How Fire Emblem Balances Jagens 

pitfall

I like that fates balances its jagen by just immediately throwing him off a bridge after 1 chapter of having him

Three Houses Maddening: Who should we deploy, m'lord? Me: Please, I just need someone who won't die if an enemy npc breathes on them Three Houses Maddening: No, sire.

Not having Jeralt as the Jagen of 3H was one of 3H's worst missed opportunities

"How Fire Emblem Balances Jagens" - Sigurd "well I got roasted on the mid game" - Sothe "Is not that I am bad , is that the Dawn Brigade sucks against the GRIEL MERCENARIES" - Marcus "I was too old to carry Roy on FE6 but I was on my peak to carry Eliwood on FE7" - Titania "I pretty much can hold my owned but can't solo the game" - Seth "What does balance means ?"

Remember kids: Bad Level Ups are not an isue if you only use Prepromoted Units.

If i had a nickel for every youtuber with a gen 1 Pokémon profile picture who makes videos about how valuable the Jagen units are I'd have two nickels, which isn't much but it's crazy it happened twice

Maybe the real Jagens were the friends we made along the way.

When I first played 3 Houses, I saw Jeralt and my mind immediately went, "Awesome, so that's our Jagen for this game?" And then he didn't join the party. *And then the story happened.*

when you are an enemy in the early chapters of fe8 and a paladin approaches you: what it looks like: a paladin approaching what it feels like: *impending doom* approaching

Anyone else find it really weird that Gaiden/SoV gives you your traditional Jagen character at the end of the game rather than the start? Makes Alm and Lukas do all the work babying your village idiots instead.

I like how Fates's Jagen is just a rock

Till the Jagen is basically the Lord in Fe4

Another way FE10 Sothe is balanced is that after Part one, the Dawn Brigade are all but forgotten about until ENDGAME!! Can't be a broken unit if you can't use them for 80% of the game!!!!!!

I'd love to see your essay on whenever you discuss Armor Knights. They are a flawed class that is designed to not be able to fulfill its role. Armor Knights are meant to act as a human shield to protect the other weaker units. Despite that, they have so little movement that they can't get anywhere and lag behind everyone. You have to sacrifice the use of a cavalier or your Jaegen to carry over the knight so it can be used. How can you fix this issue? Well the answer is simple. Since the Knight is usually at the back of the pack, give them a skill that allows them to traverse through the other units as a terrain that doesn't take up a movespace. They can pass through the rest of your units so they can pop out to stand at the front. It's kind of like a continuous chain of rescue trading but without wasting the use of all your units.

Solid content. The audio level is pretty low and I had to turn up the volume on my headphones to hear you clearly. I think it's fine for Jagen archetypes to be in strong classes, because strong classes are fun. Rogue is a strong class in the context of FE10 earlygame because they have no movement penalty through thickets and reduced movement penalty across ledges. Knives also have the earliest forgeable 1-2 range. There are a bunch of maps where it's probably better for Sothe that he is a rogue instead of a paladin - the only superior class would by dracorider, and possibly pegasus knight.

I once tried to push Seth off a cliff, but nothing happened since he just refused to fall off.

You have no idea how painful the early game is in 3H due to the fact that all your starting units are growth reliant. Having Jeralt being able to deal good damage and debuff enemies for easy kills for the others would’ve been so useful.

I think the Frederick mention is kinda weird as he's one of the jeigans that definitely falls off. While he does have high growth rates, he gains experience at a very low rate and his base-stats are very low for his level. Due to this in spite of his weapon ranks and doubled weapon experience gain from Discipline he winds up facing low hit-rates and deals relatively low damage. Not helping matters is that Awakening, especially late-game has a lot of mages which Frederick doesn't exactly fare well against. While you can use a second seal on him, he'll still end up levelling up slower due to the internal level system, and if you reclass him to a base class he'll have to deal with that and his poor base-stats. Where he can shine when he begins to fall off is as a pair-up partner, particularly for units who need strength and defense such as Sumia. All in all I'd argue he's one of the better balanced Jeigans that people seem to think is more powerful than he is due to his growth rates.

Jeigan being arguably one of the best balanced Jagens is terrifying.

Next game will have a wyvern lord Jagen

Jeralt being playable seems perfect because of the personal skill and because of the story. But they probably just wanted to focus on students primarily over the adults.

Oifey is one the best designed Jeigens/Oifeys, because he's comparatively amazing if the child units you got are weak, but just decent if you got optimal pairings. He does his job of helping weaker units without breaking the game

Three Houses "Jagen" is getting Catherine early.

Naga bless Titania. PoR was my first Fire Emblem, I got almost everyone killed and she still carried me to the finish line. And she was the reason I found out I'm bisexual. Absolute giga chad unit

Hardline Traditionalist: "Jagen is a Jagen." Growths Neutral, Class Purist: "Oifey is a Jagen." Growths Rebel, Class Purist: "Seth is a Jagen." Growths Purist, Class Neutral: "Gunter is a Jagen." True Neutral: "Frederick is a Jagen." Growths Rebel, Class Neutral: "Sigurd is a Jagen." Growths Purist, Class Rebel: "Dagdar is a Jagen." Growths Neutral, Class Rebel: "Sothe is a Jagen." Radical Jagen Anarchist: "Jakob is a Jagen."

Answer: it dont

Having Jeralt in Three Houses would be SOOOOOOOOO GOOD, like UGH, seriously, you either take everything at Snail’s Pace, or you get obliterated.

Kinda surprised that FE3 Arran didn't get a mention. Paladin is far from a win button in FE3. As early as Chapter 2 you have to face off against promoted Wyvern Knights. While Arran can easily mop-up the rest of earlygame, even he doesn't do much damage to the Wyverns. The only units who can really do damage to them are Steel Bow Gordin and Linde, giving incentive to dump EXP into them so they can level Strength and Speed. Then in Chapter 4 he gets replaced by Sirius and his roll of carrying you through earlygame is over. Even Sirius isn't perfect. FE3's dismount feature makes Paladins awful indoors. Since FE3 endgame is entirely indoors, it gives you plenty of incentive to early growth units.

Having a Jagen die or be forced off your team by the game is an interesting idea. It might not be balanced but it does kinda get the message to the player or most likely newer players that you can’t rely on this one character to carry you through the game, so you have to actually think and use other characters. Though that also could be a very bad idea. But idk I kinda like the idea. Though yeah the best Jagens are the ones you can use without completely snapping the game in half.

I think another problem connected to this is how the weapon triangle works early game. Most early maps have enemies with only one or two weapon types. This discourages players from using some of their more standard units, depending on the map, while Jagens can basically solo any map no matter who the enemies are, because they dominate the weapon triangle. Early-game 3H basically has this problem three-fold; since 3H has no weapon triangle, none of your units have any real strengths & everyone feels useless. If the early game maps had enemies across the weapon triangle, there'd be a lot more room for Jagens & the rest of the party to play off each other. It would be a bit more brutal, since this makes the weapon triangle harder for the player to exploit, but it would encourage players to use their roster more effectively & prepare them more for the challenges in the late-game.

I think Jagens are balanced around new players playing the game, and permadeath. Jagens are going to be doing the most dangerous work in the game, and facing the mist powerful foes. Jagens are balanced by the fact that they are a character that is likely to be lost at some point. That fact is lost now that everyone just always resets, but the intent, I think, is there.

Maybe this is just me, but I find using overpowered (or strong at base) characters to be a diminishing return on fun.

To add on to the Sothe being a well balanced Jeigan, an aspect that is interesting because he is a Rogue are locked doors and chests. Most often chests tend to be in far corners of the map, which definitely makes sense to send Sothe to get them with his higher move, and with his higher stats he should usually have no problem dealing with the enemies on his own, but it also lowers the overall power of your main army now that he isn't with them. So now you have to make an additional decision. "Do I send Sothe to get these chests, even if it may involve splitting him from the main army?"

I knew the "Don't use Jagens!" was BS the first time I played FE6 hard mode back in 2003 or whenever. Marcus made it smooth sailing.

Your videos are so good! I’m having an amazing time watching these essays

Me who has only played Fates and Three Houses: Yeah sure I understand.

Really enjoyed this video, one of the chilliest videos I've seen on the topic. Volume was quite low tho but I'm sure you've fixed that already

Solid video, I like how this was a civilized and calm argument, with a lot of sense.

Great Video! And yeah, FE3H Maddening w/ no Jagen is rough. The closest thing you have is Byleth, just because they have reliable growhs. My main strategy for most of my Maddening Silver Snow run was "hope Byleth crits"

Theee houses: no Jagen? Me with my army of archers: no sire

Blue lions: Dedue just go wait in everyone's range Golden deer: Professor play nice with Catherine so we can have them help us please Black eagles: Profuse crying

Sothe as a Jagen sounds perfect, now if he wasn't made a required unit in the endgame... as for the rest, I played the English GBA titles and I use Seth and Marcus for rescuing, visiting houses, trading with characters, giving the steel sword to the lords to save uses of the rapier sometimes, etc. I then bench them when I can to bring lower level units into fights before reintroducing them later whenever I feel enemy units are powerful enough to warrant it, as well as early arenas, as foes in there are scaled to whoever enters, meaning tougher opponents and higher exp gain. Use higher level units for arenas to come out ahead in exp as opposed to weaker ones!

Imagine a version of fe3h chapter 5 where you get a controllable Geralt as a one-time ally instead of Gilbert. Yeah, that’s the stuff.

Great video! I fell into the same trap as you with titania in por

Your content's so good! You definitely are deserving of more subscribers!

It seems like everyone can learn from this video, regardless of experience! Keen to see more

7:05: Something feels off... Why is Claude upside-down?

Not only FE12 Prologue and FE16 lack a Jeigan, Fire Emblem Gaiden and Echoes neither have one. Not that it ever presents a problem, as Alm stats are superior of early-game brigands right off the bat. I love that the game taunts you with Mycen, but he doesn't join until almost the end of the game, having busted bases and very low growths. He is a Jeigan in story but a Gato in gameplay. I think it's cool to look at how post-Fire Emblem Kaga games do their Jeigans, as the main series has proven to not be effective at balancing them, especially from FE7 onwards. Vestaria Saga has nothing resembling a Jeigan; TearRing Saga zigzags this trope a lot, as you have a non-playable story Jeigan and a high-stat but very low move pirate from the beggining, but has it's closest to a traditional Jeigan in Raffin, an early-game paladin with mediocre growths. He is more akin to Awakening Frederic, what means that he's stats are not especially over the top and he can be surpassed, but can use pretty good weaponry (coming with a Killer lance that I think no one else can use at that time) and hold thanks to good mobility and the rare ability to use lances indoors. He, however, gets very ridiculous if you do a kind of obscure side-objective in Chapter 10, which let's him promote to Wyvern Rider and remain extremely useful for the remainder of the game. Overall he's one of the best units in the game, but the experience with him can greatly differ if you trigger that event. But what I think it's the far best example is Ward from Berwick Saga. Ward comes from the first chapter with bases that let him defend himself against enemies on the final chapter without gaining a single level, but it's still one of the best balanced ever. How is it possible? By the game mechanics themselves. Firstly, Berwick Saga doesn't have a "double attacks" as in Fire Emblem fashion. The flow of battle dictates that units attack, if they miss the enemy gets a chance to counterattack, and if the enemy misses its counterattack the unit strikes again. Ward is not an exception to this rule, meaning he will very rarely one-round enemies, unless he one shots them or crit. The Pursuit skill is present, but only in two characters and he is not one of them. On the other hand, Ward has the advantage of being capable of using high-level weapons, such as the Knight Sword he comes with, which adds another round of combat, like the Charge skill in Thracia 776. Secondly, he is only present in Primary missions and two mandatory side-stories, which are only 17 out of the more than 40 maps. Desptie being the Jeigan and appearing on Chapter 1, he is one of the least availible characters in your rooster. Coindidentally, Primary missions are usually the most intrincate, so he can help a great deal on those chapters holding off enemies left and right. Thirdly, his movement type. Berwick is a very terrain-heavy game, and he is classified as "Cavalry", which grants him 7 move on a horse, but very harsh terrain penalties that other units of "Light Cavalry" movement type do not have. Furthermore, when he is dismounted, he suffers similar penalties but with only 4 move. This makes him useless in some maps, such as the later part of Chapter 11-1 (a mandatory side-story) and Chapter 14, and hampers his utility in many more; whereas he is one of the most mobile units in plainer maps. He also fulfills his role as Jeigan by having the Guard skill, that allows him to shield an adjacent unit of incoming attacks, being redirected to him instead, which is useful during the entire game but on the first few chapters particularly. In genera, I think Ward is one of the best crafted Jeigan characters in Fire Emblem, even if he is not strictly in the series.

Seems like the algorithm is leading us here, and I'm personally all for it. Good video lad.

i have learned more in this video than anything else I've seen about this series

This was a really nice video. Imma hit the sub button

Cool video. I always had a warped view of jagens. It seems the relevant context of their power level has always been powerful. I've always looked at raw stats and growth relative to the other units in a vacuum.

You missed what I think could be a crucial balancing mechanic: availability. As soon as the player might not need their Jagen, take him away for plot reasons for 2 maps. When they come back, the player will be used to operating without them and the other units’ stats will guaranteed to have grown in relation to the Jagen.

I see this video in my recommendations all the time, and the thumbnail makes me laugh every time

I slept on Gunter in conquest. His personal skill makes him the best pairup partner and reclassing him to wyvern makes him a great ferry. Pairup bonuses + personal + movement boost = great unit. He will fall off combat wise but his utility will always stay good and thats what i like about him.

I feel like a tanky Sniper would be an ideally balanced Jagen by your standards, as it would limit their effectiveness on EP while letting them pick off dangerous units safely, and would fall off later by virtue of being bowlocked compared to alternatives, especially if you balance bow units by giving them bonuses that you can just exclude the Jagen from. Limiting reclasses with the justification of the character being too old and stubborn to change would help with this too. With Sothe, I think it's also important to note that even when he is the best combat unit, he always has things to do that encourage you to use other units. For example in 1-3 the boss has the Discipline scroll but with his high movement you'll want to kill him in one turn or you'll likely lose a unit and get a Game Over. Micaiah is usually just strong enough to oneshot him with the Thani, provided she's levelled up a little, and that reinforces her own utility and makes the player feel smart. 1-5 gives you the choice of keeping him with the rest of the party, or sending him right to steal a Master Seal, and as the rest of your party is likely to struggle against those enemies, including your new recruit Volug due to his Fire weakness, you have an interesting choice to make that also lets Volug show just how strong he is if you choose to separate Sothe from the party, especially as the game punishes you for not using him by giving Jill a credible chance of death on Turn 1 if he doesn't kill an enemy only he can reach. Neither of these are essential items, but the act of getting to them is used to test and teach the player excellently. RD has some of my favourite map design in any FE game thanks to these sorts of things, even with its faults and stumbles.

Jagen are pretty good at tricking noobs that they aren't good.

"we'll take a look at the 2 fire emblem games without a Jaegan: new mystery of the emblem prologue and 3 houses" Gaiden/Echoes: Am I a joke to you?

Great video

I like this. Good stuff my dude.

Great video, this definitely earned you a subscriber in me!

How do you only have 700 subs??? Your channel is awesome! keep it up!

Excellent video. Liked and subscribed. :)

Here from FED, keep up the good work

Sothe is one of my favorite characters in Fire Emblem. The concept of having the weakest, almost joke unit in FE9 become a Jeigan and pseudo-lord in FE10 was a very interesting bit of character development. Also, even as he begins to fall off stat-wise he still has some unique utility. In Part 3, he can have one of your strongest player phases due to the Beastkiller - but you don't want to leave him exposed on enemy phase because of his frailty, so there's a trade-off. He also helps with visibility in the Fog of War chapter. In Part 4, he's still useful for finding treasures in the desert even though he's totally fallen off combat-wise. I also like that he's forced into The Tower, not because he's a great unit at that point, but because Yune knows how deep Micaiah's bond with him is.

I think Engage, which has just been released a few weeks ago, has a really good Jagen in Vander. He has just enough defensive presence to soak up a couple blows without dying, just enough offensive presence to soften up targets for your other characters to finish them off, his exp growth is abysmal so you feel no progress by getting him kills early, paladins have only 6 move and 1 weapon type compared to other entries, and his growths are trash.

Sacred Seth is my favorite fire emblem.

Ah Titania, my first Jagen. I love her.

I admit that I am one of those people who play the games wrong as I am very stingy with my gold (I hardly ever use silver weapons and stick with iron for longer than I should) and use characters who end up with higher numbers rather than those with immediate power. I have never gone for low turn counts and always avoid using Jeigans as much as possible (even benching Seth). With that being said, I do understand the value Jeigans have and how tiering works. I would say an armored Jeigan (but not mounted like Fredrick) would be not be too bad of an idea for, as someone already has mentioned, said character would still be outclassed late-game no matter how strong that character is due to the nature of such characters. I have wanted a armored mage for quite some time, but someone noted how a magic Jeigan would be broken and how a slow spellcaster is just wrong. I know it would not be a good idea, but having an armored mage with good power and bulk while being molasses slow and having terrible Luck and Resistance (sort of like Balthus with Raphael's Speed & Resistance, Dedue's HP, and Edelgard's Magic) would be fun. Unfortunately, that would be too broken to ever happen.

Definitely think you hit the nail on the head with Sothe being the best balanced Jagen. He's super strong early game and remains useful throughout but can't be relied upon late game. I think it would be really cool to see a mage Jagen character, one that starts out super strong but essentially becomes a staff bot late game. I think Jagens need to have that extra utility for late game because otherwise people will just feel punished for using them, meaning making them thieves or mages with staff usage is perfect. Don't think there's another class that can do this unless FE starts introducing some new unique skills for other classes.

Good video, good music taste.

>New Mystery prologue lacks a jeigan Athena, Ogma and Cain want to: know your location Though admittedly all of those are missable - stupid differentiating prologue maps. That said prologue 8 can be cleared regardless.

Where can I find the funny FE1 dialogue (such as the one featured in the thumbnail of this video)?

nice video i enjoyed it a lot. personally think all jaegans/oifye archetypes are balanced but I like your analysis. It would be nice if in future games they tried newer classes

What's the name of the track playing around 14:30?

How did you get Lethality on Sothe though? I've been trying AR codes to do that lol I don't mind Bane because you put Adept on Sothe and he remains useful since he either softens enemies or outright kills them with good RNG, but it's just weird the character blessed by a goddess and known for high potential got a low str cap end game and a worse skill than lethality.

I just did a playthrough of randomised Sacred Stones that reclassed Seth as a General with comparably low growths and notably low HP, both base and growth. Even with the fact that I only ended up getting three mounted units in the entire playthrough (of which Kyle and Forde were both troubadours), he still managed to remain balanced throught, falling off as offensive and even defensive threat but doing crowd control better than anything.

It's fascinating to think that there is not only a meta for a single-player game, let alone a series, but that meta has evolved over time, even for the older games.

In games like hacks of randomized runs where I've had Jaigens that are promoted magic units, I've had a lot of fun using them. Magic generally makes them able to take out certain threats when needed, but not to steamroll entire maps with low defences, while staff utility means they will always be able to have some sort of niche.

Sothe is only as balanced as he is due to the weirdness of his game and the army he babysits being well the Dawn Brigade and the other armies providing such good units for end game, I think the skill route might be best with giving your Early game power house balance. Like Oifey, may technically be mid game, being given more support skills while the kids get better offensive tools would balance him out more than just shortening the time he is ahead of so many units with allocating his starting stats out better, lower growths and others gaining mounts more consistently in the eventual remake...both should be done.

I've always loved that Seth is one of the best characters, probably because my name is Seth.

Nice video

Thank you RU-vid algorithm

He did it. . He talked about new mystery of the emblem lunatic mode. Its unreal. Almost impossible to complete without save states/action replay codes. And even then it's still hard. Maybe do a video on it on the future ? 🤔

I find it really funny how Seth is a legitimately better balanced unit if he is literally carrying another person on his back

Nomad trooper (or equivalent) seems like a good option for a Jagen class. The melee utility can fall off quickly while the ranged chip and mobility remains useful much longer.

I would love a Sniper Jagen so much, that'd be super fun to play around with

Tear Ring Saga has some very well balanced Jagens that play their role early on and meet your army's strengths as the game goes on. Or, in the case of one, throws you for a loop.

I think you underrated Gunter somewhat. For anyone considering using Gunter, it's absolutely vital that you reclass him to Wyvern Lord as soon as his chapter begins and have him gain 3 levels so he learns Rally Defense - as strange as it seems, Gunter levels very fast and Corrin is likely to not earn that much EXP from the enemies here anyway so there's no real loss giving the kills to him. Gunter actually rejoins with stats somewhat similar to a level 20/5 Beruka without any form of training, although that falls off in just a couple of chapters and his speed is pretty abyssmal. Gunter is however a very good Attack Stance user if you need additional offense, but is generally more useful for having Shelter on a flying body (mostly for Azura Shelter Dance tricks) and Rally Defense at a very early level. It's really common for most people to just use Gunter as a backpack and it works, but he honestly has much more to offer than that. (Only talking about Conquest because lol Rev)

Good video! Personally if I had to pick I'd rather a powerful Jagen that works as a crutch for lower skill players to fall back on without punishing them late game, than something like House's no Jagen.

The world was not prepared for the level of violence Seth was about to bring on the battlefield.

Sethless, towerless sacred stones insane can be completed? I remember working on it with a bunch of guys back in like 2005 or 6 and we came to the conclusion that it was impossible because of the ship mission.

*Hey I was wondering about Mycen availability I was told he was going to be the Jagen of the game hmmmm act 5 ok*

The 3ds era tried the Great Knight class as a balance to Jagens with the caveat that they have slightly less movement than Paladins and die to hammers as well as ridersbanes. This doesn't normally play a factor but every once in a while you encounter enemies on the hardest difficulties like in chapter 2 of Awakening where a rando with a hammer has a decent chance of 1-shotting the only unit who can survive most of the other attacks without a huge issue. If this is the method they are going with for balancing jagens then there needs to be more than one or two enemies in the game that pose a serious and unique threat though.

So one unit I think you should have mentioned was Fates Jakob. He has good enough stats to be a Jagen, his Class perfectly lets him support other units along with his Healing, and if all else fails he works great with Corrin.

Good Video As for Jeigans being op, I'm fine with it but my ideal jagen is one who weakens enemies and kills the troublesome enemies with ease, but doesn't necessarily fall off but should stop being the dominant force they were in the early game. Also you might want to adjust on the audio levels, put some chill music...

"This is booty bopper" *slowly clicks away from video*

Even with good Jeigens like Seth and Titania I tend to play using them as little as possible. For me that way of playing is more fun. But, it is very nice to have the option to use a jeigen to soften sone bosses or thicc armor bois.

7:04 It's so weird to see Claude facing upright in the box art