I gave her a Bolganone tome with Celica's engraving (it was a fire tome from the start). The -1 might is somewhat bad but the -1 weight and +50 dodge helps her get around the bad luck stat she starts with. I might replace that engraving later on but for now it does help patch up a couple of her shortcomings.
I am a senior, I have been playing Fire Emblem games for years going back to Gameboy Advance. I beat Three Houses easily, but the builds and mechanics of this version though me, thanks for the tutorials - I had to restart the game because I was skipping part of the ring creating and skill upgrades.
@@victoriascholl4607 that’s awesome! I started on hard and dropped down to normal to get familiar with the game. I’m currently finishing my hard classic run and planning my first maddening. This is my fav FE game so I am enjoying my runs.
I honestly just give her dire thunder and the +weight +mt engrave on +5 thunder and make her a flying secondary staffbot(2nd hortensia essentially) with good chip damage in the midgame then switch to a lyn build with nova with +speed for quad in the endgame.
I think Byleth’s engraving is pretty underrated on her for the extra dodge, since Ivy’s luck is absolutely abysmal. Seriously, she’ll have like 7% incoming crit from regular scrubs, and while turnwheel makes that much easier to account for, it’s still super annoying. Also, her decent build growth can help offset the added weight to a degree.
With Micaiah I could also imagine she’s a decent Nosferatu user, due to her decent bulk and speed. The main issue is that nosferatu can’t be forged but you can at least refine it a small amount even without doing any trials, and if you get her to the point of doubling with Speedtaker she can probably enemy phase masses without needing bonded shield support. In a DLC setting however, you are basically just far better giving her Soren for Flare to turn her forged Bolganone into a stronger Nosferatu, at least until Veyle joins to start Soren 100% crit killing everything
Elsurge + 2 with a crit. + engraving is pretty good for her. It goes well with Grasping Void. Dex + and Spd + passives are good for helping her crit., double, and boosting Grasping Void activation. Her def. and res. are actually good enough to tank some hits and her Avo. is high enough where she can quite often avoid hits altogether. I think I ran Elsurge + 3 on her like this to the very end of the game. It held up well but I was also on Normal with Random stat. growth.
@@IcedCoffeeGaming Lyn and Eirika are crit engraves that give hit rate, those are very strong for carries. Only Corrin and Camilla has more crit rate. isn't Lucina pure upside as well, those are the best best engraves where they only make something better. Engraves that are not contested are things like Ike and Hector, but you can slap them on Thoron or Silver Greataxe/Greatlance to make it hit event harder since speed is irrelevant for those weapons. This makes Thoron sage like Citrinne even better and Generals with a Silver smash weapon event better as they do not need priority engraves at all, though for Generals you probably would run a hit engrave to help with their accuracy.
Have you considered Eirika? Here's my reasoning: Eirika gives a whopping +17 hit for just raw stats. It's better than most other rings. It also helps her abysmal luck, so it dodge fixes her (crit avoid that is). Then, she can stay on the "Day" side of the ring to get a pseudo Soren effect (player phase only) and Bravery (+5 damage, which with tomes is the best you can get as a damage boost passively). When engaged, her mixed defensive stats makes great use of Gentility. She only doesn't make use of the lunar brace and emblem weapons. She can offtank effectively with this ring as well as hit much better (I don't have any hit engraved weapons) and you can run Speed/Dex +5 from chrom with Canter, or Hit +30, or run more dex for better Grasping Void procs. I find that Lyn ring is so good with a good Astra Storm user, and losing that engage attack is bad. Whereas twin strike is definitely powerful but not as much as a loss. You can also use Wind Sword with it to scale her damage with her MAG stat, so it's not as bad.
You’re ALWAYS spot on!!! I was just building my Ivy yesterday! This helps so much!!! Thanks a lot, great content! Can’t wait for the rest of the characters :)
I throw Veronica on her, fixes her hit rate quite well and even if she misses, book of worlds' effects still activate. So ypu pretty much have a flying enemy freezing unit that deals good magical damage.
Can’t wait for Lady Anna and the dragon twins Nil and Nel!! 🥰🥰🥰🥰 I’m also building them and want to check your opinion on those since you’re always spot on mister! Thanks for the content, always happy to see you uploaded an Engage video 🧡🤲🏾☁️
@@eustacemcgoodboy9702 that’s too many emotions for a video game. But I respect you. A bit off putting thinking you’d say something like that to a complete stranger on the streets. Questionable values.
She only need speed fixing early game... In the late game, if you play all the maps even without DLC she stills double with bolganone in the later maps, so speed +5 is a waste in her... She sometimes can have accuracy problems, so speedtaker is better but movement and debuff or movement and damage are the way to go...
There should be CC on your end (Closed captions) but if you can't see them on your device for some reason I could make a written guide P.s where does your pfp come it looks like a lemongrab pink guy lol
@@IcedCoffeeGaming the bonus damage skill based on % enemy defense i know only procs on physical damage it is just not a skill, anything from Eirika, i would ever consider inheriting because there are better skills like draconic hex and canter+ only time to consider inheriting Eirika is for a brave weapon build or flashing fist build
Lunar Brace works on player phase with physical weapons, Gentility/Bravery reduce all damage taken by 3/5 (based on base or +, 2k/3k cost) and Bravery increases damage by 3/5. You can flip modes switching between the twins/you get both at the same time when the Eirika unit engages. Bravery lets you get +3/5 damage for 2/3k SP at all times including enemy phase. It allows you to cheaply damage boost tomes.
@@IcedCoffeeGaming Yea, still not good. Tomes are supportive in Engage, not carry tools. Eirika stuff is good for brave weapons and flashing fist. Brave Sword Zelestia with Eirika passives for some real nuclear damage.
Her speed in lindwurm isn't fast, compared to sage about 20 other units match her. Her build as lindworm is above average for tome users, so her ability to use heavy tomes without penalty is what makes her seem fast, along with a good personal base speed for join time. Her magic is above average, and since speed is fixable in this game, it creates a unit that can reliably kill, but everyone in their rankings overlook just how much favoritism Ivy gets in overcoming her flaws.
@IcedCoffeeGaming flying only matters if you can make use of it, and there are enough enemy fliers and archers that she struggles leaving the group. The game gives many ways to play around her weaknesses to her strengths, I just think people overlook just how much they do that for Ivy in comparison to other units
If you said Mage Knight was better than Lindwurm I would’ve agreed but Lindwurm is better than Sage. Having a mage unit that can canter away on mountains is huge.
@nicholasstacey6146 that's part of why Ivy isn't necessarily the best magic flyer of midgame, because she is locked out of canter until Sigurd is back. I still consider her high tier being strong with little investment, like a Citrinne who comes 7 levels and 4 chapter later, but her value as flyer is over expressed and her speed as a lindwurm really isn't fast
I actually agree, in terms of just combat she’s probably somewhere in A tier. As you say her speed is actually below average and her magic is not quite high enough to consistently ORKO most enemies through end game without a little nudge, AND she has some hit issues so there’s a few things that need fixing. Personally I think having staff Utility with 6 move and flying on top of that probably juuust pushes her up in to high A/bottom of S though. Even if she can’t reliably break off from the group having extra move and access to flier only tiles/not being impeded by terrain is very nice.
If you really want a flying sage, then Ivy is the ONLY option. If you want a better sage... then Framme or Pandreo is better, and if you want the ultimate Thoron+4Staves Sage then Citrinne or Gregory. Then Hortensia is significantly better than Ivy, but as a purely focused stave bot or thunder+4 staves and be a dedicated draconic hex debuffer or 5 staves and Rally+ bot. She is good at this role with not just her passive and class passive, but because she can do it as a flier for the extra movement and terrain ignoring. The only thing Ivy is great at is her booba, and if you want to run booba for booba then that is fine, but as a good unit she is not very good - even with flier advantage.
@@IcedCoffeeGaming She kinda bad, on her default class she is alright-to-good, but Sage Framme, Sage Pandreo, Sage Citrinne, and Sage Gregory are 4 sages that are significantly better than her, even Sage Chloe is significantly better and Chloe was worse than Framme on Sage (she was still good, but Framme's bases and first 10 levels with way better magic growth surprisenly made her way better the entire time; and Framme's better supports gave her better accuracy than sage chloe) Ivy just gets outshined unless you really like booba and really want a flying sage
This build is so weak. I do agree Ivy as Lindwurm is super good but then all your suggestions make her so pathetically weak that she will never carry a run. I hate the backwards way you think with dismissing DLC because most of the game is DLC and the only reason to not run it is challenge runs, but like Speed +5 or Speedtaker aren't even that good when you don't have DLC. Compared to the avoid Marth and Celica can provide, it's not even close, so it leaves only the doubling aspect and it's not necessary. EXP up would out scale it long term. Speedtaker is just bad because it takes 5 turns to full stack, so it's usually speed +0 +2 or +4, which is just nothing. There are real skills in this game more worth using like Vantage, or Reprisal or Canter. The weapon options are fine but the 3 staff thing is overkill usually, better to have a third tome than a third staff. But damn as bad as the skill recommendations are, the Emblem Rings are the ones that really miss the mark. Use your #1 Dragon Vein user on a fcking flying instead of Backup/Covert/Dragon? That's the opinion of someone who have never thought about being good at Fire Emblem once in their life. If you wanted Flying Dragon Vein, Camilla is a way better choice for Ivy, but even that might not be the best choice since it means you might not have both Earth and Avoid Smoke Dragon Veins. Lyn on a unit with no avoid is just sacing shadow clones and wasting Astra Storm. No point. Also doesn't use the weapons well. Byleth on flying is good, even though Ivy's poor strength isn't ideal for Luin, it's not worthless because the weapon is so good, but if you're using a physical flier or a mystical unit, both could do a little better in areas, Ivy is a decent split, but Hortensia is better. Sigurd is mediocre, his high movement means nothing because your Ivy doesn't have any avoid which leaves just Micaiah and Celica, both okay options, but Micaiah doesn't get use of her staff prof skill this way, as Ivy already has access to all that she would use, still Nosferatu is strong and works well on her. Celica provides way less and much like Sigurd, Warp Ragnarok is useless because you're Ivy doesn't dodge shit. I realize Marth and Celica are kind of late game with their avoid boosts, and you spend most of the game with 20 avoid from Marth, but still.
How would you build her exactly? Which emblem/weapon/refines/engravings/skills do you think are optimal for her? Also just curious as to what you mean when you say EXP bonus will out-scale skills like speed+ and Speedtaker?
@@adamdavey1261 I typed out so much and it vanished, so going to give a short answer, so sorry. EXP acts as a weaker Star Sphere, the more levels you gain on Ivy, the higher her stats go, it takes 2 extra levels to crush the stats gained through speed +5, but if you want to beat out Speedtaker or Speed+5 is speed specifically then you need around 4-6 levels. Which is doable but not ideal. I tend to run Avoid on Mages since their options are worse and Avoid does a ton of work. If an enemy has 90% chance to hit you and you get 45 avoid, the enemy has less than 45% chance to hit you. It adds a ton of survivability, way better than any stat boosters allow you to have. As for Emblems I've tried many but I am not sure what is ideal, Celica, Micaiah, Camilla and Soren all have strengths and weaknesses to using them. As a double dragon vein lover, even though Camilla seems ideal, I reject it for myself because I want covert and backup dragon veins. So I recommend Celica or Soren probably, but it depends what you run as a whole.
@@ThePurpleKnightmare No worries about the shorter answer, sucks that the longer one was deleted :(. Ivy has a speed growth of 40% so on fixed growths you actually need 13 levels to match the speed bonus of speed+5, and 25 levels to match a max stacked Speedtaker. Not really sure why you think those skills are bad, speed is a very important stat and those two skills have great cost/benefit. Without them at late game Ivy will double nothing but Generals and will be doubled by basically everything else in the game. Speed fixing her is definitely a good idea! I agree stacking avoid on Mages can be very good, although I don’t think Lindwurm is the best candidate for it given it’s low speed/luck/inability to benefit from Corrin Fog. The other thing about speed is that every point gives you two avoid, so just stacking speed will confer a much bigger survival benefit than just using Avoid+ skills. As an example, if you give Ivy Avoid+30 and Tome Precision 5 she now has an additional 45 avoid. If instead you gave her Speedtaker and speed+5 (which is much cheaper as well) then she gains 30+ avoid AND is no longer doubled by just about every enemy in the game, not to mention doubling her damage against quite a few of them too. So now let’s say she’s going up against an enemy that a 50% chance to hit her with the avoid+ skills and will double her because of her low speed, or with the speed skills will have a 65% chance to hit her once because of her high speed. The probability of her being hit once with the avoid skills is actually 75% because the enemy gets two chances, and if you get unlucky they hit you twice. The probability of her being hit once with the speed skills is 65%, and there is a 0% chance she will be hit twice (and once again, she is more likely to double her damage against the enemy with the speed skills). There’s really no contest between these two possible set ups when one is mathematically worse and costs more SP to achieve. This sort of thing is the reason ICG recommends giving Ivy an emblem like Lyn, because the benefits of giving her all that speed outweighs things like losing 10 range on astra storm, or not making good use of Mulagir.
@@adamdavey1261 My original reply covered how the avoid works and why it's so important to get below 50%. If you're above 50% the chance is greater than it displays, if you're below 50% it's lower than it displays. However Speedtaker is not 10 speed. That's it's cap, it starts at 0, but it's only 2 per turn and only if you kill. Speed Taker doesn't work on enemy suicides, so it's 2 speed per turn and only when you kill, which means you probably don't need it or you you need help weakening. I do think there is a legitimate argument for Speed+DEX > Celica's Hit/Avoid. One I agree with, and heck if you're running Reprisal on Ivy, than maybe the argument for Speed+DEX works even to beat out +30 avoid. Not only because of your own points but also it's poor availability. However ICG refuses to acknowledge DLC as the correct way to play. So when you eliminate options like that, avoid stacking becomes the best way, because speed+5 is mediocre and speedtaker is outright bad and a huge trap for people who are at all efficient in how they play.
@@ThePurpleKnightmare Ah damn, I would have loved to have read the original response. I’m pretty sure in Engage True hit only exists above 50% hit rates (as in, true hit=displayed if hit is equal or less than 50). So when you account for that (which I definitely did forget to do in the example before) the enemy has a 75% to hit once and 25% chance to hit twice when they double, and 72% chance to hit once when they don’t double, so you still have less chance of being hit with higher speed and lower avoid. I’m pretty sure that 50/65% example is actually the breakpoint at which true hits causes the biggest disparity too. One other thing we haven’t gotten in to the specifics on is how do you deal meaningful damage to late game enemies on a magic unit if you’re not doubling? I’m pretty sure an Ivy that stays on ~the same level as the enemy misses ORKO thresholds on most late game enemies even with Celica, a highly refined and engraved Bolganone and the maximum possible benefit from reprisal+ (ie. even if she’s sitting at one HP) if she’s only hitting once. For that matter how do even stack enough avoid on her to have a decent chance of surviving against late game enemies? At IL40 on Lindwurm Ivy has 24 speed and 7 luck. With Avoid+30, and the Awakening engraving she only has 111 avoid… Most enemies in the last few chapters have between 120-180 hit, and most of them will double her. Maybe I’m missing something but it doesn’t sound all that great.
