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To whom would you even give steady stance 4?

Some of the candidates people have named that I prefer with other builds:
Beruka: I'd rather go fortress def/res + hack'o'lantern
Lukas: I'd rather use steady breath + spiral for instant ignis. With harmonic lance, some builds would demand over 100 physical bulk for the target to survive, without merges.
Silas: I could go for, or I could use a fast build because he has a spd superboon and access to hone cavalry.
Any other axe: there's hack'o'lantern, and A-slots are really good especially now that fortress def/res is a thing.

Candidates I kind of like:
Hardin
Zelgius: use vengeful fighter
Arden because the guy's so minmaxed
Y.Ike maybe if the guy gets demoted

Asked by Seeker1 month 1 week ago

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Answers

Nah forget Young Ike, give Brave Ike Steady Stance 4. He can tank mostly anything ingame, so this will only make it worse for mages and units that rely on those specials.

Could be considered, but I like the one-round aether.

One of my favorite skills to combo with it is Null Follow-Up 3. By having the Null with the built-in Guard and bonus defense, you essentially fully nullify the effects of Bold Fighter, both in cooldown charge and follow-up granting. Additionally, the +8 defense lets you be a lot sturdier versus any physical Bold Fighter units. It's even better with DC. So I think the best heroes with it are DC units with good Speed, general mixed-phase speed tanks, or units who (1) aren't axes, (2) want Guard, and (3) also want another high-power B-Slot like Bold Fighter at the same time, and (4) aren't able to run Special Fighter effectively.

Someone gets it. The effect of guard are not offensive. And with this you can run a slaying weapon to increase your own effect to. AND you have a B slot still

See, I disagree because I say either don't let your opponents double (and then you expect not to get hit with a special) or let them double and use guard, in which case I try to get the def to 45+, which is where I believe this skill fits in. If your speed is good, aim not to let the opponent double, so null follow-up makes sense (if you're an armour like Zelgius I guess steady stance 4 makes sense), and if your spd is not good enough, go for OHKO like the Lukas I offered or bunker down, get to really high def, and just let them hit twice and block their special.

But at the same time, it's a matter of if the unit can deal with taking a special or not. A lot of fast units, while they won't be getting doubled, take a lot of their bulk from their speed. If an enemy builds up their special it's a major problem since they often don't have as high of Hp. I see your point, since yes, you are getting less raw value out of the Guard, but at the same time it's just an insurance policy. The +8 defense gives a lot of bonus bulk to a lot of fast tanks (e.g. Fae) that they really like, along with a skill that can just give extra safety.

You might say the extra safety isn't useful, but that's not true. A lot of mixed tanks hit around 40 speed, which is still slow enough to be doubled by a lot of DPS units. By having Null Follow-Up, they can protect against slower units. By having Guard built-in, they can protect against Brave weapons, or against fast units that try to unleash powerful specials (like Ayra or Mia). The bonus defense helps both. Mixed-phase units can use it fine because this middling speed usually is enough to double the units that would need to be doubled.

But yeah, that's why I added some bonus "good" units beyond my idea of speedy tanks, because there are a lot of units who aren't fast who'd work well with the Guard effect and appreciate it.

You're making really good points and I agree with a lot of your analysis.

I want to start with the part about 40 spd, because this one was especially observant of you. I do think that 40 is actually a very accurate number for a lot of fast tanks and that a lot of hyper-aggressive units can break 45 without too much difficulty. I personally think 42 is actually kind of a minimum for a tank that wants to rely on blocking doubles against player-built units; these days I think you better get 43 or 44. 47 would be the close-to-100% play. So when I say don't let them double, I really mean go hard or go the other way. (And yes, they often won't have the bulk to take an enemy special. That's the cost of being fast. Otherwise I think fast tanks are probably imba, and bold fighter would never have been an issue.)

If the tank can't reach 42+ spd with buffs factored in, then I think it's time to consider hanging out in the low 30s and using guard as you suggest.

The other consideration is that on a unit like Fae (maybe on fast tanks in general) I like aether. I find that they tend not to hit as hard, which means they they want some damage from their special, so on lightning breath it's a decision between bonfire/iceberg and aether. I tend to like sustain, so I'll accept the higher charge cost of aether, which means I probably need a breath skill. (But these days flashing blade might not be so bad, actually, especially if it's on my teammate's C-slot. Like, two attacks from Fae, one from the opponent and we only need to be faster by 1spd, and then after taking one more hit in a second engagement aether activates)

Ehi,You Have Seen My Xander,Right?

Xander is a nice idea:
He can use it to tank melee and archer amazingly. And he won't have to worry about those pesky moonbow/luna users.(or Wo dao/wrath)

Very good candidate. I would definitely get behind this.

Xander and Garon are two that immediately come to mind for me.

ARDENNNN

I like Xander and Camus’s name thrown around. They will be back!

Defensive fliers or cavalry who don't have access to better skills.

Examples: Xander, Camus, Quan, Silas, Michalis, Laegjarn, Subaki...

So, following my reply to Blackdrakon:
Xander I agree, because he's in the slow category and reaches extremely high def to accept getting doubled.
Silas I already covered
Michalis I like. But he could conceivably get fast enough with flier buffs that he would actually go into the fast category.
Camus, Laegjarn, and Subaki are definitely too fast for this skill in my opinion. If they see bold fighters, either attack into them and hit them with a moonbow+10 or a bonfire if your def is huge or let some mage on the team deal with them. Subaki and Laegjarn especially - you have flier buffs to boost atk. And if there's no bold fighter or a breaker, these three shouldn't be getting doubled.
Quan, even, I think can go into this category, especially with hone cavalry and his native A-skill, but if you have -spd then I suppose I like this skill.

The trade off here is how much it opens up.
Let's use Lucas for a hot second with his common set of Guard+QR+LanceofChoice+Breath skill. With Guard being moved to his A slot he opens up his B slot to QR. With that QR moved he now has +5atk/+5def in his seal slot if he chooses to use the bond seal which he probably will. Now you only lose the cooldown per attack but you can even fix that with a different lance choice. And with this set you have +9Def and +5Atk more thn you did originally. Only sacrifice being the breath passive.

It's going to be better on everyone who can't run a breath skill basically by default, or if they find the special trade off worth it because their attack is high enough.

Side note: I disagree on Silas fundamentally. I think he benefits from not investing into his speed much more. You will never double with him even with a superboon and he gets more from investing into surviving 2 hits (to speed up his special). Especially since he can potentially do more damage this way and doesn't have to worry about their special. Since he has no breath I'd say this skill is amazing for him.

Steady stance 4 I think is an obvious and direct improvement over the old guard + QR seal. The breath skill wasted extra charges when ignis activates anyways on both sides doubling if he's using a slaying lance. Now he can just put QR in the B-slot and leave the seal for someone else, and he's got good options for seals - close def, atk/def, atk/def bond, even fortress def, or he could go for something else like panic ploy.

But I say why bother with getting doubled when there's spiral + breath skill + ignis and it even hits harder due to harmonic lance?

With that spread you won't be tanky at all though. You have a refine and that's basically it. You have to give up either doubling or extra stats. You also won't slow their special which is essential for a tank as it's the only way to really kill them unless you have triangle advantage or hit res. I'd say that's a risky build.

On this one it's essentially Guard, QR, +13 Def 5 Atk, and a weapon of your choice. Sure he won't be special scumming but it's off the table for the enemies so you don't need to.

What are you talking about, not tanky?

A blue needs 103 physical bulk to survive the ignis when def wave is not active. Green can get away with 94, and we can buff either atk or def, or we can switch to atk/def bond, and merges haven't even been considered.

Just to reinforce the point: Sheena +res -spd with def refine will get OHKO'd if she attacks into this without special fighter or hack'o'lantern. Even with 5 merges she will get OHKO'd. If def wave is active, even at 10 merges she will get OHKO'd.

I mean that he's still going to be countered by specials and without doubling he's going to have to player phase after because Ignis won't be charged until they hit you on a counter. This is less tanky. This makes it more difficult to work with him. I suppose you'd need to only survive onehit and you'd be able to reset special spiral again. But he's still less tanky due to having no guard and this lets him run it fine. If your goal is to upset the weapon triangle sure but you'd have to tank a hit every time, my goal with him would be to make him a wall and he's not nearly as good at that without guard.

To give an example he loses to BF users with a 3 or less cooldown, mine will not. (Actually anyone who can speed up cooldown) Mine also won't have to reposition because he most likely netted the kill because Ignis still applies due to QR. And he also has many stat boosts to boot. And he can redo this every step of combat. given he isn't fighting green/blue dragons. And Sheena runs those so Idk the point of the example. And with the new mode if your positioning is off you get boned.

Maybe you aren't getting that I assume he starts at 2CD. Anyone hits him, they will immediately get an ignis. Bold fighter, natural doubles, everything gets thrown out the window if they can't OHKO him, so the only specials he cares about are pre-charged specials, and guard doesn't help against those.

Plus, with steady stance 4 he's taking two hits instead of one. Mind you, I figure you're getting his def to 55 so it won't matter. But this build is also showing 55 def.

But it's with the addition of doubling and slowing their cooldown. I guess I just never assume you start at -2 cooldown with these things. Yours will KO but needs to player hase to get it going and with Aether Maps especially you need to be able to position well. I understand the idea of how it will work, but you can't shortcut to the -2

I was thinking to infantry pulse it, actually. Not easy with that 47HP, but should be possible to give him one infantry pulse, like, from a merged dragon or Ogma or something, and if I can't get a second, quickened pulse is an option because I don't think I need all 103 of that potential damage.

Black Knight. He's my pick for first +10 merge on GHB units, and a part of my future arena core. Already has Vengeful Fighter. Just need a Surtr and armor march fodder, and a dual rally to make him a +10 monster.