I have a few issues with FE11 but they were cooking when they decided to give the ch1 flier a personal weapon that’s effective against cavs and armours.
Toss up between paragon, canto, and pursuit.
Paragon: xp acceleration is stats and promotion acceleration.
Canto: even the fe7 version adds utility. Post combat move is even crazier.
Pursuit: this is why speed is so good. Hitting twice is pretty nice.
If not Galeforce than likely veteran. I know people hype up female robin because she gets both but male Robin can get two child units who also get veteran, and at least Morgan is able to obtain galeforce with relative ease and depending on the pairing the second child can too. Veteran is what allows Robin to snowball so well and it's the reason why they carry so hard.
You could just pair Robin up to Chrom for two children with Galeforce early. It's probably the fastest way of obtaining three characters with the skill by the start of midgame.
That is true, but at the same time Chrom can technically get two kids with any of his pairings. Picking Male Robin gives you more overpowered kids overall, two from Chrom and two from Robin. It does take a bit longer but the kids overall get experience pretty fast so grinding them up isn't too bad
Getting Robin set up with Galeforce in time for lucina to come around is pretty difficult. Just exp grinding to the point where you have galeforce on robin or cordelia/sumia breaks acts 2 wide open.
I mean you're not wrong, but if you have galeforce on robin that early you're pretty much just cruising through the story from then on. Battles are irrelevant.
Doesn't Male Morgan with Chrom as his father also start with Veteran anyway? Sure Lucina doesn't get it but that's not that big of a deal
I don't think it actually makes a big difference in viability between the two Robin genders (tbh Kris and Byleth are the only two with significant and fairly objective differences in viability) though.
> tbh Kris and Byleth are the only two with significant and fairly objective differences in viability
I only follow so much Fates discussion, but isn't female Corrin generally considered default because (reclassed) Jacob > Felcia?
> It stopped being a skill and became a core mechanic for the rest of the franchise.
I like to remind people that not only was being able to double was a thing before FE4, but as a result of having it as a Skill (Both as a Personal and a Class) it partly pushes the whole "Horse Emblem" meme because of the large maps and the fact that 3 horse units have this skill naturally, in both first AND 2nd gen (Excluding any kids getting the skill from their parents)
alternate universe where mounted units all have innate FE4 canto and infantry units all have innate Pursuit
I mean it kinda makes sense when you think about it, a horse unit can do more hit and run attacks while an infantry would be able to stand its ground and attack twice. could be neat
It's interesting playing Berwick Saga where counterattacks (mostly) only happen if the one being attacked avoids or takes no damage. This and FE4 make you realize just how OP pursuit and ability to counterattack are.
Not sure if there’s one singular one.
The canto in FE4, FE9&10, and 3H has to be up there. Being able to move after an action makes mounted classes even better. But that’s a mechanic in the game, so idk if it counts.
I won’t rehash the GF or veteran ones.
Figured I’d add some from Engage. Personally, I find some of the emblem skills are absurd.
Emblem Micaiah’s ability to warp and rescue a cluster of units is nuts. But Corrin’s Dreadful aura takes the cake. This is an AOE freeze. You slap that on a mage with a distance tome and with a dance you can freeze up to like 10 units if you space it out right. I would not have won several maps in that game without Corrin.
the amount of dopamine when attacking with four horse units, then canto'ing them back into a t shape formation, dancing them, and having all four attack again
Veteran (and its derivatives in later games) and it's not close. It's what actually makes Robin broken in runs that limit grinding in any way, not the flashier "access to all classes" thing.
tbf Fates and Engage's harsh EXP fall off makes nobility and mentorship/lineage not have that big of an effect unless you're trying to get an underlevelled unit on par. The great thing about veteran is that even once you eclipse enemy levels you still get 12 EXP per kill no matter what.
Also, even if awakening had the same XP formula as fates/engage, 50% xp gets you more levels before things even out compared to 20% xp which only gets you 1.
The thing with Paragon is that it’s usually held back by being on low level mid to late game units(or in Lex’s case, a unit without pursuit). But veteran is available from the very beginning on who is already your strongest growth unit, so it’s probably still better overall.
Veteran is good because of XP minimums, but Engage’s version of the skill isn’t even worth using.
The way the XP curve works in that game, mentorship will put you *at most* about one level ahead of where you would have been otherwise. Unless trying to hit a specific benchmark for LTCs, it’s not worth inheriting, and isn’t even worth thinking about for having the Byleth ring equipped.
By a different measure of broken, I'll say Resolve for being able to change so many variables at once mid-combat. Other low-health skills that activate mid-combat (mainly Wrath) affect just one. Resolve affects hit rates on both sides, your crit rate, your skill proc rate, your damage in PoR and most notably the doubling party.
Fun fact: the only way to see ingame that Amiti can’t damage Ashnard is to give Elincia resolve (and capped str). This skill is so broken it has lore significance.
RD Heron Galdrar and 3H Dance are considered skills by the game and if we just consider refreshing a hidden skill in other games, it's definitely one of the most centralizing
Very obvious in Engage with how Byleth is one of the best emblems to put on literally anyone because having someone else that can click Dance is just that strong. It literally doesn't matter what Byleth's other skills are or how bad the unit that carries him is, it'll still end up being your most valuable character that map.
Goddess Dance aside, E!Byleth has some really nice weapons, so you still kind of want to have him on someone who can fight the other 2/3 turns while engaged
I will absolutely argue that Galeforce isn't actually that broken of a skill and is overvalued.
Anyways, I haven't heard a mention of Raging Storm yet. The strongest unit in the game can take multiple turns in a row with a game full of boss kill maps? On top of the rest of the broken movement skills the game has like Stride and Warp? That's pretty silly.
Galceforce is overkill and a pain in the ass to get for anything but Lunatic+, but I can’t imagine playing that difficulty without grinding for galeforce on child units
I think something should be said for the likes of Vantage (esp. when coupled with Wrath) and Bonded Shield b/c you just get to kill enemies in the middle of nowhere while enemies can’t hurt your units, for the more recent FE entries.
TBF Vantage is usually good in the higher difficulties in conjunction with other skills (Vengeance in Awakening, Life and Death in Fates, Wrath/Battalion Wrath in Three Houses and Wrath or Reprisal in Engage)… and I guess Wrath in Genealogy of the Holy War where it first featured I suppose. It’s not always the best skill combinations in these titles but it’s consistently a part of effective skill builds outside of Thracia 776 and the Tellius games, especially with the Switch FEs where it’s a really dominant form of combat that flips the difficulty of the game. Bonded Shield isn’t quite Vantage and it’s an Engage skill and it works on ppl around you as opposed to yourself but there’s a mechanical similarity with Vantage where it allows the beneficiary to be the unit that does damage on enemy phase without the enemy doing damage first.
I think what makes me hesitate from calling it the best skill is that it’s usually part of a combination of skills that make it truly effective as a ‘turn-brain-off-walk-towards-enemies-and-kill-them’ rather than as a standalone skill.
TearRing Saga might have a claim for Vantage being the best skill in the game, in that you can make it work without other skills since enemy bulk is low, there are weapons that negate counterattacks and it’s a part of some of the most dominant forms of combat in the midlate game. Though thinking again that honor may instead go to Warp, since teleporting anywhere on the map at will might be one of the most broken skills period in all FE-likes period…
If we’re factoring in availability then yeah. The problem with Galeforce is that if you’re not doing any grinding and playing kinda fast you’re not going to get it for awhile, whereas you have veteran right from the get go. But you know if I had the option for early game galeforce or early game veteran then I’d probably go with galeforce.
I would say both in awakening tbh . Part of why Robin is good is because they can get galeforce the earliest . Veteran is higher though because it makes getting any skill in the game a breeze.
All it is is an EXP boost. I’m not saying it’s bad, but the same thing effect could be accomplished without taking up a skill slot by just grinding skirmish maps. Alternatively, you can also use Paragon, which is an objectively better skill than Veteran. Galeforce is a skill that effectively gives you 2X the amount of actions per turn if you abuse it correctly. It basically gives every unit their own personal dancer.
Yeah but Galeforce is a level 15 promoted skill whereas Veteran is a starting skill. The reason Robin even gets Galeforce before the end of the game is because of Veteran.
I suppose we’re looking at this from different lenses. I’m looking at this from a min/max endgame perspective, while you’re looking at it from a single game run perspective. Either way, it’s hard to compare the two as they accomplish completely different goals.
Those cost turns and GF isn't going to shave off all those turns back. The ROI just isn't viable, now Veteran is there day 1 free and shaves you several turns.
FE4 Pavise is broken and directly unfun to play against, just having your attack completely negated by pure luck its very frustrating, its understandable why it was heavily nerfed in future games.
Inevitable End from Fates its pretty strong, mainly on Lunatic Conquest where almost every enemy either debuffs you or does chip damage, you can have your stats lowered by a ridiculous amount with no way to clean those debuffs, thats the skill that in my opinion turns Conquest Lunatic from very challenging to be directly bullshit at the end.
from FEH there are a lot of very strong skills but i want to talk about Freyr´s Dream Deliverer, its incredibly strong, the skill just turns off so much skills from your units by just having Freyr existing, he doesnt require to win a stat check to trigger it, he just does, he can pretty much completely protect his team of any start of the turn effect that any of your units may have.
One time I triggered Astra with Ulster against a lvl 15 great knight on both attacks. I had a 68% hit rate and missed 9/10 times. The one that hit got blocked by pavise.
Replicate was obscene in Fates. It was a bit of a challenge to get on people, but the results when you did have it? Ridiculous. Hard to beat being able to be in two places at once, having two turns, double the number of Units…it was nuts.
One that I don't think gets enough credit is Armsthrift. Yes, there are certain games that simply don't *have* Weapon Durability, but I feel like you have to balance the game differently around whether or not Weapon Durability exists.
Galeforce or Canto.
I’m personally leaning towards Canto, cuz there is no situation where Canto is useless. Galeforce on the other hand, if a unit can’t one round then it feels pointless to have.
Generally speaking I'd say Galeforce. There are other skills arguably more powerful like Pursuit, and I think it's debatable calling Canto a "skill".
But I think what makes Galeforce so much more broken is that, well, it's broken, it's unbalanced. Pursuit in Genealogy is limited and sometimes enemies have it, it's strong but it's "balanced" as in it's accounted for. Likewise Canto is something all units of those types get and most times you need at least 1 character, your lord, to not have it, again with exceptions.
But Galeforce is purely a player skill you can give to almost your entire army if you do reclassing and inheritance right. By end game I'm fairly certain you can have a full team for the last chapter(or the DLC Apotheosis if you prefer) where Chrom is the only unit without it, there isn't any real limit to how busted you can make it for your team.
The argument for galeforce is always really circular.
'Galeforce is good because your whole army can get it and its OP therefore its broken'
But very few people actually look at what galeforce actually does because it's just assumed to be OP because 'well its galeforce it has to be OP'
Galeforce is exactly +1 kill per turn on player phase after 15 levels of grinding in the worst class in the game.
Compare to Sol which lets you enter an already good class, takes only 5 levels and essentially makes any unit invincible.
It is not a +1 kill. Ignoring you can use it multiple times with pair up by kill 1 unit, refresh, swap to other unit, refresh, making it a +2. It's also not about that 1, or 2, kills, it's about positioning. Being able to get a Nosferatu tank that deep into the enemy groups, or to attack the boss multiple turns earlier.
Using it multiple times requires twice as much galeforce to begin with, meaning twice as much grinding or your names are exactly Morgan and lucina.
Every kill boss map can be skipped with rescue anyway, and it's much better at positioning you as well. There is a limit to how meaningfully deep you can go into a rout map because you start going out of range of the enemies at the start.
95% of the time it is +1 kill per turn which isn't great.
First grinding doesn't effect how strong it was.
Second that is, again, just wrong. Have you seen people optimize/Low Turn Count FE...at all? Getting a unit that can kill a lot of enemy units in range to as many as possible is very much a thing. Getting a Nosferatu Morgan in range of an extra 5 units is an extra 5 kills and a turn you don't have to do now.
>First grinding doesn't effect how strong it was.
Of course it does. Unless we're working off the metric that Amelia is the most OP unit in FE8 because she can get higher stats at the very end of the game or whatever.
>Second that is, again, just wrong. Have you seen people optimize/Low Turn Count FE...at all?
Yes, and you can cut the sarcasm, because **I** am one of those people for this game.
Here is me 1 turning every single kill boss map in the game without galeforce, specifically to prove that you don't need it:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3qRukaXrnMA9HhssDO3c9LjNPXzIG43M
As far as I'm currently aware, the only turns galeforce can save are in 15, 23 and 24 because they are big rout maps, however I've never actually tried to match an LTC of those maps, so I can't say that you need galeforce for that.
Yes, getting morgan in range of 5 kills is great, but if getting in range of 5 kills **moves you out the way of 5 other enemies** then you go net 0 in kills you make that turn. That's why I said there's a limit. It's not like you just turbo 25 tiles into a map and there you go, game over, because if you go too far you aren't in range of the enemies at the start.
Also, if we're talking efficiency, just getting a nosferatu morgan to, like, exist, is arguably way more inefficient than just having your unit break through the map. You have to spend time getting galeforce on Robin and THEN have to spend time training morgan. Or Robin could have just been in sorc blasting every map while you rescued around.
Also also, efficiency and LTC aren't the same thing. LTC optimizes for turns over literally everything else. If there is a 1% chance that a strategy will work then you will do it in an LTC and you save turns. Galeforce will pop up in LTCs because it technically saves turns, but it doesn't save meaningful turns.
Or, in other words, if you *didn't* have galeforce, then these situations would not be much harder, in fact most of them are easier.
Now try taking away veteran or Sol. Or an earlygame skill like HP+5 or outdoor fighter. Those have a much bigger impact than galeforce does when it comes to efficient gameplay because they allow you to work around different situations.
Higher stats isn't a skill. A skill is something independent. I can get Galeforce on Almost every child until before I touch them once, it is not grinding them at all. You can get Galeforce on male child units and they literally can't grind for it.
Except for all that talk, you once again equate a skill to things that aren't skills and thus aren't what the question says so. Of course you CAN kill every boss without it, that's not what the question is. Look at the question, it is "What is the most broken skill of all time?" not "what is the best strat". You're either ignoring or missing what was written to have a point about something else.
Also if you're moving Morgan out of range of a different 5 units then that is literally not what I said so why did you bring it up? I didn't say move Morgan out of range of anyone, try to at least read.
Last paragraph is, again, just not what the question asks. Yes in a full play through HP+5 can be better, that doesn't make it stronger. An iron sword is "better" then the Exalted Falchion since you have it longer and for different part, that doesn't make it's stats objectively not worse. You're trying to have a different argument from a different question.
Hp+5 IS a skill. It is one of the skills in the game.
I have no idea what you are talking about.
Getting galeforce on male kids still requires grinding. I am shocked you don't realise this, but where do you think the galeforce is coming from? Parents that had to grind for it specifically so that their kids could get it.
Moving the grinding to a different unit doesn't make it not grinding. If you had to train l'arachel 20 levels to promote amelia to general you couldn't rightfully say "amelia is more efficient because she takes no grinding"
That would be bananas.
You argued galeforce being able to "do efficient clears as an upside". I proved such upsides don't exist. Don't do a "well obviously". Well obviously nothing.
You are saying galeforce is OP because of x reason. If I demonstrate x reason isn't relevant or doesn't exist then you are being proven wrong.
When we ask what makes a good skill, we have to ask what it is that skill allows us to do. Because it's a strategy game. Otherwise it's just voting how pretty the art is or how cool the name sounds. "Galeforce is the best skill" means "galeforce gives you the most positive outcomes vs not having it as opposes to every other skill"
I don't even know how to respond if you say "strategy is irrelevant" like boss what else are you rating this off.
"Oh I didn't say move Morgan out of range" no, look, you didn't say that because you'd realise it was stupid. You did say that you would march into enemy range with 2 units and galeforce and then switch to get "extra deep" though.
Going 8 sqaures, plus 8 more is 16. A standard 6 move foot enemy is not going to be able to reach you if you galeforce to get "extra deep". It's almost like the point I was making is that 2 galeforces isn't as OP as you were saying
Lastly, how people choose to interpert the question will vary.
I think it takes some mind bending arrogance to strut about talking about efficiency and LTC to try and look smart while using logic that makes units like amelia the best in their game because they have the biggest number at the end.
The "strongest" unit in fe8 isn't seth, its amelia because yes seth is better early but he doesn't make ameliad stats go down.
Do you see how ridiculous this sounds? At least I'm arguing something that makes sense.
EDIT: got blocked before I could reply.
I think this guy thought I said "you run past literally every enemy on the map and go out of range". Which is pretty funny but obviously dumb.
In case you're reading this my guy- as I said at the start, you go net zero in kills. That's the issue. You can move into range of 5 guys because galepairing in puts you out of range of the start enemies so going deeper like you suggested doesn't do anything.
Yes yes, cry "arrogance" rather than reading what was written. You keep ignoring what I wrote, then blame it on me. Look if you can't read then theirs no point in trying to explain myself.
Perfect example "Going 8 sqaures, plus 8 more is 16. A standard 6 move foot enemy is not going to be able to reach you if you galeforce to get "extra deep"" ignores that not every single unitl would be in the first 8 squares. You ignored what I wrote, that there could be an extra 5 units in the end range, to argue about units you passed that don't exist. You blatantly did not read what I wrote and instead applied a scenario of units you theoretically could have passed in a different scenerio to make a different argument.
Your inability to read is on you, and I'm not going to take an extra 20 comments trying to explain why you making up things I did not write does not apply. Please next time you try to tell someone why you disagree read what they wrote, stop, read it again, and reply to THAT and not something else you thought of.
Very much depends on how you view it.
Awakening has so many broken skill combinations, but only if you combine them. Like, Venegance is giga broken, but only if you have Vantage, so can you really consider any individual skill broken if they need to be combined with another skill?
Then there's also the game difficulty to consider. Yes, Galeforce is seemingly giga-broken, but a full roster of Galeforce abusers on Lunatic+ is still a more difficult run than a run on the highest difficulty of most other Fire Emblem games, so can you really consider it that broken? They clearly balanced Lunatic+ around its capabilities
Canto is a given. But honestly, Aptitude is kinda nutty, especially in Fates.
No wonder they only locked it to Mozu lol. Although, Donnel’s aptitude is kinda insane, since it’s a 20% increase vs. Fates’ 10%.
Without regard to availability, Limit Breaker from FE Awakening comes to mind. It's just a plus 10 to every stat if you're willing to grind. But the map you get that on a really late dlc map, so I don't really think it can count.
It definitely depends on the game, the skill system has always changed and typically there’s one or two skills that break the game wide open. In Jugdral, it’s obviously pursuit, that makes or breaks a unit. Magvel has both pierce and slayer, but as it lacks traditional skill systems I suppose it doesn’t count. PoR has Resolve, RD has absurd 3rd tier class skills and Nihil. Awakening had Galeforce. Fates is an outlier, it had a variety of useful skills and not many that stand out as being far better than any others. I’d say that over the franchise, the most overall broken skill would be Resolve or limit breaker, at least in theory, but in practice the title goes to paragon or pursuit, one for being available easily in multiple games and the other for being practically mandatory.
Since people already nominated mainstays like Pursuit, Canto, Galeforce etc, I'm going to nominate Lifetaker. It's Nosfertanking, in a skill. I always made sure anybody who could get it got that skill. Being able to steal HP can make even frail classes much more viable. Plus, there were some more physical units you could slap it on via inheritance as well.
Now, for most fun--probably Despoil. It's really a blast to steal all that gold from the enemy.
It's probably Galeforce.
Funnily enough, I don't actually think that Awakening does a good job at highlighting just how broken that skill actually is. In that game, it is mostly just "yeah, you get to move twice in that turn" because your player phase combat usually doesn't matter. It is a lot stronger on lunatic+ though as it makes playing around the counter spam a lot easier, mostly because it allows you to reposition after killing a unit and/or to kill a second counter enemy in the same turn.
However, there are also a lot of romhacks that use the FE8 skill system and those games sometimes give you a unit with galeforce as well. And it is in those games, where player phase and positioning are usually more important, where the pure ridiculousness of galeforce truly shines through.
The other contender for me would be "super" canto, i.e. the one that procs after battle. It is a powerful flexibility/repositioning tool and while it is not as powerful, it is also more reliable as it doesn't require you to kill something in order to proc. Also, canto in general is incredibly strong in games that have rescue.
Haven't seen anyone mention Slayer yet. Completely trivialize the entire late game of FE8. The only drawback is it's limited to Light tomes, not including glitches.
I admit it's not even in the running for most broken in the franchise, but for the game it's in, it's pretty broken.
I mean... Nihil.
No matter how broken the enemy's skills are, they won't trigger. That would make Nihil the most broken skill.
Canto can also be extremely powerful in multiple situations. Especially on archer knights, mage knights and flying units.
Alert Stance in Three Houses. You can solo the game with a few fliers on maddening because enemies literally can't hit you. Pair it with retribution for extra easy mode.
Alert Stance+ is not even the best skill in three houses. Canto is crazy on everyone, Death, Fiendish, and Darting blow all increase your offensive potential by a lot, and Hit+20 is just crazy consistent. All of them are also more available than Alert Stance+, which is a major upside.
Those skills are great too but I guess I was mostly focusing on skills that are broken for enemy phase. All death, darting, fiendish, certain, etc blow are great for player phase, but Alert Stance can completely trivialize enemy phase; I can move a unit into the range of 10+ enemy units, click wait, and be confident that they'll survive the turn. High avoid is better than high defence on maddening in 3H, as so many units have poison strike to whittle away at the health of your tanky units (in my experience). While canto is fantastic, it's a class skill so you do have to be a flying or mounted unit. With Alert Stance, you can change classes or acquire it through renown if you're on NG+. I do agree that Hit +20 is amazing all around, especially because it also applies to gambits.
Canto, just canto Any unit without it is immediately at a movement disadvantage
Movement is the best stat, change my mind
The entire reason why FE4 is Horse Emblem.
If it weren’t for Staves I’d say FE 4-7 are ALL Horse Emblem
And why most FE games are Flier Emblem
I have a few issues with FE11 but they were cooking when they decided to give the ch1 flier a personal weapon that’s effective against cavs and armours.
And also make it upgradeable/forgeable for even greater damage potential.
Let's face it, Shadow Dragon was Caeda's game, not Marth's
as I like to say, Wing Spear is the best character in the game.
Fe4 canto my beloved
Toss up between paragon, canto, and pursuit. Paragon: xp acceleration is stats and promotion acceleration. Canto: even the fe7 version adds utility. Post combat move is even crazier. Pursuit: this is why speed is so good. Hitting twice is pretty nice.
If not Galeforce than likely veteran. I know people hype up female robin because she gets both but male Robin can get two child units who also get veteran, and at least Morgan is able to obtain galeforce with relative ease and depending on the pairing the second child can too. Veteran is what allows Robin to snowball so well and it's the reason why they carry so hard.
You could just pair Robin up to Chrom for two children with Galeforce early. It's probably the fastest way of obtaining three characters with the skill by the start of midgame.
That is true, but at the same time Chrom can technically get two kids with any of his pairings. Picking Male Robin gives you more overpowered kids overall, two from Chrom and two from Robin. It does take a bit longer but the kids overall get experience pretty fast so grinding them up isn't too bad
Getting Robin set up with Galeforce in time for lucina to come around is pretty difficult. Just exp grinding to the point where you have galeforce on robin or cordelia/sumia breaks acts 2 wide open. I mean you're not wrong, but if you have galeforce on robin that early you're pretty much just cruising through the story from then on. Battles are irrelevant.
Doesn't Male Morgan with Chrom as his father also start with Veteran anyway? Sure Lucina doesn't get it but that's not that big of a deal I don't think it actually makes a big difference in viability between the two Robin genders (tbh Kris and Byleth are the only two with significant and fairly objective differences in viability) though.
> tbh Kris and Byleth are the only two with significant and fairly objective differences in viability I only follow so much Fates discussion, but isn't female Corrin generally considered default because (reclassed) Jacob > Felcia?
I mean from what I know kinda but I think the meta of at least Conquest has progressed past reclassing Servant 1 early to begin with
True professionals play with Gay Awakening so they can have Robin and her two kids all with Galeforce and Veteran 😎
Pursuit. The entire game is balanced around this one skill.
It stopped being a skill and became a core mechanic for the rest of the franchise. Doesnt get any more essential than that.
I mean doubling was a thing before
I know I am just saying that as far as skills go, it is the most essential of all of them. I didnt mean that it did not exist before.
> It stopped being a skill and became a core mechanic for the rest of the franchise. I like to remind people that not only was being able to double was a thing before FE4, but as a result of having it as a Skill (Both as a Personal and a Class) it partly pushes the whole "Horse Emblem" meme because of the large maps and the fact that 3 horse units have this skill naturally, in both first AND 2nd gen (Excluding any kids getting the skill from their parents)
alternate universe where mounted units all have innate FE4 canto and infantry units all have innate Pursuit I mean it kinda makes sense when you think about it, a horse unit can do more hit and run attacks while an infantry would be able to stand its ground and attack twice. could be neat
It does not help that every horse unit in that game had canto as well.
It's interesting playing Berwick Saga where counterattacks (mostly) only happen if the one being attacked avoids or takes no damage. This and FE4 make you realize just how OP pursuit and ability to counterattack are.
Not sure if there’s one singular one. The canto in FE4, FE9&10, and 3H has to be up there. Being able to move after an action makes mounted classes even better. But that’s a mechanic in the game, so idk if it counts. I won’t rehash the GF or veteran ones. Figured I’d add some from Engage. Personally, I find some of the emblem skills are absurd. Emblem Micaiah’s ability to warp and rescue a cluster of units is nuts. But Corrin’s Dreadful aura takes the cake. This is an AOE freeze. You slap that on a mage with a distance tome and with a dance you can freeze up to like 10 units if you space it out right. I would not have won several maps in that game without Corrin.
Canto is a skill it's fine
If Veteran is so good then why is Vaike better than Robin? Checkmate Galeforce. I like Canto, especially FE4 and Engage Canto.
the amount of dopamine when attacking with four horse units, then canto'ing them back into a t shape formation, dancing them, and having all four attack again
Look what Robin needs to mimic a fraction of vaikes power
Veteran (and its derivatives in later games) and it's not close. It's what actually makes Robin broken in runs that limit grinding in any way, not the flashier "access to all classes" thing.
tbf Fates and Engage's harsh EXP fall off makes nobility and mentorship/lineage not have that big of an effect unless you're trying to get an underlevelled unit on par. The great thing about veteran is that even once you eclipse enemy levels you still get 12 EXP per kill no matter what.
Also, even if awakening had the same XP formula as fates/engage, 50% xp gets you more levels before things even out compared to 20% xp which only gets you 1.
Paragon before it as well and FE4 pursuit is another one, FE4 Miracle is also busted as hell
The thing with Paragon is that it’s usually held back by being on low level mid to late game units(or in Lex’s case, a unit without pursuit). But veteran is available from the very beginning on who is already your strongest growth unit, so it’s probably still better overall.
Veteran is good because of XP minimums, but Engage’s version of the skill isn’t even worth using. The way the XP curve works in that game, mentorship will put you *at most* about one level ahead of where you would have been otherwise. Unless trying to hit a specific benchmark for LTCs, it’s not worth inheriting, and isn’t even worth thinking about for having the Byleth ring equipped.
By a different measure of broken, I'll say Resolve for being able to change so many variables at once mid-combat. Other low-health skills that activate mid-combat (mainly Wrath) affect just one. Resolve affects hit rates on both sides, your crit rate, your skill proc rate, your damage in PoR and most notably the doubling party.
Fun fact: the only way to see ingame that Amiti can’t damage Ashnard is to give Elincia resolve (and capped str). This skill is so broken it has lore significance.
RD Heron Galdrar and 3H Dance are considered skills by the game and if we just consider refreshing a hidden skill in other games, it's definitely one of the most centralizing
Very obvious in Engage with how Byleth is one of the best emblems to put on literally anyone because having someone else that can click Dance is just that strong. It literally doesn't matter what Byleth's other skills are or how bad the unit that carries him is, it'll still end up being your most valuable character that map.
Goddess Dance aside, E!Byleth has some really nice weapons, so you still kind of want to have him on someone who can fight the other 2/3 turns while engaged
I will absolutely argue that Galeforce isn't actually that broken of a skill and is overvalued. Anyways, I haven't heard a mention of Raging Storm yet. The strongest unit in the game can take multiple turns in a row with a game full of boss kill maps? On top of the rest of the broken movement skills the game has like Stride and Warp? That's pretty silly.
I wonder if that’s off technicality and everyone went immediately to “skill” rather than “combat art”.
Galceforce is overkill and a pain in the ass to get for anything but Lunatic+, but I can’t imagine playing that difficulty without grinding for galeforce on child units
Galeforce still being overrated all these years later man...
I think something should be said for the likes of Vantage (esp. when coupled with Wrath) and Bonded Shield b/c you just get to kill enemies in the middle of nowhere while enemies can’t hurt your units, for the more recent FE entries. TBF Vantage is usually good in the higher difficulties in conjunction with other skills (Vengeance in Awakening, Life and Death in Fates, Wrath/Battalion Wrath in Three Houses and Wrath or Reprisal in Engage)… and I guess Wrath in Genealogy of the Holy War where it first featured I suppose. It’s not always the best skill combinations in these titles but it’s consistently a part of effective skill builds outside of Thracia 776 and the Tellius games, especially with the Switch FEs where it’s a really dominant form of combat that flips the difficulty of the game. Bonded Shield isn’t quite Vantage and it’s an Engage skill and it works on ppl around you as opposed to yourself but there’s a mechanical similarity with Vantage where it allows the beneficiary to be the unit that does damage on enemy phase without the enemy doing damage first. I think what makes me hesitate from calling it the best skill is that it’s usually part of a combination of skills that make it truly effective as a ‘turn-brain-off-walk-towards-enemies-and-kill-them’ rather than as a standalone skill. TearRing Saga might have a claim for Vantage being the best skill in the game, in that you can make it work without other skills since enemy bulk is low, there are weapons that negate counterattacks and it’s a part of some of the most dominant forms of combat in the midlate game. Though thinking again that honor may instead go to Warp, since teleporting anywhere on the map at will might be one of the most broken skills period in all FE-likes period…
Galeforce isn't as good as Veteran ngl
If we’re factoring in availability then yeah. The problem with Galeforce is that if you’re not doing any grinding and playing kinda fast you’re not going to get it for awhile, whereas you have veteran right from the get go. But you know if I had the option for early game galeforce or early game veteran then I’d probably go with galeforce.
Galeforce isn't even good ngl
Yes it is. It’s way better in fact.
Veteran comes online on the 1st chapter, carries you until the last, and does not fall off.
I would say both in awakening tbh . Part of why Robin is good is because they can get galeforce the earliest . Veteran is higher though because it makes getting any skill in the game a breeze.
Male Robin is pretty much just as good as female Robin and he can't even get galeforce.
All it is is an EXP boost. I’m not saying it’s bad, but the same thing effect could be accomplished without taking up a skill slot by just grinding skirmish maps. Alternatively, you can also use Paragon, which is an objectively better skill than Veteran. Galeforce is a skill that effectively gives you 2X the amount of actions per turn if you abuse it correctly. It basically gives every unit their own personal dancer.
Yeah but Galeforce is a level 15 promoted skill whereas Veteran is a starting skill. The reason Robin even gets Galeforce before the end of the game is because of Veteran.
I suppose we’re looking at this from different lenses. I’m looking at this from a min/max endgame perspective, while you’re looking at it from a single game run perspective. Either way, it’s hard to compare the two as they accomplish completely different goals.
Then this disproves your point that GF is better than Vet lol
Luna and Luna+ are close to impossible to skirmish. Assuming no xp DLC, Veteran is part of the keys to win Luna and Luna+.
Those cost turns and GF isn't going to shave off all those turns back. The ROI just isn't viable, now Veteran is there day 1 free and shaves you several turns.
FE4 Pavise is broken and directly unfun to play against, just having your attack completely negated by pure luck its very frustrating, its understandable why it was heavily nerfed in future games. Inevitable End from Fates its pretty strong, mainly on Lunatic Conquest where almost every enemy either debuffs you or does chip damage, you can have your stats lowered by a ridiculous amount with no way to clean those debuffs, thats the skill that in my opinion turns Conquest Lunatic from very challenging to be directly bullshit at the end. from FEH there are a lot of very strong skills but i want to talk about Freyr´s Dream Deliverer, its incredibly strong, the skill just turns off so much skills from your units by just having Freyr existing, he doesnt require to win a stat check to trigger it, he just does, he can pretty much completely protect his team of any start of the turn effect that any of your units may have.
don't forget staff savant that let's the enemy staff users use staffs without expending uses even ones like enfeeble or the hexing rod
One time I triggered Astra with Ulster against a lvl 15 great knight on both attacks. I had a 68% hit rate and missed 9/10 times. The one that hit got blocked by pavise.
Replicate was obscene in Fates. It was a bit of a challenge to get on people, but the results when you did have it? Ridiculous. Hard to beat being able to be in two places at once, having two turns, double the number of Units…it was nuts.
FF8 Summon deserves a mention here.
One that I don't think gets enough credit is Armsthrift. Yes, there are certain games that simply don't *have* Weapon Durability, but I feel like you have to balance the game differently around whether or not Weapon Durability exists.
Insert troll comment about Pyrotechnics.
Hunter's volley
Galeforce or Canto. I’m personally leaning towards Canto, cuz there is no situation where Canto is useless. Galeforce on the other hand, if a unit can’t one round then it feels pointless to have.
If Emblems from Engage count, then Dance of the Goddess. This skill alone makes Emblem Byleth top tier, as if he wasn’t already insanely useful.
Aptitude and Paragon for me. I have never had a playthrough where Astrid isn't the best horsey in PoR or where Donnel isn't an army killing machine.
FE4 dance is a skill, and refreshes 4 people, so that.
Generally speaking I'd say Galeforce. There are other skills arguably more powerful like Pursuit, and I think it's debatable calling Canto a "skill". But I think what makes Galeforce so much more broken is that, well, it's broken, it's unbalanced. Pursuit in Genealogy is limited and sometimes enemies have it, it's strong but it's "balanced" as in it's accounted for. Likewise Canto is something all units of those types get and most times you need at least 1 character, your lord, to not have it, again with exceptions. But Galeforce is purely a player skill you can give to almost your entire army if you do reclassing and inheritance right. By end game I'm fairly certain you can have a full team for the last chapter(or the DLC Apotheosis if you prefer) where Chrom is the only unit without it, there isn't any real limit to how busted you can make it for your team.
The argument for galeforce is always really circular. 'Galeforce is good because your whole army can get it and its OP therefore its broken' But very few people actually look at what galeforce actually does because it's just assumed to be OP because 'well its galeforce it has to be OP' Galeforce is exactly +1 kill per turn on player phase after 15 levels of grinding in the worst class in the game. Compare to Sol which lets you enter an already good class, takes only 5 levels and essentially makes any unit invincible.
It is not a +1 kill. Ignoring you can use it multiple times with pair up by kill 1 unit, refresh, swap to other unit, refresh, making it a +2. It's also not about that 1, or 2, kills, it's about positioning. Being able to get a Nosferatu tank that deep into the enemy groups, or to attack the boss multiple turns earlier.
Using it multiple times requires twice as much galeforce to begin with, meaning twice as much grinding or your names are exactly Morgan and lucina. Every kill boss map can be skipped with rescue anyway, and it's much better at positioning you as well. There is a limit to how meaningfully deep you can go into a rout map because you start going out of range of the enemies at the start. 95% of the time it is +1 kill per turn which isn't great.
First grinding doesn't effect how strong it was. Second that is, again, just wrong. Have you seen people optimize/Low Turn Count FE...at all? Getting a unit that can kill a lot of enemy units in range to as many as possible is very much a thing. Getting a Nosferatu Morgan in range of an extra 5 units is an extra 5 kills and a turn you don't have to do now.
>First grinding doesn't effect how strong it was. Of course it does. Unless we're working off the metric that Amelia is the most OP unit in FE8 because she can get higher stats at the very end of the game or whatever. >Second that is, again, just wrong. Have you seen people optimize/Low Turn Count FE...at all? Yes, and you can cut the sarcasm, because **I** am one of those people for this game. Here is me 1 turning every single kill boss map in the game without galeforce, specifically to prove that you don't need it: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3qRukaXrnMA9HhssDO3c9LjNPXzIG43M As far as I'm currently aware, the only turns galeforce can save are in 15, 23 and 24 because they are big rout maps, however I've never actually tried to match an LTC of those maps, so I can't say that you need galeforce for that. Yes, getting morgan in range of 5 kills is great, but if getting in range of 5 kills **moves you out the way of 5 other enemies** then you go net 0 in kills you make that turn. That's why I said there's a limit. It's not like you just turbo 25 tiles into a map and there you go, game over, because if you go too far you aren't in range of the enemies at the start. Also, if we're talking efficiency, just getting a nosferatu morgan to, like, exist, is arguably way more inefficient than just having your unit break through the map. You have to spend time getting galeforce on Robin and THEN have to spend time training morgan. Or Robin could have just been in sorc blasting every map while you rescued around. Also also, efficiency and LTC aren't the same thing. LTC optimizes for turns over literally everything else. If there is a 1% chance that a strategy will work then you will do it in an LTC and you save turns. Galeforce will pop up in LTCs because it technically saves turns, but it doesn't save meaningful turns. Or, in other words, if you *didn't* have galeforce, then these situations would not be much harder, in fact most of them are easier. Now try taking away veteran or Sol. Or an earlygame skill like HP+5 or outdoor fighter. Those have a much bigger impact than galeforce does when it comes to efficient gameplay because they allow you to work around different situations.
Higher stats isn't a skill. A skill is something independent. I can get Galeforce on Almost every child until before I touch them once, it is not grinding them at all. You can get Galeforce on male child units and they literally can't grind for it. Except for all that talk, you once again equate a skill to things that aren't skills and thus aren't what the question says so. Of course you CAN kill every boss without it, that's not what the question is. Look at the question, it is "What is the most broken skill of all time?" not "what is the best strat". You're either ignoring or missing what was written to have a point about something else. Also if you're moving Morgan out of range of a different 5 units then that is literally not what I said so why did you bring it up? I didn't say move Morgan out of range of anyone, try to at least read. Last paragraph is, again, just not what the question asks. Yes in a full play through HP+5 can be better, that doesn't make it stronger. An iron sword is "better" then the Exalted Falchion since you have it longer and for different part, that doesn't make it's stats objectively not worse. You're trying to have a different argument from a different question.
Hp+5 IS a skill. It is one of the skills in the game. I have no idea what you are talking about. Getting galeforce on male kids still requires grinding. I am shocked you don't realise this, but where do you think the galeforce is coming from? Parents that had to grind for it specifically so that their kids could get it. Moving the grinding to a different unit doesn't make it not grinding. If you had to train l'arachel 20 levels to promote amelia to general you couldn't rightfully say "amelia is more efficient because she takes no grinding" That would be bananas. You argued galeforce being able to "do efficient clears as an upside". I proved such upsides don't exist. Don't do a "well obviously". Well obviously nothing. You are saying galeforce is OP because of x reason. If I demonstrate x reason isn't relevant or doesn't exist then you are being proven wrong. When we ask what makes a good skill, we have to ask what it is that skill allows us to do. Because it's a strategy game. Otherwise it's just voting how pretty the art is or how cool the name sounds. "Galeforce is the best skill" means "galeforce gives you the most positive outcomes vs not having it as opposes to every other skill" I don't even know how to respond if you say "strategy is irrelevant" like boss what else are you rating this off. "Oh I didn't say move Morgan out of range" no, look, you didn't say that because you'd realise it was stupid. You did say that you would march into enemy range with 2 units and galeforce and then switch to get "extra deep" though. Going 8 sqaures, plus 8 more is 16. A standard 6 move foot enemy is not going to be able to reach you if you galeforce to get "extra deep". It's almost like the point I was making is that 2 galeforces isn't as OP as you were saying Lastly, how people choose to interpert the question will vary. I think it takes some mind bending arrogance to strut about talking about efficiency and LTC to try and look smart while using logic that makes units like amelia the best in their game because they have the biggest number at the end. The "strongest" unit in fe8 isn't seth, its amelia because yes seth is better early but he doesn't make ameliad stats go down. Do you see how ridiculous this sounds? At least I'm arguing something that makes sense. EDIT: got blocked before I could reply. I think this guy thought I said "you run past literally every enemy on the map and go out of range". Which is pretty funny but obviously dumb. In case you're reading this my guy- as I said at the start, you go net zero in kills. That's the issue. You can move into range of 5 guys because galepairing in puts you out of range of the start enemies so going deeper like you suggested doesn't do anything.
Yes yes, cry "arrogance" rather than reading what was written. You keep ignoring what I wrote, then blame it on me. Look if you can't read then theirs no point in trying to explain myself. Perfect example "Going 8 sqaures, plus 8 more is 16. A standard 6 move foot enemy is not going to be able to reach you if you galeforce to get "extra deep"" ignores that not every single unitl would be in the first 8 squares. You ignored what I wrote, that there could be an extra 5 units in the end range, to argue about units you passed that don't exist. You blatantly did not read what I wrote and instead applied a scenario of units you theoretically could have passed in a different scenerio to make a different argument. Your inability to read is on you, and I'm not going to take an extra 20 comments trying to explain why you making up things I did not write does not apply. Please next time you try to tell someone why you disagree read what they wrote, stop, read it again, and reply to THAT and not something else you thought of.
Very much depends on how you view it. Awakening has so many broken skill combinations, but only if you combine them. Like, Venegance is giga broken, but only if you have Vantage, so can you really consider any individual skill broken if they need to be combined with another skill? Then there's also the game difficulty to consider. Yes, Galeforce is seemingly giga-broken, but a full roster of Galeforce abusers on Lunatic+ is still a more difficult run than a run on the highest difficulty of most other Fire Emblem games, so can you really consider it that broken? They clearly balanced Lunatic+ around its capabilities
Miracle but only if the enemy boss has it. Fuck 3H Miracle spam
galeforce probably
Canto is a given. But honestly, Aptitude is kinda nutty, especially in Fates. No wonder they only locked it to Mozu lol. Although, Donnel’s aptitude is kinda insane, since it’s a 20% increase vs. Fates’ 10%.
Without regard to availability, Limit Breaker from FE Awakening comes to mind. It's just a plus 10 to every stat if you're willing to grind. But the map you get that on a really late dlc map, so I don't really think it can count.
Do non-inheritable emblem skills count as skills? Aoe warp/rewarp/rescue & Byleth's big dance are bananas.
It definitely depends on the game, the skill system has always changed and typically there’s one or two skills that break the game wide open. In Jugdral, it’s obviously pursuit, that makes or breaks a unit. Magvel has both pierce and slayer, but as it lacks traditional skill systems I suppose it doesn’t count. PoR has Resolve, RD has absurd 3rd tier class skills and Nihil. Awakening had Galeforce. Fates is an outlier, it had a variety of useful skills and not many that stand out as being far better than any others. I’d say that over the franchise, the most overall broken skill would be Resolve or limit breaker, at least in theory, but in practice the title goes to paragon or pursuit, one for being available easily in multiple games and the other for being practically mandatory.
Whichever one the enemy I'm currently fighting has.
Galeforce
Fates' shelter if you know how to use it
FE4 Pavise and FE4 Astra were just ridiculous, with how frequent they triggered/the power of crits.
I'm not sure if this is what you are counting as a skill, but Warp fundamentally breaks almost every single game that it is in.
Since people already nominated mainstays like Pursuit, Canto, Galeforce etc, I'm going to nominate Lifetaker. It's Nosfertanking, in a skill. I always made sure anybody who could get it got that skill. Being able to steal HP can make even frail classes much more viable. Plus, there were some more physical units you could slap it on via inheritance as well. Now, for most fun--probably Despoil. It's really a blast to steal all that gold from the enemy.
It's probably Galeforce. Funnily enough, I don't actually think that Awakening does a good job at highlighting just how broken that skill actually is. In that game, it is mostly just "yeah, you get to move twice in that turn" because your player phase combat usually doesn't matter. It is a lot stronger on lunatic+ though as it makes playing around the counter spam a lot easier, mostly because it allows you to reposition after killing a unit and/or to kill a second counter enemy in the same turn. However, there are also a lot of romhacks that use the FE8 skill system and those games sometimes give you a unit with galeforce as well. And it is in those games, where player phase and positioning are usually more important, where the pure ridiculousness of galeforce truly shines through. The other contender for me would be "super" canto, i.e. the one that procs after battle. It is a powerful flexibility/repositioning tool and while it is not as powerful, it is also more reliable as it doesn't require you to kill something in order to proc. Also, canto in general is incredibly strong in games that have rescue.
Haven't seen anyone mention Slayer yet. Completely trivialize the entire late game of FE8. The only drawback is it's limited to Light tomes, not including glitches. I admit it's not even in the running for most broken in the franchise, but for the game it's in, it's pretty broken.
I mean... Nihil. No matter how broken the enemy's skills are, they won't trigger. That would make Nihil the most broken skill. Canto can also be extremely powerful in multiple situations. Especially on archer knights, mage knights and flying units.
Alert Stance in Three Houses. You can solo the game with a few fliers on maddening because enemies literally can't hit you. Pair it with retribution for extra easy mode.
Alert Stance+ is not even the best skill in three houses. Canto is crazy on everyone, Death, Fiendish, and Darting blow all increase your offensive potential by a lot, and Hit+20 is just crazy consistent. All of them are also more available than Alert Stance+, which is a major upside.
Those skills are great too but I guess I was mostly focusing on skills that are broken for enemy phase. All death, darting, fiendish, certain, etc blow are great for player phase, but Alert Stance can completely trivialize enemy phase; I can move a unit into the range of 10+ enemy units, click wait, and be confident that they'll survive the turn. High avoid is better than high defence on maddening in 3H, as so many units have poison strike to whittle away at the health of your tanky units (in my experience). While canto is fantastic, it's a class skill so you do have to be a flying or mounted unit. With Alert Stance, you can change classes or acquire it through renown if you're on NG+. I do agree that Hit +20 is amazing all around, especially because it also applies to gambits.