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What strange builds do you guys have?

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I don't know about strange builds per say but the following seem uncommon...

Life & Death Black Knight.

Wow, that actually looks surprisingly good. I'm assuming you use him on an armored team as well, or at least have some source of Hone Armor, where he would reach 61 attack and 45 speed... that's insane lol

Indeed. I almost always run him with Healer Gwendolyn for Hone Armor and HP donation.

A single Hone Armor enables him to OHKO the majority of blue mages (all except Reinhardt, M!Robin, and Odin if memory serves) which is very helpful once Vantage is up.

Felicia capable of tanking/killing Reinhardt and walling TA/Raven.

Another quite interesting build. Though I'm a little confused about Cancel Affinity. I know it lets her take less damage from Robin and other Raven tome users, but it seems like she wouldn't be able to do much anyways because of their defense. Is she meant to debuff them?

Well, surviving them and actually taking neglegible damage helps. They can definitely become annoying, and I totally see Cancel Affinity working in their. I'd just go with Poison Dagger altogether.

I'm trying to decide between Poison Dagger+, Rogue Dagger+, and Dancer's Fan+... But I don't feel any sense of urgency to change things up soon as Silver Dagger+ has done well enough by me.

I'm actually skeptical in regards to the whole "mage killer" deal. How would that work? Her Atk is really low, and as far as I know, you'd be somewhat checking the squishier ones (but that also escape doubles, like Nino and Delthea?). I always just took it Poison Dagger is basically the best for any dagger user, and I'd actually be open to think outside the box. I like the idea of Rogue Dagger heavily amping her mage tanking, but I don't much else to it in regards to, well, actually killing things?

This is my poor man Felicia

My build relies heavily on Iceberg to seal the deal. She can ORKO Reinhardt because he doubles her, instantly charging it, but you're correct that it's more of duel against equally fast mages.

I did try Life & Death on her but I like running high RES. The big thing holding me back from Poison Dagger+ - aside from having other projects eating up my feathers - is that my Kagero has struggled since inheritance went live and cavalry popped up all over the place.

I also have her with Fury at times so she can tank somewhat, but I ocassionally find myself needing it when she has Desperation. It's actually amazingly fun when you run QP > Desperation > Iceberg in Trials and Chains.

While it's obviously true Arena is filled with horses, it doesn't change the fact there's also a fair mix of of those and not. I've had my fair uses of using her there and she did will against most Infantry.

I expected more defensive-reliable builds on her would mostly run QR and garantee the double/kill with Iceberg. Now that you put it, I forgot she could potentially make a cheap-ish Reinhardt counter.

I'd been seeing more TA/Raven builds infiltrating the arena to counter Brave Lyn so I decided to go with Cancel Affinity. I like her as an all purpose anti-mage; the dream is to give her Ploy DEF* and the Ploy ATK seal.

*But I just can't bring myself to sacrifice my only S!Gaius yet...not after that hilarious voting gauntlet.

The appeal of Rogue Dagger+ is that it makes her a better duelist but Poison Dagger+ is certainly superior against infantry and Dancer's Fan+ provides some utility by healing.

Like I said, I'm currently all for thinking outside of my narrow corner. That said, I don't really know what this "duelist" thing is in the meta. I've seen it use a lot. Is it basically to be able to survive a battle without taking much or giving much damage?

It's being able to reliably win 1v1 over a multi-turn battle. So it might take five turns but eventually Felicia should win 1v1 against the majority of mages.

Healer Gwendolyn.

LOL ok I said the last 2 were interesting but this one definitely takes it to a whole new level. Never have I thought about using an armored unit to heal. Also, 46 defense??? Wow

She's been a fantastic wall in and out of armor emblem. Next I'm planning to merge her into a +RES -SPD Gwendolyn which will lower her defense by 2 but raise her HP by 4 and RES by 3. The long term plan is to inherit Berkut's Lance+ to her for 35 RES on the defense. But that was all before the seal upgrades went live... I need to rethink my plans now.

good fuckin lord 46 Def
On utility, I have to give it to you.

WIP based on Bravart's theorycraft. Still needs Braveaxe+ and Panic Ploy 3.

The Caeda compromise... I wasn't willing to sacrifice the units to give her her optimal build (Slayer's Edge+, Iceberg, and Ploy DEF).

I'm not sure why people are going with Bowbreaker on that. TA Raven Tomes counter two different types of weapon, and as such, QR will likely be a far better option since you're meant to be tanking those anyway. Not to mention, getting rid of Lyndis and Reinardt is best done by baiting them.

Anyway, far as "creative" goes, me and a friend were looking to Brash Assault and it's uses. Basically came up with this, though there are still significantly tankier characters that use it better:

"Quad Assasult". My Charlotte is -Atk/+Def. That last part, along with Escutcheon allows her to live a few lethal attacks and Quad in return. I likely plan on giving her Death Blow if I don't S-support her again, at least she'll be taking further advantage of heavy hitting as well as not having to deal with the drawback of -6 HP per battle (which is why Reciprocal Aid is there).

Yeah I realized that QR would have been better afterwards, so I'm currently forging the Deflect Magic seal to make up for it. Though I do like the fact Mae only takes 1 hit from Lyn in case she needs to deal with another unit

That Charlotte is definitely interesting. She's more well rounded with that setup than I initially thought she was. Nice job salvaging what you could out of that boon/bane

Finally! A viable use for Brash Assault! I've tried on Hawkeye, Lyn, and Seliph (of course) to little effect... I think I'll try something like this. Though, no B!Charlotte, so maybe I'll see how it is on Donnel.

Yeah, it's pretty usable in paper, let alone on certain characters actually meant to be tanky. And there's a few ways to play with it, too. I'm experimenting with other A-skills like even Fortress Def on her (she'd be looking at 35-38 Def if I keep the Atk Seal or just go full-blown tank) and mix that up with one of Bonfire or Ignis instead of Escutcheon. Fury's kind of contraddictive, as you want to be able to tank as well as you can and hit at least moderately hard. I also gave my Hawkeye Brash Assasult, and I've yet to fully experiment with him (also +Def). I can definitely see Donnel with it.

Her Sacae's Blessing doesn't disable counter attacks from books, bows, and dragon stones. Her bow nerfs away the buffs on mages.

Thid bike killer

So beautiful...

My pretty much unkillable Lukas (unless, y'know, you throw magic at him.) DEF+ SPD-, which is basically two boons in one since the lowered speed means he can proc his Ignis more, and he barely takes much damage. Soon to have 45 DEF with the Def +3 Sacred Seal. I want to put Attack Smoke on him soon, but I haven't gotten around to it. Basic premise is that he is a 1v1 dueler. Once he gets to half health his effective defense jumps to 50, and the seal attack essentially makes that 57 defense. Since emerald axes are mostly used to bolster mediocre attack, even they have a very tough time killing him.

My greatest achievement was killing an arena Hector (Using shenanigans, of course.) on full health. He was on a defensive tile, and both units were attacking for 0 damage until using the special. I did have a Kagero bait out the Hector's Ignis, though.

I kind of posted this a while back on another post but here's a +Res -Spd Hawkeye.

Put in a lot of effort (And luck to pull an extra Hector) to get him like he is now.

I bet you danced for joy when Deflect Magic was released. It's perfect on this build.

Deflect Magic would make him a greater magic wall than he already is, so I was glad to see that, but he already comfortably counters all magic attacks except reds, Deflect Missile on the other hand really helps his matchups against Lyn and Brave Bows which this build was slightly weak to, so I danced for joy seeing Missile more than Magic.

My bad. I misread. Either way, it's an awesome choice that really syncs with the build.

It's alright. Now if only I had managed to get a Summer Xander for Infantry Pulse when he was available, as I recently had an idea for a Steady Breath, QR3, Aether Chrom that is +HP -Spd, and would have helped Hawkeye's special go down quicker, he's also the perfect candidate for the Panic Ploy Seal, leaving my team with a dangerous combination of 2 Panic Ploy units.

I mean, for a while the fact that I had a Fae that I was using as a physical tank (thanks, fury, renewal, and +def IV!) seemed pretty weird to me, but she's meta now so probably we see all types of Faes.

The strangest build I can think of, which I haven't actually done yet but I want to, is Ninian with Defiant Attack. Why? PvE optimization. For chain challenge and tempest trials, my strategy is to get her below half health early and leave her there for all subsequent maps so she has permanent Escape Route. Defiant Attack would give her a permanent +7 attack as well, giving me the choice between having her use escape route to dance or to kill if I want.

I dig this a lot. I use a Dark Breath +Atk Ninian with Fury and Swordbreaker, which is amazing for arena, but Fury does have it's drawbacks for marathon game modes.

I might have to give this a shot.

Well my Effie is +Spd so I whipped up a pretty unique build for her.

Heavy Blade 3
Escape Route 3
Fortify Armor/Whatever
Speed +2 seal (working on 3)
Galeforce

With Hone and Brave Lucina buffs, she gets to 65 atk and 40 speed, so she doesn't need Wary Fighter. If she doubles a melee unit, she immediately charges her Galeforce and she's free to teleport to something else or out of harms way.

I tend to be more experimental on units that I am going to keep at 4 star with merge builds. My favorite is a +ATK Donnell build:

Brave Lance
A: Defiant Attack 3
B: Drag Back
C: Threaten Def
Reciprocal Aid
Miracle

Between Miracle, which charges pretty quickly with BL, and Drag Back, he is hard to kill with any physical unit.

He can either play healer with RA or tack a bunch of hits to get into defiant attack range, and then the +7 makes his brave lance really shine.

Threaten defense just sweetens the deal, especially after a miracle proc.