardiest supertanks from the word "Go".
• Brave Claude, with his Wind Parthia after it got refined. It grants him +5 to all stats, and he restores 50% of his max HP when his Special activates, letting him stay topped off to continue the fight. Before his refine, Fatal Smoke thrashed this effect, but now, he's able to mitigate 60% of Fatal Smoke's effect, meaning one way or another, Claude will be getting his healing off. His skill refine further improves this, as he gets another +5 to all stats, and the offense based parts of Null Follow-Up and Tempo, letting him get past follow-up denial and Guard. For good measure, he also gets 30% Damage Reduction if he has a [Bonus] active on him, which will also let him survive even better. Claude is versatile enough to go for pure offense, and he can put Windsweep and Watersweep to good use and still be able to double for safe engagements, but he can also tank pretty well too thanks to his self sustain. Like his Legendary version, he can also put Close Counter and Smoke 4 skills to great use, with Spd Smoke 4 basically letting him emulate Fallen Star to an extent, while also fulfilling the [Bonus] condition thanks to its Spd buff, and Atk Smoke 4 can instead doubles down on tanking and gives him a pseudo Null Follow-Up by letting him deny his foe's follow-up attacks while he's still able to get past any follow-up denial. Like the other Brave units, Claude was a free pick for any player before September of 2022, when the "A New Future" free summon event ended, and is accessible on banners that pop up around anniversaries or Hero Fests.
• Brave Marianne got a new lease on life after her Phantasm Tome got refined. It now has -1 Special, still inflicts -6 Spd/Res and neutralizes any Spd and Res buffs on the opponent, but now, she gets 80% Damage Reduction on the player phase, and 30% DR on the enemy phase, letting her survive better while also not being entirely helpless on the enemy phase. When given its skill refine, she gets +5 to all stats, lets her deal damage = 20% of her Spd, lets her null Guard, and pierces through half of any non-Special DR effects like Spurn or Dragon Wall. She has everything she needs to be a potent mage nuke, whose Special can't be deterred, which makes activating her Requiem Dance far easier, thanks to her Time's Pulse, or she could equip Flash Sparrow or Flashing Blade to help with that too. That way, she can act as a pseudo dancer that can also put up a fight, albeit at the cost of reducing her Mov to 1 after combat. Alternatively, she can forgo Requiem Dance and just play more conventionally with Specials like Luna or Flare and still be quite a combatant. As with any other CYL unit, Marianne was available as a free pick for any summoner, and shows up on banners around anniversaries.

Duo and Harmonized Units

Introduced in Oct 2019, Duo Heroes are a special type of unit that feature two heroes, have a special once per map ability (which works in any mode) that can usually help a team immensely, and they are also treated as having a high base score for the purposes of Arena scoring, meaning they can just hop right into and help in those modes as well.

Harmonized Heroes on the other hand, also feature two heroes, but they hail from different games. While they don't have the high base score effect, they instead boost score in Resonant Battles, and they also have a once per map ability which affects any unit, including themselves, if they also originate from the same games in question. The range is global, allowing it to work from across the map.

Both types of units are incredible for support, and some are also formidable combatants.

Red Units

• Winter Altina and Sanaki. The founder of Begnion and her descendant are a Sword Infantry who can seemingly do it all. Altina has a very min maxed statline of 42 HP, 40 Atk, 18 Spd, 37 Def, and 39 Res, making her a Mighty Glacier. She dual wields both Ragnell and Alondite, granting her Distant Counter, and she can also strike twice consecutively on either phase, which gets past her low Spd. Her unique Special, shared with her Mythic version, is Twin Blades: a 2 charge Special that boosts damage by 40% of her Res, and it also cancels any non Special Damage Reduction skill, such as Close Call and the like. She has Null C-Disrupt to punish Firesweep and Dazzling Staff users, and Atk/Res Oath to further boost her Atk and Res. Her A skill is Atk/Res Unity, which grants +5 Atk and Res during combat if she's near an ally, and if she has any debuffs to those two stats, she gets an in combat boost equal to double the debuff, basically counteracting it. Debuff Altina at your peril, for a -7 Atk debuff means she gets +14 Atk during combat for a net gain of +7 Atk. With her Harmonized ability, Sanaki jumps in to grant the Begnion pair and any ally on the map who also hail from Tellius the Resonance: Blades effect, which grants +4 Atk and Spd, and for Altina herself, Vantage. While it's only for one turn, this means she can get the jump on pesky threats and just double strike them before they can even react, and with Null C-Disrupt, not even denying her counterattacks will work. As an Infantry unit, Altina can also wield all sorts of super Infantry skills like Fierce Breath or Time's Pulse to quickly charge Twin Blades, or Special Spiral so she can spam Twin Blades. The latter is especially notable as for one turn, she could Vantage her foes and spam Twin Blades at the same time to really menace her attackers. Her only real weakness is Hardy Bearing, which will put a stop to Vantage, but even then, she's still got pretty good defenses.
• Valentine Chrom and Male Robin. The leader of the Shepherds and his faithful Tactician, they're a Red Bow Infantry powerhouse with a Mighty Glacier statline with 40 HP/Def, 44 Atk, 27 Spd and 26 Res that also serves as a great support unit for Special-orientated units. Not only do they have Deadeye, but they have the skillkit to exploit it, as they have Close Salvo and Time's Pulse alongside Legendary Chrom's To Change Fate!, but their Destiny Bow is the binding that brings it all together. Destiny's Bow gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, effective against Armored and Flying units, gives them +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat and a guaranteed follow-up attack if they either initiate combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, but most importantly if they either use or are the target of a movement assist skills once per turn and it is turns 1 to 4, they give themselves and that ally -1 special cooldown. This means that not only will Time's Pulse charge Deadeye to 1 cooldown, but them using To Change Fate! will fully charge it as well as help their target ally closer or even fully charging their special as well, and the +6 Atk and Extra Turn to potentially One-Hit Kill all but the toughest tanks in their sights, and all of that is before any Elite Tweaks. Finally, their Duo Skill, while inflicting -5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to themselves and all allies within 2 spaces of them, is actually a Deliberate Injury Gambit as they also grants [Grand Strategy] to themselves and all those allies, where [Grand Strategy] basically reverses any field stat debuffs the user has, while also keeping those "debuffs" until the start of their next turn, meaning any additional field stat debuffs they get from their foes will actually makes them stronger.
• Summer Edelgard and Altina. The emperors of summer make up a Sword Armor Mighty Glacier with 46 HP, 45 Atk, 17 Spd, 43 Def and 39 Res, and the both of them bring their gimmicks together and then some, coming prepacked with Glimmer, Atk/Def Ideal 4, and Legendary Edelgard's Raging Storm, with their Assault Troop 3 and Regal Sunshade bringing it all together. Assault Troop grant them [Charge] at the start of their turn if either they're at full HP or there is a foe within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on them, where [Charge] allows them to move up to 3 spaces in cardinal directions, and said movement acts as a warp effect, which means that movement is not hindered by [Gravity] or [Stall], and Regal Sunshade gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, and if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, they gain +6 Atk, inflict -6 Atk on the foe during combat, reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 40%, and if there is a certain amount of foes or more compared to the total amount of current foes on the enemy team within 3 rows or 3 columns^note 1 if 2 or less foes, 2 if 3 to 5, 3 if 6 or more, they can attack twice in one round. That alone makes them insane, but things get better if they inherit Galeforce, as they will get 2 Extra Turns, and with additional dancer support, they have a good change to perform a Total Party Kill. Finally, their Harmonized skill grants them and all allies that share their Fire Emblem titles +6 Atk, [Resonance: Shields] and [Bonus Doubler], turning themselves and their allies into powerhouses.

Blue Units

• Summer Thórr and Loki. The gods of summer, they're a Blue Tome Flier with a Squishy Wizard statline of 40 HP, 43 Atk, 17 Spd, 30 Def and 38 Res, and they have the skills to exploit it. They have Blazing Thunder, Still Water 4, A/R Far Trace 3 and regular Thórr's Worldbreaker, and their Divine Whimsy brings it all together. Divine Whimsy grants them -1 maximum special cooldown, grants them +6 Atk and inflicts -6 Atk on the foe during combat if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, grants -1 special cooldown at the start of their turns if they're within 2 spaces of an ally, and inflicts [Stall] and [Exposure] to the foe with the lowest Spd and all foes within 2 spaces of that foe at the start of their turn, where [Exposure] has the one inflicted with it receive +10 damage per attack. Not only they're an AoE nuker that can charge it up on their next turn if they attacked, but they also a great support unit that will help allies charge their specials up and boost their attacks, especially those that can attack twice. Finally, their Duo skill not only inflict [Gravity] on foes in cardinal directions of them, but they will remove any [Bonus] the foe has active within 5 rows or 5 columns centered on them, which has a good chance to weaken enemies, especially those that rely on bonuses to activate their skills. Of course, one strong arrow shot can take them down with ease, so one should be careful of archers.
• Young Duo Mark & Lyn. They're a walking debuff bot that punishes enemies that group up, as their Total War Tome gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, inflicts -5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res, [Stall] and [Sabotage] to the nearest foes within 5 spaces of them and all foes within 2 spaces of those foes at the start of their turn, and if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat they inflict -5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res on the foe during combat, grants them a guaranteed follow-up attack and if there is a field stat debuff on any foe within 2 spaces of the target they ignore skills that inflict -X special buildup per attack on them. Alongside their Sabotage A/R 3 further debuffing the foe's Atk/Res, they inflict massive debuffs on the foe, even if said foe can ignore field stat debuffs during combat, as Sabotage A/R 3 and [Sabotage] also calculates field stat debuffs on foes within 2 spaces of that foe, meaning that not even Save units are safe from them. What's more is that their Duo Skill inflicts +2 special cooldown, [Isolation] and [Guard] on all foes within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on them when it activates, making them total menaces that depend on pre-charged specials and Assists with the right timing.

Green Units

• New Year's Peony and Triandra. The two álfars join together to serve pretty much the same role as regular Peony does: fly around, support, refresh, and grant the Warp status^note  In which the user can warp to a space adjacent to any ally within two spaces to any allies. This Peony is pretty much just a green, non Mythic version of herself, which means she isn't limited to just Light season. Her weapon, Bond of the Álfar, grants +6 Atk to any ally within a cardinal direction of her during combat. She keeps the same refresh ability as her Mythic self in Gentle Dream, and her Duo ability has Peony and Triandra both refresh an adjacent ally who has the highest HP, while also granting them the same effects as Gentle Dream. Notably, this will work on another refresher ally, which makes Peony and Triandra a refresher that can refresh a refresher^note  to highlight just how dumb this is, if you run 3 copies of Duo Peony plus one non-refresher unit, it is possible for the non-refresher unit to take a whopping 7 actions in a single turn (8 with Galeforce and 9 for Legendary Edelgard with Raging Storm and Galeforce) by dancing 3 times and using Duo skill 3 times. They could also just use it to refresh a regular ally twice, provided they can stay in range of the Duo ability. This ability will only affect one ally at a time however, and if multiple allies meet the condition, then it just will not work.
• Ninja Female Corrin and Elise take the 'A Hero Rises' winning formula and largely improve on it (Ninja Reinhardt anyone?). She has a 38/41/40/23/20 stat line (with her weapon 49 Atk, 44 Spd, 19 Def, 16 Res), which is par for a Glass Cannon ninja unit. On top of the usual (for ninja weapons) Brave effect and stat adjustments, her Ninja Scrolls will if she outspeed her enemy add 70% of the Spd difference (up to 7) true damage to her attacks. Her assist is Rally Up Def+, allowing her to buff clustered allies (not herself) Her Slot A is Atk/Spd push 4 (boosts her in-combat Atk/Spd by 7 as long as she has 25 perfect or higher HP but with a recoil). Her Slot B is S/R Far Trace 3 (Enemy's Spd/Res -3 in combat plus Canto), Slot C is Joint Drive Atk (+4 in-combat At to allies within two places and +4 in-combat Atk to unit if an ally is within two spaces). Her Duo skill is being able to act again after being in combat. While she doesn't have a special, giving her Moonbow shouldn't be difficult. In optimal conditions, she'll be able to have 63 final Atk and 54 final Spd. Being the winner of the 2022 A Hero Rises contest, she will be a freebie as well being able to spark her in the banner.
• Spring Harmonized Karla and Freyja. Their Sisterly War Axe gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, grants -2 special cooldown at the start of odd turns, and if they either initiate combat or are within 2 spaces of an ally, they get +6 Atk/Spd during combat, deals damage equal to 20% + 10% for each point of their maximum special cooldown when they trigger their special during combat, and when they trigger their special during combat they ignore non-Special damage reduction effects and disable the foe's specials that trigger when they attack. When their special is not ready their Harmonized Skill gives them and all allies that are from The Blazing Blade and Heroes -2 special cooldown, +6 Atk and [Resonance: Blades]. With all of that, they're a walking delete button as they can deal massive damage to one-shot many units.

Colourless Units

• Ninja Lyn and Florina. Lyn is a Colorless Dagger Flying who, like the other Ninjas, is all about striking twice and being fast. She has a very high 38 Atk (42 Atk if she's +Atk), and 42 Spd, and that's pretty much all she needs. Her weapon is the Tailwind Shuriken, which has -1 Special, strikes twice when initiating combat, and grants +4 Spd, but reduces her Def and Res by -4. With Swift Sparrow 3, Chill Atk/Def 2, Spd/Def Rein 3, and Moonbow, she'll hit quite hard. She's notably the first unit to have a -1 Special Brave weapon, letting a Special like Moonbow activate on the second hit. At base, with all those skills active, factoring in the debuffs, that's effectively 62 Atk striking twice. Unlike prior Duo Heroes, Lyn's Duo ability is selfish, but still very powerful: Florina jumps in to grant Lyn an extra turn to move, but only if Lyn has entered combat at least once that turn. A self refresh on command is an incredible effect, letting her either hit and run or continue her assault. In essence, it's like a pseudo Galeforce, which ranged units notably cannot really use. This ability can let Lyn perform "Lynjaforce" ^note  A set up that allows Lyn to ravage an opponent's Aether Raids defense team by safely engaging with Disarm Trap, striking twice with her weapon, and taking recoil damage from Fury, dealing splash damage with Savage Blow, and with enough recoil damage from repeated engagements thanks to other refreshers and her self-refresh, she becomes a Wings of Mercy beacon for Galeforce units to fly in and finish the job. . Since she's as strong as if not stronger than a good invested ranged unit with just her two strikes, she can wield other B skills like Windsweep so that she can be a pain to deal with in the AI's hands, Desperation to quadruple strike enemies in Player Versus Environment content, or a Flier mobility skill to help her move around better. As the victor of 2021's A Hero Rises event, she became free to every player for a brief period of time that year, making her accessible to many players.
• Scion Leif and Seliph. With Seliph in tow, he's similar to his legendary self, but with some tweaks. With a 40/40/41/27/20 statline, he is more clear about his player phase role as he has more speed but less bulk compared to his legendary self. He's blessible to boot. His Weapon, Bow of Twelve has 14 Mt, -1 Special, Canto (1), and it grants +5 to all stats if initiating or in combat with a tome or staff user while having 75% HP or more. It also has a Miracle effect (once per combat provided unit has more than 1 HP) under those same conditions. His special is Njörun's Zeal (same as his Legendary self, 2 Cooldown due to weapon). His A slot skill is Atk/Spd Catch 4 (+7 in-combat buff to both stats if the target is at full HP or has a field debuff of any kind. If both apply, then the bonus increases to +9). His B Slot is naturally S Drink (At Start of Map, recover 99 HP and reduce cooldown by 1). C Slot is Pulse smoke 3 (After combat, Target and all enemy units in 2 space radius get +1 to special cooldown up to the max of the special). His Harmonic Skill gives Resonance: Blades (Atk/Spd+4) and the desperation effect (Unit can make their follow-up attack before the enemy counters) to unit and others from the two series. This is a powerful effect given how units in both series are either fast and/or have the Brave effect. In optimal conditions, he can reach 63-67 Atk and 50 Spd. That combined with Canto and his special, he has considerable ability to move after attacking with healer support. And the Miracle effect helps ensures he can retreat after an attack gone wrong.
• New Year's Askr and Embla ring in the new year with support, power, and resilience. Askr is a colourless tome infantry that wields Duality Vessel, which grants +5 to all stats, inflicts Guard, grants a guaranteed follow-up attack, mitigates damage taken by 20% of his Def, and heavily mitigates damage taken from AoE Specials. He comes with Def/Res Finish 4 and Atk/Res Tempo for more bulk and a bit of healing, and he keeps his Opened Domain from his Mythic version. That way, he can provide his team wide Time's Pulse to both himself and any ally, as well as the Resonance Blades and Shields statuses for more power and sturdiness, and he can do it in any season. Or, even alongside himself to stack the effects. Askr's Duo skill has him and Embla buff up themselves and nearby allies for +6 to all stats, while also granting another Special charge alongside the buffs. Galeforces on other allies can be cut down from 4 -> 2, Specials like Askr's on Bonfire can be ready to go right away (which pairs well with Special Spiral 4, if given to him), and it really opens the gates to any strategy that relies on Special spamming.

Support Units

Some units aren't the strongest combatants but instead can provide immense support to the team, often providing great utility or buffs to other, more or equally powerful units.

Red Units

• Legendary and Young Eliwood. At first glance they seem like strong yet bog-standard Sword Cavaliers, but it's in their support skills that they start getting scary, granting +6 Atk/Spd/Def, [Bonus Doubler] and [Null Panic] the highest Atk allies and themselves at the start of their turns with the former's Ardent Durandal and Vision of Arcadia II and the latter's Inborn Idealism, with Legendary Eliwood also granting [Canto (1)]. If they need to enter the fray as well, they are no slouches either, with Legendary Eliwood having his refined Ardent Durandal gives him up to +8 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat, ignores any of the foe's field stat buffs during combat and deals extra damage equal to 15% of the foe's Def and, Death Blow 4 and Flow Refresh 3, and Young Eliwood's Fiery War Sword granting -1 max special cooldown, and granting him +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat and +3 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat for each [Bonus] active on him that is not field stat buffs, up to +17 total, ignore skills that deny any of his follow-up attacks and guarantee the foe's follow-up attacks and reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 40%. Both Eliwoods come with everything they need to turn the strongest ally on his team into a monster, or possibly multiple allies if they're tied for the highest Atk on the team, though you just have to steer clear of any effects that nullify your buffs or bonuses like through [Dull] or [Ploy].

Blue Units

• Legendary Azura. She is, bar none, one of the best refreshers in the entire game, due to her two incredible unique skills. The first is her weapon, Prayer Wheel, which takes her refresh target's highest stat buff and applies it to all of their stats ^note (i.e. if they receive/have Atk+6, they will gain Atk/Spd/Def/Res+6 upon being refreshed). The second is her unique refresh skill, Gray Waves, which if used on an Infantry or Flier ally gives them an extra space of movement (i.e. 2 spaces becomes 3 spaces). This double whammy can turn the right ally into an utter monster, such as -blade tomes or Galeforce rushers, especially since most debuffs they might suffer will have fallen off after being refreshed^* (the only exception is weapons or skills that inflict debuffs right after combat, like Daggers or the "Seal (stat)" skills). She also comes with Atk Tactic to emphasize this playstyle, though if the team composition doesn't allow for that, Hone/Fortify skills or Dance-based Sacred Seals work just as well. The latter of which is especially notable, since she could use say, Torrent Dance to grant +5 Res to an ally, which then becomes +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res all on command, which would get past the restrictions of the other buffing skills. Finally, since she's a Flier, she can use all sorts of skills that improve the mobility of either her or her allies. She even comes with one in Aerobatics, intended to be used with her Atk Tactic 3. Her remix in March 2022 doesn't dramatically boost her supportive abilities, but it does allow her to handle other things. Her weapon's refine gives all allies within 2 spaces of her with +6 Spd at the start of her turn (allowing her to self-sufficiently use her weapon's buffing effect and use her C slot for something else), +5 Atk/Spd during combat, and the Triangle Adept effect, which means her AI is less likely to attack green units^explanation Dance unit AI will only attack an enemy over dancing a nearby ally if they can do more than 5 damage and better win favorable match ups. She also receives Gray Waves II which adds [Null Panic] to the effect. She also gets Atk/Spd Push 4, which maybe be useful if you want more of an offensive use for her. Being in the remix pool, she is sparkable by all.
• Peony challenges Azura for title of best refresher, because while Azura's refresh immensely boosts a single unit, Peony's refresh can instead help out the entire team. Her weapon, Flower of Joy, grants +3 Atk/Spd during combat to any ally that's in a cardinal direction of her, meaning she can stay far, far from the action and still support and buff her allies. When she uses her unique refresh, Gentle Dream, she grants +3 to all stats to the refreshed ally, as well as the Warp status ^note Which allows the unit to move to a space adjacent to any ally within two spaces. However, she also grants this effect to any other ally that's in cardinal directions of both her and the refreshed ally. While this means positioning is even more important, it also means that in a single action, she could grant a stat and mobility boost to her entire team, and still be able to support her team from very far away. Aside from that, she's basically like Azura, right down to sharing her B Duel Flying skill so she'll score well in Arena modes, and Aerobatics to help her reach her more grounded allies better. The best part is, she's available to every player, being a free unit, given to the player at the start of Book IV.
• Rearmed Plumeria is another contender for one of the best refreshers, as she fills a similar role to Legendary Azura, but instead on working on only Infanty or Flying, Rearmed Plumeria offers her gimmick to all movement types. Her Cloying Dreams grants +5 to all stats, [Foe Penalty Doubler]^note inflicts Atk/Spd/Def/Res equal to the foe's field stat debuffs during combat and [Charge]^note unit can move up to 3 spaces in a cardinal direction, but is treated as warp movement and cannot pass through foes, obstructions and skills like Obstruct and the Bulwark skills to that target ally, as well as inflict -5 to all stats on the nearest foe within 5 spaces of that ally, which is already great, but she also has by default Wings of Mercy 4 to warp to a damaged ally with ease, and Def/Res Ploy 3 to inflict -7 Def/Res, [Exposure]^note units inflicted with it receive 10 damage from attacks during combat and [Ploy]^note units inflicted with it cannot activate [Bonus Doubler], [Treachery], and [Grand Strategy] during combat to all foes within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on her if she has 5 or more Res than those foes as the start of her and her foe's turns, helped with her Still Water 4. If she needs to enter the fray, then she has Arcane Euphoria as well as a Squishy Wizard statline to give her a great chance to elimiate a troubling foe.

Green Units

• Reyson, as well as his sister Leanne, are near identical in function, so this entry will cover these two units at once, and their differences will be outlined afterwards. The two Heron siblings are Flying Beast refreshers, and the two wield the Heron Wing weapon, which grants them both an extra +3 Spd, and it heals 7 HP to any ally within two spaces of them at the start of the turn. This is incredibly helpful in any mode, patching up chip damage (like Duma's Upheaval(+) in Aether Raids, or getting hit by Savage Blow), and in maps where the player can stall and take their time, they can heal a team back up to full health. As Flying Beasts, when they transform, they gain +1 Mov, meaning they become 3 Mov refreshers, letting them reach their allies way more easily. This does come with a team composition restriction however. On teams where transformation isn't so feasible, they can still take advantage of the multitude of Flier mobility skills they have access to. Now, the differences: Leanne is colourless, and has more Res to take better magical hits, and she can use the likes of Sabotages or Ploys better. Reyson is green, and is more of a Jack of All Stats, but he's also a 4* summon, so he's more accessible than his sister. Other than that, the two basically function the same, and are both very helpful units to have around.
• Thórr provides great support for any team by way of her unique skill Worldbreaker, which grants Special accel per hit to both herself and nearby allies, working on either phase and on both hits, similarly to Special Fighter. This can help charge up Specials very quickly, letting units with -1 Special weapons retaliate with a skill like Bonfire or Armoured Floe upon being hit, or helping charge skills like Galeforce, which Thórr herself can also do decently enough if she must. As a flying unit, she also has access to mobility skills like Aerobatics and Flier Formation, as well as the regular versions of Guidance and Flier Guidance in her Seal slot, which can also help improve mobility.
• Ymir, the Dragon of the Realm of Life, will make sure that your units will stay alive. Her Everliving Breath, while giving her +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and a guaranteed follow-up attack if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat to make her a good combat unit, also has the effect of healing 10 HP and removing any [Penalty] active on all allies within 2 spaces of her and her target ally, including herself, if either she uses or is the target of either Rally or movement assist skills, helped with her Rally Up Atk+, and her Everliving Domain has the effect of granting +4 Def/Res to herself and all allies within 2 spaces of her if there is an ally within 2 spaces of her, but more importantly allows them to have a Last Chance Hit Point if they're at 75% HP or above before a lethal attack. The last effect basically prevents allies from being One Hit Killed, especially if those units have their devastating special ready, giving that ally a chance to retaliate.
• Yune, once was one of the worse Mythic heroes, now was Rescued from the Scrappy Heap with her Remix in update 6.11.0, where initially her Chaos Named had an awkward effect of just inflicting -5 to the foe's highest stat, treating Atk as if it was -15, if the foe has 3 or more less Res than her and is within 3 columns of her at the start of her turn, now has Chaos Named+ basically be a souped up Chill Spectrum, where it inflicts -7 Atk, Spd, Def or Res to the foe with the highest specific stat and any foes within 2 spaces of that foe, as well as inflict Panic to those highest stat foes at the start of her turn, making her a superb debuff bot simply by existing and actively punishing teams that group up together. Even better is with her refined Chaos Manifest, where the unique refine makes her deal true damage equal to the highest total stat debuffs of either the foe or all foes within 2 spaces of that foe, and if she initiates combat reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by a percentage equal to double the same condition as the true damage mentioned beforehand, so with her Chaos Named+, she can deal 28 damage per attack and reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 56%, but what gets ridiculous is that stats inverted by Panic stacks with the standalone debuffs as well, so with +6 Atk/Spd/Def/Res on the foe and is affected by Panic, that's 24 true damage and 48% damage reduced, so combined that together and you got someone dealing 52 damage per attack and 104% damage reduced from the foe's first attack, making her a great nuker if she needs to enter the fray as well and gets out of it unfazed if everything is in her favor, and even the foe having penalty neutralization won't bypass that with her selecting a debuffed foe near them instead to calculate her true damage and damage reduction.
• Heiðr is one of, if not the best Rally support units thanks to her unique Assist skill Gold Serpent, which acts as Rally Atk/Spd on steroids, granting more Atk and Spd and effects as the battle progresses, and she gets those same effects for herself too. Her eponymous tome has a spectrum Ruse built in ^note inflicts -4 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and Guard on foes within cardinal directions of Heiðr and her target ally after using a Rally Assist, while Gold Serpent is treated as a Rally Assist for this purpose, and she can even move again after using it. On turn 1, it only grants +2 Atk/Spd. On turn 2, it grants +4 Atk/Spd, as well as [Canto (1)], which is excellent for positioning and mobility. On turn 3, it grants +6 Atk/Spd, [Canto (1)], and [Treachery], which deals damage equal to the total bonuses on your unit. This means you'll deal at least 12 damage, and that can get even higher if another unit provides the Def and Res buffs. And on turn 4 and onward, it grants +8 Atk/Spd, [Canto (1)], [Treachery], and [Dual Strike], which lets you strike twice consecutively if you initiate combat while next to another ally with the same status (which Heiðr is also granted just as she provides it). The damage output that Heiðr can help provide is immense, because if you have a +6 Def and Res buff (provided by say, Elimine, or Def Tactic and Res Tactic together, or however else), that means you can deal 28 damage twice in a row, well above the average HP of 40, and that's not even considering the fact that you've likely Rused the enemy too. Heiðr herself is no pushover in combat either, because she's also getting all of these effects, and with her innate Mag. Null Follow, which can pierce through half of any non-Special Damage Reduction skill, there's really not a lot that could withstand such powerful attacks. That's not even all either, because she also has Panic Smoke 4, which inflicts -3 Atk/Spd/Def/Res on the target and nearby foes, grants [Foe Penalty Doubler] ^note inflicts an in combat debuff equal to any penalty the foe has to herself and allies within cardinal directions, so cleaning up the other enemies becomes a breeze. With a lot of buffs, statuses, debuffs, and the ability to keep moving after using her unique Assist all at her disposal, Heiðr offers an incredible amount of support and power.
• Brave Soren is a very unique support unit, because he can turn any unit into a Save tank. His Arch-Sage Tome gives [Assign Decoy] and +6 to all stats to whichever ally has the highest Def, or whichever unit he's ally supported with. Assign Decoy activates lets the unit activate [Saviour] if any of their allies are being attacked by an opponent that matches their range, meaning if Soren got attacked by a melee unit, then whichever melee unit Soren gave [Assign Decoy] will step in and take the hit. This lets units that can otherwise never have access to Save skills, like infantry or flier units, protect their allies. It can also be given to multiple units if their respective Def stats match, although the attack ranges must still match, and the other Save restrictions apply, like a unit cannot be protected if the Save unit cannot move to their space. Soren's not just lost in his books either, because he can be quite the combatant— his tome also grants +5 to all stats, further increased depending on the total buffs of an ally within three spaces (like say the +6 to all stat buff he just granted to his ally), and he also gets Damage Reduction based on his Res, letting him withstand a hit here or there if needed. He also introduces an infantry mage exclusive Special in Flare, which deals 60% of the foe's Res as damage if the user is healthy enough, or 40% otherwise while also healing the user for 30% of their max HP, helping the wielder stay healthy throughout the battle. Soren can spam this Special pretty easily thanks to his unique A skill Rare Talent, which grants +7 to all stats, disables adaptive damage, and if his Res is higher than his foe's at all, then he nulls Guard. If it's higher by 10 or more, and he either initiates combat or fights another ranged opponent, then he can strike twice. Couple all of this with his Mag. Null Follow and Time's Pulse 4, and he can also pierce through half of any opposing DR effects and quickly activate Flare. As with any other CYL units, Soren is a free pick for any summoner to choose.

Colourless Units

• Bridal Fjorm is a Staff Flier who has the ability to completely shut down the use of Assists that the opponent might use. Her high 42 HP works well with her staff, Gjallarbrú, which inflicts [Isolation] on any enemies in a cardinal direction from her as long as her HP is greater than theirs by at least 3 with the unrefined version, and just more HP with the refined version, and the unique refine also gives all allies within 2 spaces of her +4 Atk/Spd and ignores any field stat debuffs they have during combat. [Isolation] prevents the afflicted unit from using Assists or being the target of Assists, shutting down enemy refreshers, Rallies, enemy healers, and even movement assists, basically forcing the enemy just to move and even be forced to attack an enemy in range if there are any. This is mainly for Aether Raids, where such tactics such as Rally or Restore traps can threaten opposing players. In Player Versus Environment maps, this effect might not be helpful, or even possible, but thankfully, Fjorm can just inherit one of many staffs to either send the enemy to disarray with statuses, or help support her team in more conventional ways. She comes with Dazzling Staff naturally, letting her disrupt foes with no fear, and then her flight lets her flee to safety afterwards. While she can shine on Flier teams, she can also shine on regular teams thanks to her newly introduced Ground Orders skill, which grants Infantry, Cavalry, and Armour units the ability to warp to a space adjacent to any nearby ally, improving their mobility considerably.
• Mila. The Goddess of Zofia weighs in as a Colorless Infantry Dragon with a Light Mythic blessing. She comes with a decent 53 Atk and huge 44 Def / 41 Res out of the box that you might expect from an Armored unit, but is so much worse to face because she isn't an Armored unit and thus can't have that weakness exploited. She also comes with Bracing Stance 3 and Sabotage Atk 3, so nothing short of a heavy damage dealer or another Enemy Phase tank can hope to scratch her. The rest of her kit however is weighted to support, and she has plenty of it: her Nurturing Breath would be a bog standard Breath weapon that happens to give her +3 Def, were not for granting +2 to all allies' stats during combat within a 7x7 space radius around her. But better still is her Mila's Turnwheel C skill which inflicts Isolation on enemies in cardinal directions, though unlike Bridal Fjorm who targets HP, Mila flexes her titanic Def stat to apply it and only needs it to be 1 point higher than the enemy's, which is much harder to challenge. Mila's Turnwheel also grants an Aether Raids-specific boon where she'll increase the turn limit by 1 if deployed on an Offense team (i.e. 7 turns becomes 8), which heavily incentivizes her role in the metagame to shut down Defense teams that rely on refreshers. Mila's sole weakness is that she is ridiculously slow at 17 Spd and can't get any follow-up denial as a Infantry, so a unit that can successfully breach her defenses will put a stop to her Team Mom-esque shenanigans very quickly.
• Yuri. Also known as King of Summoner Duels. He's a Colorless Dagger Infantry with a 40/39/43/26/29 (neutral) statline but the main reason isn't so much his in-combat ability (not that it's lacking), but his kit giving him quite the bag of tricks. His weapon Honorable Blade has a number of powerful effects. Plus one movement at the start of turn, special cooldown acceleration, +6 Atk/Spd if his foe is at 50% HP or above at the start of combat, and [Canto (2)]. This is on top of the standard Dagger 7 effect. The other main reason is Foul Play; basically Swap with a range of 3. With the effects of both weapons and this, he can do various movement and repositioning stunts. While he only has an A and C slot skill, they're pretty good. C Duel Infantry 4 adds 5/2/2/2/2 to his stats, and Time's Pulse 3, which combined with his weapon allows Glimmer spam. Under the best conditions at base, he'd have 47 Atk (54 if the target got daggered previously) and 51 Spd. At base, he's only stonewalled by particularly tanky units, but that's nothing that tweaks can't fix either with Lethality or AoE specials. Other tweaks can easily increase his support abilities. He's a normal pool unit meaning you have chances to get him and he is in the Feb 2022 Hero Fest.
• Elimine, is a staff flier who's also an Astra Mythic Hero, supporting her team with Damage Reduction and being able to shut down plenty of effects. Her Holy Ground grants all allies within 2 spaces of her +4 Def/Res during combat and reduces damage taken from attacks by 30%, and her Staff of the Saint not only grants +6 Def/Res to all allies within 2 spaces of her at the start of her turn, but also inflicts [False Start] to foes in cardinal directions of her if she has more Res than that foe, where [False Start] negates start of turn effects from activating. Those two skills alone makes not only a good support unit that toughens the the defenses of allies, but she also dulls any defense teams in Aether Raids that rely on start of turn effects from one unit, including the infamous [Triangle Attack] and [Guidance] from Harmonized Bridal Catria & Thea's Wedding-Bell Axe. You just need to watch out for any Freyr, because his Dream Deliverer was designed to specifically counter her by purging any debuffs and penalties.
• Fallen Maria. She is a walking Life Unending for an ally, where her Sacrifice Staff grants her -1 maximum special cooldown, prevents the foe from counterattacking, grants her +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and ignore skills that inflicts -X special buildup per attack on her if she either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and grants +4 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to all allies within 2 spaces of her during combat, and, once per map, grants the Miracle effect and restores 99 HP to an ally if that ally is going to die. Already great with her extending the durability of an ally, especially a tank, and often losing one of your units spell an end to your run in all competitive modes, so having a Life Unending effect on that ally is the difference between victory and defeat. She also is no slouch in combat as she also has Holy Panic, Atk/Spd Unity and Poetic Justice to dish out pain and debuffs.

Types of Units

• Refresher units. These are units who can allow another ally to act again through the use of Sing or Dance. Just like in the main series, the ability for a unit to act again is absolutely invaluable, especially when the player has one of the units listed on this page that can defeat many opposing units. Refreshers are inherently great at support, and often run Wings of Mercy to let them warp to injured allies. Flying refreshers can take advantage of mobility skills like Aerobatics or Guidance to either let them reach their allies more easily or vice versa, while some other refreshers even have unique refresh abilities like any of the álfars, granting a refresh and usually some status buff on allies or debuff on foes. Even common refreshers shouldn't be underestimated; ones like Sylvia or Tethys who can be merged up easily, the former having a massive HP pool and the latter having massive Res which can both be used to easily spread debuffs with the right skills.
• Save tanks. The Save skill, introduced on the Valentine's 2021 banner, allows an Armoured unit to take the place of an ally whenever they're under attack. Far Save lets the unit protect their allies from ranged attacks, while Near Save does the same but for melee attacks. Ever since then, Armoured units have mostly shifted into this role, protecting the team from harm. They just need to watch out for skills and effects that deny their counterattacks, as well as any opponents with Null Follow-Up, since they also usually rely on follow up manipulation themselves. While any Armoured unit can be built up to be a Save tank, the following units go above and beyond in what they can do, often having multiple effects that let them stand up to just about anything and everything:
  • Brave Hector and Ascended Idunn both have the distinction of having no Armour weakness despite being Armoured units, with Idunn even getting effective damage against other Armoured units. Both can also deny their foe's follow up attacks, neutralize their penalties, and both have some method of a guaranteed follow up attack in their skillset. Idunn comes with D/R Near Save by default, but both of them can use either Save skill well on account of the Distant Counter Seal for Idunn and Hector's own Ostian Counter giving him Distant Counter and Sturdy Stance at once. Hector in particular has been a complete menace since he got his Maltet refine, made only more notorious once Save skills were introduced, with plenty of powerful green units having been introduced since then that usually come with some way of getting past follow up denial at the least, and it's mostly because of him.
  • The other two versions of Idunn are nothing to scoff at either, both sharing the ability to neutralize penalties just like Ascended Idunn, both inflict an Atk debuff on the opponent during combat, and both are also effective against other Armoured units. Duo Spring Idunn in particular has a way to remove her weaknesses too. The original version of Idunn also boasts Damage Reduction when her weapon is refined, mitigating 70% damage from the first hit if her foe can make a follow up attack, which is pretty likely given her low Spd. Her spring version, partnered with Fae, is able to deny the foe's follow up attack instead, and her Duo skill has her and Fae grant themselves and any ally near them +6 Def and Res, the Dracoshield status, and the Svallin's Shield status, which removes the user's Dragon and Armour weakness respectively. Basically like her Ascended version, Duo Idunn can remove her weaknesses, albeit for one turn, but unlike her, she can also remove her Dragon weakness. Both Idunns are perfectly suited for either Near Save, or with the Distant Counter seal, Far Save. All versions of Idunn are pretty formidable in some way, all of them get to ignore their debuffs, and have plenty of ways of strengthening their high defenses even further. ^{Fun fact:}  Idunn was originally conceived to have this ridiculous defense in Binding Blade, being nearly unkillable to everything that wasn't Roy's Binding Blade. But because this was an era in the Fire Emblem series where Regalia were subject to Breakable Weapons like everything else, Idunn was heavily nerfed (perhaps a bit too hard) by replacing her unique Dragonstone weapon with something less busted. Idunn in Heroes is basically what happens when she gets her Dragonstone back. Here's a video demonstration.
  • Ascended Fjorm, blessed by her god Nifl, is an Axe Armour who wields Nifl's Bite, which has -1 Special, restores 7 HP after combat, has Distant Counter, and uniquely for an Armoured unit, she gets Null C-Disrupt against ranged opponents. The likes of Firesweep Bow and Dazzling Staff have all been literally stopped cold by Fjorm, as they usually lack the firepower to break through her. Like her regular version, Fjorm also has Ice Mirror, which mitigates any damage taken at a range by 30%, and then she gets a damage boost equal to how much damage she reduced. To help with this, she introduces Hardy Fighter, which prevents the foe's guaranteed follow up attacks and acts as a souped up Shield Pulse, precharging any defensive Special, boosting the power of their effects twofold and then some, allowing for huge Damage Reduction. With her capabilities, her healing, and the ability to always counterattack against ranged opponents, Fjorm makes for a formidable Far Save tank. She just has to watch out for Guard since she does rely on her Special, and Duo Chrom in particular will eat her alive unless she has Svalinn's Shield.
  • Duo Halloween Duma and Mila. The gods of strength and love offer some pretty spooky tricks against any ranged opponent trying to go up against 'em. Duma is a red armour dragon that can deny the opponent's follow-up attack while also preventing any effects that guaranteed the opponent's follow-up attack, and if he has 5 more Res than his foe, he can inflict +1 Special cooldown on the opponent during combat before their first attack, stopping any precharged Special cold. As long as he meets the Res check, he can put a stop to effects like Deadeye or Lethality that will attempt to pierce through his Damage Reduction, like say from Valentine's Chrom, who can't hope to match Duma's Res at all. Said DR comes in the form of Dragon Wall, and Duma's unique C skill in Woeful Upheaval, which deals 7 damage to all foes on turn 1, and it mitigates damage taken by the foe's first hit equal to the difference between Duma's Atk and the opponent's Atk, plus the difference between the foe's max and current HP, multiplied threefold, to a maximum of 30% Damage Reduction. It also has Far Save built in, making Duma an excellent Far Save tank, compounded with his Distant Ferocity granting him +5 Atk in addition to Distant Counter.
  • Fomortiis, the wicked Demon King, is a colourless Armour Beast, and has a monstrous base skillset that can really ravage any ranged opponent trying to go up against him. With his Ravager weapon and unique Nightmare A skill, he can inflict up to -16 Atk/Def on the foe during combat, it inflicts Guard, grants him Special accel per both his and his foe's attacks, and he gets 30% DR on his foe's first attack, and 80% DR on any follow-up attacks. He comes with A/D Far Save by default, and being an armour Beast, he gets Distant Counter when transformed. To help with this, he introduces Beast Follow-Up, which grants him a follow-up attack and removes the transformation condition, which allows for team flexibility. Finally, his Nightmare skill has a fittingly nightmarish effect in that after combat, the closest foes within 4 spaces of Fomortiis's attacker have their actions ended immediately, which can prevent them from rescuing the assailing unit and bring them out of danger. Additionally, he was available less than two months later as a free unit for a limited time for winning "A Hero Rises 2023", allowing many players access to the powerhouse.
  • Harmonized Bridal Adult Tiki and Young Tiki. The lovely divine bride (and her younger self) is a colourless armour dragon that is basically like Brave Tiki and then some. With her weapon, this Tiki is able to get +5 to all stats, heal 7 HP after combat, a guaranteed follow-up attack, up to 40% Res based Damage Reduction, the Scowl effect (similarly to both Brave Tiki and Halloween Duma), which inflicts +1 Special cooldown on the foe during combat if Tiki's Res is high enough, and she also gets -1 Special cooldown for herself, activating her Special faster. Said Special is Armoured Floe, which she introduces into the game, boosting her damage based on her Res, while also providing her another form of DR as it mitigates damage taken by 40% if her foe is ranged and either her or her foe's Special is either ready, activated before, or during combat. To round out her skillset, she has New Divinity from her Brave version, inflicting -5 Atk/Res on the foe, has another form of DR, and denying the foe a follow-up attack. She also comes with Mirror Stance 3 for both Guard and more Atk/Res, along with A/R Far Save (to be used alongside the Distant Counter Seal).
• Damage Reduction tanks. Introduced with skills like Spurn or Close Call, such effects can mitigate damage taken up to 40% damage taken. Some units have this effect built into their weapon, can acquire it through the [Dodge] status effect, and some check different stats like Res. Units with Spd based DR usually look frail, but being able to mitigate damage through these effects can make them sturdier than they seem. Generally though, any DR tank will rely on their Spd or whatever stat they need to keep them safe while their weapons and other skills give them other effects to play with to take on their foes. They just need to watch out for Specials like Deadeye and other effects that pierce through damage reduction.
  • Brave Dimitri is a bit different from any other Dodge tank, as his Blue Lion Rule checks Def instead, and it also gives him a follow-up attack on the enemy phase if he has more Def. He wields Moon Gradivus, which has Distant Counter and a bit of Special accel built in, and he comes with Atk/Def Unity to further improve his Atk and Def. Good effects in theory, but in practice, he came up a bit short, at least until he got his refine. Now, it doubles down on his defenses, by granting him +5 Spd/Def/Res, inflicting -5 Def on the foe, all to help with his Def check, and he neutralizes any Atk and Def bonuses that the foe have on them. The most powerful effects however, are the true damage and true defense he can acquire, as he deals damage equal to 20% of his Def, and he can mitigate damage taken from his opponent's by the same amount. This is the same effect as Askr's weapon, being a flat Damage Reduction that can't be stopped by the likes of Lethality and Deadeye, and when paired with the Damage Reduction from Blue Lion Rule and with enough support, Dimitri can survive attacks that he has absolutely no business surviving, which especially helps given his atrocious Res stat. Like the other Brave units, this Dimitri is a free pick for any player, and is pretty accessible on various banners.
  • Byleth, counting both the male and female versions due to sharing the same weapon, and the two sharing similar stats. Despite being a unit from 2019, their Creator Sword already had everything a speedy unit could need, with full Null Follow-Up and Tempo, without any condition. When refined, it now grants +8 to all stats, helping them catch up stat-wise, provides 30% DR, and if their Special activates, they can pierce through any non-Special Damage Reduction effects. No nonsense allowed with the professor, and both Byleths are available on weekly revival banners.
  • Lucia is one of the most unusual Dodge tanks around, because she disables plenty of effects for both herself and her opponent. Neither Lucia or her foe can activate Specials, take advantage of defense tiles, perform guaranteed follow-up attacks, deny the opponent's follow-up attack, deny the opponent's counterattack, or change attack priority (with skills like Vantage or Desperation). She also disables the effects of skills of every other unit on the map that could affect the outcome of the battle, such as supportive effects like the Drive skills or skills like Close Guard. Against Lucia, it's a seemingly fair and square 1v1, except it also isn't, because Lucia also deals damage = 20% of her Spd, and also gets 30% Damage Reduction built into her weapon. She also has Life and Death 4 for more Spd, and Repel 4 for more DR. Because she also doesn't have a -1 Special weapon, she can take full advantage of Gambit, letting her deal 15 true damage and get 50% DR if she has a Special that has a charge of 5. Which isn't a problem, because Lucia won't be able to activate it anyway. Alternatively, she can still use Vital Astra or Godlike Reflexes, because even though she can't activate them, she can still take advantage of their other effects, namely Dodge and more true damage respectively. Considering that most means of piercing through DR involve activating your own Special, which you just cannot do against Lucia, and you cannot manipulate anything in your favour like follow-up attacks or denying her own follow-up attack or even counterattack, then taking on Lucia becomes quite a daunting task.
• Special Spamming Dodge Tanks are a different type of Damage Reduction tank. Units like Ascended Mareeta, Ascended Fir, and Felix, these units are very fast infantry that rely on their Spd to mitigate damage, and coming with a whole host of effects that help give them an edge in battle, whether it's more Damage Reduction, Null Follow-Up to ensure that Spd can't be manipulated, Tempo to bypass Guard, a stat swing, and more. These units also come with some way of pre-charging a Special, either through their weapon or through Time's Pulse 4, and often have means to maintain that charge after combat. Specials like Vital Astra and Godlike Reflexes come with extra effects that are only active while the Special is ready (like more DR on Vital Astra, or extra damage with Godlike Reflexes), which such speed demons can take full advantage of.
  • Fallen F Byleth gets a special mention for her Divine's Pulse, which provides a damage boost based on 25% of her Spd while also mitigating the damage taken by the foe's next attack by 75%, then boosting the damage of Byleth's next attack by another 20% of her Spd. She has to activate it first, but she has innate Spd Preempt built into her Captain's Sword, letting her strike first as long as she's fast enough, thus letting her activate Divine's Pulse and making her much harder to take down, making her a menace on either phase, while Time's Pulse 4 keeps it basically always active. Her weapon also has both Dull ^note nullifies foe's bonuses during combat and Bulwark ^note prevents melee units from getting past her, and prevents ranged units from getting near her, while also healing 7 HP after combat built in to make her even more of a pain to fight against. Unlike Vital Astra (which is also an offensive Special), but much like Godlike Reflexes (which is a defensive Special), the DR from Divine Pulse can't be pierced through by Deadeye and similar effects either.
  • Summer Fjorm is another special mention in that her she effectively gets Null C-Disrupt and Distant Counter in without actually have those in her B and A slots, where her Ice-Bound Brand gives her -1 maximum special cooldown, gets Null C-Disrupt if the foe wields a ranged weapon, and grants her +5 to all her stats, inflicts debuffs on her foe's stats equal to 20% of her Spd at the start of combat, Guard, and reduces damage taken by 5 when the foe triggers her defensive special with their attacks, all which activates if the foe either initiates combat or is at 75% HP or above at the start of combat, and her Frostbite Mirror is a 2 cooldown defensive special that reduces damage by 30% from ranged attacks and 10% from melee attacks, allows her to deal true damage with her next attack equal to the amount of damage she reduces, including from other skills like her Ice-Bound Brand, until the end of combat, and grants her the Distant Counter effect if she has her special ready at the start of combat. Both of those synergizes well with her Atk/Spd Finish 4, Spurn 4 and Time's Pulse 4 to consistently be a pest to ranged units as she shrugs them off with ease and counter with a strong attack, while also being decent against melee units.
• Omnibreaker tanks. These units are sturdy, have high defenses, and usually low Spd, but they have ways of bypassing this, through weapons and skills that grant themselves a follow up attack while denying the opponent's follow up attack. Such units are susceptible to Null Follow-Up and Damage Reduction negation skills if they depend on a few, but against most other units, they can usually just stand strong against nearly anything they go up against, especially in Player Versus Environment content.
  • Seiros and Halloween Rhea both have follow up manipulation skewed in their favour basically whenever they need it. Seiros gets a follow up attack when initiating combat, and can deny her foe's follow up attacks when she gets attacked on the enemy phase, while Rhea gets a follow up attack if her foe is above 50% HP, while she can deny her foe's follow up attacks if she herself is above 50% HP. The two of them also come with Dragon Wall for Damage Reduction, and both have high enough Res to take advantage of it.
  • Medeus not only has follow-up manipulation where he denies enemy follow-up attacks if they either initiate combat or are at 75% HP or above at the start of combat and guarantees his follow-up if he has more Res than the foe during combat, he also has access to Damage Reduction depend on both how much Res he has over his foes and the amount of Dragons or Staff allies within range of him, and he has a ridiculous amount of Res to activate both. Additionally, he serves as a great assist unit as well as his Shadow Breath gives himself and all allies within 2 spaces of him +6 Atk/Res and [En Garde] at the start of his turn, no strings attached, where [En Garde] negates any non-AOE special damage done outside of combat, negating the likes of Pain+ and the Bolt Tower like nothing, and said Damage Reduction will work against those AOE skills for those trying to wise up on using those against him.
• Player-Phase Mounted Powerhouses. These usually refer to Cavalry or Flying units that are meant to be player phase monsters, often having Canto for Hit-and-Run Tactics, usually used for Galeforce, some Flow or Null Follow-Up effect that lets them get past follow-up denial, other effects that their class type normally can't acquire like easy Special acceleration, extra Mov, some kind of Damage Reduction, and so on. While these units are powerful, any of them that rely on Canto will have to watch out for Canto Control if they're trying to retreat. These units have some combination of the aforementioned, usually built into their weapon, sometimes a unique B skill. The following units are often able to ride on over towards their opponents without fear and go to town:
  • Legendary Nanna is a Sword Cavalier wallbreaker with a Glass Cannon statline of 40 HP, 39 Atk, 40 Spd, 27 Def and 25 Res, and alongside Atk/Spd Push 4 and Atk/Spd Menace, her weapon and Secret Art packs a good punch. Her Lands Sword gives her +3 Atk, and if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, she gains +6 Atk/Spd during combat, ignores skills that prevents her follow-up attacks, non-Special Damage Reduction skills, Special skills that triggers from her attacks, and she restores 7 HP after combat, and her Hoðr's Zeal gives her [Canto (Rem.+1)], deals extra true damage equal to 20% of her Atk, and allows any of her follow-up attacks to go before the foe can counterattack if she initiates combat.
  • Teatime Harmonized Ayra & Mercedes is another Sword Cavalier that is a Lightning Bruiser with 40 HP, 44 Atk, 46 Spd, 32 Def and 17 Res that will be spamming strong consecutive attacks, with their Teatime's Edge granting -1 maximum special cooldown, [Canto (Dist. +1; Max 4)], and grants them +6 Atk/Spd during combat, additional Atk/Spd during combat equal to 25% of the foe's Atk at the start of combat, -2, up to a maximum of additional +10 Atk/Spd during combat, totaling up to +16 Atk/Spd during combat, deals true damage equal to 20% of their Spd during combat with their attacks, and ignores Guard, all which activates if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, as well as bring Supreme Astra, which is a 2 cooldown special (1 with their Teatime's Edge) that boosts their damage by 40% of their Spd when it triggers, grants them -1 special cooldown at the start of their turn if they're at maximum special cooldown, and one per turn, if they trigger their special, they get -1 special cooldown before their next attack, which, combined with their default Flow Desperation, allows them to trigger Supreme Astra consecutively once per turn, and their Atk/Spd Clash 4 to further bolster their highest stats. With everything in their favor, they will nuke a unit to oblivion that is a fair bit away from them and retreat just as far.
  • Brave Eirika is a Lance Cavalier that wields Binding Reginleif, which when refined, has -1 Special, dual effectiveness against Armour and Cavalry units, grants +10 to all stats, provides full Null Follow-Up, provides 40% DR, neutralizes any Atk/Spd/Def buffs on the opponent, and inflicts -5 Atk/Spd/Def, further increased for every [Bonus] active on the foe. She introduces Surge Sparrow, which grants +7 Atk/Spd when initiating combat, and when her damaging Special activates, she heals a lot of HP based on both the max Special charge and her max HP. Her unique skill, Moonlight Bangle, works similarly, dealing damage equal to a percentage of the foe's Def when her Special activates, depending on the max charge of her Special. Moonlight Bangle also lets her ignore Guard, and it gives her Canto, meaning as long as she exchanges blows, she will fire off her Luna, and she can flee to safety right after. To put into perspective, using Luna, it's as if she can pierce through 90% of her foe's Def while also healing herself for 50% of her HP, making it a fast, overtuned Aether that even Ike would be jealous of. The Damage Reduction and healing lets her exchange blows with some really powerful opponents and then keep herself topped off. She also comes with Atk/Spd Menace to effectively give her more Atk, Spd, and bulk to work with. While she loses a bit of firepower, and may need a bit of help with Special acceleration, she can also Galeforce well thanks to Moonlight Bangle's Canto and null Guard effect. Like the other Choose Your Legends units, Eirika is a free pick for any player.
  • Summer Dimitri, as an Axe Cavalry that brings a Lightning Bruiser statline of 40 HP/Spd, 42 Atk, 35 Def and 17 Res, will overwhelm his foes with his Atk/Spd Catch 4, Spd/Def Menace and Glimmer, and his Unyielding Oar and his Legendary variant's Atrocity brings the one-two punch to make him head above shoulders among other Cavalry units. How does one make good use of Atrocity's deals damage = 25% of unit's Atk? Attach a brave weapon to it, as his Unyielding Oar gives him -1 maximum special cooldown, [Canto (Rem.+1)], and if he is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, he get +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat and if either he has 10 or more Spd than his foe or the foe has any [Bonus] he attacks twice in one round. Since his Atk goes up to 72 with everything in his favor, that true damage from Atrocity goes to 18 per attack, and considering that the average HP of units is over 40, not many will survive against his initial double attack, and that is before any additional buffs to his Atk.
  • Spring Harmonized Karla & Freyja, also an Axe Cavalry that bring a Glass Cannon statline of 40 HP, 45 Atk, 47 Spd, 24 Def and 22 Res, is a strong one-shooting nuke on the word go, with their Sisterly War Axe granting -1 maximum special cooldown, grants -2 special cooldown at the start of odd turns, and grants them +6 Atk/Spd during combat, and when they trigger their specials with their attacks, they deal true damage equal to X% of their Spd, where X equals to 10 x their equipped maximum special cooldown, +20, and negates the foe's non-Special Damage Reduction skills and defensive special skills, all which activates if they either initiates combat or are within 2 spaces of an ally. Combined with their Atk/Spd Clash 4 to further increase their strongest stats, Flow N Trace 3 to trigger Canto and ignore skills that deny any of their follow-up attacks and Spd Smoke 4 to give them Damage Reduction and buff their Spd further.
• Full Cavalry teams enjoy high Mov in maps without many obstacles, and these teams are very easy to form, making them a popular choice for players to build. There are plenty of strong Cavalry units that are either free or easily accessible like Reinhardt, Eliwood, Walhart, Brave units like Eirika and Seliph, and so on. Hone Cavalry is also on the free unit Gunter, which can easily buff your other Cavalry units. Thanks to their high movement range, Cavalry units can often perform hit and run tactics, either by using the actual Hit and Run skill on melee Cavalry, or by riding out and using the Reposition or Draw Back skill to bring an ally back to safety. Some of the stronger Cavalry even have Canto built into their weapons, and can either inherit a Trace skill or simply have that skill in their kit too. Cavalry teams were so dominant that as the game went on, other types of teams just got stronger and got more exclusive skills while the game introduced trench tiles designed to purposefully slow Cavaliers down, although they still see use in PvP, particularly on Aether Raids Defense teams.

Skills and Mechanics

• Bonus stats. Any unit can become a potential Game-Breaker in certain maps if they have heightened stats. Any unit can be Summoner Supported, which grants +5 HP and +2 to all stats, which improves their overall combat performance, letting them hit harder, faster, and take hits much better. In some modes, like the Arena or Tempest, also feature specific units that get a greater stat boost of +10 HP and +4 to all stats instead. Using those units make those modes a lot easier for the player. And should the player use those units and Summoner Support them at the same time, then their stats just go through the roof, meaning the player has to really try to get them to fall in battle. These boosts are only applicable to the player's side out of fairness, but this makes Player Versus Environment maps potentially a lot easier.
• Distant Counter and Close Counter. Back when the game first launched, there were two names that would strike fear into the hearts of the fresh summoners: Hector and Takumi, all because they came with said skills, letting them counter against ranged and melee foes respectively. Since then, they've not only been accessible to other units, but as of this writing, Distant Counter is even a Seal for Dragons to use. There are also upgraded versions that either grant a stat boost in addition to the counter ability, or grant a stat boost at the cost of some HP, letting units still have some player phase presence. Armoured units in particular make great use of these skills when paired with their Save skills.
• Special accel generally refers to the act of getting extra Special charges for your units, letting you fire off Specials much faster. Generally, they grant an extra Special charge per attack during combat, ideally given when either the unit attacks or is attacked, but sometimes it's only one or the other. Breath skills and similar effects help a lot with this, and as of the Ice & Flame 2 Tempest Trials in Aug 2021, they became available as Seals, letting your units equip them while having a more focused A slot for defense or damage, or even one of the Counter skills. Special Fighter is similar, also granting Special charges per unit and foe's attacks, but it works on either phase, and it also denies the opponent's Special as well. While locked to Armoured units, this helps them fire off their Specials much faster, while also protecting them from foe Specials.
• Special Spiral may as well be renamed Special Spam, since that's what it is made to do. It's a B skill that grants -2 Special cooldown to the unit if their Special activated before or during combat. Ranged nukes in particular can be set up to spam Area of Effect Specials with the help of some precharge through Pulse skills to deal huge damage out of combat, then they finish their opponent off, usually get another Special charge, and then keep spamming their Specials. Special Spiral 4, introduced with Rearmed Ophelia (and is an excellent user of it), lets you deal 5 damage when your Special activates, but it also lets you bypass any non Special Damage Reduction. The likes of Close Call or Dragon Wall get shut down when your Special activates, meaning not even tanks that rely on such skills are safe.
  • Special mentions go to Velouria and Hatari Karla, who can both grant themselves (and Velouria's support partner, in her case) -2 Special charges at the start of the map, which can help kick start the Special spam. They're good combatants too, as Velouria can also grant her and her partner the [Dull] buff to help them both out during combat, while Karla (who already comes with Special Spiral to begin with) gets to deal extra true damage based on her Spd whenever her Special activates.
• Null Follow-Up. Abilities that alter follow-up attacks run rampant, with plenty of powerful, slow units that have guaranteed follow up attacks to bypass their low Spd, follow up denial to protect them from being attacked twice, and in a few cases like the Omnibreaker tanks, both. Null Follow-Up disables any such abilities, turning any match into a fair and square Spd check. This makes it one of the most powerful tools any unit can have, especially for faster units that want to rely on their Spd. While the B skill is locked to Infantry units, it's also a status effect that can be granted to some units through some weapons or skills, and plenty of units have part of Null Follow-Up built into either their weapon or some unique skill, usually the part that lets them get past follow up denial. In October 2022, it became a Seal that any Infantry unit can access, and in January 2023 it joined the pool of Grail skills with the release of Lumera, a Grand Hero who comes packing the skill.
  • When paired with Windsweep or Watersweep, a unit with either -Sweep and Null Follow-Up (which would have be either from the Seal, the status or built into the unit's weapon, as -Sweep skills also occupy the B slot) can safely attack against certain types of units and not fear any counterattack. Both skills normally prevent the user from performing a follow-up attack in exchange for their counter denial, but Null Follow-Up would remove this drawback entirely.
  • Guidance 4 and Soaring Guidance allow for both mobility and the key part of Null Follow-Up, the ability to get past follow-up denial. Both skills allow Infantry to warp to any space within two spaces of a Flier ally within two spaces and gives +3 Atk/Spd during combat to those allies, while the former also allows for Armoured units to do so, and the latter also allows for other Flier units to do so. It's a very powerful supportive effect, allowing Flying units to help keep your units together while also helping their combat capabilities at the same time.
• Near Save and Far Save. Introduced by Valentines Gustav and Valentines Henriette, the Saves join the Fighter skills as Armor exclusive skills. The skills allow the user to take the place of an ally within two spaces when targeted attack by a melee or ranged unit, protecting them from all after-combat effects including movement ones that don't effect the Save user like Close Call and Leila's Constant Dagger while granting the user +4 to two stats. This allows a unit to focus entirely on fighting either melee or ranged units exclusively rather than try and deal with all types of foes. Far Save in particular can allow protection from Cav line setups which rely on ranged Cavs to leave as few safe spaces for a non-carry unit as possible or safely tanking an AoE while Near Save makes it harder for Galeforce strategies to work by stopping Lunge. Appropriately enough, Gustav and Henriette come with the tier 4 versions of Close and Distant Def respectively to maximize their ability to tank on melee and ranged units. The only real weaknesses are the Save user can only protect units on panels they can traverse so water and mountains are out of the question, multiple saves of the same type will cancel each other out leaving the targeted ally vulnerable, and the user is considered next to an ally so a unit like Legendary Edelgard or Winter Ephraim who want to be alone can't use their prfs to their full potential with a Save.
• Canto, introduced by Reginn in Book V, allows the user to move again after performing any action such as attacking an opponent, using an Assist, or destroying an obstacle. How far you can move again depends on what kind of Canto you have, for instance, Canto 2 would give you a fixed 2 Mov to return with, while Canto Rem. +1 would give you however many spaces you have yet to use, plus another. Canto allows for incredible Hit-and-Run Tactics, letting units get into the fray and right back to safety without much trouble. It gave new life to powerful player phase Cavalry and Fliers, who put their high Mov and mobility to great use with it, although some Infantry and Armoured units have been able to acquire Canto as well. Canto's use was even so prevalent in the game that they had to introduce a skill that directly countered it in Canto Control.
  • Canto Dist. is a particular form of Canto that lets the unit retreat using however many spaces they used before moving to attack. Melee units get Canto Dist. +1, while ranged just get Canto Dist., but that's still a maximum of 4 and 3 spaces moved respectively, the full Mov of a cavalry unit (and then some, in the former's case). This makes it so that any such unit can charge right up to an opponent, take 'em out, and ride back to safety, allowing for some very potent hit and run strategies.
• Arcane Weapons, introduced with Rearmed Heroes in late 2022, are powerful weapons that come with -1 Special and grant +5 to all stats (with one exception), a few different effects to give the unit an edge in battle, and can breathe new life into old units. These weapons can be inherited from a Rearmed Hero to any other unit that's applicable ^{For instance...} Arcane Grima can only be inherited by dragons for example, and if you inherit an Arcane weapon onto a new unit, that unit can't equip it and any unique skills they have at the same time, and the Rearmed Hero will not disappear, letting you keep them to still play around and fight with, usually with a base kit tailor made for said Arcane weapon. If you summon for another copy of the Rearmed Hero, you can also inherit from the first copy (using up the Arcane inheritance), then merge to the new copy, and then the new copy will be able to inherit to another unit, letting you transfer over the weapon again and up to three rare skills.
  • Arcane Éljúðnir, inherited from Rearmed Líf, is a Sword that inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe, grants the user a follow-up attack, and lets the user deny the opponent's follow-up attack. This turns any sword wielder into an Omnibreaker tank. Slow units get to take advantage of their bulk, while faster units can use the free follow-up attack as a pseudo Null Follow-Up, either way, freeing up the B slot for something else, like Lull Atk/Def on the slower units or a Damage Reduction skill on the faster ones.
  • Arcane Downfall, inherited from Ganglöt, is an Axe that denies the foe from a follow-up attack, grants the user Special accel per both their attacks and their foe's similarly to Special Fighter, and it restores 7 HP to the user per hit during combat. This is a pretty defensive axe in nature, protecting you from being doubled, while also restoring HP to keep your tanky axe unit topped off. It's got some good offensive capabilities too though, as the Special accel and -1 Special means that your units can retaliate back with something like Bonfire or Iceberg, or you can charge Galeforce pretty quickly as long as you're able to provide the follow-ups or using Pulse skills to help pre-charge it.
  • Arcane Grima, inherited from Rearmed Female Robin (who is the vessel for the titular Grima), is a Breath that allows the user to make a guaranteed follow-up attack, deal damage equal to 15% of the user's Atk, and it restores 7 HP to the user after combat. It's a pretty good general purpose Breath for most dragons, with a straightforward damage boost, a guaranteed follow-up attack, and healing for good measure, giving your dragon better self sustain. With the follow-up in the weapon, these dragon units get their B slot also freed up for the various dragon-exclusive skills to use at their disposal like Dragon Wall or Dragon's Wrath.
  • Arcane Eclipse, inherited from Rearmed Ophelia, is a Red Tome that grants -1 Special cooldown at the start of turn 1, a guaranteed follow-up attack, and neutralizes any penalties to your Atk stat. This tome, alongside inheriting Special Spiral and/or Time's Pulse if possible, allows your red mage to become a devastating nuke that can spam Specials and bust through opponents, without having to worry about any Atk debuffs, and if Special Spiral 4 is inherited, without having to worry about Damage Reduction skills like Spurn or similar effects. Said skills are locked to infantry, but red mages of other movement types can also take advantage of the tome, like any red armour mage being able to retaliate with Bonfire or Iceberg if they have Special Fighter equipped, since this is notably the first -1 Special tome that any red mage can inherit.
  • Arcane Qiang, from Alfred, is a Lance that also has the Omnibreaker effect, granting the user a follow-up attack while denying the foe a follow-up attack. It also grants the user Special accel per both their and their foe's attacks, but only if either the user or foe moved before combat. It's a great, general purpose lance, with both offensive and defensive capabilities. While the Special accel requires some movement first, you're most likely going to be moving to attack an opponent to activate Galeforce, which you can do in two strikes, while tankier lance units can instead let the opponents come to them instead, so that they can retaliate with Bonfire or Iceberg. Mounted lance units also get to inherit Flow N Trace from Alfred at the same time, letting them bypass follow-up denial effects, while also giving them Canto to return to safety.
  • Arcane Náströnd, from Rearmed Tana, is a bow that grants a guaranteed follow-up attack and 30% damage reduction from the foe's first attack. It also punishes foes with low special cooldown as it grants further Atk during combat by 12, -2 Atk for each point of the foe's maximum special cooldown value, with a minimum of 4 Atk. It's a great all purpose bow where both initiators and Save units want it, as it provides great Atk and durability. While you want to always inherit Deadeye as well from Tana, Atk/Spd Unity is great with Save units as it always activates when saving a unit, and Guidance 4 is great for flying support units as well, as it provides great mobility, buffs to Atk/Spd and follow-up denial negation to Infantry and Armored allies.
  • Arcane Lúin, from Rearmed Ingrid, is a lance that lets the user deal damage equal to 20% of the user's Spd, and ignore any stat buffs the foe has on their Spd/Def during combat. What's more is that it provides the Null Follow-Up effect if the user is faster than the foe. This weapon is geared for fast lance units, as it provides great damage output and almost guarantees that the user can follow-up naturally. While it doesn't provide much bulk, Flying units get a great boon from Rearmed Ingrid with her Guard Bearing 4 to provide that bulk, with Spd/Def Hold also an option to further increase damage output and provide support.
  • Arcane Devourer, from Fallen Rearmed Chrom, is a sword that grants Special accel per both the user and their foe's attack and 40% damage reduction from the foe's first attack. Like the Arcane Lúin, it provides the Null Follow-Up effect if the user is faster than the foe, and is thus geared towards fast sword wielders, as it provides stats, bulk and special acceleration to keep their momentum up and activate strong specials such as Luna and Galeforce, the latter also in Fallen Rearmed Chrom's kit. Speedy godswords often run Damage Reduction skills in their B slot, but with it being covered in the weapon, they're free to run other skills like Bulwark or Tempo, and the Special accel also lets them loop Godlike Reflexes pretty easily. Sword Cavalry and Flying units get the best out of Fallen Rearmed Chrom's kit, as Atk/Spd Clash 4 to boost damage output through mobility, a semi-support option with Spd/Def Snag 4 to inflict debuffs after using a movement Assist, a support option with Inf. Spd Tactics to provide Null Follow-Up and Spd to Infantry allies.
  • Arcane Euphoria, from Rearmed Plumeria, is a blue tome that grants a guaranteed follow-up attack, deal true damage based on 15% of the user's Atk and 30% damage reduction on the foe's first attack. It's a great general blue tome that any unit that at least have good Atk to use well, as the true damage and guaranteed follow-up attack means that Squishy Wizard and Mighty Glacier units would enjoy this, while the damage reduction gives durability for Lightning Bruiser and Glass Cannon units as well. However, units with high Res would get the most out of this, as Rearmed Plumeria also comes with Still Water 4, Wings of Mercy 4 and Def/Res Ploy 4, with all three being great options for both units with combat and/or support roles on a team that can also shut down units like Legendary Eliwood and Legendary Male Robin and their gimmicks if positioned correctly.

Old Entries

Red Units

Melee Units

• Reginn is the first unit from Niðavellir, and can show off what the combined might of magic and technology can achieve. She is a Sword Cavalry that comes with a unique Special in Seiðr Shell, which boosts damage by 15 and it hits the lower of Def or Res, letting her hit very hard. Units with high Def but low Res would have to watch out against her, especially since she also gets a lot of Atk and Spd from her weapon Lyngheiðr, Swift Sparrow 3, and effectively from Lull Spd/Def 3 as well. Lyngheiðr is also the first weapon to introduce Canto into the game, letting units move again (but only move, not attack or use an Assist) after performing an action. As the first unit with Canto, Reginn not only uses it well by letting her perform Hit-and-Run Tactics, blasting something with Seiðr Shell, then retreat to safety. She also bears the distinction of being one of the few units with Canto 3, letting her use her full Cavalry movement to return back to her allies, whereas most other units with fixed Canto is usually just Canto 2 at most. The best part is that she's free, and can be acquired from the story mode in Book V.
• Legendary Sigurd. Chalphy's Knight in Shining Armor rides onto the battlefield as a fearsome combatant with a very powerful support effect. He wields Hallowed Tyrfing, which has -1 Special and grants him +5 to all stats and a follow-up attack if his foe is above 75% HP, and he can mitigate 40% damage taken from his opponent if he either initiates combat or if his foe is fighting him at a range, and his B skill Crusader's Ward will further mitigate any damage taken from ranged foes. Sigurd is pretty strong, but what cements him as a champion is his unique Special: Holy-Knight Aura. It boosts his damage by 25% of his Atk, has a charge of 1 thanks to his weapon, and at the start of the turn, Sigurd is granted +1 Mov. This means that at all times, Sigurd is a 4 Mov Cavalry unit, and can take full advantage of skills like Flow or Trace to further improve his combat. Once he activates Holy-Knight Aura though, watch out: it'll grant him and his allies +6 Atk and +1 Mov for a turn. Unlike most skills that boost a unit's Mov, which usually excludes ranged Cavalry, there is no such restriction here. With its fast charge, he can use Quickened Pulse or some form of pre-charge to ensure that he can fire it off, and then you'll be at the mercy of both him and his now far more mobile allies, which gets especially dangerous if they have Pathfinder or Canto added to the mix.
• Marth, the Hero-King, The Dragonslayer and face of Fire Emblem, fittingly has two versions that let him be a shining star on the battlefield. Brave and Legendary versions share Shining Emblem, which boosts his damage by 35% of his Spd when it activates, and it grants him +6 to all stats at the start of the turn if he's near an ally, which then get shared with every ally on the map upon activation. Both Marths also have effects that take full advantage of these buffs, and both make particularly great use of the Bonus Doubler Seal to get a free +6 to all stats. Aside from that, they differ quite a lot, but are both very powerful:
  • Brave Marth wields Genesis Falchion, which has -1 Special, letting him activate his Shining Emblem much faster, and it also grants him +5 to all stats and more effects depending on how many total buffs his allies have. If the total buffs are ≥ 10, then he gets Null Follow-Up. If they're ≥ 25, then he gets another +5 Atk during combat and he restores 5 HP per hit. And if they're ≥ 60, then he gets Vantage. While this is buff dependent, he can supply the buffs with Shining Emblem, and can at least get the first effect easily since Marth also grants +6 Atk to nearby allies at the start of the turn. He also has Distant Pressure, which is Distant Counter and Spd Push, granting +5 Spd if he's above 25% HP but at the cost of 5 HP, although the healing effect from his weapon can help mitigate this. His B skill is Spurn, which gears Marth to be a Dodge tank by default, and he gets Even Tempest to move around a little better. As one of the Choose Your Legends victors, he is a free unit for any player to acquire, and is usually pretty accessible on banners that pop up.
  • Legendary Marth has Exalted Falchion, which grants him +8 to all stats when refined, and he can get a ridiculous amount of stats from it thanks to the other effects. Its base effect is still Bonus Doubler, granting an in combat buff equal to the field buffs that Marth has, so that's a free +6 to all stats with Shining Emblem. Its skill refine however, is the Unity effect, which grants an in combat buff equal to twice any debuffs that Marth has, so if he has a -5 Atk debuff, he gets +10 Atk during combat to counteract the debuff and give him 5 more Atk. What this essentially means is that Marth is no longer stopped by Panic, and simply gets even stronger because of it. With all of this, and the Bonus Doubler Seal, Marth can quickly snowball and become a gigantic ball of stats, only being stopped by effects that remove or ignore his buffs entirely like with the [Dull] effect. But wait, there's more: This Marth also comes with a unique B skill in Binding Shield II, which, in addition to its base effect of working on Dragon foes, now works on any opponent if Marth is faster than them by 5 Spd. This turns Marth into a player phase menace, because now he gets to deny counter attacks, follow up attacks, and get his own follow up attack against anyone, acting as a sort of pseudo Null Follow-Up combined with Windsweep and Watersweep.
• Legendary Nanna is a Sword Cavalier that is basically a wallbreaker with a Glass Cannon statline of 40 HP, 39 Atk, 40 Spd, 27 Def and 25 Res, and alongside Atk/Spd Push 4 and Atk/Spd Menace, her weapon and Secret Art packs a good punch. Her Lands Sword gives her +3 Atk, and if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, she gains +6 Atk/Spd during combat, ignores skills that prevents her follow-up attacks, non-Special Damage Reduction skills, Special skills that triggers from her attacks, and she restores 7 HP after combat, and her Hoðr's Zeal gives her [Canto (Rem.+1)], deals extra true damage equal to 20% of her Atk, and allows any of her follow-up attacks to go before the foe can counterattack if she initiates combat. Basically, she takes down units that rely on Damage Reduction and Hardy Fighter to reduces damage taken, as well as perform Hit-and-Run Tactics if the going get tough, with only tanky and/or Blue can survive her onslaught, but one should be careful she does not face a counterattack with her Glass Cannon statline if they do survive.
• Seliph has two very powerful cavalry versions who share an innate Miracle effect, where he can live any fatal blow as long as he's either above 25% HP and either he or his opponent has moved at least one space (for his Brave version), or his foe initiates combat, he's within 3 spaces of an ally, and he's above 50% HP (for his Legendary version). The two play very differently, with Brave Seliph being more of a player phase powerhouse, while Legendary Seliph stands his ground on the enemy phase, but both of them can perform well on the opposite phase too.
  • Brave Seliph follows in his father's footsteps as a Sword Cavalier with incredible Mov and effects that take full advantage of it. He wields Holytide Tyrfing, which has -1 maximum special cooldown, [Canto (2)], and he gets +5 to all stats if either he or his opponent moved before combat. He also deals damage based on the foe's Def that increases the further either of them moved, improving his damage output greatly, and if he's above 25% HP, he gets Miracle, letting him survive even the strongest of attacks. He introduces a new A skill in Atk/Spd Clash, which grants more Atk and Spd under that same movement condition, and if either Seliph or his foe moved at least two spaces, he neutralizes any Atk and Spd penalties he has on him. To really charge ahead on the battlefield, he has his unique C skill in Heir to Light, which grants +6 Atk/Spd, +1 Mov, and [Null Follow-Up]. He'll be able to get past follow-up denial, and if he moves far enough thanks to the extra Mov, he doesn't have to worry about losing his Atk and Spd buffs either. With Canto 2, he can then return back to safety without much of a problem, and with Heavy Blade, he can Galeforce really well too. While this all makes him player phase focused, the movement effects can still depend on the foe moving too, so he can also let them come to him if needed, so he can be built for the enemy phase as well. His Miracle effect is also pretty unique, as being able to survive at 1 HP lets him be a perfect Wings of Mercy beacon for his allies to jump in and continue the attack, or he can use Escape Route to really get out of danger. With Canto and Null Follow-Up being taken care of through his weapon and C skill, his B skill is truly free for such skills. Other skills he can use include Desperation for consecutive attacks, or he can use Mystic Boost alongside the Seal to restore 12 HP after combat, which can let him try to loop an infinite Miracle build. As one of the winners of Choose Your Legends, he is a free pick for any player.
  • Legendary Seliph went from zero to hero when he received his refine and remix in August 2023. His reworked Virtuous Tyrfing and new Holy War's End II lets Seliph inflict up to -16 Atk/Def on the foe, lets him deal true damage equal to 15% of his Atk, allows him to disable effects that would deny his counterattacks like Dazzling Staff, gives him 8 HP healing per each of his attacks, gives him 80% Damage Reduction against mages and staffs, 40% DR against everything else, gives him the Miracle effect as mentioned, and Seliph can also perform a follow-up attack, deny the opponent's follow-up attack, and if the foe initiates combat, Seliph can strike twice. This means that he can potentially quadruple strike opponents on the enemy phase, healing his HP back up all the while, and since his counterattack can't be denied, watch out. He was once considered the worst Earth Legendary, but received everything he needed to succeed, with a bunch of effects cavalry usually don't easily or even have access to at all, and actually has become quite a threat.
• Elincia's devoted retainer Lucia is an infantry sword who's widely considered by the fan base to be easily the most game-breaking unit since Fallen Edelgard. The secret lies in her unique weapon Queensblade which references the Tellius games' Parity skill: it makes her a Mechanically Unusual Fighter, cutting both herself and her foe off from any skill effects besides Damage Reduction, disabling external effects from nearby allies, and preventing their Specials from activating. This sounds like an insane handicap that would make her a novelty at most, but as previously stated, Damage Reduction is one of the few things Queensblade doesn't turn off — and Lucia is one of the fastest units in the game, also gets extra damage based on her Spd, and can fully the benefits of Vital Astra (which only needs to be CHARGED, not activated). Even worse, most skills that negate Damage Reduction require a Special to proc for it, which Lucia disables. There are only two units in the whole game who can freely ignore this (Legendary Nanna negates DR, and Legendary Celica halves it); everyone else has to either outspeed Lucia or just suck it up, making her incredibly oppressive in every game mode.
• Both the Male & Female Variants of Regular Byleth are two sword infantry units that even long after being released in 2019, have started to age very well within the meta, and can even compete with some of the more recent units! While the female variant has 2 more speed than the male variant, Male Byleth contains an extra punch in attack power by having two more attack alongside having the sought-after Distant Counter to enable certain builds. Their Creator Sword which they both share, while granting the typical slaying affect that would go on to be common-place in the recent years is one of the strongest weapons in the entire game, nullifying enemy skills affecting follow-ups and special acceleration/blocking enitrely, meaning units who rely on those abilities may be kneecapped during an encounter with Byleth, and their high speeds mean they can survive one hit outside of multiple strikes. They have also benefited the most from the skill inheritance system, being able to make immaculate use of speed-based Damage Reduction skills and the inheritable special Vital Astra. But before Damage Reduction skills became the norm in an oversaturated pool of sword infantry units, Byleth held a very unique niche of being able to get a follow-up attack while denying counterattacks from enemies. Their refine already makes them even better just from the pure Simple, yet Awesome additions it grants. If Byleth initiates combat or is within two spaces of an ally, they get +4 to all their stats. Additionally, if their HP is greater than 25% which is essentially existing, they are given another +4 to all their stats, totaling to 8 if the conditions are met and reduces the damage of the enemy's first attack by 30%, stacking with the aforementioned Damage Reduction skills. One last addition changes everything, if Byleth's special triggers, they neutralize Damage Reduction skills that aren't special skills like Escutcheon or Pavise, giving them more survivability while denying the enemy's own survivability, which combined with Male Byleth's innate Distant Counter will immediately give you a mixed phase unit. If you need an infantry sword unit that has good utility and flexibility for builds, Byleth is for you. Lastly, you were able to get a free Male Byleth in a promotion for Three Houses, meaning for those that bought the game and kept their Male Byleth? They were effectively rewarded a free unit that can hold up with the ever-increasing power level of units since 2019.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Yuri follows his regular self's gimmick of being one of the best Hit-and-Run Tactics units. Alongside his regular self's Foul Play, his Abyssal Blade grants him -1 maximum special cooldown, the standard [Dagger 7] effect, and grants him +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat, ignores skills that deny any of his follow-up attacks, deals damage equal to 20% of his Spd, and reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 30%, all which activates if he either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and his Fetters of Dromi grants him [Canto (2)], +1 movement at the start of his turn, removes that +1 movement if he is inflicted with [Stall], and inflicts -4 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to all foes within 2 spaces of him during combat. This makes him a mobile unit that can hit-and-run while being soft immune to [Stall], one of the banes of Regular Yuri, while also being a hard hitter, especially if he is near a Tome ally with his Atk/Spd Hexblade to deal adaptive damage.

Blue Units

Melee Units

• Brave Eirika is a Lance Cavalier who charges into battle, taking a page right out of her brother's book, right down to dressing like him and wielding his own weapon. Her stats are very offense focused, with 40 Atk and 42 Spd but low HP and defenses, but her effects can make up for that, making her more of a Lightning Bruiser. She wields Binding Reginleif, which has -1 Special, Armour and Cavalry effectiveness, grants +5 to all stats during combat, gives Eirika 30% Damage Reduction, and if she initiates combat, her follow up attack cannot be denied. She comes with a new A skill in Surge Sparrow, which grants +7 Atk/Spd during combat, and when her damaging Special activates, she heals a lot of HP based on both the max Special charge and her max HP. Her unique skill, Moonlight Bangle, works similarly, dealing damage equal to a percentage of the foe's Def when her Special activates, depending on the max charge of her Special. Moonlight Bangle also lets her ignore Guard, and it gives her Canto, meaning one way or another, she will fire off her Luna, and she can flee to safety right after. To put into perspective, using Luna, it's as if she can pierce through 90% of her foe's Def while also healing herself for 50% of her HP, making it a fast, overtuned Aether that even Ike would be jealous of. The Damage Reduction and healing lets her exchange blows with some really powerful opponents and then keep herself topped off. She also comes with Atk/Spd Menace to effectively give her more Atk, Spd, and bulk to work with. While not exactly her intended role, she can also use other skills like Windsweep to double and face no counterattacks, albeit at the cost of Moonlight Bangle, or she can use Galeforce pretty well since her Special can't be denied. Like the other Choose Your Legends units, Eirika is a free pick for any player.
• Brave Chrom. The brave exalt rides atop a trusty steed and wields a lance, always ready to change fate in his favour. His weapon Geirdriful has -1 Special, grants a stat boost for each [Bonus] and [Penalty] he has active on him, he gets 40% Damage Reduction from the foe's first attack, and he gets Special accel for both his and his foe's attacks during combat. [Bonus] in this case refers to any positive status effects and not stat buffs, while [Penalty] is the same but for negative statuses and not debuffs. To acquire said [Bonus] and [Penalty], he has his unique skill in A Fate Changed!, which acts as Reposition while granting Chrom an Extra Turn, much like Duo and Legendary Chrom. After use, Chrom acquires any [Bonus] that was on the targeted ally, while also inflicting [Isolation] on himself just to prevent him from abusing this Assist too much. However, since that is a [Penalty], that does activate his weapon. The fun part is that he gets to acquire status effects that cavaliers normally cannot, and he comes with Inf. Spd Tactic for one such effect, as that grants [Null Follow-Up] to any Infantry allies near him as long as they meet the Tactics condition (i.e. no more than 2 of the same Mov type on the team). This means he can support Infantry allies by giving them Null Follow-Up, perfect for speedier units, and he can then get it himself. Another example would be Brave Seliph, another powerful Cavalier that he was introduced alongside. Seliph gets +6 Atk/Spd, [Null Follow-Up] and +1 Mov himself, so Chrom can just take that and the two Cavaliers can go to town, while also helping Seliph get closer to the action. The more [Bonus] and [Penalty] Chrom acquires, the higher his stats can go, and the more status effects that get introduced into the game, the more Chrom can acquire. From Legendary Claude's Fallen Star for even more Damage Reduction, to Scion Leif's Desperation for consecutive attacks, to quote Chrom himself, anything can indeed change. He also comes with Surge Sparrow for more Atk and Spd, while also keeping him topped off, and S/D Near Trace 3 to let him use Canto (with potentially more Mov to work with) to move around better. With the Special accel in his weapon, he can also Galeforce very well. As one of the winners of Choose Your Legends, he is a free pick for any player.
• Halloween Female Corrin is a blue infantry dragon with all sorts of treats for any summoner to enjoy, being a blue version of her Legendary self. Like her Legendary version, she also has very high stats all around, comes with Negating Fang, which offers 30% Damage Reduction against any hit and a power boost equal to 30% of her Atk, and she has Shield Pulse built into her weapon to precharge it, and it also grants +5 to all stats and +1 Special accel per her own attacks if her foe initiates combat or is healthy enough, letting her loop her Special pretty easily. She also inflicts -1 Special charge on her foe's attacks, protecting her from opposing Specials. With all of these effects wrapped into her weapon, she has a completely powerful base kit with Atk/Spd Finish 4 to give her more Atk and Spd, damage, and healing, Dragon's Wrath 4 to give her 25% Damage Reduction and a damage boost equal to 25% of her Atk minus the foe's Res, and Joint Drive Atk for even more Atk. The bewitching result is a unit that has huge DR, power, healing, Guard, and Special accel all at once. Being an infantry dragon, she can also equip the Distant Counter (D) Seal to also punish ranged opponents, or the Null Follow-Up Seal to ensure she can put her high Spd to great use.

Ranged Units

• Reinhardt. He's a Blue Tome Cavalier who dominated the meta for quite a long time, forcing players to always account for him by having a high Res tank to deal with him, and can still catch unsuspecting players off guard. He's a prime Glass Cannon, needing only two things: his horse, and his Dire Thunder tome, which has 9 Mt, reduces his Spd by -5, and lets him strike twice when initiating combat. With his 3 Mov, which lets him seek out foes from across the map with ease, and all sorts of skills and buffs at his disposal like Death Blow, he becomes a unit that would make his original boss incarnation proud. The developers knew how much trouble he caused, introducing more skills to deal with him and units with capabilities to counter him right out of the box, and even going so far as introducing trench tiles for the sole purpose of slowing Cavalry down. Some Abyssal and Infernal maps have ridiculous enemies that are designed to stand in his way too. Reinhardt is a popular choice for most players, and is very dangerous against most red units and low Res units, being able to decimate them without breaking a sweat. As a 3* and 4* available unit, he's not too difficult to summon from any blue stones, and he's even a free unit through the Heroes Path quests, making him available to every player. He also received a Resplendent version in March 2021, giving him a bit more stats to work with, notably some extra Atk for him to strike even harder. With the lack of base stat total restrictions in Aether Raids, he can put in some work on defense teams that also use other Cavalry units alongside him. Reinhardt is remarkable as the oldest combat unit in the game that is still considered good thanks to all his unique and powerful traits previously mentioned despite his 32 Atk being fairly mediocre even by gen 1 standards.
• Ophelia. She's a Blue Tome Infantry with a very powerful tome: Missiletainn, which has -1 Special charge, and she gets +1 charge for every mage on her team, and this includes herself. With enough charges through a combination of Pulse skills, other mages on the team, or similar effects, she can have a powerful Special charged right from turn one, including the usually underused AoE Specials, one of which she already comes with. These allow her to pack an incredible punch, capable of even defying the weapon triangle, and it all but demands having a very high Res green tank if the player dares to take her head on. She also has Chill Res 3 by default however, which can threaten said tank. If she's given Special Spiral on the other hand, then as long as she's not deterred by Guard, then she can launch a devastating AoE Special, then hit her foe and gain a charge, and then she gets another two after combat, fully charging the AoE for her next turn. Ophelia is also one of the very few units that can use the Hardy Bearing Seal effectively, which nullifies enemies with Vantage, negating the most prominent weakness to AoE-centric builds. In short, Ophelia can quickly charge up a destructive Special on her first turn, and can even potentially keep spamming said Specials, making her a dangerous threat, especially on an Aether Raids defense team.
• Legendary Female Shez. She's a Blue Dagger Infantry that performs best when she initiates combat, and comes with the powerful Asura Blades and the especially strong Swift Slice. Asura Blades has 8 Mt, the standard [Dagger 7] effect, grants +5 Spd, allows Shez to attack twice regardless of phase, lets her ignore any stat penalties she has during combat, and if she is faster than her foe during combat she gets +1 special charges per attack. Her unique skill Swift Slice grants her +8 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat if she initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and she deals effective damage against all weapon types if she initiates combat and she either has 20 or more Spd than her foe if the foe is a non-Dragon or Beast Infantry unit, or otherwise has 5 or more Spd than her foe if they're a Cavalry, Armored, Flying, or Infantry Dragon or Beast unit. Coupled with her default Seal Spd 4 to inflict up to -11 Spd on the foe and Atk/Spd Oath 4 to grant her up to +9 Spd on top of high mobility, and you have someone who excels at the player phase as she will be dealing effective damage against a large majority of the playable roster with an easy Spd check with her base 44 Spd, even before equipping the Phantom Spd Sacred Seal, with only the personals weapons of Sothis and her variants and Garon and his Breath of Blight only being able to neutralize Swift Slice's effective damage. And this is all before Elite Tweak kicks in; she can also inherit the Tempo skills to consistently trigger her specials, Spd Preempt 3 to be a strong Vantage option, the powerful Special Spiral 4 to give her a bit of true damage and Damage Reduction-negation whenever she triggers her special as well as start the next fight with a fully charged special, or even Lethality and Special Spiral 3 or 4 with some team synergy to ensure guaranteed KOs against many units, even if she does not initiate combat.

Green Units

Melee Units

• Legendary Hector. The brash Marquess of Ostia is a Mighty Glacier like any other Hector, but this Hector is the most supportive of them all while still being a great, sturdy combatant, especially after he got his refine and his remix. When refined, Thunder Armads inflicts -10 Atk/Def on the foe, the foe is denied a follow-up attack, and Hector can mitigate damage taken by the foe's first (and ideally only) hit by 40%. The huge stat swing, Damage Reduction, and follow-up denial all serve to make Hector harder to take down, and he gets Distant Counter and Crafty Fighter to let him fight ranged foes too, get a follow-up attack himself, and deny their Specials while he's at it. What makes him a great support unit is his new Ostian Pulse II, which grants him and any ally +6 Def/Res and Time's Pulse, precharging any Special if their cooldown count is at the max. The range is global and will work anywhere on the map, but it requires a Tactic activation, meaning no more than 2 of the same Mov type on the team. This lets other types of units that aren't Infantry take full advantage of the extra charge, which can be perfect for Galeforce or AoE spam strategies. Should you decide to double down on Hector's combat instead, he can also put either Save skill to great use thanks to his weapon's powerful tanking effects.
• Edelgard, the peerless emperor of Adrestia, has two versions that are both Mighty Glacier Axe Armour units that are one woman armies, prevailing over their foes with their capabilities. Both have very similar stats, with basically no Spd but very high stats everywhere else, especially in Atk and Def. They play pretty differently however, so the differences are outlined below:
  • Legendary Edelgard prevails over her foes by working alone, as her entire skillset revolves around her having no one near her. Her Aymr inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe while also denying the foe's follow-up, Atk/Res Solo boosts her Atk and Res, and Armoured Stride gives her +1 Mov, letting her move around better and actually punish any foes she needs to. She can do this with her unique B skill Raging Storm, which grants her an extra turn after initiating combat while alone, and she gets a follow-up attack against Dragon or Beast foes, letting her smite them handily. It stacks with the actual Galeforce, letting her potentially move up to three times in a single turn, so that she can either ravage multiple foes, smash a single foe multiple times, or simply use the extra turn to retreat and get back to position. Her refine and remix added more effects, while also having more lenient conditions so that she doesn't have to be completely allergic to working with others. Her refined Aymr adds an enemy phase condition, while also letting her deal damage equal to 15% of her Atk, has 30% Damage Reduction, inflicts -5 Atk/Def on her foe, and grants her Special accel per her attacks (which can help her charge Bonfire or Galeforce). Meanwhile Raging Storm II has an added, very lenient 25% HP threshold condition, lets her perform a follow-up attack, inflicts another -5 Atk/Def on her foe (to a total of -16 Atk/Def), and if her foe is a Dragon or Beast, she can bypass any affects that deny her own follow-up attack. The extra conditions make it so that she can still perform the typical Save tank role of any armour if need be, but either way, these extra effects can really help lead you to victory with her Extra Turn, Omnibreaker effect, extra damage, Damage Reduction, huge Atk/Def swing, and Special accel.
  • Brave Edelgard is far easier to use, and unlike her Legendary version (until she got her refine and remix), this Edelgard simply needs to be healthy enough for all of her effects. As long as Edelgard is above 25% HP, her Flower Hauteclere, which has -1 Special, will grant +1 Mov, the Orders status ^note Unit can move to a space adjacent to any ally within two spaces, inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe, and her unique B skill, Black Eagle Rule, grants her a follow-up attack on either phase, while also mitigating damage taken from any follow-up attack on the enemy phase by 80%. You can very easily forget that this Edelgard is still an Armoured unit, thanks to the fact that she can move like an Infantry unit and warp around like a Flier, letting her stay near her allies way more easily, acting as both their sword and shield. Flower Hauteclere also got a refine that inflicts a further -6 Atk/Def on the foe, grants Edelgard extra Atk/Def/Res depending on how far she or her foe moved before combat, inflicting Guard if either one moved at least one space, and she also heals herself for 7 HP per hit, giving her even more survivability. All of this makes her into a fantastic tank, and can be equipped with either Save skill to help protect her allies too. However, her capabilities also lend well to Galeforce, thanks to her unusually great mobility for an Armour, her weapon's -1 Special, and she can either use Heavy Blade along with Black Eagle Rule as a substitute for Bold Fighter, or she can just use Bold Fighter itself. While she needs to watch out for Armour effectiveness and Null Follow-Up, Edelgard can truly do it all. She can tank, has damage reduction, can Galeforce well, and with her improved mobility, she avoids the biggest shortcomings that Armours have to face. As one of the winners of Choose Your Legends, she was also available as a free pick before September of 2022 when the "A New Future" free summon event ended, and has been accessible on some Hero Fest banners.
• Thórr is a Mighty Glacier Axe Flying with 40 HP, 44 Atk, 19 Spd, 41 Def and 34 Res that is a Mythic Hero of Astra, and backs up her title as the War God of Heroes. Her War-God Mj&oulm;lnir gives her -1 maximum special cooldown, effective against Armored units, and if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, she gains +6 Atk during combat, inflicts -6 Atk on the foe during combat, a guaranteed follow-up attack, and ignores the foe's field stat buffs if he is also not adjacent to an ally. She also brings Atk/Def Push 4, Flow Guard 3 and Bonfire, which, alongside her weapon, makes great use of her Mighty Glacier statline. Finally her Secret Art Worldbreaker gives herself and all allies within 2 spaces +1 special buildup per attack during combat, making her a good support unit as well. Not only that, that skill also makes her a great Galeforce unit and supporter, especially if she has increased mobility from skills like Wings of Mercy.
• Summer Dimitri, as an Axe Cavalry that brings a Lightning Bruiser statline of 40 HP/Spd, 42 Atk, 35 Def and 17 Res, will overwhelm his foes with his Atk/Spd Catch 4, Spd/Def Menace and Glimmer, and his Unyielding Oar and his Legendary variant's Atrocity brings the one-two punch to make him head above shoulders among other Cavalry units. How does one make good use of Atrocity's deals damage = 25% of unit's Atk? Attach a brave weapon to it, of course, as his Unyielding Oar gives him -1 maximum special cooldown, [Canto (Rem.+1)], and if he is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, he get +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat and if either he has 10 or more Spd than his foe or the foe has any [Bonus] he attacks twice in one round. Since his Atk goes up to 72 with everything in his favor, that true damage from Atrocity goes to 18 per attack, and considering that the average HP of units is over 40, not many will survive against his initial double attack, and that is before any additional buffs to his Atk.
• Young Hector is one of the best Far Save units thanks to his kit, with Valiant War Axe grants him -1 maximum special cooldown, and inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe during combat, -1 special buildup per attack on the foe during combat, reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 30%, and if he within 3 spaces of an ally he inflicts -12 Atk, reduced by 2 for each maximum special cooldown value the foe has, down to a minimum of -4 Atk, all which actives if he is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, and Ostia's Heart gives him Distant Counter, and inflicts -8 Atk/Def on the foe during combat and restores 7 HP to him per attack he performs if the foe either initiates combat or is at 75% HP or above at the start of combat. Combined with his Vengeful Fighter 4, A/R Far Save 3 and Armored Beacon he is a rather difficult unit to take down while also hitting hard and protecting his allies from ranged attacks.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Male Robin being a Green Tome unit with a fantastic statline will wipe away any unit that has low resistance almost instantly, and unlike a typical unit, he inflicts a penalty of -6 on your allies highest and second highest values, alongside -4 to all stats on himself. However, the real draw of the deal is his weapon "Master's Tactics." It has the typical cooldown acceleration, but at the start of the turn, if Robin's HP ≥ 25%, he grants the【Grand Strategy】buff, which converts your penalties into bonuses. And if that wasn't enough, If he exists, he also inflicts Atk/Spd/Res-5 on foe during combat and disables their follow-up attacks. While he plays an utterly fantastic role of supporting your team and can bring your team to victory all for essentially staying alive, his statline and weapons are enough for him to be able to play a part in combat too! His PRF A Skill, "Part of the Plan" where as long as he... well, you get the idea,^{Actual Explanation} If his HP is greater than 25%inflicts Atk/Spd/Res-8 on whatever enemy he's fighting against foe and grants Atk/Spd/Def/Res+X during combat on himself, with X equaling the current penalty on each of unit's stats multiplied by 2, and he makes a guaranteed follow-up attack. He also comes with Seal Atk 4 to inflict Atk-4 on the foe during combat, but if no effect neutralizes penalties to foe's Atk, he instead inflicts the penalty on foe's Atk during combat = 7 - current penalty on foe's Atk, and the aforementioned Seal skill counts as a penalty. Last but not least, he comes with Canto Control, with the third tier of the skill being preferable. If a unit who is unfortunate enough to be in at least 4 spaces of Robin when they trigger Canto, he reduces their movement to 1 if they're a melee unit, and outright disables their next action if they're a ranged unit. Being a unit with a flexible role, Legendary Male Robin can either be your main support unit, or your main offensive unit and do both well. In fact, he's so useful in Aether Raids where debuffs are heavily common that you'd be forgiven for using him off-season. He's that good.

Colourless Units

Melee Units

• Legendary Female Corrin is a colourless infantry dragon with high stats all around, and she has a Damage Reduction and a damage boosting Special rolled into one. She wields Primordial Breath, which has -1 Special, grants +5 to all stats, and gives her +1 Special accel for her own attacks if her foe is either at full health or initiates combat against her. Her unique Special, Negating Fang, mitigates any damage taken at any range by 30%, and then boosts the damage by her next attack by 30% of her Atk, acting as Escutcheon, Sacred Cowl, and Draconic Aura all rolled into one, and she'll usually be able to recharge her Special when she retaliates. Being a defensive Special, it can't be pierced by the likes of Deadeye or Lethality, and she has Shield Pulse to help charge it at the start of the map. She's also got Distant Counter to let her fight ranged foes, and Joint Drive Atk to boost her Atk even further. As an infantry dragon, she can also make great use of the Null Follow-Up Seal to stop follow-up shenanigans, or the Distant Counter (D) Seal, freeing up her A slot for something more offensively or defensively oriented.
• Fallen Edelgard is an absolute literal monster of a unit. This Edelgard is also Armored, but is a Colorless Beast, assuming her Final Boss form from the Azure Moon path. Her weapon, Twin-Crest Power, has -1 maximum special cooldown, and if she's at 25% HP or above, she inflicts -6 Atk/Def on her foe, denies her foe's follow up attack (as well as her own, like Wary Fighter), and if she initiates combat after transforming, she gets an Extra Turn like Legendary Edelgard's Raging Storm. Since she's an Armoured Beast, she also gets Distant Counter (and +2 Atk) when transformed. She also comes with a unique B skill in Armoured Wall, which is Special Fighter, granting her an extra Special charge during combat while denying her foe's Special charge, but at a 25% HP threshold, and after combat, she heals for 7 HP, and under that same threshold, if she's transformed, she gets 40% Damage Reduction from the foe's first attack during the first combat on either phase. Her Special is Bonfire, working well off of her huge 44 Def, and she also has Atk/Def Ideal 4, which grants her extra Atk and Def if she's either at full health or has a bonus, or more if she has both, and Armoured Stride to help her move further when she's alone. Thanks to the Extra Turn from her weapon, she can function as a Galeforce machine like her Legendary version, but with a -1 Special weapon and Armoured Wall, her Special charges line up much more easily. Her base stats are your typical Mighty Glacier, with 45 HP, 42 Atk, 14 Spd, 44 Def, and 39 Res, and when you factor in every effect, you're dealing with a truly demonic beast that can effectively sport up to 75 Atk, 59 Def, 45 Res, with follow up denial, Special denial, and Damage Reduction. Try to engage her and face her Distant Counter, and try to stand your ground and she just gets an Extra Turn against you to attack again, either way, she can crush almost anything that comes her way, and heal off any attempts at taking her down. The only real thing she has to worry about is that some of her effects rely on her being transformed, which does mean you have to take that into account when building a team, and Null Follow-Up will also be a problem, although her opponents still have to pierce through all those other defensive effects. Since her release, there has been a rise in units with ways to counter her, like Brave Eirika and Legendary Male Byleth.
• Ash, as a Mighty Glacier Colorless Infantry Beast with 41 HP/Def, 39 Atk, 27 Spd and 34 Res, is one Light Mythic Hero that is given for free for all players who completed the first chapter of Book VI, and she brings the big guns. Her weapon Horn of Opening gives her -1 maximum special cooldown, +6 Atk and inflicts -6 Atk on the foe during combat if there is an ally within 3 spaces of her, grants her a guaranteed follow-up if there is at least 2 allies within 3 spaces of her, and prevent the foe from performing a follow-up attack if there is at least 3 allies within 3 spaces of her, but most importantly her introduction introduced a new standard effect for Infantry Beasts when transformed, where while the +10 special damage is reduced to +7, now also ignores skills that inflicts -X special buildup on her and grants +X special buildup on the foe. That weapon alone makes her a great powerhouse, but she also comes with Atk/Def Unity, Lull Atk/Def 3 and Bonfire to make use of her Mighty Glacier statline. Finally, her Secret Art Opening Retainer gives her great support utility: not only does it function like Joint Drive Atk, but any allies within 2 spaces of her can warp to a space within 2 spaces of her. That skill alone has a lot of functionality for allies, such as grant massive mobility, bypass terrain, and even removes the downside of [Gravity] and [Stall].
• Askr, as another Mighty Glacier Colorless Infantry Beast with 40 HP, 43 Atk/Def, 26 Spd and 31 Res, is another Light Mythic Hero, while not given for free, is one that is worth his while for players that summon him. His weapon Illuminating Horn gives him -1 maximum special cooldown, and if he either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, he gets +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat, a guaranteed follow-up attack, deals extra true damage equal to 20% of his Def during combat and reduces damage taken from foe's attacks equal to 20% of his Def during combat, and the post 6.0.0 Infantry Beast effects. One note is that Damage Reduction effect is immune to "reduce damage by X%", so skills like Deadeye and Lethality's extra effect will not work on him. That weapon alone makes him a great combat unit, which, alongside Atk/Def Ideal 4, Atk/Def Bulwark 3 and Bonfire, synergizes with his Mighty Glacier statline. Finally, he is also a great support unit with his Secret Art Opened Domain, which if he is within 2 spaces of an ally from a different Fire Emblem game than him (a pretty easy requirement), he grants himself and all allies, including those from Heroes the [Resonance: Blades]^note +4 Atk/Spd during combat and [Resonance: Shields]^note +4 Def/Res during combat and prevents the foe's follow-up attacks during the first combat of each player and enemy phase status effects, as well as grant -1 special cooldown to those who are at maximum special cooldown at the start of his turn. That skill makes him a walking universal buffer and Time's Pulse.

Ranged Units

• Legendary Alm. The king of Valentia can crush any foe he comes across ever since he got his remix and refine, boasting some very powerful defense piercing capabilities. He wields Luna Arc, which grants +5 Atk/Spd and deals damage equal to 25% of the foe's Def, and when refined, it grants another +5 Atk/Spd, lets him ignore Guard, and he essentially gets Windsweep, letting him deny the counterattacks from physical units if he's fast enough. He also has a unique Special in Lunar Flash II, which boosts Alm's damage by 20% of his Spd, while also piercing through 20% of the foe's Def, and it also disables any non-Special Damage Reduction effects, which basically gives him his own version of Deadeye. With Null Follow-Up and Time's Pulse in his base kit, as well as the Guard nulling Tempo effect from his weapon, he'll be able to fire off Lunar Flash pretty easily, and he can bust through even the sturdiest of walls and tanks.
• Legendary Leif. His second appearance in the game, now playing at being a Master Knight, Leif rejoins the fight as a Bow Cavalier with a nasty bag of tricks. His weapon is Meisterbogen, a dual-phase Brave Bow and a very high base Atk of 38 to take advantage of it (and his superasset is in Atk too). But what really makes him mean is his Special, Njörun's Zeal, which is a 3-CD Galeforce with the stipulation that it self-inflicts the Gravity debuff after activating. This gives him a unique role as the only ranged unit in the game - with Cavalry movement no less - that has access to Galeforce, and the self-Gravity can be removed by an allied healer with Restore. Compounding on this is the S-Drink, Leif's unique B Skill that heals him to full HP and (more importantly) gives him a Special charge on Turn 1, so it's possible for him to activate Njörun's Zeal right away. With Atk/Res Push 4 and Def Smoke also in his base kit, Leif hits as much as 58 Atk out of the box with a superasset and can capitalize on a Def-7 debuff with Njörun's Zeal, which with allied buffs is more than enough to obliterate all but the hardiest supertanks from the word "Go".
• Claude, the master schemer and heir to the Leicester Alliance, has two versions that prove his mastery of schemes by being deceptively tricky to fight. Both are Flying archers with high Atk and Spd, and while their defenses seem low, he has many ways of bypassing this, turning him into a Lightning Bruiser. Claude can pull out all the stops with all sorts of powerful effects, particularly Damage Reduction and bypassing follow-up denial, to ensure that he'll reduce his foes to ashes and dust.
  • Legendary Claude wields Failnaught, which has -1 Special, and it grants him +5 to all stats and Null Follow-Up. His high Atk and Spd are complemented by Atk/Spd Catch 4 and Spd/Def Rein, but his unique skill Fallen Star is what makes him especially dangerous: when he initiates combat, he mitigates damage taken by his foe's first attack by 80%, letting him even shrug off opposing archers like it's nothing. After combat, he gains the Fallen Star effect as a status, providing the same Damage Reduction for either phase for the rest of that turn. His foe and any adjacent foes will also suffer Gravity, reducing their Mov to 1 for a turn. Having Claude engage you will almost always put you in a bad spot unless you can pierce through Fallen Star with effects like Deadeye, enemy phase Brave attacks, or simply outspeeding him. He can also improve his enemy phase with skills like Close Counter and Smoke 4 skills. Claude's player phase is not to be underestimated, although unless Fallen Star is active, his enemy phase isn't as strong.
  • Brave Claude takes a different approach with his Wind Parthia after it got refined. It grants him +5 to all stats, and he restores 50% of his max HP when his Special activates, letting him stay topped off to continue the fight. Before his refine, Fatal Smoke thrashed this effect, but now, he's able to mitigate 60% of Fatal Smoke's effect, meaning one way or another, Claude will be getting his healing off. His skill refine further improves this, as he gets another +5 to all stats, and the offense based parts of Null Follow-Up and Tempo, letting him get past follow-up denial and Guard. For good measure, he also gets 30% Damage Reduction if he has a [Bonus] active on him, which will also let him survive even better. Claude is versatile enough to go for pure offense, and he can put Windsweep and Watersweep to good use and still be able to double for safe engagements, but he can also tank pretty well too thanks to his self sustain. Like his Legendary version, he can also put Close Counter and Smoke 4 skills to great use, with Spd Smoke 4 basically letting him emulate Fallen Star to an extent, while also fulfilling the [Bonus] condition thanks to its Spd buff, and Atk Smoke 4 can instead doubles down on tanking and gives him a pseudo Null Follow-Up by letting him deny his foe's follow-up attacks while he's still able to get past any follow-up denial. Like the other Brave units, Claude was a free pick for any player before September of 2022, when the "A New Future" free summon event ended, and is accessible on banners that pop up around anniversaries or Hero Fests.

Duo and Harmonized Units

Introduced in Oct 2019, Duo Heroes are a special type of unit that feature two heroes, have a special once per map ability (which works in any mode) that can usually help a team immensely, and they are also treated as having a high base score for the purposes of Arena scoring, meaning they can just hop right into and help in those modes as well.

Harmonized Heroes on the other hand, also feature two heroes, but they hail from different games. While they don't have the high base score effect, they instead boost score in Resonant Battles, and they also have a once per map ability which affects any unit, including themselves, if they also originate from the same games in question. The range is global, allowing it to work from across the map.

Both types of units are incredible for support, and some are also formidable combatants.

Red Units

• Winter Altina and Sanaki. The founder of Begnion and her descendant are a Sword Infantry who can seemingly do it all. Altina has a very min maxed statline of 42 HP, 40 Atk, 18 Spd, 37 Def, and 39 Res, making her a Mighty Glacier. She dual wields both Ragnell and Alondite, granting her Distant Counter, and she can also strike twice consecutively on either phase, which gets past her low Spd. Her unique Special, shared with her Mythic version, is Twin Blades: a 2 charge Special that boosts damage by 40% of her Res, and it also cancels any non Special Damage Reduction skill, such as Close Call and the like. She has Null C-Disrupt to punish Firesweep and Dazzling Staff users, and Atk/Res Oath to further boost her Atk and Res. Her A skill is Atk/Res Unity, which grants +5 Atk and Res during combat if she's near an ally, and if she has any debuffs to those two stats, she gets an in combat boost equal to double the debuff, basically counteracting it. Debuff Altina at your peril, for a -7 Atk debuff means she gets +14 Atk during combat for a net gain of +7 Atk. With her Harmonized ability, Sanaki jumps in to grant the Begnion pair and any ally on the map who also hail from Tellius the Resonance: Blades effect, which grants +4 Atk and Spd, and for Altina herself, Vantage. While it's only for one turn, this means she can get the jump on pesky threats and just double strike them before they can even react, and with Null C-Disrupt, not even denying her counterattacks will work. As an Infantry unit, Altina can also wield all sorts of super Infantry skills like Fierce Breath or Time's Pulse to quickly charge Twin Blades, or Special Spiral so she can spam Twin Blades. The latter is especially notable as for one turn, she could Vantage her foes and spam Twin Blades at the same time to really menace her attackers. Her only real weakness is Hardy Bearing, which will put a stop to Vantage, but even then, she's still got pretty good defenses.
• Valentine Chrom and Male Robin. The leader of the Shepherds and his faithful Tactician, they're a Red Bow Infantry powerhouse with a Mighty Glacier statline with 40 HP/Def, 44 Atk, 27 Spd and 26 Res that also serves as a great support unit for Special-orientated units. Not only do they have Deadeye, but they have the skillkit to exploit it, as they have Close Salvo and Time's Pulse alongside Legendary Chrom's To Change Fate!, but their Destiny Bow is the binding that brings it all together. Destiny's Bow gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, effective against Armored and Flying units, gives them +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat and a guaranteed follow-up attack if they either initiate combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, but most importantly if they either use or are the target of a movement assist skills once per turn and it is turns 1 to 4, they give themselves and that ally -1 special cooldown. This means that not only will Time's Pulse charge Deadeye to 1 cooldown, but them using To Change Fate! will fully charge it as well as help their target ally closer or even fully charging their special as well, and the +6 Atk and Extra Turn to potentially One-Hit Kill all but the toughest tanks in their sights, and all of that is before any Elite Tweaks. Finally, their Duo Skill, while inflicting -5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to themselves and all allies within 2 spaces of them, is actually a Deliberate Injury Gambit as they also grants [Grand Strategy] to themselves and all those allies, where [Grand Strategy] basically reverses any field stat debuffs the user has, while also keeping those "debuffs" until the start of their next turn, meaning any additional field stat debuffs they get from their foes will actually makes them stronger.
• Summer Edelgard and Altina. The emperors of summer make up a Sword Armor Mighty Glacier with 46 HP, 45 Atk, 17 Spd, 43 Def and 39 Res, and the both of them bring their gimmicks together and then some, coming prepacked with Glimmer, Atk/Def Ideal 4, and Legendary Edelgard's Raging Storm, with their Assault Troop 3 and Regal Sunshade bringing it all together. Assault Troop grant them [Charge] at the start of their turn if either they're at full HP or there is a foe within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on them, where [Charge] allows them to move up to 3 spaces in cardinal directions, and said movement acts as a warp effect, which means that movement is not hindered by [Gravity] or [Stall], and Regal Sunshade gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, and if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, they gain +6 Atk, inflict -6 Atk on the foe during combat, reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 40%, and if there is a certain amount of foes or more compared to the total amount of current foes on the enemy team within 3 rows or 3 columns^note 1 if 2 or less foes, 2 if 3 to 5, 3 if 6 or more, they can attack twice in one round. That alone makes them insane, but things get better if they inherit Galeforce, as they will get 2 Extra Turns, and with additional dancer support, they have a good change to perform a Total Party Kill. Finally, their Harmonized skill grants them and all allies that share their Fire Emblem titles +6 Atk, [Resonance: Shields] and [Bonus Doubler], turning themselves and their allies into powerhouses.

Blue Units

• Ephraim and Lyon. A Lance Infantry Duo Hero, Ephraim and Lyon are basically a better vanilla Ephraim stat-wise: their weapon Reginleif grants Atk+3, is effective against Armor and Cavalry, and guarantees a follow-up attack if either their Atk is higher than the foe's or they have +1 movement. This is simple task with a high base Atk of 39, and it's also a superasset to boot. All of their skills emphasize this playstyle: Lull Atk/Def 3, Odd Atk Wave 3 and Heavy Blade 4 make for a deadly mix, giving Ephraim and Lyon a functional 76 Atk on their own merits with a superasset, compounded on by Draconic Aura (which with Heavy Blade can trigger on the second attack if they're countered). Even better is with their refine for their Reginleif, where the refined version now make them unhindered by forest tiles and gives them +4 to all their stats if they have either higher Atk than their foe at the start of combat or have a [Bonus] active on them, on top of giving them guaranteed follow-up if they have either higher Atk than their foe during combat or have a [Bonus] active them them, and the unique refine basically grants Even Tempest 3, Canto (Rem. +1) if they have a [Bonus], and gives them an additional +4 to all their stats and prevent the foe from making a follow-up attack if they are at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, granting them great damage, bulk, and mobility. In addition to this huge offensive presence, they also have an incredible Duo ability. Their Duo Skill has Ephraim/Lyon grant themselves and all Infantry/Armor allies within two spaces an extra space of movement. This doesn't sound like much on paper, but remember how small FEH maps are and how many battles are decided by situations like, "If only my Reposition/Dance/tank unit could move one more space..." That one turn where everyone has extra movement is all the player needs to change a match from a disaster to a victory, and unlike Legendary Azura the Duo Skill doesn't consume their turn. While previously very rare, the 2022 Anniversary update made them a 4-Star special unit, upping their rarity a considerable deal compared to before.
• New Year's Alfonse and Sharena. Alfonse is a Blue Tome Infantry with a very min maxed statline, with good to great stats all around with Spd being a Dump Stat. Which is all fine and good, since his weapon, Imbued Koma, has -1 maximum special cooldown, and if his Special is ready, it grants him +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and prevents the foe from making a follow up attack. His Duo ability has him and Sharena grant 2 Special charges to themselves and any Infantry ally within three rows and columns of them. This helps support their team immensely, especially through a combination of Pulse type skills, allowing for all sorts of shenanigans like instantly charged Galeforces or setting up other Special Spiral spammers. This ability also charges up Alfonse's unique Special, Open the Future, which is essentially Bonfire + Noontime, dealing damage equal to 50% of Alfonse's Def and healing HP equal to 25% of the damage dealt. With Special Spiral in Alfonse's base kit, he can spam this constantly for high damage, keep himself topped off, and with his natural Close Counter, high defensive stats (bolstered through his weapon), and his Def/Res Oath 3, he can also tank and take hits just fine too. Skills such as Null Follow-Up, Witchy Wand+/Melancholy+, and Pulse Smoke will ruin his day though.
• Summer Thórr and Loki. The gods of summer, they're a Blue Tome Flier with a Squishy Wizard statline of 40 HP, 43 Atk, 17 Spd, 30 Def and 38 Res, and they have the skills to exploit it. They have Blazing Thunder, Still Water 4, A/R Far Trace 3 and regular Thórr's Worldbreaker, and their Divine Whimsy brings it all together. Divine Whimsy grants them -1 maximum special cooldown, grants them +6 Atk and inflicts -6 Atk on the foe during combat if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, grants -1 special cooldown at the start of their turns if they're within 2 spaces of an ally, and inflicts [Stall] and [Exposure] to the foe with the lowest Spd and all foes within 2 spaces of that foe at the start of their turn, where [Exposure] has the one inflicted with it receive +10 damage per attack. Not only they're an AoE nuker that can charge it up on their next turn if they attacked, but they also a great support unit that will help allies charge their specials up and boost their attacks, especially those that can attack twice. Finally, their Duo skill not only inflict [Gravity] on foes in cardinal directions of them, but they will remove any [Bonus] the foe has active within 5 rows or 5 columns centered on them, which has a good chance to weaken enemies, especially those that rely on bonuses to activate their skills. Of course, one strong arrow shot can take them down with ease, so one should be careful of archers.
• Young Duo Mark & Lyn. They're a walking debuff bot that punishes enemies that group up, as their Total War Tome gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, inflicts -5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res, [Stall] and [Sabotage] to the nearest foes within 5 spaces of them and all foes within 2 spaces of those foes at the start of their turn, and if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat they inflict -5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res on the foe during combat, grants them a guaranteed follow-up attack and if there is a field stat debuff on any foe within 2 spaces of the target they ignore skills that inflict -X special buildup per attack on them. Alongside their Sabotage A/R 3 further debuffing the foe's Atk/Res, they inflict massive debuffs on the foe, even if said foe can ignore field stat debuffs during combat, as Sabotage A/R 3 and [Sabotage] also calculates field stat debuffs on foes within 2 spaces of that foe, meaning that not even Save units are safe from them. What's more is that their Duo Skill inflicts +2 special cooldown, [Isolation] and [Guard] on all foes within 3 rows or 3 columns centered on them when it activates, making them total menaces that depend on pre-charged specials and Assists with the right timing.

Green Units

• New Year's Peony and Triandra. The two álfars join together to serve pretty much the same role as regular Peony does: fly around, support, refresh, and grant the Warp status^note  In which the user can warp to a space adjacent to any ally within two spaces to any allies. This Peony is pretty much just a green, non Mythic version of herself, which means she isn't limited to just Light season. Her weapon, Bond of the Álfar, grants +6 Atk to any ally within a cardinal direction of her during combat. She keeps the same refresh ability as her Mythic self in Gentle Dream, and her Duo ability has Peony and Triandra both refresh an adjacent ally who has the highest HP, while also granting them the same effects as Gentle Dream. Notably, this will work on another refresher ally, which makes Peony and Triandra a refresher that can refresh a refresher^note  to highlight just how dumb this is, if you run 3 copies of Duo Peony plus one non-refresher unit, it is possible for the non-refresher unit to take a whopping 7 actions in a single turn (8 with Galeforce and 9 for Legendary Edelgard with Raging Storm and Galeforce) by dancing 3 times and using Duo skill 3 times. They could also just use it to refresh a regular ally twice, provided they can stay in range of the Duo ability. This ability will only affect one ally at a time however, and if multiple allies meet the condition, then it just will not work.
• Ninja Female Corrin and Elise take the 'A Hero Rises' winning formula and largely improve on it (Ninja Reinhardt anyone?). She has a 38/41/40/23/20 stat line (with her weapon 49 Atk, 44 Spd, 19 Def, 16 Res), which is par for a Glass Cannon ninja unit. On top of the usual (for ninja weapons) Brave effect and stat adjustments, her Ninja Scrolls will if she outspeed her enemy add 70% of the Spd difference (up to 7) true damage to her attacks. Her assist is Rally Up Def+, allowing her to buff clustered allies (not herself) Her Slot A is Atk/Spd push 4 (boosts her in-combat Atk/Spd by 7 as long as she has 25 perfect or higher HP but with a recoil). Her Slot B is S/R Far Trace 3 (Enemy's Spd/Res -3 in combat plus Canto), Slot C is Joint Drive Atk (+4 in-combat At to allies within two places and +4 in-combat Atk to unit if an ally is within two spaces). Her Duo skill is being able to act again after being in combat. While she doesn't have a special, giving her Moonbow shouldn't be difficult. In optimal conditions, she'll be able to have 63 final Atk and 54 final Spd. Being the winner of the 2022 A Hero Rises contest, she will be a freebie as well being able to spark her in the banner.
• Spring Harmonized Karla and Freyja. Their Sisterly War Axe gives them -1 maximum special cooldown, grants -2 special cooldown at the start of odd turns, and if they either initiate combat or are within 2 spaces of an ally, they get +6 Atk/Spd during combat, deals damage equal to 20% + 10% for each point of their maximum special cooldown when they trigger their special during combat, and when they trigger their special during combat they ignore non-Special damage reduction effects and disable the foe's specials that trigger when they attack. When their special is not ready their Harmonized Skill gives them and all allies that are from The Blazing Blade and Heroes -2 special cooldown, +6 Atk and [Resonance: Blades]. With all of that, they're a walking delete button as they can deal massive damage to one-shot many units.

Colourless Units

• Bridal Micaiah and Sothe. Micaiah, the beloved bride, is a Colourless Tome Flier, and basically plays out how any other Micaiah does: high Atk, high Res, and dual effectiveness on Armours and Cavalry. Her being colourless means she'll have a neutral matchup against most units, letting her decimate her foes without having to worry about the weapon triangle. When she uses her Duo skill, she and Sothe grant the Dominance status to themselves and any ally within three columns of themselves, while also debuffing any foe in that range for -7 Def and Res. Dominance allows the user to deal damage equal to the total penalties on the foe. So with just that alone, that's 21 extra damage: 7 damage by hitting the weakened defenses, and an extra 14 damage by adding those penalties to the damage. Using other types of debuffs like Sabotage, Ruse, Ploys, or even the Temari+ dagger or Brave Micaiah's Yune's Whispers, you can get the Atk and Spd debuffs to add on the damage. The beauty of this Duo skill however, is that all of this extra damage true damage. This effect allows you to tear through enemy defenses, and while it's only active for one turn, that one turn might be all you need to engage a really tough map with a super tank. When facing an opponent that has -7 to all stats for instance, that's a guaranteed 28 damage in addition to however much you'd normally do. ^note To show off the power of this ability, this image◊ became infamous, showing a Lv 1 Donnel annihilate a Legendary Edelgard, an incredibly sturdy Axe Armour tank.
• Ninja Lyn and Florina. Lyn is a Colorless Dagger Flying who, like the other Ninjas, is all about striking twice and being fast. She has a very high 38 Atk (42 Atk if she's +Atk), and 42 Spd, and that's pretty much all she needs. Her weapon is the Tailwind Shuriken, which has -1 Special, strikes twice when initiating combat, and grants +4 Spd, but reduces her Def and Res by -4. With Swift Sparrow 3, Chill Atk/Def 2, Spd/Def Rein 3, and Moonbow, she'll hit quite hard. She's notably the first unit to have a -1 Special Brave weapon, letting a Special like Moonbow activate on the second hit. At base, with all those skills active, factoring in the debuffs, that's effectively 62 Atk striking twice. Unlike prior Duo Heroes, Lyn's Duo ability is selfish, but still very powerful: Florina jumps in to grant Lyn an extra turn to move, but only if Lyn has entered combat at least once that turn. A self refresh on command is an incredible effect, letting her either hit and run or continue her assault. In essence, it's like a pseudo Galeforce, which ranged units notably cannot really use. This ability can let Lyn perform "Lynjaforce" ^note  A set up that allows Lyn to ravage an opponent's Aether Raids defense team by safely engaging with Disarm Trap, striking twice with her weapon, and taking recoil damage from Fury, dealing splash damage with Savage Blow, and with enough recoil damage from repeated engagements thanks to other refreshers and her self-refresh, she becomes a Wings of Mercy beacon for Galeforce units to fly in and finish the job. . Since she's as strong as if not stronger than a good invested ranged unit with just her two strikes, she can wield other B skills like Windsweep so that she can be a pain to deal with in the AI's hands, Desperation to quadruple strike enemies in Player Versus Environment content, or a Flier mobility skill to help her move around better. As the victor of 2021's A Hero Rises event, she became free to every player for a brief period of time that year, making her accessible to many players.
• Scion Leif and Seliph. With Seliph in tow, he's similar to his legendary self, but with some tweaks. With a 40/40/41/27/20 statline, he is more clear about his player phase role as he has more speed but less bulk compared to his legendary self. He's blessible to boot. His Weapon, Bow of Twelve has 14 Mt, -1 Special, Canto (1), and it grants +5 to all stats if initiating or in combat with a tome or staff user while having 75% HP or more. It also has a Miracle effect (once per combat provided unit has more than 1 HP) under those same conditions. His special is Njörun's Zeal (same as his Legendary self, 2 Cooldown due to weapon). His A slot skill is Atk/Spd Catch 4 (+7 in-combat buff to both stats if the target is at full HP or has a field debuff of any kind. If both apply, then the bonus increases to +9). His B Slot is naturally S Drink (At Start of Map, recover 99 HP and reduce cooldown by 1). C Slot is Pulse smoke 3 (After combat, Target and all enemy units in 2 space radius get +1 to special cooldown up to the max of the special). His Harmonic Skill gives Resonance: Blades (Atk/Spd+4) and the desperation effect (Unit can make their follow-up attack before the enemy counters) to unit and others from the two series. This is a powerful effect given how units in both series are either fast and/or have the Brave effect. In optimal conditions, he can reach 63-67 Atk and 50 Spd. That combined with Canto and his special, he has considerable ability to move after attacking with healer support. And the Miracle effect helps ensures he can retreat after an attack gone wrong.
• Winter Lysithea and Lute. This sweets-loving duo are a Colorless Tome Cavalry Glass Cannon with 38 HP, 42 Atk, 40 Spd, 19 Def and 23 Res, and they bring Moonbow, Swift Sparrow 3, A/R Far Trace 3 and C Feud 3, all brought together with their Sweet Yule Log. Sweet Yule Log give them -1 maximum special cooldown, and if they're at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, they get +6 Atk/Spd during combat and if they initiate combat they either perform any follow-up attacks before the foe can counterattack if they have 9 or less Spd higher than the foe during combat or can attack twice in one round if they have 10 or more Spd than the foe during combat. Because of that, they can at least double attack and trigger their Moonbow with their second attack if they can double attack, making them a Colorless version of Reinhardt. Not only that, but their Harmonized skill grants them and all allies from Three Houses and The Sacred Stones +6 Atk, [Resonance: Blades] and [Bonus Doubler], allowing them and those allies to hit harder. Of course, one should be careful with their Glass Cannon statline as any attacks they receive has a good chance to take them down, and against foes that are fast enough to negate their Sweet Yule Log's double attack abilities.

Support Units

Some units aren't the strongest combatants but instead can provide immense support to the team, often providing great utility or buffs to other, more or equally powerful units.

Red Units

• Legendary and Young Eliwood. At first glance they seem like strong yet bog-standard Sword Cavaliers, but it's in their support skills that they start getting scary, granting +6 Atk/Spd/Def, [Bonus Doubler] and [Null Panic] the highest Atk allies and themselves at the start of their turns with the former's Ardent Durandal and Vision of Arcadia II and the latter's Inborn Idealism, with Legendary Eliwood also granting [Canto (1)]. If they need to enter the fray as well, they are no slouches either, with Legendary Eliwood having his refined Ardent Durandal gives him up to +8 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat, ignores any of the foe's field stat buffs during combat and deals extra damage equal to 15% of the foe's Def and, Death Blow 4 and Flow Refresh 3, and Young Eliwood's Fiery War Sword granting -1 max special cooldown, and granting him +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat and +3 Atk/Spd/Def/Res during combat for each [Bonus] active on him that is not field stat buffs, up to +17 total, ignore skills that deny any of his follow-up attacks and guarantee the foe's follow-up attacks and reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 40%. They come with everything they need to turn the strongest ally on his team into a monster, or possibly multiple allies if they're tied for the highest Atk on the team.
• Phina, the series' original dancer (and to date, the only FE 1/3 dancer, to boot), puts a refreshing spin on the aged "Sword Infantry Dancer" archetype. Revisiting the old Development Gag from Mystery of the Emblem that was excised in its remake, Phina wields the Rapier, the classic Lord weapon with Anti-Armor and Anti-Cavalry built in. Phina's Rapier in Heroes not only retains these qualities, but adds Spd+3 and most importantly Vantage to the mix to counterattack immediately if her HP is below 75%, and she has a decent 35 Atk / 37 Spd base statline which which to use it. Having a free B slot as an Infantry already makes her very versatile, but having Dance at the same time is what pushes Phina from "great" to "fantastic" as her Action Initiative on Enemy Phase lets her Dance on Player Phase without worry, ensuring she rarely wastes a turn. She has only continued to age well as Infantry units get more skills; with goodies like Special Spiral and the Distant Counter derivatives, it's not uncommon to watch Phina tear through half an Infernal- or even Abyssal-level map on her own, while her Dance enables her allies to deal with the foes she can't. She shines even in the current metagame, as many meta-level threats are Armored and Cavalry that her Rapier will have bonus damage against, including a fair few listed on this page.
• Festival Micaiah. She's a Red Tome Infantry refresher who boasts a good 34 Atk and great 34 Res, and while all her other stats are poor, those two stats are all she needs. Her main job will be to refresh her allies, but should she decide to step in to the fray, she has a few tricks up her sleeve. Her Dawn Suzu tome grants her an extra +3 Atk, and it's effective against Armour and Cavalry units. It also has Hardy Bearing built in, which can actually help her take down an opponent who's attempting to thwart her team with Vantage. This is especially helpful if she's ran on an Aether Raids defense team, and her low HP can actually lend well to Infantry Pulse setups, which can quickly charge her Special to destroy something. Her high Res also means she can make great use of Sabotage or Ploy skills to debuff her foes, further supporting her allies. In a few ways, she compares and contrasts with Phina up above. ^{For instance...} They're both Red Infantry refreshers with dual effectiveness, but Phina can put up a fight on the enemy phase thanks to her innate Vantage, which also frees up her B slot, while she can focus on refreshing on the player phase. Micaiah can instead bypass enemy Vantage, and her work is pretty much just done on the player phase, whether it comes to nuking at a range or choosing to refresh.

Blue Units

• Legendary Azura. She is, bar none, one of the best refreshers in the entire game, due to her two incredible unique skills. The first is her weapon, Prayer Wheel, which takes her refresh target's highest stat buff and applies it to all of their stats ^note (i.e. if they receive/have Atk+6, they will gain Atk/Spd/Def/Res+6 upon being refreshed). The second is her unique refresh skill, Gray Waves, which if used on an Infantry or Flier ally gives them an extra space of movement (i.e. 2 spaces becomes 3 spaces). This double whammy can turn the right ally into an utter monster, such as -blade tomes or Galeforce rushers, especially since most debuffs they might suffer will have fallen off after being refreshed^* (the only exception is weapons or skills that inflict debuffs right after combat, like Daggers or the "Seal (stat)" skills). She also comes with Atk Tactic to emphasize this playstyle, though if the team composition doesn't allow for that, Hone/Fortify skills or Dance-based Sacred Seals work just as well. The latter of which is especially notable, since she could use say, Torrent Dance to grant +5 Res to an ally, which then becomes +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res all on command, which would get past the restrictions of the other buffing skills. Finally, since she's a Flier, she can use all sorts of skills that improve the mobility of either her or her allies. She even comes with one in Aerobatics, intended to be used with her Atk Tactic 3. Her remix in March 2022 doesn't dramatically boost her supportive abilities, but it does allow her to handle other things. Her weapon's refine gives all allies within 2 spaces of her with +6 Spd at the start of her turn (allowing her to self-sufficiently use her weapon's buffing effect and use her C slot for something else), +5 Atk/Spd during combat, and the Triangle Adept effect, which means her AI is less likely to attack green units^explanation Dance unit AI will only attack an enemy over dancing a nearby ally if they can do more than 5 damage and better win favorable match ups. She also receives Gray Waves II which adds [Null Panic] to the effect. She also gets Atk/Spd Push 4, which maybe be useful if you want more of an offensive use for her. Being in the remix pool, she is sparkable by all.
• Peony challenges Azura for title of best refresher, because while Azura's refresh immensely boosts a single unit, Peony's refresh can instead help out the entire team. Her weapon, Flower of Joy, grants +3 Atk/Spd during combat to any ally that's in a cardinal direction of her, meaning she can stay far, far from the action and still support and buff her allies. When she uses her unique refresh, Gentle Dream, she grants +3 to all stats to the refreshed ally, as well as the Warp status ^note Which allows the unit to move to a space adjacent to any ally within two spaces. However, she also grants this effect to any other ally that's in cardinal directions of both her and the refreshed ally. While this means positioning is even more important, it also means that in a single action, she could grant a stat and mobility boost to her entire team, and still be able to support her team from very far away. Aside from that, she's basically like Azura, right down to sharing her B Duel Flying skill so she'll score well in Arena modes, and Aerobatics to help her reach her more grounded allies better. The best part is, she's available to every player, being a free unit, given to the player at the start of Book IV.
• Brave Lucina. She's a Lance Infantry that offers incredible utility and support to her allies. Her lance, Geirskögul, when given the unique refine, grants +3 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to her nearby allies, though only if they wield a physical weapon (swords, lances, axes, bows, daggers, Beasts). Additionally, she also grants said allies a Breath effect, which grants them an extra Special charge per attack when their foe initiates combat. She essentially has a Drive All + Drive Breath for her physical allies. The former is already good enough, since +3 to all stats is a simple but effective boost, but she opens the door for many types of units that don't normally get to enjoy Special acceleration, and all just by standing near them. The fact that it works from 2 spaces away also means she can keep her distance from Beast allies, allowing them to stay transformed but still take advantage of the effect. To top it all off, the lance is also effective against dragons, so Lucina can step in to slay a troublesome dragon enemy if she feels the need to. What sells her is that as a Brave Hero, she has appeared as a guaranteed summon, and especially notable is that she goes like butter on bread with Brave Ike who can be acquired separately from the Heroes' Path quests.
• New Year's Velouria, a Blue Beast Infantry who can either work well as either a support or a carry. Her weapon is Renewed Fang, which has -1 Special, and grants the Breath effect^note Grants the user an extra Special charge for every attack dealt during combat to herself and her support partner. While Brave Lucina can do something similar and give a few extra stats, her effect only works on physical allies, and it only works on the enemy phase. Velouria on the other hand, can support a Mage or a Dragon ally, allowing them to take advantage of the effect, and it'd work on either phase. The best part is, Velouria can take full advantage of this effect herself: since she also gets the Breath effect, she can put up a fight, as she comes with Distant Counter and Null Follow Up, and she inflicts -6 Atk and Spd on her foe during combat when her support partner is nearby. With Sol in her base kit and a -1 Special weapon, she has a ready made enemy phase kit to help her tank.

Green Units

• Reyson, as well as his sister Leanne, are near identical in function, so this entry will cover these two units at once, and their differences will be outlined afterwards. The two Heron siblings are Flying Beast refreshers, and the two wield the Heron Wing weapon, which grants them both an extra +3 Spd, and it heals 7 HP to any ally within two spaces of them at the start of the turn. This is incredibly helpful in any mode, patching up chip damage (like Duma's Upheaval(+) in Aether Raids, or getting hit by Savage Blow), and in maps where the player can stall and take their time, they can heal a team back up to full health. As Flying Beasts, when they transform, they gain +1 Mov, meaning they become 3 Mov refreshers, letting them reach their allies way more easily. This does come with a team composition restriction however. On teams where transformation isn't so feasible, they can still take advantage of the multitude of Flier mobility skills they have access to. Now, the differences: Leanne is colourless, and has more Res to take better magical hits, and she can use the likes of Sabotages or Ploys better. Reyson is green, and is more of a Jack of All Stats, but he's also a 4* summon, so he's more accessible than his sister. Other than that, the two basically function the same, and are both very helpful units to have around.
• Legendary Male Byleth, gifted with the power of the goddess, assumes his Enlightened One class as a Green Tome Infantry. Like the other Byleths, he's got Null Follow-Up, ensuring that no follow up manipulation can get past him, but what makes him stand out is that he gives Null Follow-Up to any ally within two spaces, cementing him as an excellent support role. Units that normally can't use it, like Fliers or Cavalry, can now take advantage of such a powerful ability, although they do need to meet a Spd check, while also staying near him. Still, this means they can use skills like Windsweep or Watersweep (something even shown in Byleth's Legendary Hero Battle) to great use. Byleth himself is also no slouch in combat, acting as a perfect check to some troublesome opponents. With his Professorial Text granting -1 Special, his unique Special in Sublime Heaven, and Time's Pulse to always insta-charge it at the start of each turn, Byleth will show anyone he stands against something to believe in. Sublime Heaven boosts Byleth's damage by 25% of his Atk, or 50% of his Atk against a Dragon or Beast, and it pierces through any non Special Damage Reduction skill like Spurn or Close Call. ^{Incidentally...} These capabilities make Byleth a great hard counter to basically every 3H Lord and Seiros/Rhea outside of Summer Edelgard, several of which are Game-Breaker units themselves, as most of them boast Damage Reduction and/or follow up manipulation, and two of them take extra damage from Sublime Heaven.
• Ymir, the Dragon of the Realm of Life, will make sure that your units will stay alive. Her Everliving Breath, while giving her +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and a guaranteed follow-up attack if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat to make her a good combat unit, also has the effect of healing 10 HP and removing any [Penalty] active on all allies within 2 spaces of her and her target ally, including herself, if either she uses or is the target of either Rally or movement assist skills, helped with her Rally Up Atk+, and her Everliving Domain has the effect of granting +4 Def/Res to herself and all allies within 2 spaces of her if there is an ally within 2 spaces of her, but more importantly allows them to have a Last Chance Hit Point if they're at 75% HP or above before a lethal attack. The last effect basically prevents allies from being One Hit Killed, especially if those units have their devastating special ready, giving that ally a chance to retaliate.
• Yune, once was one of the worse Mythic heroes, now was Rescued from the Scrappy Heap with her Remix in update 6.11.0, where initially her Chaos Named had an awkward effect of just inflicting -5 to the foe's highest stat, treating Atk as if it was -15, if the foe has 3 or more less Res than her and is within 3 columns of her at the start of her turn, now has Chaos Named+ basically be a souped up Chill Spectrum, where it inflicts -7 Atk, Spd, Def or Res to the foe with the highest specific stat and any foes within 2 spaces of that foe, as well as inflict Panic to those highest stat foes at the start of her turn, making her a superb debuff bot simply by existing and actively punishing teams that group up together. Even better is with her refined Chaos Manifest, where the unique refine makes her deal true damage equal to the highest total stat debuffs of either the foe or all foes within 2 spaces of that foe, and if she initiates combat reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by a percentage equal to double the same condition as the true damage mentioned beforehand, so with her Chaos Named+, she can deal 28 damage per attack and reduces damage taken from the foe's first attack by 56%, but what gets ridiculous is that stats inverted by Panic stacks with the standalone debuffs as well, so with +6 Atk/Spd/Def/Res on the foe and is affected by Panic, that's 24 true damage and 48% damage reduced, so combined that together and you got someone dealing 52 damage per attack and 104% damage reduced from the foe's first attack, making her a great nuker if she needs to enter the fray as well and gets out of it unfazed if everything is in her favor, and even the foe having penalty neutralization won't bypass that with her selecting a debuffed foe near them instead to calculate her true damage and damage reduction.
• Heiðr is one of, if not the best Rally support units thanks to her unique Assist skill Gold Serpent, which acts as Rally Atk/Spd on steroids, granting more Atk and Spd and effects as the battle progresses, and she gets those same effects for herself too. Her eponymous tome has a spectrum Ruse built in ^note inflicts -4 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and Guard on foes within cardinal directions of Heiðr and her target ally after using a Rally Assist, while Gold Serpent is treated as a Rally Assist for this purpose, and she can even move again after using it. On turn 1, it only grants +2 Atk/Spd. On turn 2, it grants +4 Atk/Spd, as well as [Canto (1)], which is excellent for positioning and mobility. On turn 3, it grants +6 Atk/Spd, [Canto (1)], and [Treachery], which deals damage equal to the total bonuses on your unit. This means you'll deal at least 12 damage, and that can get even higher if another unit provides the Def and Res buffs. And on turn 4 and onward, it grants +8 Atk/Spd, [Canto (1)], [Treachery], and [Dual Strike], which lets you strike twice consecutively if you initiate combat while next to another ally with the same status (which Heiðr is also granted just as she provides it). The damage output that Heiðr can help provide is immense, because if you have a +6 Def and Res buff (provided by say, Elimine, or Def Tactic and Res Tactic together, or however else), that means you can deal 28 damage twice in a row, well above the average HP of 40, and that's not even considering the fact that you've likely Rused the enemy too. Heiðr herself is no pushover in combat either, because she's also getting all of these effects, and with her innate Mag. Null Follow, which can pierce through half of any non-Special Damage Reduction skill, there's really not a lot that could withstand such powerful attacks. That's not even all either, because she also has Panic Smoke 4, which inflicts -3 Atk/Spd/Def/Res on the target and nearby foes, grants [Foe Penalty Doubler] ^note inflicts an in combat debuff equal to any penalty the foe has to herself and allies within cardinal directions, so cleaning up the other enemies becomes a breeze. With a lot of buffs, statuses, debuffs, and the ability to keep moving after using her unique Assist all at her disposal, Heiðr offers an incredible amount of support and power.

Colourless Units

• Bridal Fjorm is a Staff Flying who has the ability to completely shut down the use of Assists that the opponent might use. Her high 42 HP works well with her staff, Gjallarbrú, which inflicts [Isolation] on any enemies in a cardinal direction from her as long as her HP is greater than theirs by at least 3 with the unrefined version, and just more HP with the refined version, and the unique refine also gives all allies within 2 spaces of her +4 Atk/Spd and ignores any field stat debuffs they have during combat. [Isolation] prevents the afflicted unit from using Assists or being the target of Assists, shutting down enemy refreshers, Rallies, enemy healers, and even movement assists, basically forcing the enemy just to move and even be forced to attack an enemy in range if there are any. This is mainly for Aether Raids, where such tactics such as Rally or Restore traps can threaten opposing players. In Player Versus Environment maps, this effect might not be helpful, or even possible, but thankfully, Fjorm can just inherit one of many staffs to either send the enemy to disarray with statuses, or help support her team in more conventional ways. She comes with Dazzling Staff naturally, letting her disrupt foes with no fear, and then her flight lets her flee to safety afterwards. While she can shine on Flier teams, she can also shine on regular teams thanks to her newly introduced Ground Orders skill, which grants Infantry, Cavalry, and Armour units the ability to warp to a space adjacent to any nearby ally, improving their mobility considerably.
• Mila. The Goddess of Zofia weighs in as a Colorless Infantry Dragon with a Light Mythic blessing. She comes with a decent 53 Atk and huge 44 Def / 41 Res out of the box that you might expect from an Armored unit, but is so much worse to face because she isn't an Armored unit and thus can't have that weakness exploited. She also comes with Bracing Stance 3 and Sabotage Atk 3, so nothing short of a heavy damage dealer or another Enemy Phase tank can hope to scratch her. The rest of her kit however is weighted to support, and she has plenty of it: her Nurturing Breath would be a bog standard Breath weapon that happens to give her +3 Def, were not for granting +2 to all allies' stats during combat within a 7x7 space radius around her. But better still is her Mila's Turnwheel C skill which inflicts Isolation on enemies in cardinal directions, though unlike Bridal Fjorm who targets HP, Mila flexes her titanic Def stat to apply it and only needs it to be 1 point higher than the enemy's, which is much harder to challenge. Mila's Turnwheel also grants an Aether Raids-specific boon where she'll increase the turn limit by 1 if deployed on an Offense team (i.e. 7 turns becomes 8), which heavily incentivizes her role in the metagame to shut down Defense teams that rely on refreshers. Mila's sole weakness is that she is ridiculously slow at 17 Spd and can't get any follow-up denial as a Infantry, so a unit that can successfully breach her defenses will put a stop to her Team Mom-esque shenanigans very quickly.
• Flayn. She's a Staff Flying who wields the Caduceus staff, which has a very powerful effect: any allies near her receive 30% less damage during combat. Simply by being near her allies, they get a free, always active Sacred Cowl and Escutcheon. While the damage reduction B skills (like Close Call and Spurn) mitigate up to 40% damage, they are usually still reliant on some sort of stat check, and being in the B slot, that prevents said units from using other skills that can give them an edge during combat. But by standing near Flayn, their damage reduction is covered albeit at 30%, although she could equip C skills or Seals to further protect her allies. Also, units that can't even use damage reduction B skills, like Fliers (Guard Bearing aside) or Armours get to enjoy having their damage mitigated.
• Yuri. Also known as King of Summoner Duels. He's a Colorless Dagger Infantry with a 40/39/43/26/29 (neutral) statline but the main reason isn't so much his in-combat ability (not that it's lacking), but his kit giving him quite the bag of tricks. His weapon Honorable Blade has a number of powerful effects. Plus one movement at the start of turn, special cooldown acceleration, +6 Atk/Spd if his foe is at 50% HP or above at the start of combat, and [Canto (2)]. This is on top of the standard Dagger 7 effect. The other main reason is Foul Play; basically Swap with a range of 3. With the effects of both weapons and this, he can do various movement and repositioning stunts. While he only has an A and C slot skill, they're pretty good. C Duel Infantry 4 adds 5/2/2/2/2 to his stats, and Time's Pulse 3, which combined with his weapon allows Glimmer spam. Under the best conditions at base, he'd have 47 Atk (54 if the target got daggered previously) and 51 Spd. At base, he's only stonewalled by particularly tanky units, but that's nothing that tweaks can't fix either with Lethality or AoE specials. Other tweaks can easily increase his support abilities. He's a normal pool unit meaning you have chances to get him and he is in the Feb 2022 Hero Fest.
• Elimine, as a Staff Flying, is very similar to the above Flayn, but thanks to being a Mythic Hero of Astra, she brings a few more perks. Her Holy Ground grants all allies within 2 spaces of her +4 Def/Res during combat and reduces damage taken from attacks by 30%, and her Staff of the Saint not only grants +6 Def/Res to all allies within 2 spaces of her at the start of her turn, but also inflicts [False Start] to foes in cardinal directions of her if she has more Res than that foe, where [False Start] negates start of turn effects from activating. Those two skills alone makes not only a good support unit that toughens the the defenses of allies, but she also dulls any defense teams in Aether Raids that rely on start of turn effects from one unit, including the infamous [Triangle Attack] and [Guidance] from Harmonized Bridal Catria & Thea's Wedding-Bell Axe.
• Fallen Maria. She is a walking Life Unending for an ally, where her Sacrifice Staff grants her -1 maximum special cooldown, prevents the foe from counterattacking, grants her +5 Atk/Spd/Def/Res and ignore skills that inflicts -X special buildup per attack on her if she either initiates combat or is within 2 spaces of an ally, and grants +4 Atk/Spd/Def/Res to all allies within 2 spaces of her during combat, and, once per map, grants the Miracle effect and restores 99 HP to an ally if that ally is going to die. Already great with her extending the durability of an ally, especially a tank, and often losing one of your units spell an end to your run in all competitive modes, so having a Life Unending effect on that ally is the difference between victory and defeat. She also is no slouch in combat as she also has Holy Panic, Atk/Spd Unity and Poetic Justice to dish out pain and debuffs.

Types of Units

• Refresher units. These are units who can allow another ally to act again through the use of Sing or Dance. Just like in the main series, the ability for a unit to act again is absolutely invaluable, especially when the player has one of the units listed on this page that can defeat many opposing units. Refreshers are inherently great at support, and often run Wings of Mercy to let them warp to injured allies. Flying refreshers can take advantage of mobility skills like Aerobatics or Guidance to either let them reach their allies more easily or vice versa, while some other refreshers even have unique refresh abilities like any of the álfars, granting a refresh and usually some status buff on allies or debuff on foes. Even common refreshers shouldn't be underestimated; ones like Sylvia or Tethys who can be merged up easily, the former having a massive HP pool and the latter having massive Res which can both be used to easily spread debuffs with the right skills.
• Save tanks. The Save skill, introduced on the Valentine's 2021 banner, allows an Armoured unit to take the place of an ally whenever they're under attack. Far Save lets the unit protect their allies from ranged attacks, while Near Save does the same but for melee attacks. Ever since then, Armoured units have mostly shifted into this role, protecting the team from harm. They just need to watch out for skills and effects that deny their counterattacks, as well as any opponents with Null Follow-Up, since they also usually rely on follow up manipulation themselves. While any Armoured unit can be built up to be a Save tank, the following units go above and beyond in what they can do, often having multiple effects that let them stand up to just about anything and everything:
  • Brave Hector and Ascended Idunn both have the distinction of having no Armour weakness despite being Armoured units, with Idunn even getting effective damage against other Armoured units. Both can also deny their foe's follow up attacks, neutralize their penalties, and both have some method of a guaranteed follow up attack in their skillset. Idunn comes with D/R Near Save by default, but both of them can use either Save skill well on account of the Distant Counter Seal for Idunn and Hector's own Ostian Counter giving him Distant Counter and Sturdy Stance at once. Hector in particular has been a complete menace since he got his Maltet refine, made only more notorious once Save skills were introduced, with plenty of powerful green units having been introduced since then that usually come with some way of getting past follow up denial at the least, and it's mostly because of him.
  • The other two versions of Idunn are nothing to scoff at either, both sharing the ability to neutralize penalties just like Ascended Idunn, both inflict an Atk debuff on the opponent during combat, and both are also effective against other Armoured units. Duo Spring Idunn in particular has a way to remove her weaknesses too. The original version of Idunn also boasts Damage Reduction when her weapon is refined, mitigating 70% damage from the first hit if her foe can make a follow up attack, which is pretty likely given her low Spd. Her spring version, partnered with Fae, is able to deny the foe's follow up attack instead, and her Duo skill has her and Fae grant themselves and any ally near them +6 Def and Res, the Dracoshield status, and the Svallin's Shield status, which removes the user's Dragon and Armour weakness respectively. Basically like her Ascended version, Duo Idunn can remove her weaknesses, albeit for one turn, but unlike her, she can also remove her Dragon weakness. Both Idunns are perfectly suited for either Near Save, or with the Distant Counter seal, Far Save. All versions of Idunn are pretty formidable in some way, all of them get to ignore their debuffs, and have plenty of ways of strengthening their high defenses even further. ^{Fun fact:}  Idunn was originally conceived to have this ridiculous defense in Binding Blade, being nearly unkillable to everything that wasn't Roy's Binding Blade. But because this was an era in the Fire Emblem series where Regalia were subject to Breakable Weapons like everything else, Idunn was heavily nerfed (perhaps a bit too hard) by replacing her unique Dragonstone weapon with something less busted. Idunn in Heroes is basically what happens when she gets her Dragonstone back. Here's a video demonstration.
  • Ascended Fjorm, blessed by her god Nifl, is an Axe Armour who wields Nifl's Bite, which has -1 Special, restores 7 HP after combat, has Distant Counter, and uniquely for an Armoured unit, she gets Null C-Disrupt against ranged opponents. The likes of Firesweep Bow and Dazzling Staff have all been literally stopped cold by Fjorm, as they usually lack the firepower to break through her. Like her regular version, Fjorm also has Ice Mirror, which mitigates any damage taken at a range by 30%, and then she gets a damage boost equal to how much damage she reduced. To help with this, she introduces Hardy Fighter, which prevents the foe's guaranteed follow up attacks and acts as a souped up Shield Pulse, precharging any defensive Special, boosting the power of their effects twofold and then some, allowing for huge Damage Reduction. With her capabilities, her healing, and the ability to always counterattack against ranged opponents, Fjorm makes for a formidable Far Save tank. She just has to watch out for Guard since she does rely on her Special, and Duo Chrom in particular will eat her alive unless she has Svalinn's Shield.
  • Duo Halloween Duma and Mila. The gods of strength and love offer some pretty spooky tricks against any ranged opponent trying to go up against 'em. Duma is a red armour dragon that can deny the opponent's follow-up attack while also preventing any effects that guaranteed the opponent's follow-up attack, and if he has 5 more Res than his foe, he can inflict +1 Special cooldown on the opponent during combat before their first attack, stopping any precharged Special cold. As long as he meets the Res check, he can put a stop to effects like Deadeye or Lethality that will attempt to pierce through his Damage Reduction, like say from Valentine's Chrom, who can't hope to match Duma's Res at all. Said DR comes in the form of Dragon Wall, and Duma's unique C skill in Woeful Upheaval, which deals 7 damage to all foes on turn 1, and it mitigates damage taken by the foe's first hit equal to the difference between Duma's Atk and the opponent's Atk, plus the difference between the foe's max and current HP, multiplied threefold, to a maximum of 30% Damage Reduction. It also has Far Save built in, making Duma an excellent Far Save tank, compounded with his Distant Ferocity granting him +5 Atk in addition to Distant Counter.
  • Fomortiis, the wicked Demon King, is a colourless Armour Beast, and has a monstrous base skillset that can really ravage any ranged opponent trying to go up against him. With his Ravager weapon and unique Nightmare A skill, he can inflict up to -16 Atk/Def on the foe during combat, it inflicts Guard, grants him Special accel per both his and his foe's attacks, and he gets 30% DR on his foe's first attack, and 80% DR on any follow-up attacks. He comes with A/D Far Save by default, and being an armour Beast, he gets Distant Counter when transformed. To help with this, he introduces Beast Follow-Up, which grants him a follow-up attack and removes the transformation condition, which allows for team flexibility. Finally, his Nightmare skill has a fittingly nightmarish effect in that after combat, the closest foes within 4 spaces of Fomortiis's attacker have their actions ended immediately, which can prevent them from rescuing the assailing unit and bring them out of danger. Additionally, he was available less than two months later as a free unit for a limited time for winning "A Hero Rises 2023", allowing many players access to the powerhouse.
  • Harmonized Bridal Adult Tiki and Young Tiki. The lovely divine bride (and her younger self) is a colourless armour dragon that is basically like Brave Tiki and then some. With her weapon, this Tiki is able to get +5 to all stats, heal 7 HP after combat, a guaranteed follow-up attack, up to 40% Res based Damage Reduction, the Scowl effect (similarly to both Brave Tiki and Halloween Duma), which inflicts +1 Special cooldown on the foe during combat if Tiki's Res is high enough, and she also gets -1 Special cooldown for herself, activating her Special faster. Said Special is Armoured Floe, which she introduces into the game, boosting her damage based on her Res, while also providing her another form of DR as it mitigates damage taken by 40% if her foe is ranged and either her or her foe's Special is either ready, activated before, or during combat. To round out her skillset, she has New Divinity from her Brave version, inflicting -5 Atk/Res on the foe, has another form of DR, and denying the foe a follow-up attack. She also comes with Mirror Stance 3 for both Guard and more Atk/Res, along with A/R Far Save (to be used alongside the Distant Counter Seal).
• Damage Reduction tanks. Introduced with skills like Spurn or Close Call, such effects can mitigate damage taken up to 40% damage taken. Some units have this effect built into their weapon, can acquire it through the [Dodge] status effect, and some check different stats like Res. Units with Spd based DR usually look frail, but being able to mitigate damage through these effects can make them sturdier than they seem. Generally though, any DR tank will rely on their Spd or whatever stat they need to keep them safe while their weapons and other skills give them other effects to play with to take on their foes. They just need to watch out for Specials like Deadeye and other effects that pierce through damage reduction. The following units are some notable examples that boast some form of Damage Reduction and can perform very well against many foes:
  • Dimitri, the saviour king of Faerghus, has two versions that both mostly operate as a tank, boasting Damage Reduction and big damage capabilities. While his Legendary version is more Spd focused, his Brave version is more Def focused.
    • Legendary Dimitri has Dodge built into his Areadbhar, putting it to good use with his high Spd, and it frees up his B slot for something else. In this case, he has his unique Atrocity skill, which greatly debuffs nearby foes for -5 to all stats and +1 to Special cooldown, and it also lets Dimitri deal damage equal to 25% of his Atk, letting him really tear into his opponents— every last one of 'em.
    • Brave Dimitri is a bit different from any other Dodge tank, as his Blue Lion Rule checks Def instead, and it also gives him a follow-up attack on the enemy phase if he has more Def. He wields Moon Gradivus, which has Distant Counter and a bit of Special accel built in, and he comes with Atk/Def Unity to further improve his Atk and Def. Good effects in theory, but in practice, he came up a bit short, at least until he got his refine. Now, it doubles down on his defenses, by granting him +5 Spd/Def/Res, inflicting -5 Def on the foe, all to help with his Def check, and he neutralizes any Atk and Def bonuses that the foe have on them. The most powerful effects however, are the true damage and true defense he can acquire, as he deals damage equal to 20% of his Def, and he can mitigate damage taken from his opponent's by the same amount. This is the same effect as Askr's weapon, being a flat Damage Reduction that can't be stopped by the likes of Lethality and Deadeye, and when paired with the Damage Reduction from Blue Lion Rule and with enough support, Dimitri can survive attacks that he has absolutely no business surviving, which especially helps given his atrocious Res stat. Like the other Brave units, this Dimitri is a free pick for any player, and is pretty accessible on various banners.
  • Fallen Ike has Distant Counter and Spectrum Unity built into his Chaos Ragnell, which grants him an in combat buff equal to any debuff he currently has. With say a -7 Spd debuff, Ike would get +14 Spd during combat for a net gain of +7 Spd. His method of Dodge is through Repel, and he gets Darting Breath to help give him the Spd needed to use it well, and he's got his unique Mayhem Aether, a 4 charge variant of Aether, to help him stay healthy. What will make Ike truly crush his foes is that his weapon's Unity effect will stack with any other Unity skill, like Atk/Spd Unity or the [Grand Strategy] status.
  • Legendary Ryoma is a Flying Dodge tank, on account of his Bushido II granting Dodge, along with letting him always deal +7 damage and also remove his archer weakness. His Raijinto gives him +4 to all stats and Null Follow-Up when refined, so Ryoma's able to take full advantage of his high Spd for both offense and defense. As a Flier, he can also use skills like Catch and Rein skills to help improve either the soaring samurai's damage output or his tanking potential.
  • Brave Ike, taking after his father and wielding his Urvan, has a different take on being a Damage Reduction tank. Once refined, Urvan will mitigate the damage taken from the first hit he takes during combat by 40%, and any consecutive attacks taken will be mitigated by 80%. To ensure that second effect, he forces the opponent to attack consecutively if they can follow up as though they have Desperation, which won't too hard given Ike's middling Spd, although Hardy Bearing will ruin this strategy. Like the other Brave units, he was available as a free pick, but he also became free from the Heroes' Path questline, and he also got a Resplendent version to boost his stats.
  • Legendary Julia is a mage version of this, as she checks Res, and her skillset is tailored perfectly for it. Her Virtuous Naga grants her +10 Atk/Res, +4 Spd/Def, can mitigate up to 40% damage taken depending on how much greater her Res is, a free follow-up attack, and the ability to counter Dragons at close range. Her Light and Dark II inflicts -5 to all stats on the opponent, disables the adaptive damage from Dragons and similar effects, and it neutralizes both Julia's penalties and her foe's bonuses, meaning relying on such effects just won't work on Julia. With Mirror Impact and Atk/Res Menace, Julia gets a huge Atk and Res swing on her opponents, which when combined with her Damage Reduction, lets her be quite a sturdy mage.
• Special Spamming Dodge Tanks are a different type of Damage Reduction tank. Units like Ascended Mareeta, Ascended Fir, and Felix, these units are very fast infantry that rely on their Spd to mitigate damage, and coming with a whole host of effects that help give them an edge in battle, whether it's more Damage Reduction, Null Follow-Up to ensure that Spd can't be manipulated, or Tempo to bypass Guard. These units also come with some way of pre-charging a Special, either through their weapon or through Time's Pulse 4, and often have means to maintain that charge after combat. Specials like Vital Astra and Godlike Reflexes come with extra effects that are only active while the Special is ready (like more DR on Vital Astra, or extra damage with Godlike Reflexes), which such speed demons can take full advantage of.
  • Fallen F Byleth gets a special mention for her Divine's Pulse, which provides a damage boost based on 25% of her Spd while also mitigating the damage taken by the foe's next attack by 75%, then boosting the damage of Byleth's next attack by another 20% of her Spd. She has to activate it first, but she has innate Spd Preempt built into her Captain's Sword, letting her strike first as long as she's fast enough, thus letting her activate Divine's Pulse and making her much harder to take down, making her a menace on either phase, while Time's Pulse 4 keeps it basically always active. Her weapon also has both Dull ^note nullifies foe's bonuses during combat and Bulwark ^note prevents melee units from getting past her, and prevents ranged units from getting near her, while also healing 7 HP after combat built in to make her even more of a pain to fight against. Unlike Vital Astra (which is also an offensive Special), but much like Godlike Reflexes (which is a defensive Special), the DR from Divine Pulse can't be pierced through by Deadeye and similar effects either.
• Omnibreaker tanks. These units are sturdy, have high defenses, and usually low Spd, but they have ways of bypassing this, through weapons and skills that grant themselves a follow up attack while denying the opponent's follow up attack. Such units are susceptible to Null Follow-Up and Damage Reduction negation skills if they depend on a few, but against most other units, they can usually just stand strong against nearly anything they go up against, especially in Player Versus Environment content.
  • Seiros and Halloween Rhea both have follow up manipulation skewed in their favour basically whenever they need it. Seiros gets a follow up attack when initiating combat, and can deny her foe's follow up attacks when she gets attacked on the enemy phase, while Rhea gets a follow up attack if her foe is above 50% HP, while she can deny her foe's follow up attacks if she herself is above 50% HP. The two of them also come with Dragon Wall for Damage Reduction, and both have high enough Res to take advantage of it.
  • Medeus not only has follow-up manipulation where he denies enemy follow-up attacks if they either initiate combat or are at 75% HP or above at the start of combat and guarantees his follow-up if he has more Res than the foe during combat, he also has access to Damage Reduction depend on both how much Res he has over his foes and the amount of Dragons or Staff allies within range of him, and he has a ridiculous amount of Res to activate both. Additionally, he serves as a great assist unit as well as his Shadow Breath gives himself and all allies within 2 spaces of him +6 Atk/Res and [En Garde] at the start of his turn, no strings attached, where [En Garde] negates any non-AOE special damage done outside of combat, negating the likes of Pain+ and the Bolt Tower like nothing, and said Damage Reduction will work against those AOE skills for those trying to wise up on using those against him.
  • Brave Tiki has follow-up manipulation where she gets a guaranteed follow-up attack if she is within 3 spaces of an ally, and prevents the foe from performing a guaranteed follow-up attack if she is at 40% HP or above at the start of combat. She also has Damage Reduction based on how much Res she has over her foe and inflicts -5 Atk/Res on the foe during combat if she is at 25% HP or above at the start of combat, and gets sustainability with her default Atk/Res Finish 4. Most importantly, if she has a Special that triggers when she attacks she gets -1 Special cooldown before her first attack, and if the foe has the same and she has 5 or more Res than the foe during combat, she inflicts +1 Special cooldown before their first attack, shutting down a lot of units that rely on instantly charging their Special and triggering it with their first attack and potentially met an early demise against Tiki's own Special, and she has a lot of Res for both her Damage Reduction and special disruption.
• Mounted powerhouses. These usually refer to Cavalry or Flying units that are meant to be player phase monsters, often having Canto for Hit-and-Run Tactics, usually used for Galeforce, some Flow or Null Follow-Up effect that lets them get past follow-up denial, other effects that their class type normally can't acquire like easy Special acceleration, extra Mov, some kind of Damage Reduction, and so on. While these units are powerful, any of them that rely on Canto will have to watch out for Canto Control if they're trying to retreat. These units have some combination of the aforementioned, usually built into their weapon, sometimes a unique B skill. The following units are often able to ride on over towards their opponents without fear and go to town:
  • Eliwood and Brave Roy, as both share Blazing Durandal (the latter by default, the former via refinery). Blazing Durandal has Steady Impact (+7 Spd, +10 Def, and follow-up denial) and Special Fighter (Special accel for the user, Guard on the foe) when initiating combat. Two powerful effects that Cavalry units normally can't acquire, but are here on these two, with Eliwood even being a common, mergeable unit, even getting a Resplendent version to bridge the stat gap between father and son (at least until Roy ended up getting a Resplendent version as well).
  • Pirate Tibarn, being a Colorless Flying Beast, can have up to 3 Mov, and his weapon grants him a free follow-up attack if he's alone. With his Heavy Blade 4, Galeforce, and Dive-Bomb, he can fly up to an opponent, get two consecutive hits in with Dive-Bomb, and as long as he meets the Atk check for Heavy Blade and gets those two hits in, he can easily activate Galeforce and either fly back to safety or assail another foe right after.
• Full Cavalry teams enjoy high Mov in maps without many obstacles, and these teams are very easy to form, making them a popular choice for players to build. There are plenty of strong Cavalry units that are either free or easily accessible like Reinhardt, Eliwood, Walhart, Brave units like Eirika and Seliph, and so on. Hone Cavalry is also on the free unit Gunter, which can easily buff your other Cavalry units. Thanks to their high movement range, Cavalry units can often perform hit and run tactics, either by using the actual Hit and Run skill on melee Cavalry, or by riding out and using the Reposition or Draw Back skill to bring an ally back to safety. Some of the stronger Cavalry even have Canto built into their weapons, and can either inherit a Trace skill or simply have that skill in their kit too. Cavalry teams were so dominant that as the game went on, other types of teams just got stronger and got more exclusive skills while the game introduced trench tiles designed to purposefully slow Cavaliers down, although they still see use in PvP, particularly on Aether Raids Defense teams.

Skills and Mechanics

• Bonus stats. Any unit can become a potential Game-Breaker in certain maps if they have heightened stats. Any unit can be Summoner Supported, which grants +5 HP and +2 to all stats, which improves their overall combat performance, letting them hit harder, faster, and take hits much better. In some modes, like the Arena or Tempest, also feature specific units that get a greater stat boost of +10 HP and +4 to all stats instead. Using those units make those modes a lot easier for the player. And should the player use those units and Summoner Support them at the same time, then their stats just go through the roof, meaning the player has to really try to get them to fall in battle. These boosts are only applicable to the player's side out of fairness, but this makes Player Versus Environment maps potentially a lot easier.
• Distant Counter and Close Counter. Back when the game first launched, there were two names that would strike fear into the hearts of the fresh summoners: Hector and Takumi, all because they came with said skills, letting them counter against ranged and melee foes respectively. Since then, they've not only been accessible to other units, but as of this writing, Distant Counter is even a Seal for Dragons to use. There are also upgraded versions that either grant a stat boost in addition to the counter ability, or grant a stat boost at the cost of some HP, letting units still have some player phase presence. Armoured units in particular make great use of these skills when paired with their Save skills.
• Special accel generally refers to the act of getting extra Special charges for your units, letting you fire off Specials much faster. Generally, they grant an extra Special charge per attack during combat, ideally given when either the unit attacks or is attacked, but sometimes it's only one or the other. Breath skills and similar effects help a lot with this, and as of the Ice & Flame 2 Tempest Trials in Aug 2021, they became available as Seals, letting your units equip them while having a more focused A slot for defense or damage, or even one of the Counter skills. Special Fighter is similar, also granting Special charges per unit and foe's attacks, but it works on either phase, and it also denies the opponent's Special as well. While locked to Armoured units, this helps them fire off their Specials much faster, while also protecting them from foe Specials.
• Special Spiral may as well be renamed Special Spam, since that's what it is made to do. It's a B skill that grants -2 Special cooldown to the unit if their Special activated before or during combat. Ranged nukes in particular can be set up to spam Area of Effect Specials with the help of some precharge through Pulse skills to deal huge damage out of combat, then they finish their opponent off, usually get another Special charge, and then keep spamming their Specials. Special Spiral 4, introduced with Rearmed Ophelia (and is an excellent user of it), lets you deal 5 damage when your Special activates, but it also lets you bypass any non Special Damage Reduction. The likes of Close Call or Dragon Wall get shut down when your Special activates, meaning not even tanks that rely on such skills are safe.
  • Special mentions go to Velouria and Hatari Karla, who can both grant themselves (and Velouria's support partner, in her case) -2 Special charges at the start of the map, which can help kick start the Special spam. They're good combatants too, as Velouria can also grant her and her partner the [Dull] buff to help them both out during combat, while Karla (who already comes with Special Spiral to begin with) gets to deal extra true damage based on her Spd whenever her Special activates.
• Null Follow-Up. Abilities that alter follow-up attacks run rampant, with plenty of powerful, slow units that have guaranteed follow up attacks to bypass their low Spd, follow up denial to protect them from being attacked twice, and in a few cases like the Omnibreaker tanks, both. Null Follow-Up disables any such abilities, turning any match into a fair and square Spd check. This makes it one of the most powerful tools any unit can have, especially for faster units that want to rely on their Spd. While the B skill is locked to Infantry units, it's also a status effect that can be granted to some units through some weapons or skills, and plenty of units have part of Null Follow-Up built into either their weapon or some unique skill, usually the part that lets them get past follow up denial. In October 2022, it became a Seal that any Infantry unit can access, and in January 2023 it joined the pool of Grail skills with the release of Lumera, a Grand Hero who comes packing the skill. Phys and Mag Null Follow are the upgraded versions introduced with Ascended Fir and Heidr respectively, which not only provide a stat swing to the relevant stats, but also allow the user to pierce through half of any Damage Reduction effects they face, which is going to be a lot.
  • When paired with Windsweep or Watersweep, a unit with either -Sweep and Null Follow-Up (which would have be either from the Seal, the status or built into the unit's weapon, as -Sweep skills also occupy the B slot) can safely attack against certain types of units and not fear any counterattack. Both skills normally prevent the user from performing a follow-up attack in exchange for their counter denial, but Null Follow-Up would remove this drawback entirely.
• Near Save and Far Save. Introduced by Valentines Gustav and Valentines Henriette, the Saves join the Fighter skills as Armor exclusive skills. The skills allow the user to take the place of an ally within two spaces when targeted attack by a melee or ranged unit, protecting them from all after-combat effects including movement ones that don't effect the Save user like Close Call and Leila's Constant Dagger while granting the user +4 to two stats. This allows a unit to focus entirely on fighting either melee or ranged units exclusively rather than try and deal with all types of foes. Far Save in particular can allow protection from Cav line setups which rely on ranged Cavs to leave as few safe spaces for a non-carry unit as possible or safely tanking an AoE while Near Save makes it harder for Galeforce strategies to work by stopping Lunge. Appropriately enough, Gustav and Henriette come with the tier 4 versions of Close and Distant Def respectively to maximize their ability to tank on melee and ranged units. The only real weaknesses are the Save user can only protect units on panels they can traverse so water and mountains are out of the question, multiple saves of the same type will cancel each other out leaving the targeted ally vulnerable, and the user is considered next to an ally so a unit like Legendary Edelgard or Winter Ephraim who want to be alone can't use their prfs to their full potential with a Save.
• Canto, introduced by Reginn in Book V, allows the user to move again after performing any action such as attacking an opponent, using an Assist, or destroying an obstacle. How far you can move again depends on what kind of Canto you have, for instance, Canto 2 would give you a fixed 2 Mov to return with, while Canto Rem. +1 would give you however many spaces you have yet to use, plus another. Canto allows for incredible Hit-and-Run Tactics, letting units get into the fray and right back to safety without much trouble. It gave new life to powerful player phase Cavalry and Fliers, who put their high Mov and mobility to great use with it, although some Infantry and Armoured units have been able to acquire Canto as well. Canto's use was even so prevalent in the game that they had to introduce a skill that directly countered it in Canto Control.
• Arcane Weapons, introduced with Rearmed Heroes in late 2022, are powerful weapons that come with -1 Special, a few different effects to give the unit an edge in battle, and can breathe new life into old units. These weapons can be inherited from a Rearmed Hero to any other unit that's applicable ^{For instance...} Arcane Grima can only be inherited by dragons for example, and if you inherit an Arcane weapon onto a new unit, that unit can't equip it and any unique skills they have at the same time, and the Rearmed Hero will not disappear, letting you keep them to still play around and fight with, usually with a base kit tailor made for said Arcane weapon. If you summon for another copy of the Rearmed Hero, you can also inherit from the first copy (using up the Arcane inheritance), then merge to the new copy, and then the new copy will be able to inherit to another unit, letting you transfer over the weapon again and up to three rare skills.
  • Arcane Éljúðnir, inherited from Rearmed Líf, is a Sword that inflicts -6 Atk/Def on the foe, grants the user a follow-up attack, and lets the user deny the opponent's follow-up attack. This turns any sword wielder into an Omnibreaker tank. Slow units get to take advantage of their bulk, while faster units can use the free follow-up attack as a pseudo Null Follow-Up, either way, freeing up the B slot for something else, like Lull Atk/Def on the slower units or a Damage Reduction skill on the faster ones.
  • Arcane Downfall, inherited from Ganglöt, is an Axe that grants +5 to all stats, denies the foe from a follow-up attack, grants the user Special accel per both their attacks and their foe's similarly to Special Fighter, and it restores 7 HP to the user per hit during combat. This is a pretty defensive axe in nature, protecting you from being doubled, while also restoring HP to keep your tanky axe unit topped off. It's got some good offensive capabilities too though, as the Special accel and -1 Special means that your units can retaliate back with something like Bonfire or Iceberg, or you can charge Galeforce pretty quickly as long as you're able to provide the follow-ups or using Pulse skills to help pre-charge it.
  • Arcane Grima, inherited from Rearmed Female Robin (who is the vessel for the titular Grima), is a Breath that grants +5 to all stats, allows the user to make a guaranteed follow-up attack, deal damage equal to 15% of the user's Atk, and it restores 7 HP to the user after combat. It's a pretty good general purpose Breath for most dragons, with a straightforward damage boost, a guaranteed follow-up attack, and healing for good measure, giving your dragon better self sustain. With the follow-up in the weapon, these dragon units get their B slot also freed up for the various dragon-exclusive skills to use at their disposal like Dragon Wall or Dragon's Wrath.
  • Arcane Eclipse, inherited from Rearmed Ophelia, is a Red Tome that grants +5 to all stats, grants -1 Special cooldown at the start of turn 1, a guaranteed follow-up attack, and neutralizes any penalties to your Atk stat. This tome, alongside inheriting Special Spiral and/or Time's Pulse if possible, allows your red mage to become a devastating nuke that can spam Specials and bust through opponents, without having to worry about any Atk debuffs, and if Special Spiral 4 is inherited, without having to worry about Damage Reduction skills like Spurn or similar effects. Said skills are locked to infantry, but red mages of other movement types can also take advantage of the tome, like any red armour mage being able to retaliate with Bonfire or Iceberg if they have Special Fighter equipped, since this is notably the first -1 Special tome that any red mage can inherit.
  • Arcane Qiang, from Alfred, is a Lance that grants +5 to all stats, and also has the Omnibreaker effect, granting the user a follow-up attack while denying the foe a follow-up attack. It also grants the user Special accel per both their and their foe's attacks, but only if either the user or foe moved before combat. It's a great, general purpose lance, with both offensive and defensive capabilities. While the Special accel requires some movement first, you're most likely going to be moving to attack an opponent to activate Galeforce, which you can do in two strikes, while tankier lance units can instead let the opponents come to them instead, so that they can retaliate with Bonfire or Iceberg. Mounted lance units also get to inherit Flow N Trace from Alfred at the same time, letting them bypass follow-up denial effects, while also giving them Canto to return to safety.
  • Arcane Náströnd, from Rearmed Tana, is a bow that grants +5 to all stats, a guaranteed follow-up attack and 30% damage reduction from the foe's first attack. It also punishes foes with low special cooldown as it grants further Atk during combat by 12, -2 Atk for each point of the foe's maximum special cooldown value, with a minimum of 4 Atk. It's a great all purpose bow where both initiators and Save units want it, as it provides great Atk and durability. While you want to always inherit Deadeye as well from Tana, Atk/Spd Unity is great with Save units as it always activates when saving a unit, and Guidance 4 is great for flying support units as well, as it provides great mobility, buffs to Atk/Spd and follow-up denial negation to Infantry and Armored allies.
  • Arcane Lúin, from Rearmed Ingrid, is a lance that grants +5 to all stats, deals damage equal to 20% of the user's Spd, and ignore any stat buffs the foe has on their Spd/Def during combat. What's more is that it provides the Null Follow-Up effect if the user is faster than the foe. This weapon is geared for fast lance units, as it provides great damage output and almost guarantees that the user can follow-up naturally. While it doesn't provide much bulk, Flying units get a great boon from Rearmed Ingrid with her Guard Bearing 4 to provide that bulk, with Spd/Def Hold also an option to further increase damage output and provide support.
  • Arcane Devourer, from Fallen Rearmed Chrom, is a sword that grants +5 to all stats, Special accel per both their and their foe's attack and 40% damage reduction from the foe's first attack. Like the Arcane Lúin, it provides the Null Follow-Up effect if the user is faster than the foe, and is thus geared towards fast sword wielders, as it provides stats, bulk and special acceleration to keep their momentum up and activate strong specials such as Luna and Galeforce, the latter also in Fallen Rearmed Chrom's kit. Speedy godswords often run Damage Reduction skills in their B slot, but with it being covered in the weapon, they're free to run other skills like Bulwark or Tempo, and the Special accel also lets them loop Godlike Reflexes pretty easily. Sword Cavalry and Flying units get the best out of Fallen Rearmed Chrom's kit, as Atk/Spd Clash 4 to boost damage output through mobility, a semi-support option with Spd/Def Snag 4 to inflict debuffs after using a movement Assist, a support option with Inf. Spd Tactics to provide Null Follow-Up and Spd to Infantry allies.