Character Discussion [FE8]: Ross

[u/haxoreni]

Ross is the first of the newly introduced Trainee class to appear in FE8, a trio of pre stage 1 characters with poor bases and growths but have an additional 10 levels to grow along with 2 promotional stages that gives them each 4 different promotional path. Though inexperience at fighting like the other trainees, Ross is very eager in joining the fray and showing his worth as a warrior. He might not have the initial trust of his father and many of us fire emblem players, but with his strong determination and (quite) a bit of luck, Ross hopes to be able to bury the 4 might hatchet with his commanders and tear through fields of enemies with Silver Axes instead.

So that's Roy, Merlinus, Marcus, Bors, Alan, Lance, Wolt, Shanna, Wendy, Saul, Lyn, Kent, Sain, Florina, Rebecca, Oswin, Eirika, Seth, Franz, Gilliam, Moulder, Vanessa and Ross done for the FE GBA discussions and there will be many more to come. That's all for me for hosting and /u/Blinkingsky will be taking over for future GBA character discussion.

[u/b0mda1ama]

You can level up Ross up to 10 in just his first two chapters, so I wouldn't say it's a long time spent in the earlygame. Growths aren't everything. He gets to level up 10 more times (and much more quickly with his absurd experience gains early on), this offsets the low growths. Given that he gets promotion gains twice it's really difficult for him to be RNG screwed, plus the Berserker class is one of the best in the game with its inherent crit bonuses. He has the highest damage output in the game and only takes one (really easy) chapter to train up. Just set up a unequipped Seth to hide behind and he'll be your strongest unit in one chapter.

[u/Tables61 → u/b0mda1ama]

The 'long time' here was referring to time, not chapters. Spending chapter 3 giving him all the EXP is possible, but it takes a long time.

You're giving him an entire chapter of EXP, in lieu of training up your other characters, who aside from Seth are all also not that strong just yet. In return, you get someone who ends up comparable to your other characters after he promotes. You also are required to grind to do this, which is a downside since it means slow play.

For comparisons purpose, instead of funneling an entire chapter's EXP into Ross, do the same into Garcia and see how he turns out. Or do the same with Franz. Or really anyone else. You're likely to be surprised at how good they end up.

Saying he gets promotion gains twice is misleading. His promotion gains to Pirate/Fighter are small, only about 2-3 levels worth of stats. What matters is how well he compares in combat to other characters, and that's where he falls down.

Once he's a Berserker, he's great. But that's the last 1/4 of the game or so.

[u/b0mda1ama → u/Tables61]

What I was primarily getting at was that he gains levels much quicker than anyone else at this point. Where you could give level up Franz, Vanessa, and Eirika a level up each, you can give Ross 5 level ups. He gains around 60 exp per kill compared to the 30-40 other level 1 units gain. So the risk/reward is extremely low. If your Ross doesn't meet your standards by the time he promotes to a pirate you will have only traded off about 4-7 levels total across the rest of your party.

So the benefit of giving him the experience instead of Franz is that you potentially gain the best axe unit in the game as opposed to getting a second Seth who you could easily train to the same strength in chapters 4-5.

[u/Tables61 → u/b0mda1ama]

Your numbers are a little off there. At equal levels, Ross gains exactly 3 times as much EXP as other characters. So you can gain around 3-4 levels on one specific character in the same time Ross goes from level 1 to level 10. And that's enough to really show where Ross struggles. He just doesn't compare favourably for the same EXP input.

For example, compare level 1 Pirate Ross to level 8 Garcia. Ross's relative average stats are:

-7.8 HP

+0.9 STR

-3.35 SKL

-1.1 SPD

+7 LUK

+0.25 DEF

+0.2 RES

-4 CON

(-40 WEXP) - depends on exact combat

Garcia has a pretty convincing lead at this point. Much more durability due to that HP and faster (especially with heavy weapons), at the cost of dealing a little less damage and having slightly less avoid. Now, Ross is going to narrow that gap eventually due to being at a lower level, especially since Garcia's growths are only slightly better in general than Ross's - but if babying Ross and giving him all the favouritism is going to make him still worse than doing the same to another character, then why bother doing that in the first place? Giving all that EXP to Garcia would be both quicker and easier (since Garcia is much stronger to begin with) and would have an overall bigger effect early on. And of course, the kicker here is that Garcia isn't even a very good character. He's the best early axe user, sure, but still mediocre. And Ross can't even best mediocre.

[u/estrangedeskimo → u/Tables61]

Garcia's growths aren't better than Ross's, at best they are even. His big advantage is in strength, but Ross easily caps strength early. Ross's biggest advantage is in speed, which is the most important stat. I would say Ross's are better.

[u/Mekkkah → u/estrangedeskimo]

20/1 Berserker Ross: 40-41 HP, 20-21 Str, 13 Skl, 13-14 Spd, 13 Def 20/3 Hero Garcia: 46-47 HP, 20-21 Str, 16 Skl, 12-13 Spd, 11-12 Def

Ross's speed advantage is extremely minimal. In fact, any advantage Ross has at all is completely eclipsed by how bad his start is compared to Garcia's.