Struesdell's Tier Lists [10/4/12]

bigpig506 wrote:

Charles rated bottom 6*? agreed his stats for a 6* are low as hell, but hes 10 unit cost, S speed. situationally better than alex/beatrix

Situationally better, sure. That's why they're all in the same tier.

Also, speed is accounted for. Testing was done and S attacks something like 1.2 times a second, C = 1s, D = 0.9s, or something like that. Yes that makes a difference, but not necessarily enough to make up for the low stats and boost him up any tiers. Someone has to be low-tier.

timlai1209 wrote:

At least cae should be in tier 3, if you have taken a look on 5* land monster, most of their weakness is land magic attack. cae is still useful in case. Besides, you may find people who are selling cae in pretty lower amount TE while other magic unit worths like 200-300 TEs, as most of them noticed cae is useless in their view.

This list makes no accounting for supply/demand or price of cards. You can get Meg for dirt cheap, but she's still rated highly in tiers because she has pretty decent stats -- if this were a rating of prices, it would look pretty different.

While there are some monsters that are weak to magic and are land (er, which? Toads?), the amount of other monsters that aren't, or are air-type, etc, balances things out I think. I personally think it's very rare you would want specifically a MAGIC SLOW -- even if you did, there's Laura and Stefan, and if you just want magic, there's Erhard, or just slow, there's Edgar.

clocksprocket wrote:

While there are some monsters that are weak to magic and are land (er, which? Toads?), the amount of other monsters that aren't, or are air-type, etc, balances things out I think. I personally think it's very rare you would want specifically a MAGIC SLOW -- even if you did, there's Laura and Stefan, and if you just want magic, there's Erhard, or just slow, there's Edgar.

Land 5* monster like Kerberos, Cyclops, Hydra, Manticore,Penth with D magic defence.

Consider strength and weakness of other 5* land monster, there would be 7 of 12 in 5* land monster which weak in magic def and 4 with C magic def, only Griffin got a B for magic defence.

For the air type monster, you may find 5*missile unit or sofia do much better air attack compare to 5* magic unit.

Agree with your view that some unit must be low tier, but I must say that some low tier unit do better in some case. And, this is the limtation of everyone's making their tier list if they only consider stats, cost,skill and attack speed. But, I also counted weakness of the monsters in my owned tier list.

Fourth tier doesn't mean BAD. None of the 5*s are bad cards, not even Fiona (though, yes, Fiona is justifiably a fraction of what the others cost). There's a method to the tiering. Think of them this way:

Tier 1: Either superlative stats (Sheryl, Rose, Heide, Joachim) or solid stats and a very good skill supporting them (Edgar's high attack + Slow, Meg's speed and range + Poison)

Tier 2: Very good but not quite top notch. Either excellent ground melee with anti-air (Ignat, Bernhard, Victoria, Sofia), well-rounded stats with a good skill (Laura, Franz, Erhard, Stefan, Kiki), a special case (Camille's self-boosting melee) or sneaking in the back door (Sera's C speed squeaks her in).

Tier 3: Decent but not a standout. Mid-range stats (Sonia, Luc, Sarah, Julia), a range advantage (Marg) or a useful skill but imbalanced stats (Plautia's huge ground attack + KB, Vivi's strong ground + KB).

Tier 4: Capable but with a deficiency. Hilde's speed, Thrain and Gerhard's lack of anti-air, Emma's lacking stats, Fiona's even lower stats, Elena and Adolph being slow and unremarkable are all examples of this. All of them can be useful, but it's rare that you'd specifically pick one of these if you had a similar higher tier available.

Elena's probably the closest to a 3 among that set. Caecilia isn't far behind -- she DOES have a useful Slow 5 and a good ground stat -- but that's all she has. Mediocre speed, high point cost, and deficient against air creatures (she will slow them down but can barely damage them).

Again, thanks to Clocks for reposting this and to Struesdell for the creation of this awesome list. Though it cannot be used to price a card, it more or less tells me which card I should keep unless i get a ridiculously stunningly good offer.

Cheers!

I have been playing around with attack speeds and some things seem deceptive. Sonia being the big one. She is a C attack speed but she attacks slower than Caecilia who is a D speed magic. But Sonia does attack faster than Kiki who is a D speed area-attack.

Do the area attack people get some attack speed penalty?

I just did another few tests with Geoergine and Gleb. Gleb get's almost 3 attacks for every 2 attacks of Georgine's. But they are both D speed ranged units.

clocksprocket wrote:

★★★★
Tier 1: Samantha, Yuriya, Scarlet, Chris, Georgine, Dhimitrios, Agnes, Livia, Blad, Anton
Tier 2: Gloria, Gleb, Miriam, Django, Partenope, Walpurgis, Tullia, Lieselotte, Felicia, Vilhelm, Mermaid, Paige, Achillea
Tier 3: Zenobia, Maia, Angela, Estlin, Sergei, Mylene, Luce Dorothy
Tier 4: Robert, Charl, Fredrike, Alfonso, Christof, Stray Cat, Biance, Avril, Alex, Helmut, Gunnel, Benedetta

I'll let struesdell's own words explain Benedetta: "Benedetta is the new bottom of the list. Attack Up (Men) is good. But her stats are worse than Alex's. In both cases I think Attack Up (Men) gets a little devalued right now just because all the best cards from the Gladiator, Military, Witch and Black Dragon Reincarnation sets are women."

Putting Benedetta in the bottom of 4* is extremely big mistake and worsest analysis I have ever seen.

I'm going to never discuss about this tier list and many units have been seriously under-rated or over-rated in this tier list.

^ Strue's explanation of why Benedetta was ranked so lowly is precise. I would have given her the same ranking in the current game enrivonment. Right now strong male units are just not available to the average player. Look through your unit list and tell me how many super powerful males you have that could benefit from a Male Boost 4?

I can tell you mine without looking - zero. And that's why she's currently ranked dead last, is because at the moment she is useless for most players.

Having said that - she does have a lot of potential to move up depending on what male cards are released and when.

The question at the end of the day is this: As the game stands right now, are you going to benefit more from cherry-picking male units and adding Alex or Bene to the mix, or...

* simply playing a different, more powerful unit instead of Alex/Bene, or...

* playing your best units regardless of gender and avoiding Alex/Bene, or...

* picking all female units instead and playing Claudio?

The number of situations in which males + Alex/Bene is the best move is not zero.... but it's also not very many.

First of all, I want to clarify that the tiers are meant to be taken as tiers, not as a unit-by-unit ranking (as in, if a unit is listed "dead last," it should just be considered 4th tier -- not the worst unit in the game). Often the difference within tiers is minimal.

Secondly, I do agree that Benedetta has situational usefulness, perhaps more-so than some other units, but the situation is rather limited. I actually leveled/used a Benedetta up so I could level Atk Boost Up skill to level 10 (aka +10% to attack boost skills).

With +20% to all attacks and +10% to attack boost, a Vlad goes from about 158k when placed to, I think, 203k or something like that -- can't check at the moment. So yeah, this boost is substantial, but it's only realized when you have male units, and the chances of you having three Vlads and a Benedetta to place or something is pretty low for most normal players. Another thing to keep in mind is that during Colosseum-type events Benedetta really is useless -- her attack boost doesn't go into effect to support your team, and her stats are so low you'd never use her (so her deployment cost in this case is not that big of a concern).

Once again, you are obviously free to disagree with these tiers. However I find their general idea is pretty good -- just because you don't think Charles or Benedetta should be last place, doesn't mean the rest of the tier list is particularly inaccurate. (:

Actually, attack boosts work in VC type battles. But they have to go off like normal skills first. Camile hurts!

There was at least one 'enemy' team in the VC that had a Claudio -- might've been Cornelia's.

Yeah, it was Claudio + Cornelia/Agrippina. Claudio would do barely anything...unless attack boost went off. D:

I don't know -- anytime I noticed "attack boost" going off, absolutely nothing happened. Unless it was just Camilles and such -- point is, a lot of other units have much stronger attacks that they use in addition to skills that proc -- Benedetta/Alex? Not so much. Plus, chances are, you don't have a team of really strong male units assembled.

This list just needs to be taken down Clocksprocket.
I know a lot of work was put into it, but too many people are using it as a bible, (which it is not, and even if it was they are reading it wrong) and it's starting to effect card values.

it's starting to effect card values.

To whom?

And even if it is, why is that a bad thing if it's based on rational discussion of card abilities?

For one it's effecting me.
Since this thread first came up I have been involved in 3 separate trade haggles where their cards "teir" has been brought up as a factor of price, and one where someone actually wanted me to throw in some TEs on what should have been a flat trade because their cards was higher up on the list on the same teir!

I am not a major trade tycoon either so if a peasant like me is seeing this I know the people running shops have to be seeing it too.

basiliskeye wrote:

For one it's effecting me.
Since this thread first came up I have been involved in 3 separate trade haggles where their cards "teir" has been brought up as a factor of price, and one where someone actually wanted me to throw in some TEs on what should have been a flat trade because their cards was higher up on the list on the same teir!

I am not a major trade tycoon either so if a peasant like me is seeing this I know the people running shops have to be seeing it too.

i have no problems with it.

but i usually have my trades quite cheap.. so happy on both sides

I mean, I will leave it for discussion if people think a thread like this should exist or not, but here are my thoughts --

First, if this thread didn't exist, undoubtedly someone else would just make another tiered ranking thread (possibly based on different values etc). People like knowing where their cards fall. Even if no one did, people could still sort the unit spreadsheet by max total stats or max [xxx] stat and decide from there. I think that's essentially what we were all doing before these threads, anyway. Everyone back then knew Joachim was a top 5* because he had higher stats than everyone else and knockback. Victoria and Edgar sold for high quantities of TE because they were seen as just that good -- not because of some tierlist.

That said, how are card values being affected?

If people are more willing to wait until they get a "good" 5* (having seen this list, or any others, checked out the stats/skill/etc compared to other 5*s), what's wrong about that? If they're not willing to pay 200TE for a card like Hildegarde or Caecilia which is not that great, is that so wrong? And if sellers are more likely to keep their "good" cards close and not sell them until they get their value, is that so wrong also?

Now, I want to make it very clear, this thread is in no way a pricing guide or indicative of real supply/demand. I do agree that using solid "tiers" and assuming that card worth is tied to that is stupid, but I've seen "tiers" used even before struesdell posted his first thread.

Essentially, if people are wisening up to card value due to things like stats, etc, instead of just pinning a price on it, I am not sure that's a bad thing. That's moving to a market with less asymmetric information. Would you really want to trade your Erhard for a max Emma knowing what the stats are like? Would you even without this tierlist?

^

Based on my experiences, the only cards sold commonly enough to even have a "set price" are 4* and below. One could infer these prices simply by checking out 4-5 shop threads and seeing what the card they want (or comparable) is selling for.

I have limited experience buying and selling 5* and above but from what I've seen most people simply list what they have available and leave it open to offers. These offers can range from any number of different cards with different levels +/- TE.

Never-the-less I think this list, whether you personally agree with it or not, is a very useful list for the average player who is not trying to "switch lanes" in 5* and 6* brackets - and is instead probably sitting on a handful of 4* low leveled cards and wondering where they rank in and which ones to focus on leveling first.

I think we can all agree that if I'm a newer player and have 500K to buy a few 4* with that this list will be extremely useful to me if I'm buying from someone who is selling a Dhimitrious and an Alex at the same price.

basiliskeye wrote:

For one it's effecting me.
Since this thread first came up I have been involved in 3 separate trade haggles where their cards "teir" has been brought up as a factor of price, and one where someone actually wanted me to throw in some TEs on what should have been a flat trade because their cards was higher up on the list on the same teir!

So tell 'em to go sit on a pointed stick and spin.

There are no set prices. The official 'value' of a card is simple: whatever someone else is willing to pay for it. That is a separate issue from weighing the ABILITIES of a card, which is what this thread is about. As the whole Attack Boost kerfluffle demonstrates nicely, some people value certain attributes more highly than others, so none of this is carved in stone, but it's a handy reference as to WHY some cards are more capable than others.

As far as I am in the game, I can only discuss about 4* Heroes.

I wanted to know why Mermaid is ranked Tier 2. She was my first 4*, and I used her a lot because of that. But compared to other 4* cards, I think she's pretty bad, since her stats excel only at Sea damage. It would be great if the game had some hard Sea monsters, but there are not that many. And if we're looking at Sea damage, Scarlet would be a better choice. I'm guessing that she is in Tier 2 because the hard Sea monsters in the game are already slow, and with Mermaid's slow and any knockback unit, the monster would never pass.

And Sergei is Tier 3? Are his stats that bad? Because I always liked him, and he sure saved my life a lot.

Sorry if you already talked about this in another place.

I guess I would like to see how this Tier system is calculated. Point by point.
For example. Speed E=0 D=1 C=2, Land attack (+1) Air (0) Sea (-1), or however it's calculated
You add it all together, you can see which Tier they fall into.

Base on what I can tell, there is quite a disadvantage for melee units, no matter what. Melee unit will only go as high as Tier 2, due to them being:
- Range 130 (always - lowest points in the system)
- Not balance (High focus attack - land)

Case in point
Rose(air)- Tier1 | Sofia(melee)- Tier 2
- Max attack - TIE (110k)
- Land attack - SOFIA (R36k/S40k) - valued land attack
- Air attack - TIE (R38.8/S39.3)
- Sea attack - ROSE (R35/S31) - less valued sea attack
- Speed - TIE (C)
- Distance - ROSE (R150/S130)

As you can see, they are quite similar, Rose has advantage simply because she's Missle(usually starts Distance at 150). Sofia should also gain some points since she wins land(+1), while Rose is better at sea (-1). Being better at Land should edge out disadvantage of lower distance. All logic puts them at the same Tier except for the Sofia's disadvantages of being melee. Seems like if Sofia wants to be Tier 1, her focus attack must be 10k higher than Rose, just to balance out the lost in Distance.

Harada wrote:

As far as I am in the game, I can only discuss about 4* Heroes.

I wanted to know why Mermaid is ranked Tier 2. She was my first 4*, and I used her a lot because of that. But compared to other 4* cards, I think she's pretty bad, since her stats excel only at Sea damage. It would be great if the game had some hard Sea monsters, but there are not that many. And if we're looking at Sea damage, Scarlet would be a better choice. I'm guessing that she is in Tier 2 because the hard Sea monsters in the game are already slow, and with Mermaid's slow and any knockback unit, the monster would never pass.

And Sergei is Tier 3? Are his stats that bad? Because I always liked him, and he sure saved my life a lot.

Sorry if you already talked about this in another place.

I actually don't know much about 4*s and how struesdell figured out their ratings (well, same as anything else, but read on). I'd have to really take a look at all the cards to see what the real differences are between them. But first, you'll notice Scarlet is ranked higher than Mermaid -- because she is better in the same situations. That said, the only thing that the Mermaid really excels at is probably sea attack. We devalue sea attack compared to land/air because it's not as useful, but because it's so high (and her other stats aren't too awful), and due to her slow skill, she is somewhat useful.

Looking at Sergei's ratings, he's really not that far behind the Mermaid rating-wise. He has decent stats and knockback, but cards like Gleb or Miriam win out by having much higher stats (as opposed to decent overall stats).

sagemacleod wrote:

question about melee units

I'm not going to go into all the variables and their specific weighting, but yes, melee units are disadvantaged due to their range. We assume the base range is 130 (so it's weighted at 1) but a range of 150 is weighted at 1.16 and 175 at 1.35. These weightings are literally gotten from struesdell calculating "time-on-target" -- ie, how long does the unit keep attacking a monster in its range (or how many attacks it gets while something is in its range). Obviously, units with higher range have much more time to get attacks in, making them more useful. Sofia might have 4k more land attack, but if Rose gets more attacks in, that's kind of a negative against Sofia.

Sofia is... close to Tier 1. There's not always a large gap between tiers, and Rose <-> Sofia is much closer than, let's say, Joachim <-> Serafiina.

Past Victoria, whose strong attack and knockback put her at #1 in 5* melee, all three of the next top melee 5*s are quite solid:

Sofia:
Melee / 15 / C / 130 / No skill
40300 / 39300 / 31000 110600

Bernhard:
Melee / 25 / C / 130 / No skill
50425 / 18700 / 40275 109400

Ignat:
Melee / 25 / B / 130 / No skill
51500 / 13000 / 31925 96425

Sofia loses a little bit of ground power to the other two, but is more than twice as good against air targets, making her a better pick for any kind of level with mixed enemies. Cheaper to deploy, too. Among released melee 5*s, only Camille (with self-boost) and Gerhard can top Ignat or Bernhard's raw ground attack, and both of those stand and watch air enemies fly by. The higher speed on Ignat, better balance on Sofia and point-in-between that is Bernhard makes choosing one over the other somewhat situational.

Now, Rose:
Missile / 15 / C / 150 / No skill
36250 / 38800 / 35240 110290

and Sofia again:
Melee / 15 / C / 130 / No skill
40300 / 39300 / 31000 110600

As noted, Rose is basically Sofia with improved range. If there was a Tier 1.5, both Rose and Sofia would likely slide nicely into it.