The Oifey "Archetype" was created by the young Western FE fanbase circa 2004 who, after playing Sacred Stones, was physically incapable of processing that Seth was good, actually. There's just no way that Best Boy Seth and Exp Thief Marcus could possibly be the same. I know. I was there. It was me. I was young FE fans on GameFAQs in 2004.
Being someone who hasn't even heard of Fire Emblem until the 3DS games came out, this tells me that the 'Oifey' archetype is an outdated term that's just NOW being seen as such.
GameFAQs forum users bending backwards to act like Seth wasn't a Jagen was amazing. I sometimes miss the mental gymnastics people would perform to try and reason that investing in Gilliam & Franz were worth it because they didn't understand how the boss XP formula worked. I couldn't imagine what Engage discussion would look like if most of the GameFAQs user base managed to live through the 3DS FE crisis they experienced.
@@666Kaca Yup, but this is the early days of the FE fandom. Keep in mind that it took the entire lifetime of FE7 for people to finally accept that Nino was a bad unit (instead of the "best unit ever omg"). It took even longer than that for people to accept that FE7 Marcus was actually good instead of "strip his weapon so other units can get EXP". Our game knowledge was not very good back then. Oifey was pulled to describe Seth because the fandom back then loved using early FE for archetypes, and Oifey was the only one that even comes close to fitting the idea of Seth at all.
The majority of the early western FE fanbase was in middle or high school and didn't know shit about Japanese. I imported FE6 because translation patches didn't exist and printed a fan translation of all the dialogue out in a binder to read side-by-side. Some of us knew specifics with FE6, but basically all of the info for previous games was thirdhand--for years I "knew" that trying to health your own swordmasters in FE5 was nearly impossible because they had so much speed and could dodge staves. At this time, the majority of people who considered Oifey an archetype unto itself had never actually played FE4 and were just aware that he was a pre-promote who had good growths. Mekkah has a lot of good videos where he goes through the old SF forum posts about the game and he shows how much the games were discussed "in theory" rather than in practice.
This video is pretty great for the most part, however I’ve noticed a pretty serious flaw: Vander is the 32nd steward of the divine dragon, not the 37th
To be fair, Engage's dialog and story are pretty forgettable. I barely remember much from my two playthroughs aside from Etie being a beast as a warrior.
I've never cared for the Oifey archetype as a thing. One, it's a useless sub-archetype that serves mostly to limit the traditional Jagen archetype in scope rather than bring anything new or unique to the conversation, and two because Oifey himself doesn't really fit the definition we try to apply to his archetype in the first place. It's a holdover term from 15 years ago that we've only kept because the FE community is too bullish about its archetypes to stop using any of them.
The big irony is that it is not "People don't use Jagens generally preceived to be worse because they are told so" and more that people only use Jagens because they are called Oifeys. I have genuinely seen people who are not aware of that fanmade destinction refuse to use great units like Seth. Not because they make the game significantly easier, but because "Jagen bad, don't use jagen. Jagen steal EXP". Basically, the moment we stop to use the term "Oifey unit", the community is screwed, lmao.
@@lpfan4491They don't use Seth because it "steals Exp". I don't use Seth because it's a spot that could be used by General!Amelia (or Super Recruit Amelia if available) and Sniper!Neimi. We are not the same. (Though Seth does steal Exp for Gilliam who deserves all the Exp because he's handsome and cool and great.)
@@lpfan4491 see my casual thought process was always "Seth is super good but gains no exp. Use other units because exp but Seth is the trump card". Except that you never need a trump card in Sacred Stones, you don't need to use Seth for Sacred Stones to be easy either. So I end up just not using him so that other units can shine, because I don't find solo challenges (which is what using seth nearly turns into) fun.
Regarding the Dragonstone: I think the way it mechanically functions in the Fates combat system makes it a better fit than it might at first seem. A huge might weapon that can't double is strong in the early game because of how Attack Stance works, but the way stats interact in Fire Emblem means that being able to double necessarily gets better as the game goes on, and Guard Stance becomes more important for survival and to reach speed/attack benchmarks (even if Attack Stance can still be useful for the entire game). As such, combat with a Dragonstone "falls off", your weaker units stop being able to rely on its assistance to set up kills, and even the unit that has access to it is likely to use other weapons instead. (The Yato upgrades are midgame prepromotes in this analogy)
You forgot about the defensive stat buffs that when the stone is the active weapon allow Corrin to weather early game hits but end up inconsequential/irrelevant later on.
I think part of the reason folks call the Dragonstone a Jagen is because they use Jagens to set up kills rather than to one-round difficult objectives. Any weapon that cannot follow-up is great for setting up Kills (Kodachi my beloved), but the Dragonstone has the added benefit of huge bulk on top of that. Alternatively, if Setting Up Kills isn't the main objective of a Jagen, then it doesn't apply.
Personally for me "falling off" is when you can no longer reliably one round normal enemies when others can. Though the problem with that is it's very difficulty dependent
@@cairyth2051 yeah his personal skill is pretty much the only thing that could stop him from feeding experience to your other units on a silver platter
I went into FE4 knowing that people had made the distinction between Jagen and Oifey archetypes so I tried to use Oifey as heavily as I used Seth and Titania. I got a game over at the end of Chapter 9 for stationing him on the home castle, and by Endgame his physical combat was only slightly better than my Azel!Nanna at the same level before I gave her the strength ring. I feel I am a better Fire Emblem player and better at using my Jagens for going through that experience. Good video, thank you.
Most of the non-child characters have a difficult time holding up to the kids (assuming the pairings were even remotely decent). Really only Shanon and Ares can, and there is a common denominator between the two (holy weapons).
I love Vander because he is the pinnacle Jagen who most would bench after Chapter 6 or 7, but due to how insane Engage is, you can honestly bring him through Maddening with any number of classes and builds for him and it can work. My first playthrough (that was also on Maddening) I heard about Vander being bad and wanted to make him a Mage Knight with Celica to confirm just how crazy Engage's customizability would be and iff he'd be viable. After some forging to give him a Thoron early game, and soon enough Canter, he became my main man for setting up kills safely for other units. He was just continuing his role from early-game but better. Definitely not an Oifey, but I luv him all the same.
I think Vander is the funniest Jagen of all time to me. At first, you'd think giving him an axe was kind of a bad idea. I mean, he's a Jagen, he's supposed to be setting up kills for the others, so giving him an axe with high mt and low hit is a bit asinine. Then you find out they doubled down on that shit because his personal passive is a crit boost. My guy will either fuck up your xp by missing and not setting up the kill, or he's gonna crit some mf to death and ruin your setup that way. He's so funny.
I think the Jagen archetype is also a story variant. As they are typically filled with mentor roles, that don't need to be old but are typically old due to mentors being old and experienced in general. Typically they are someone the main character respects more than their own role(ie. Lord), typically they are the cornerstone as to why the main character is as good as they are storywise.
Most of the time, they're also retainers or a noteable knight of their country. Gunter is actually a pretty great example for a story-Jagen that's not necessarily a Jagen in gameplay. Specifically in Conquest, where he only rejoins your army more than halfway through the game after you lose him in like chapter 3. He definitely doesn't fill the role of a Jagen there gameplay-wise, but he most definitely is a take on Jagen as a character.
Vander is such a sad story. That makes him one of the Jageanist of Jeagens isn't even something you can see looking at his stats... it's the Internal Level. And the fact he is outright "don't deploy Vander" from like Chapter 6/7 is... sad.
I absolutely love it, honestly. It's the first time I actually liked using a Jagen. As a Jagen (Seth doesn't counts since not using him is just Sacred Stones actual Hard Mode). I don't know why exactly tbh, but I really got it this time around
Actually currently using Vander in my third Maddening run, and he’s kept up with the rest of my units pretty well. Brave weapons synergise great with being next to Alear due to their personal, and the extra crit from Vander skill also helps. Is he likely mostly useful because I funnelled every stat booster into him and gave him Starsphere? Yes. However, I wanted to use him, and at least he’s not a detriment like I initially expected him to be in the late game.
You could argue Catherine is a Jagen in 3 houses if you get supports to recruit her early around chapter 5. She becomes very useful for early game maddening maps but "falls off" as she doesn't get any unique skills/spells.
@@leargamma4912 Yes you can! Get a c+ support by sharing meals and giving her items and the level requirement to recruit her to blue lions/golden deer becomes level 9, which should be very attainable by the month leading up to chapter 5. If you want more info watch Mekkah's "Waifu" video on Catherine.
about palla in FE3 book2 at 23:00 it should also be noted how freaking insane palla is.her bases compared to every other pegasus knight are hilarious. being higher in every single area except luck ( ties with catria, lower than caeda and est ). but the real test to how busted of an unit she is, is when you compare her to minerva, who joins 6 chapters later. so to put into perspective, here are palla bases: lvl10/HP24 Str10 Skl11 Spd16 Lck9 Wlv12 Def9 Res6 now minerva bases: lvl8/HP25 Str13 Skl9 Spd15 Lck7 Wlv14 Def16 Res0 now keep in mind. minerva is a promoted wyvern knight. palla is an unpromoted pegsus who joins at level 10 in the same chapter you get acess to your first dragon whip. if you instantly promote her, thats what her bases look like; lvl1/HP24 Str14 Skl11 Spd16 Lck9 Wlv12 Def13 Res0 palla literally have overall higher stats than minerva 6 CHAPTERS EARLIER with the exception of defense and Wlv ( which isnt relevant, since 12 is the highest you will need to wield any weapon anyway ). all of this just to tell everyone the truth. Palla is kaga waifu, and you can't convince me otherwise
Excellbem might not be right about the dragonstone, but they’re right about how you should buy fire emblem fates revelation for $20 so that you can see your favorite characters survive
Another thing that makes Jeigan really good in the remake is that his "low growths" end up becoming a Nonissue thanks to the fact that the game's dynamic growths, meaning that he will **eventually** get something
I’d argue also what makes Sigurd count is the concept of gen 1. If you pair no one up and only use Sigurd, eventually the game takes him away and you’re left with substitutes. I more humor the description but I think it’s fair to give it to him if you count quan and Eyvel who are primarily considered jagens on account of the game forcing you to no longer use them past chapter 3 (odd to think that they both pretty much vanish at the exact same chapter when you directly compare them huh…)
Yeah but tbh you can solo Gen 2 with Seliph just like Sigurd with gen 1. Using only Seliph you can promote him before chapter 7 and after that he's pretty much the same as Sigurd (if not better).
Yeah, the Jagen / Oifey split is just FEwiki trying to bloat out the list of archetypes by any means necessary. It's been an issue going back well over a decade. Here to say I would be very interested in a Romhack follow-up; there's a lot of different ways you can go with the archetype, and it's one of those things that really does shape how the earlygame plays; including, of course, when a game chooses -not- to include one.
I think another thing is that for the most part, these units are designed to all fill the same role, even if some of them have varying degrees of separation from their allies in terms of bases/growths, Seth is supposed to be just a typical Jagen, so is Vander, so is Sothe, so is Frederick, so is Oifey, regardless of the specific data. I think Conquest is supposed to be hard, so they don’t let you have a real Jagen character, the dragonstone is just a weapon that makes corrin tanky but it prevents doubling, is nosferatu a Jagen?
The closest ‘true’ Jagen in CQ is probably Silas with the caveat that it’s only really when Vow of Friendship is active that he reaches the insane early bulk and power that usually characterises Jagens. He does seem to fall off to some extent unless reclassed purely because Paladin/Great Knight isn’t great in CQ past a certain point unless you have Raijinto/Siegfried for 1-2 range that can double. This is still trying to force an archetype where it does exist though for sure, but in practice I’d say Silas does a lot of what Jagens are supposed to do in terms of being able to weaken a ton of enemies with good bulk and attack
@@rattyxoxo7397 That’s just because he’s a good unit, like how Sylvain is pretty strong in the early game with his personal. You make use of what you can, but Silas is definitely more designed to be your basic cav than he is a Jagen, it’s not like Fates wants you to get Corrin to half and have Silas carry them to victory.
Nosferatu is a Kliff. Starts off weak and hard to use (unless you feed all your exp into +Mag dragonstone Corrin) but once you get access to forging it goes thru the roof.
I've never liked oifey as a term. I like to think of them all as jaigens and then rate how well they are designed. My favorite Jaigens are always the ones where you really lose all reason to deploy them in midgame, at least for combat purposes. I really like vander as a jaigen. The more I play engage the longer vander stays around. He even sometimes almost gets to level 3 before being benched after chapter 11. Its mostly the fact that mobility, chip damage into breaking enemies or chain attacks, and general bulk are really nice utilities to bring. I think personally I would have given him a lot more build so he can still fulfill that role of using strong weapons to a better extent than the early units, but I get why they didnt want to give you a silver axe you could just trade away when someone promotes.
the fandom archetype list is a beautiful mess in general, especially because they have a "rejected archetypes" list where they go over some possible contenders for their archetypes and what arbitrary criteria mean they don't belong in it. That page accidentally classifies Shannan as a Lena - Colm isn't a Julian because he doesn't join alongside a Lena, Patty is a Julian, therefore she must join alongside a Lena or she'd be rejected, so Shannan must be a Lena in conclusion all archetypes are fake archetypes and as we already knew we definitely can't trust the goobers at the fandom wiki with figuring any of them out
Personally, I think the only real distinction I see between an Oifey and the true Jagen, is basically, well, the growths, Oifey was the first Jagen that had regular growths (in fact, stat-wise Oifey is basically like having a second Finn, but that can use swords), instead of having growths that stick out as particularly low (though, Jagen's particularly extreme case is obviously I think all the Jagens and Jagen-likes (well except Seth obviously) are just situational units that are useful when you need them, and if you like, can actually keep doing some job even late in the game (you can make FE7!Marcus and FE9!Titania competent late games units if a bit underwhelming compared with the unpromoted Cavs), but are suppose to become niche units to perform particular tasks (the GBA/Tellius Paladins can also help with rescue chains for example) or be outright left behind. If a Jagen, regardless of how it's designed, doesn't work like that, something wrong is happening.
38:00 > Orson Archetype. I agree whole heartedly from a mechanics perspective but Orson from a design perspective is really fun way to execute an "Abili-tease." You know that thing in games where you've given a late game kit but it gets take away like Alucards super weapons in Symphony of the Night.
i'm so jagen'd right now Also I'm fairly sure the whole "sigurd is a jagen" thing is just cause you get to make the joke about how he falls off halfway through the game
as an fe4 fan i think i like the concept of the oifey archetype because its a chance to bring up fe4 in conversation. i petition we rename the navarre archetype to the ayra archetype in lieu of this
Which Jagen though. The one who gives Sheeda her Silver Lance or the one you sacrifice in the prologue? I guess, he's useful in FE11 Hard, but still. Oifeye is a Jagen. Jagen is a failure.
Gunther actually makes for a good backpack unit throughout the game, as his personal skill gives Corrin +15 avoid and +3 damage (magic or physical), which is pretty damn great even before you factor in the stat gains he gives from his class.
I agree, the oifey archetype is not a real thing, most "jaigen" don't even fall off to begin with, or much later than most people really think and often for very different reasons in each game, for exemple fe6 marcus stat hold up until chapter 13 or 15 included in hard mode which is, no matter the ending, the half way point (desert map is bad for all your cavs) and stay relevant a lot longer in normal mode, while fe9-Titania don't fall of stat wise especially backed up by axes but cav movement start to get overshadow slowly but progressively by flyer movement around chapter 15, while as you mentioned eyvel and sothe both fall of because of yet another two different reasons, because most games have a lot of unique things or new spin on existing things. The oifey archetype seems mostly made up by people who might not even have played FE4 in the first place, nor the majority of the FEs, and just looked at some games playable characters's base lvl, growths, joining map and 20/20 stat without context and often biased against low growth and/or prepromote, just to arbitrarly put them in completly subjective box, this could be said for a lot of archetype.
I remember when FE first hit the States and before I even got into it, I read in Nintendo Power at the time that Titania was broken and the most OP FE character.
I wanna Invent a new Archetype called the "Eyvel" Archetype, where there's one unit who's around for the beginning of the game, leaves the party for a long time and the minute where said unit rejoins the party, the unit is already outclassed by a bunch of other units.
I feel like a lot of the fire emblem archetypes really started with the Awakening boom in the playerbase. Because of that people's feeling about the Jaigen archetype is characterized by their first experience being Fredrick a unit that "does" fall off due to his growth rates. Which is probably part of the reason why the community thought to separate the archetypes into Jeigans and Oifeys. (This doesn't explain to me why Oifey is the poster unit for Jaigens that don't fall off, never understood that)
@@DaniDoyle I remember on GameFAQs, FESS, and FEP back in the day everyone talking about it, and even trying to make up new ones that were real stretches.
Seth actually has the 6th highest growth total in the game not the 2nd highest. L'Arachel has a total of 330, Ephraim has a total of 345, Eirika has a total of 350 and Tethys has a total of 355. Seth only has a growth total of 325 which puts him as the highest pre-promote unit in the game easily though.
Oh WOW, I wasn't expecting Age of Mytholy music today. THAT brings back memories, great tastes in music overall. Excellent analysis, love your analyses and work!
You must remember a lot of these tropes were named back in the early 2000s (I'm sure the Japanese fandom pointed them out before that, but for the West). And people back then played the games very differently from now. Back then final strength of a character was the be-all end all, which is why common advice was "don't promote before 20" and "Don't use Jagens" or "Infantry is better than mounted because they have higher caps" and growths were valued over bases, the narrative surrounding Jagen was broken by units such as Oifey, Seth, etc. which is why the term was made for those ones. Of course these days it's funny to look back and laugh at people actively making the game harder and thinking it was the "right" way to play just because only the final chapter might be slightly easier, but that's how it was then. All that said, I have noticed a bit of a reverse recently, with decent units being called trash because they aren't good in a low turn count run.
Great video! It is my duty as a berwick elitist that while Ward's growth total is low at 62%, it's actually far from the lowest with Izerna having the worst at 35% and a few others in-between. As you point out growths dont really matter in berwick anyway.
That's kind of hilarious, I haven't finished the game yet and as a result I haven't looked at everyone's growth rates but it's hilarious that he isn't even the lowest. But as we agree it doesn't matter haha
I gave it some thought, and considered a "Jagen" as a low-growth unit, as in the worst growths in the game. Meanwhile an "Oifey" is a high-growth unit, often with the highest growths in the game to offset their promoted class. But then I realized that Oifey wouldn't fall into my definition of "Oifey", since their growths are still considerably lower than multiple units (I compared him to Fee, just as an example of someone who could have no holy blood). In comparison, Seth was only beaten by a few units (Eirika, Tethys, etc.) by only about 10-30 points, rather than upwards of 100 for Oifey. This doesn't count Myrrh, who's Myrrh.
oh no, reading the fe wiki I should't be surprised by FE wiki, but saying "these units" are Oifey it's so strange to me. Because the Oifey definition is too imprecise Game context matter way more than having good growths. For example: Sothe being an oifey lmao, he doesn't get xp to benefits from good growths, FE9 Titania: sure, she has good growths but her average str is significant lower to our expectation and she struggles to do damage with hand axe. Frederick: Trying to train him later on lunatic is a pain because he doesn't get enough xp to redo the whole training arc again Basically, wiki doesn't look to the game context, just growths Yes, berwick 3-M footage. 3 path escort mission, loved the idea I love how Ward is so great due to his base stats (including weapon level) and his "chain guard" skill. Endgame ready. And to balance him, he just don't participate in side quest, however, we must deploy him because he is too good to be benched.( I don't remember if he is forced deployed because I always use him) The idea is simple: Oifey archetype was created because people are afraid of using units who "steal xp" I love the 10 mov Jagen because he can reach the fort, and set up the kills with iron sword. It was all calculated Arran in FE12 is a strange case. I see him as a unit who can do multiple jobs with reclassing if your team is limited (draft). Even if it isn't a draft context, high move and good weapon ranks are still good to do some combat until you get your 12 units to your final team What I like about Vander is he teachs you about break. Swordfighters will break him a lot, but his HP is high enough to tank a sword critical and a normal hit, so you can still use him as a bait It's so funny the idea of "Jagen who fall of", but i think who trully fall off are Titania, Sothe and Frederick. I think Vander is better long term compared to Titania and Sothe because I played a lot of drafts and Ike Vander is my favorite build for him. He is bad enoguh to be free, but engage tools make him usable the entire game
25:50 I'm pretty sure FE11/12 Dracoknights have 10 move, just like FE1/3. Unless Serenesforest and my memory are both just wrong. The only classes that got more move in FE11 were Hero and Swordmaster. You might be thinking of the the enemy-only(well, enemy only in FE12) Wyvern class, which has 12 move in both FE3 and FE12.
Only early in to the video, but Jagen and Oifey isn't based on whether or not the unit is "Good", or how well they hold up, but how much they benefit from investment and exp. Oifey's typically have high growth rates, and as a result benefit strongly from experience, whereas Jagens have lower growth rates, and as a result giving them EXP is less beneficial. This has significant impacts on how you actually use the unit during play - which should be what defines an archetype in general. The way a unit is utilised is what makes the distinction, not something arbitrary like stats, growths, or join time.
I would argue that Jagens aren't (or shouldn't be) utilized differently based on how well they hold up long term, as they all still function as an early game crutch character and should be used as such. Seth has a better long term than Orson or FE6 Marcus, but they all play relatively the same, doing the heavy lifting combat-wise in early chapters and typically taking boss kills. Seth's good growths/long-term aren't the reason you give him kills early on, but rather because he's the unit most capable of getting kills. In fact, its often unbeneficial to give Seth kills that weaker units could take as his experience gain is minuscule compared to Artur and Vanessa, and he makes due just fine on the kills he naturally gets through advancing towards map objectives. Conversely, FE6 Marcus actively does want kills to raise his Axe rank for ch4 Halberd Access (as kills double weapon experience in fe6) meaning he's a very good target for early investment despite his weaker long term performance.
@@DaniDoyle Again though, it isn't just about how well they hold up, its about how well they make use of EXP and other resources. A unit that makes good use of exp opportunities is one who you actively want to give kills too - particularly boss kill. With a Jagen you usually want them setting up kills for your units who see more experience benefits to take. This isn't really the case with an Oifey, and you will want a lot of experience actively going their way. As Jagens and Oifey's are your best boss killers, this is a huge impact. Seth will basically sweep up every boss kill in FE8 as he is both the best candidate for the job, and still a very strong beneficiary of this experience, but with a Jagen, giving them the huge pools of EXP from boss kills will often leave you worse off in the long run, because they wont see the benefit from this. The fact you refer to a Jagen as an "Early game crutch" is why I think the distinction is so important. Because whilst units like Vander or Jagen do function in that way, units like FE7 Marcus or Seth are so much more than that. To boil Seth down to an "Early game crutch", or to imply he functions similarly in a FE Playthrough to Vander or Jagen, feels like it just isn't reflective of how the units actually work. The crux of my issue with just calling them all Jagens is that somebody like Jagen does not play similarly to somebody like Titania. What is the point of an archetype if not to group together units who play similarly to each other?
I think you're misunderstanding my comment, as I directly addressed your point of making use of resources like experience, providing an example of a unit who makes very good use of resources and investment who I doubt anyone would consider an oifey (FE6 Marcus), as well as pointing out how and why I don't think Seth is a good target for investment, despite his long term viability (as he still performs as your best without being targeted for investment). I really do not think that the units labeled as jagans and wifey's play differently from each other at all, both of them should usually be focused on accomplishing the objective of the map rather than self-improvement, and should be the units that you rely on for accomplishing those objectives. As such, FE9 Titania and FE11 Jagen play basically the same. I do want to say however that the argument of not using Jagens for boss kills feels flawed, as you end up making the hardest part of the game (early game) harder on yourself on the theoretical promise of making an easier portion of the game (midgame) easier on yourself. Given that experience caps at 100, using a weaker unit to kill early game bosses gives at most 1 level (though often less than a full level), which in the grand scheme of things is rarely if ever impactful, given the binary nature of stat level ups, the fact that most games give you many competent pre-promotes in the midgame, and the fact your weaker units can gained plenty of experience fighting standard enemies and thus won't fall behind from missing early boss kills. It's notable that the games where who you give early boss kills to is the biggest choice are Conquest and 3 Houses, both games that lack a "true" jagen and have fewer lategame pre-promotea, and thus rely more heavily on building up early game units.
@@DaniDoyle Unless I am missing something, I don't see how the Marcus example is relevant to him getting kills or exp. All he has to do is use axes, no - whether or not he is killing opponents is irrelevant, so the question of "Is he a good target for EXP sources" isn't affected by this? "I really do not think that the units labeled as jagans and wifey's play differently from each other at all, " - I could not disagree more. You are telling me that using Vander in Engage or Jagen in FE11 feels like you are using a similar unit to Titania in FE9 or Seth in FE8? The latter two units bulldoze through the early game, and use that as a baseline to carry on their strong performances throughout the experience. The former two are not nearly as dominant early, nor do they see the same advantages from this investment I can honestly say I have never used Vander and thought "This really reminds me of using Seth". Hell, FE6 Marcus wasn't reminiscent of FE7 Marcus, to be honest. "both of them should usually be focused on accomplishing the objective of the map rather than self-improvement, and should be the units that you rely on for accomplishing those objectives. " - This applies to every unit in Fire Emblem. They should all be focussed in helping you complete the objectives on the map, and in particular, being "a unit you rely on for accomplishing those objectives" can be any strong early game unit. Is Balthus a Jagen? How about Sigurd, or Kris? If we wanted a really extreme example, would this definition make Lena a Jagen? "I do want to say however that the argument of not using Jagens for boss kills feels flawed, as you end up making the hardest part of the game (early game) harder on yourself on the theoretical promise of making an easier portion of the game (midgame) easier on yourself." - Not sure if I didn't make my point clear but the idea was that one of the biggest benefits of boss kills, the huge pools of exp, is wasted in one scenario where it isn't in another. The "Early game being the hardest" is also **highly** game dependent, and definitely isn't the case for many games in the franchise - I don't think anybody considers the early chapters of FE7 harder than BBD or Cog, as an example. "It's notable that the games where who you give early boss kills to is the biggest choice are Conquest and 3 Houses, both games that lack a "true" jagen and have fewer lategame pre-promotea, and thus rely more heavily on building up early game units." I'm not sure I agree with this, but regardless, the reason this isn't a choice in a game like FE7, 8, or 9, is because the choice is incredibly obvious - you give it to the Oifey. They do it the easiest, and still see substantial benefit from it. I don't claim to be in tune with the meta's of these games to a high degree, but I don't think it's standard play to intentionally give Vander your boss kills in FE17? Wouldn't these usually go to a unit like Alear or Chloe?
Regarding Marcus: just because the primary benefit he gains from kills is weapon rank doesn't mean those kills don't count as investment. What would you define investment as if its not taking a limited resource (units to kill) away from others. It is also worth noting he does also want exp to a lesser extent as 1 point of speed lets him double ch7 wyverns. I'm actually curious what you define as investment, because you mentioned that the units you label Oifeys are such because they are good targets for investment and not because of their long term, but I'm not fully sure I understand what you mean by that. For example, I think Titania is a terrible target for investment when it comes to fe9 as the most competitive form of investment is BXP and she simply wastes it, whereas Oscar Kirean Marcia or Astrid can use it to surpass Titania's combat by around chapter 12-16 (depending on which unit you Target). Conversely, I don't see how Marcus getting kills isn't investment. Regarding units playing the same, yes I do think that Jagen, Seth, Titania, Fredrick, Marcus (Both versions) etc feel very much the same to play with. With the exception of Gunter and Aaran, Jagens always feel like the unit I can most rely on to do important combats, have the highest survivability, and often the most mobility. In games with lower enemy quality, this makes them nearly idiot proof, while higher enemy quality games you need to be more careful, but this distinction carries over to all units. Franz is less likely to die from a careless placement than Alfred, Boyd is less likely to die from a mistake than Wade, etc, this isn't a result of the Jagens playing differently than the games overall playing differently. Regarding Jagens being the units you use to most reliably accomplish map objectives, this kinda feels like you are strawmanning me. I am not claiming that any unit who contributes to the map is a jagen, but that the unit who is most capable of putting in the majority of the work for clearing early maps is the jagen, and that they all play similarly by being your primary means of accomplishing this objective, doing most of the heavy lifiting. Im this manner, they do not play meaningfully differently from each other, Jagen does the heavy lifting in fe11 early game, Eyvel does the heavy lifting in fe5 early game, Marcus does the heavy lifting in fe6 early game. Regarding boss kills, I think the biggest benefit of killing the boss is the boss being dead, not the experience you get from doing so. As a result, I wouldn't call the experience "wasted" if it went to a short term unit, as long term units have plenty of opportunities to earn experience, and will likely end up around the same level long term regardless of getting early boss kills or not (given the diminishing returns from combat at higher levels) Regarding Early vs late, while it is true that there are hard mid/endgame maps in most entries, I typically find mid/endgame to be easier due to the number of resources you have being much higher. You have many more strong units (both projects and pre-promote), and often some or all of legendary weapons, movement staffs, dancers, and skills/abilities that you did not have access to earlier. I mean, i agree that feeding boss kills to Marcus Seth and Titania is an easy choice because they are best at it, but I don't think their long term performance is a factor in my choosing to kill with them, simply that they are best at doing it. This is the same reason Eyvel is the go-to boss killer when I'm playing FE5 early game or Sothe is the go-to in FE10 early game. The decision isn't "who benefits from this most" but "who is capable of doing this" and in all cases the answer tends to be the Jagen.
Jagen is the only archetype I think is worth anything gameplay-wise. A pair of cavaliers, an edgy swordsman, or a plucky young mage are running themes but they dont mean anything. Conveying to someone that a character is a level above your army at the start but is slowly overtaken is a worthwhile piece of information to convey. Saying "Lugh is a Merric" only tells you that Lugh is an earlygame mage
And even then it’s only because FE usually balances a unit to be the designated Jagen, vander wouldn’t fit the Jagen arc if his internal level didn’t mean he can’t grow. And Jagens that are exceptions to that still don’t grow very fast on paper. Seth still needs boss kills.
Minor fairly off topic comment about Maid/Butler in Fates: Maid and Butler are functionally extremely similiar to Master Ninja, and so they’re definitely not bad combat classes, with relatively minor changes to stats that can easily be fixed due to the ease of reaching thresholds in Fates with Pair Up, Tonics, Meals, weapon forging, Rallies etc. Neither will use their secondary weapon too much, though those with decent magic may get some niche use of Staves and Live to Serve to keep themself and another unit able to stay in combat in combat as Maids, while swords do little except some situational player phase combat on MN against Axes and Bows, which can also be done with the Dual Shuriken in BR and Rev by both classes. As for skills, Maid has Res+2 and Tomebreaker to benefit itself, both of which are nice ways to patch up Maid’s worse Res compared to MN, with the advantage of Jakob and Felicia getting Tomebreaker around Ch13 because funny levelling mechanics, and Demoiselle/Gentilhomme and Live to Serve are actually very nice to have on a unit who is able to endure combat on the front lines. MN comparatively gets Locktouch (something very useful but not that necessary on a combat unit), Poison Strike (again, useful but not that necessary on a primary combat unit who wants to be taking kills for the exp rather than setting them up), Lethality (actively detrimental to guard gauge timing, and takes precedence over better skill activations like Sol when it does activate), and Shurikenfaire (fantastic to have, but obtained far later without Jakob or Felicia marrying a Ninja). It is necessary to note that MN also gets a passive +5 boost to Avo, Crit, Hit and Dodge, but the crit bonus is also actively detrimental in a lot of enemy phase situations, so it’s not unreasonable to say that Maid is still on the same level as a combat class than Master Ninja, though of course Troubadour is infinitely worse than Ninja because staff lock
If you ask me, Quan is the Jegan of fe4 gen 1. He has better bases than most other units, he can set up kills for you weaker units, and he falls off partway through (around chapter 4, and then really bad partway through 5)
I've always considered Jagan and Oifey as different but not for the reasons that fandom normally does. I've always considered a Jagan to be a pre-promote that joins early near the start where as Oifey is generally the first pre-promote around the start of the mid-game. Jagan(obviously) and Seth being good examples of Jagan, but Isadora and Libra being considered as Oifeys(Though these are 2 examples aren't meant in terms of their usability because god do most of us know how, at best, mid Isadora can be. Just references for a pre-promote's join point).
The Jagen for Gaiden and SoV is the Levin Sword, makes any Myrm do safe set damage, letting weaker units take the kill sometimes like a Jagen does (mostly a meme but it does help a lot)
I have said this exact thing before that I don't believe Jagens and Oifeys are separate archetypes and I am glad someone made an over one hour video justifying my opinion on that
Weird footnote: I never really fell into the whole "Never use Jagen units cuz they steal exp" shtick even when I played my first FE game (Path of Radiance through emulation) because... well... let's just say that the Jagen character in Path of Radiance is 'of my type'.
this isn't related to this video's point but the Tower of Guidance doesn't actually give mounted units the -2 movement penalty. Titania still isn't very good in the tower because of her class's speed cap.
Was gonna comment this. I'll also note Titania is still decent for the Tower because she can use Hammers for the abundant Generals in 4-E-1 and Wyrmslayers for the dragons in 4-E-3 while still being fast enough to double those enemies, far from ideal but she can contribute if you're lacking in better trained units, especially if you do a no Laguz Royals run.
I probably bought into the Oifey thing way back when I was a little moron on Serenes Forest but I had already long since given up on it before even this video. Clearly a lot of them play differently and have different levels of power and "falling off" but it's too nuanced to just stick them in two buckets named after units that don't really fit in those buckets to begin with. Probably the one through-line between younger me and current me on this topic is that I genuinely dislike the stupidly broken "wreck the whole game" ones in the Seth mold as being bad game design.
1:07:37 it's more about how Engage's weapon rank works. Since weapon ranks are set to the class. Giving Vander a Silver Axe kinda also means giving it to Boucheron or maybe axe second seals way too early on since I think the first silver axe comes with Bunet in his join chapter.
With Hilda's Relic, Felix's relic defiant strength, defiant defence, hit +20, Axe proficiency +5, vantage and a great knight. You can fix most of balthus' problems. Balthus has dumb growths in defense and strength. Fed him a couple Def boosters, an he legit kills everything in one hit, can hit reliably and can't be hurt by anything but magic once he loses half health
Put a comment again as i finally watched near the end of your video. I read comment somewhere silver snow edelgard was the jagen of 3h. She fell off so hard in the mid game. I subs for your video essay. I have watched couple of your essay. Really enjoy it.
I like Gunter in Conquest a lot as a Jagen, because it feels like he gets the full Jagen experience twice over. He's pretty classic Jagen for the pre-route split chapters he's there for, and when he comes back in Conquest he has surprisingly good Str, Skl, and Def, horrible growths, and like Jagen he can temporarily shine in combat from very high weapon ranks. Like really, he can use a Beastkiller out the box and his base stats are absolutely perfect for Ch19's Kitsune even in Lunatic. It's also 4 chapters after he rejoins, so you don't really expect him to suddenly wow you like that in actual combat instead of just being on the bench or a stat backpack.
I was losing my mind in the first 20s of the video trying to figure out what the hell that music was and at 0:24 my brain immediately went "Proseche" (or whatever they say =p)
I'll be upfront in saying as of 10/7/23 (date of posting) I have not played through FE4. But, from everything I've heard and know of FE4, Oifey is just a Jeigan. He's just the Jeigan of Generation 2. As was mentioned in the video, Oifey is pretty good, but compared to the paired child units, he fails to keep up in comparison to the likes of Seliph in the long term. He has better growths than the average Jeigan throughout the series, but even comparing him to just Seliph, his only stand out feature is him getting HP every level, and Seliph can do that better, getting 2 hp 40% of the time. Oifey doesnt exist as an archtype. Oifey is just the Jeigan for the 2nd part of my 2 part Fire Emblem game.
My definition of a Jagen had always been about their relationship to "soaking up" experience points. It's not so much about whether they fall off or not, but the idea was that if you lean exclusively on your Jagen, you won't end up with a trained army. Even Jagens that don't "fall off" still present the unique pitfall of hindering your other unit's growth.
and about the video: for what it's worth, when I did an all substitute run of fe4 Oifey was able to keep up a bit better. still kinda gets outclassed by the child units you're guaranteed to get though.
I think Sothe actually goes kinda hard. You think of Jagens as not gaining that much exp, but he gets a flat amount of experience that no one else has access to thanks to the steal skill, and he transitions into a more supporting role as a thief instead of as a carry. There was an old patch of FE7x where Eagler got a flat 10exp for using Sacrifice, now there was an awesome Jagen. It's worth noting that some jagens are in a more supporting role and some jagens are interested in curbstomping the game. I like Oifaye, one of my favorite characters, but he's not Seth or Titania or Frederick by a longshot. I would recommend against giving Arran any statboosters or growth orbs. Or anything that might cause you to grow attached to him. What do you think about Zeig from TRS? He's got insane growths, great abilities, and nutto stats, but he definitely has a fall off point, a little bit of Kaga Trolling.
I Disagree about sothe, because there's really not any thief utility after part one, and even if you get his experience high by abusing steal, his weapon type in class caps hold him back so much more than his limited experience
If I were to try to distinguish between the archetypes, I'd say a Jagen relies on the early level advantage to stay good, while an Oifey does not. In FE7, base Marcus is about as good as a Kent that promotes around level 15 or so. This makes him an Oifey. If Engage, base Vander (internal level 15) is about as good as an unpromoted level 8 Alfred. This makes him a Jagen. The raw growth rates are misleading because even with good growth rates, early game pre-promotes gain stats very slowly since they're only getting 3ish exp per engagement. The massive level advantage eventually wears off, and your pre-promote starts gaining stats like a normal unit. Even if growth rates are below average, it's typically enough to be fine at this point. But this is the point in time where you can tell if an early pre-promote is approaching retirement or not.
@@DaniDoyle The level advantage diminishes over time. The distinction is how good the character is once the level advantage wears off. Here's Marcus in FE6 and 7, and a freshly promoted level 15 Paladin of similar stat strength, and the level they promoted at to get those stats. Rounded for clarity. HP S/M Skl Spd Lck Def Res Marcus(FE7) 31 15 15 11 8 10 8 Kent (15) 34 13 14 15 13 10 6 Marcus (FE6) 32 9 14 11 10 9 8 Lance (10) 30 11 12 15 7 7 11 In FE7, Base Marcus is roughly as good as a that just promoted at level 15. In FE6, Marcus is clearly worse than a Lance that just promoted at level 10. FE7 Marcus also has the advantage of crazy good weapon levels A, A, B, allowing him to be better than his stats may suggest. In FE6, Marcus has D, A, E, which is much less remarkable. While the initial shared definition stated that Oifeys have lower bases than Jagen's, I assert the opposite. Oifey's have tended to also have better growth rates than Jagens. But Engage introduced our big exception. Vander's growth rates are not horrible. But his stats compared to other internal level 15 Paladins are. And when playing the game, he clearly feels much more like Marcus from FE6 than Marcus from FE7. Oifey's are just Jagen's that were made too powerful for their flaw to manifest properly. Whether to call that a real or fake archetype, a simple matter of opinion. I think I found a way to somewhat objectively classify them based on which archetype the community decides to toss them in. People can decide for themselves whether that warrants a separate category or not.
@@DaniDoyle If you say "don't reccomend this channel" on a lot of recommended videos you start getting things like videos of people counting to 10,000. Honestly I think the algorithm is pretty bad lmao
Titania is generally considered the best unit in FE10 behind the Wyverns, ahead of Ike. She is so close to her promotion level that she can get exp funneled into her for Third Tier Unit combat extremely early compared to everyone else, and she never really gets caught up to by most of the cast at all.
I’d argue Fredrick is also an example of a jagen who falls off; his class & skill selection is mediocre and in a game with crazy high growths it takes very little time to supplant him as strongest overall unit. With his abysmal exp gain he really doesn’t keep up at all without depromoting him to wyvern to let him use his good bases and get levels consistently. Awakenings enemy’s scale pretty strongly too even on the standard hard difficulty meaning unlike say Marcus fighting his first prepromoted enemy and getting a fair challenge that levels him up, Fredrick get violated and puts up zero resistance. Realistically his potential as a unit is not actually that achievable in a normal play through and doesn’t offset this like Donny does who starts ass but becomes a mid-late game monster, and is a fantastic father due to passing down Pegasus knight to daughters as well as making anyone have a positive luck cap, most likely enduring armsthrift lets them use forged glass weapons like common weapons.
Paladin is pretty middling in awakening, generally out done by most other mounted options due to better weapons skills or flying to help slower units more reliably. And inheritance plays a factor with many gen 1 units (ricken being a great example as he’s got chroms meh options with no skills you’d want outside bowbreaker, meaning libra with much better classes and skills preforms better as a father and overall) wyvern while great, by the time it’s available in the plegia maps that’s a lot of time for anyone else to catch up. It’s less wyvern isn’t good enough and more “why not just use sully, who has THE SAME options, most assuredly better stats, a kid as a big motivator to invest in, and discipline to offset the one advantage you might give Fredrick”. And this is ignoring the real argument of giving the first seal to Donny who infamously is a mid game behemoth that offsets how shit he starts out as with effectively infinite forged glass weapons and mid 20’s stats across the board when 17 is considered high for a stat, AND passes down Pegasus knight. Fredrick is just realistically a unit you baby to be viable still. It’s not like Titania where level ups determine how useful she is at endgame from ok enough to really great, Frederick simply needs Donny’s level of investment but isn’t half as good as that investment becomes. Especially considering how great other prepromotes are like Anna and say’ri who are real investments because they just get normal exp and don’t get fucked up by generic heroes.
I mean Frederick is usually going to have better stats than Sully (or insert unit here) for quite a while, unless you just choose not to let him see combat. At minimum he gains eight experience per kill, and his bases are so far ahead that if he's fed as much as she is he'll still have a stat lead for quite some time, especially considering that his growths are quite good. You'd be surprised at how well Frederick keeps up if you just let him get experience in the early game, it's kind of absurd how long he maintains his lead. He definitely doesn't have a lead in endgame but for at least half of the game he's still a phenomenal and even after he stops being phenomenal he's still usable
@@DaniDoylehis bases are a lot worse than you really remember. You have to remember EVERYONE is a growth unit in awakening. By ch4 with decent investment robin legitimately will be on par with him. He only has 2 more points of speed than chrom and 8 more hp. And sully has generally the same stats as chrom, and every 3 kills she’s getting 3-6 stats. Fredrick every THIRTY excluding bosses gets 3-5, with one of them likely being two points to hp. Units grow REALLY fast in awakening and Fredrick has it harsher than sothe when it comes to not having the exp to properly keep up even with growths that seem good on paper. He’s by all means usable, but he’s kinda just memed in how good he is. Fredrick beats everything is a fun joke, but as someone who’s beaten true apotheosis with no losses I’m pretty confident in saying outside of being an absolute necessity in lunatic and lunatic+ he is probably the unit I’ve had the most trouble getting long term value in.
Mine would be story based. They both keep the same gameplay type (early promoted unit with higher bases). However, their story role would be slightly different. I’d view Jeigans as much more veteran knights; like ones pushing retirement age. While Oifey’s are more “traditionally aged” knights but obviously quite a bit older than the Lord. Basically Jeigan’s are usually in the “old enough to be my parent” age while “Oifey” is “definitely older than the Lord, but not so old that they’d be parents”. Basically, if the Lord and the veteran knight are both of the gender the other attracts, how off putting would the romance be? 😂. And I guess since this includes Sothe, this can also refer to the “appearance” in age 😂. Meaning Jeigan’s should treat the Lord like their child, while the Oifey treats the lord like a younger sibling.
I never would have considered Sothe a Jagan, then again I also view Jagan as having a certain story archetype as well (Typically being either a retainer to the MC, or a captain of the knights that is tasked with protecting the MC but being a type of knight as a result was a requirement for me). That being said my real issue with Soothe wasn't so much that he fell of perse, it was more so that whisper absolutely crippled him and Heather. So many units they would proc the whisper skill leave it at 1 hp then immediately proc it again not killing said unit. It would go to enemy phase and that would be 4 procs of it in a row no kills, or they would die from the fact they were allergic to killing. That being said I've always considered Jagan's role to be the mega training unit. Take off weapons so they draw aggro, have them specifically finish off problematic units, or deal with side objectives. I don't typically feed them levels until other units start hitting level 10. Then just depends on if I'm vibing with them that game if keep them in the party or not (Or a lot of units just got cursed instead of blessed with stats.
I’ve already hated the “Oifey archetype” if only because it’s named after Oifey. He’s literally not even that good in gen 2 relative to everyone else. Meanwhile this is the same video game as fucking Sigurd who fits the definition more than literally any other unit.
Titania falling off in RD? Maybe I just got lucky with RNG because on my most recent playthru she's maxing several stats and is still one of my most destructive fighters, right up there with Gatrie and Haar.
On the topic of Fates debated Jagens Gunter is funny cuz he doesn't even have good personal bases. 0 str and 0 def base before class lol, which, mind you, is worse than that of the resident refresher Azura (at 2 personal str and def). So he's pretty much relying on just his status as a promoted unit with bases from promoted classes to put in any work. It is far easier to never use his combat and just use him as a support unit since he has Shelter and Forceful Partner. In which case he never really falls off, that support is just consistent throughout the game. And Jakob/Felicia... Bad growths can be a reason to classify them as Jagens, but it's ehhh half-true. They actually have personal growth rate totals on par with some of the other regular units. They even have higher growth rate totals than Arthur, a unit that I'd say has great growths. The difference between them however is how those growths are distributed. Jakob's highest personal growths for example is HP (55%, decidedly above average) and then Lck (45%, only slightly above average) but then he has disappointing Str (30%) and Spd (35%) growths. Acceptable growths but also at the same time not good growths lol.
Jagen is characters who would enter into Old man yaoi, Oifey are the ones who don’t
What about Titantina, Seth and Fredrick then?
@@ethanwebster3764 they dont have old man yaoi so they're oifeys, obviously
The Oifey "Archetype" was created by the young Western FE fanbase circa 2004 who, after playing Sacred Stones, was physically incapable of processing that Seth was good, actually. There's just no way that Best Boy Seth and Exp Thief Marcus could possibly be the same.
I know. I was there. It was me. I was young FE fans on GameFAQs in 2004.
So it is all YOUR fault that people lambasted me for using Titania throughout Path of Radiance. Well, screw you.
Kidding, this is a joke.
Being someone who hasn't even heard of Fire Emblem until the 3DS games came out, this tells me that the 'Oifey' archetype is an outdated term that's just NOW being seen as such.
GameFAQs forum users bending backwards to act like Seth wasn't a Jagen was amazing. I sometimes miss the mental gymnastics people would perform to try and reason that investing in Gilliam & Franz were worth it because they didn't understand how the boss XP formula worked. I couldn't imagine what Engage discussion would look like if most of the GameFAQs user base managed to live through the 3DS FE crisis they experienced.
@@666Kaca Yup, but this is the early days of the FE fandom. Keep in mind that it took the entire lifetime of FE7 for people to finally accept that Nino was a bad unit (instead of the "best unit ever omg"). It took even longer than that for people to accept that FE7 Marcus was actually good instead of "strip his weapon so other units can get EXP".
Our game knowledge was not very good back then. Oifey was pulled to describe Seth because the fandom back then loved using early FE for archetypes, and Oifey was the only one that even comes close to fitting the idea of Seth at all.
The majority of the early western FE fanbase was in middle or high school and didn't know shit about Japanese. I imported FE6 because translation patches didn't exist and printed a fan translation of all the dialogue out in a binder to read side-by-side. Some of us knew specifics with FE6, but basically all of the info for previous games was thirdhand--for years I "knew" that trying to health your own swordmasters in FE5 was nearly impossible because they had so much speed and could dodge staves.
At this time, the majority of people who considered Oifey an archetype unto itself had never actually played FE4 and were just aware that he was a pre-promote who had good growths. Mekkah has a lot of good videos where he goes through the old SF forum posts about the game and he shows how much the games were discussed "in theory" rather than in practice.
My definition of the Jagen archetype is people with cool shoulder spikes and the Oifey archetype is people with cool moustaches
based.
Walhart? Jagen. Cervantes? Oifey
based.
ah, yes. Moulder. My favourite Oifey
So is Vander a Jagen or an Oifey?
Sigurd is a Jagen because the game literally forces you to stop using him. In that sense he is the ultimate Jagen.
I always called Sigurd FE4's Jagen and people would get mad. It was pretty funny.
The world needs more hour-long video essays about Fire Emblem unit archetypes
I'm On It
TRUE
THIS
FE10 Tauroneo is my favourite Yunaka archetype.
I will find you
ZAPPY
Tauroneo needs to have a negative power forge in order to properly Jagen, worthless unit
Hah, Yunaka.
Classic Isadora
@@aprinnyonbreak1290 Isadora is one of my favorites of the Midia Jagen Archetype (Jagen, but girl, and super late to the party)
This video is pretty great for the most part, however I’ve noticed a pretty serious flaw: Vander is the 32nd steward of the divine dragon, not the 37th
damn, i'm a fake gamer exposed :(
To be fair, Engage's dialog and story are pretty forgettable. I barely remember much from my two playthroughs aside from Etie being a beast as a warrior.
Also Seth definitely does NOT have the "highest total growths" like homie said. Did a quick comparison to Ephraim and it's not even close...
I've never cared for the Oifey archetype as a thing. One, it's a useless sub-archetype that serves mostly to limit the traditional Jagen archetype in scope rather than bring anything new or unique to the conversation, and two because Oifey himself doesn't really fit the definition we try to apply to his archetype in the first place.
It's a holdover term from 15 years ago that we've only kept because the FE community is too bullish about its archetypes to stop using any of them.
The big irony is that it is not "People don't use Jagens generally preceived to be worse because they are told so" and more that people only use Jagens because they are called Oifeys. I have genuinely seen people who are not aware of that fanmade destinction refuse to use great units like Seth. Not because they make the game significantly easier, but because "Jagen bad, don't use jagen. Jagen steal EXP". Basically, the moment we stop to use the term "Oifey unit", the community is screwed, lmao.
@@lpfan4491They don't use Seth because it "steals Exp". I don't use Seth because it's a spot that could be used by General!Amelia (or Super Recruit Amelia if available) and Sniper!Neimi. We are not the same.
(Though Seth does steal Exp for Gilliam who deserves all the Exp because he's handsome and cool and great.)
@@lpfan4491 see my casual thought process was always "Seth is super good but gains no exp. Use other units because exp but Seth is the trump card". Except that you never need a trump card in Sacred Stones, you don't need to use Seth for Sacred Stones to be easy either. So I end up just not using him so that other units can shine, because I don't find solo challenges (which is what using seth nearly turns into) fun.
@@quinn7427 Seth can get level 16 pre-routesplit.
@@lpfan4491 again, seth solo isn't my idea of fun
Regarding the Dragonstone: I think the way it mechanically functions in the Fates combat system makes it a better fit than it might at first seem. A huge might weapon that can't double is strong in the early game because of how Attack Stance works, but the way stats interact in Fire Emblem means that being able to double necessarily gets better as the game goes on, and Guard Stance becomes more important for survival and to reach speed/attack benchmarks (even if Attack Stance can still be useful for the entire game).
As such, combat with a Dragonstone "falls off", your weaker units stop being able to rely on its assistance to set up kills, and even the unit that has access to it is likely to use other weapons instead. (The Yato upgrades are midgame prepromotes in this analogy)
You forgot about the defensive stat buffs that when the stone is the active weapon allow Corrin to weather early game hits but end up inconsequential/irrelevant later on.
But it is a weapon. Not a unit. This is obviously a joke you are taking way too far, much like the guy who made the video above.
It was definitely a thought-out mechanic for the game in question at the very least
I think part of the reason folks call the Dragonstone a Jagen is because they use Jagens to set up kills rather than to one-round difficult objectives. Any weapon that cannot follow-up is great for setting up Kills (Kodachi my beloved), but the Dragonstone has the added benefit of huge bulk on top of that. Alternatively, if Setting Up Kills isn't the main objective of a Jagen, then it doesn't apply.
Personally for me "falling off" is when you can no longer reliably one round normal enemies when others can. Though the problem with that is it's very difficulty dependent
By that definition, Vander never falls off because he was never good to begin with
@@cairyth2051 yeah his personal skill is pretty much the only thing that could stop him from feeding experience to your other units on a silver platter
“What does it mean to fall off?”
Well, you could look at Gunter. He falls off… a bridge. Hard.
He gets better, though.
I went into FE4 knowing that people had made the distinction between Jagen and Oifey archetypes so I tried to use Oifey as heavily as I used Seth and Titania. I got a game over at the end of Chapter 9 for stationing him on the home castle, and by Endgame his physical combat was only slightly better than my Azel!Nanna at the same level before I gave her the strength ring. I feel I am a better Fire Emblem player and better at using my Jagens for going through that experience. Good video, thank you.
Most of the non-child characters have a difficult time holding up to the kids (assuming the pairings were even remotely decent). Really only Shanon and Ares can, and there is a common denominator between the two (holy weapons).
I love Vander because he is the pinnacle Jagen who most would bench after Chapter 6 or 7, but due to how insane Engage is, you can honestly bring him through Maddening with any number of classes and builds for him and it can work. My first playthrough (that was also on Maddening) I heard about Vander being bad and wanted to make him a Mage Knight with Celica to confirm just how crazy Engage's customizability would be and iff he'd be viable. After some forging to give him a Thoron early game, and soon enough Canter, he became my main man for setting up kills safely for other units. He was just continuing his role from early-game but better. Definitely not an Oifey, but I luv him all the same.
I think Vander is the funniest Jagen of all time to me.
At first, you'd think giving him an axe was kind of a bad idea. I mean, he's a Jagen, he's supposed to be setting up kills for the others, so giving him an axe with high mt and low hit is a bit asinine.
Then you find out they doubled down on that shit because his personal passive is a crit boost.
My guy will either fuck up your xp by missing and not setting up the kill, or he's gonna crit some mf to death and ruin your setup that way.
He's so funny.
I think the Jagen archetype is also a story variant. As they are typically filled with mentor roles, that don't need to be old but are typically old due to mentors being old and experienced in general. Typically they are someone the main character respects more than their own role(ie. Lord), typically they are the cornerstone as to why the main character is as good as they are storywise.
Most of the time, they're also retainers or a noteable knight of their country.
Gunter is actually a pretty great example for a story-Jagen that's not necessarily a Jagen in gameplay. Specifically in Conquest, where he only rejoins your army more than halfway through the game after you lose him in like chapter 3. He definitely doesn't fill the role of a Jagen there gameplay-wise, but he most definitely is a take on Jagen as a character.
i enjoyed this one-on-one cage match between dani doyle and the fandom wiki
i'm winning
Vander is such a sad story. That makes him one of the Jageanist of Jeagens isn't even something you can see looking at his stats... it's the Internal Level. And the fact he is outright "don't deploy Vander" from like Chapter 6/7 is... sad.
Imagine being weighed down by your starting equipment... and your starting equipment is an iron weapon.
Being Vander is Hell.
I absolutely love it, honestly. It's the first time I actually liked using a Jagen. As a Jagen (Seth doesn't counts since not using him is just Sacred Stones actual Hard Mode).
I don't know why exactly tbh, but I really got it this time around
Actually currently using Vander in my third Maddening run, and he’s kept up with the rest of my units pretty well. Brave weapons synergise great with being next to Alear due to their personal, and the extra crit from Vander skill also helps.
Is he likely mostly useful because I funnelled every stat booster into him and gave him Starsphere? Yes. However, I wanted to use him, and at least he’s not a detriment like I initially expected him to be in the late game.
@@pokefan7446 I did this too. And it just feels right to give him the arena. His 30 exp is more exp than someone else's 30 exp.
I think Vander is the most valuable unit in Engage because he teaches you that "it's okay to just bench this guy" ...and also earlygame would b hell
I'm happy you were able to keep this short. I think we need more Jagen sub-archtypes. Where's my Sothes, Gunters, and Lightning Swords?
I think it was too short, UA-cam doesn't like short videos so it'll be buried in the algorithm :(
Dragonstone is my favorite Lightning Sword
i didn't realize this video was more than a hour long until i read your comment
@@adriahrin3284 I read the description
It is short in comparison to the genre of 8+ hour Elder Scrolls analyses.
You could argue Catherine is a Jagen in 3 houses if you get supports to recruit her early around chapter 5. She becomes very useful for early game maddening maps but "falls off" as she doesn't get any unique skills/spells.
You can recruit her early?
@@leargamma4912 Yes you can! Get a c+ support by sharing meals and giving her items and the level requirement to recruit her to blue lions/golden deer becomes level 9, which should be very attainable by the month leading up to chapter 5. If you want more info watch Mekkah's "Waifu" video on Catherine.
@@leargamma4912 It depends on which House you play as.
FE3 Jeigan is an Oifey because his 3% res growth CRUSHES Barth's 2% res growth! Update the fandom wiki!!!
Another Loss for Barth Bros :( We'll get Roy someday
about palla in FE3 book2 at 23:00
it should also be noted how freaking insane palla is.her bases compared to every other pegasus knight are hilarious. being higher in every single area except luck ( ties with catria, lower than caeda and est ).
but the real test to how busted of an unit she is, is when you compare her to minerva, who joins 6 chapters later.
so to put into perspective, here are palla bases: lvl10/HP24 Str10 Skl11 Spd16 Lck9 Wlv12 Def9 Res6
now minerva bases: lvl8/HP25 Str13 Skl9 Spd15 Lck7 Wlv14 Def16 Res0
now keep in mind. minerva is a promoted wyvern knight. palla is an unpromoted pegsus who joins at level 10 in the same chapter you get acess to your first dragon whip. if you instantly promote her, thats what her bases look like;
lvl1/HP24 Str14 Skl11 Spd16 Lck9 Wlv12 Def13 Res0
palla literally have overall higher stats than minerva 6 CHAPTERS EARLIER with the exception of defense and Wlv ( which isnt relevant, since 12 is the highest you will need to wield any weapon anyway ).
all of this just to tell everyone the truth. Palla is kaga waifu, and you can't convince me otherwise
Excellbem might not be right about the dragonstone, but they’re right about how you should buy fire emblem fates revelation for $20 so that you can see your favorite characters survive
Buy rev buy rev buy rev
Cant buy rev anymore though. Shoutout to nintendo
As a Scarlet-fan, I can not relate...
Another thing that makes Jeigan really good in the remake is that his "low growths" end up becoming a Nonissue thanks to the fact that the game's dynamic growths, meaning that he will **eventually** get something
Sothe is my favorite member of the Esfir archetype
"Please dont make this into an archetype"
Me, furiously typing out an orson archetype page on the fandom wiki: dont do what?
😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭
I’d argue also what makes Sigurd count is the concept of gen 1. If you pair no one up and only use Sigurd, eventually the game takes him away and you’re left with substitutes. I more humor the description but I think it’s fair to give it to him if you count quan and Eyvel who are primarily considered jagens on account of the game forcing you to no longer use them past chapter 3 (odd to think that they both pretty much vanish at the exact same chapter when you directly compare them huh…)
Stop. Just stop being stupid please
Yeah but tbh you can solo Gen 2 with Seliph just like Sigurd with gen 1. Using only Seliph you can promote him before chapter 7 and after that he's pretty much the same as Sigurd (if not better).
Yeah, the Jagen / Oifey split is just FEwiki trying to bloat out the list of archetypes by any means necessary. It's been an issue going back well over a decade. Here to say I would be very interested in a Romhack follow-up; there's a lot of different ways you can go with the archetype, and it's one of those things that really does shape how the earlygame plays; including, of course, when a game chooses -not- to include one.
Baros gaming
I think another thing is that for the most part, these units are designed to all fill the same role, even if some of them have varying degrees of separation from their allies in terms of bases/growths, Seth is supposed to be just a typical Jagen, so is Vander, so is Sothe, so is Frederick, so is Oifey, regardless of the specific data.
I think Conquest is supposed to be hard, so they don’t let you have a real Jagen character, the dragonstone is just a weapon that makes corrin tanky but it prevents doubling, is nosferatu a Jagen?
The Jagen in conquest is your willingness to play any other game in the series
The closest ‘true’ Jagen in CQ is probably Silas with the caveat that it’s only really when Vow of Friendship is active that he reaches the insane early bulk and power that usually characterises Jagens. He does seem to fall off to some extent unless reclassed purely because Paladin/Great Knight isn’t great in CQ past a certain point unless you have Raijinto/Siegfried for 1-2 range that can double. This is still trying to force an archetype where it does exist though for sure, but in practice I’d say Silas does a lot of what Jagens are supposed to do in terms of being able to weaken a ton of enemies with good bulk and attack
@@rattyxoxo7397 honestly I think non-reclassed Silas is pretty much a textbook jagen if you’re using your tools properly
@@rattyxoxo7397 That’s just because he’s a good unit, like how Sylvain is pretty strong in the early game with his personal. You make use of what you can, but Silas is definitely more designed to be your basic cav than he is a Jagen, it’s not like Fates wants you to get Corrin to half and have Silas carry them to victory.
Nosferatu is a Kliff. Starts off weak and hard to use (unless you feed all your exp into +Mag dragonstone Corrin) but once you get access to forging it goes thru the roof.
I've never liked oifey as a term. I like to think of them all as jaigens and then rate how well they are designed. My favorite Jaigens are always the ones where you really lose all reason to deploy them in midgame, at least for combat purposes.
I really like vander as a jaigen. The more I play engage the longer vander stays around. He even sometimes almost gets to level 3 before being benched after chapter 11. Its mostly the fact that mobility, chip damage into breaking enemies or chain attacks, and general bulk are really nice utilities to bring. I think personally I would have given him a lot more build so he can still fulfill that role of using strong weapons to a better extent than the early units, but I get why they didnt want to give you a silver axe you could just trade away when someone promotes.
I like the open ended role-playability in Three Houses. New Game+ bonuses onto your Byleth and only your Byleth and bam! Cooked a homemade Jagen.
the fandom archetype list is a beautiful mess in general, especially because they have a "rejected archetypes" list where they go over some possible contenders for their archetypes and what arbitrary criteria mean they don't belong in it. That page accidentally classifies Shannan as a Lena - Colm isn't a Julian because he doesn't join alongside a Lena, Patty is a Julian, therefore she must join alongside a Lena or she'd be rejected, so Shannan must be a Lena
in conclusion all archetypes are fake archetypes and as we already knew we definitely can't trust the goobers at the fandom wiki with figuring any of them out
OMG the shannan thing is hilarious
Its only a Oifie if it comes from the thracia region. Otherwise its just sparkling Jaegan
🤣
Personally, I think the only real distinction I see between an Oifey and the true Jagen, is basically, well, the growths, Oifey was the first Jagen that had regular growths (in fact, stat-wise Oifey is basically like having a second Finn, but that can use swords), instead of having growths that stick out as particularly low (though, Jagen's particularly extreme case is obviously
I think all the Jagens and Jagen-likes (well except Seth obviously) are just situational units that are useful when you need them, and if you like, can actually keep doing some job even late in the game (you can make FE7!Marcus and FE9!Titania competent late games units if a bit underwhelming compared with the unpromoted Cavs), but are suppose to become niche units to perform particular tasks (the GBA/Tellius Paladins can also help with rescue chains for example) or be outright left behind.
If a Jagen, regardless of how it's designed, doesn't work like that, something wrong is happening.
38:00 > Orson Archetype.
I agree whole heartedly from a mechanics perspective but Orson from a design perspective is really fun way to execute an "Abili-tease."
You know that thing in games where you've given a late game kit but it gets take away like Alucards super weapons in Symphony of the Night.
i'm so jagen'd right now
Also I'm fairly sure the whole "sigurd is a jagen" thing is just cause you get to make the joke about how he falls off halfway through the game
as an fe4 fan i think i like the concept of the oifey archetype because its a chance to bring up fe4 in conversation. i petition we rename the navarre archetype to the ayra archetype in lieu of this
The difference between jagens and oifeys in the end is that Oifeys are the jagens I like using /s
TRUE
i always thought this was a weird archetype cuz Oifey is literally worse than Jagen lmao
Which Jagen though. The one who gives Sheeda her Silver Lance or the one you sacrifice in the prologue?
I guess, he's useful in FE11 Hard, but still. Oifeye is a Jagen. Jagen is a failure.
I'd argue that being a mentor figure to the main character is a pretty essential aspect of the Jagen archetype that's entirely story-based
I don't think jagen is a story archetype
Favorite Jaegan has to be the forged Ephraim's Lance.
Gunther actually makes for a good backpack unit throughout the game, as his personal skill gives Corrin +15 avoid and +3 damage (magic or physical), which is pretty damn great even before you factor in the stat gains he gives from his class.
the only jaegan that hasn’t fallen off is the FE6 reverse recruitment yodel (staff users always helpful), and Seth (the very model of an oifey)
I agree, the oifey archetype is not a real thing, most "jaigen" don't even fall off to begin with, or much later than most people really think and often for very different reasons in each game, for exemple fe6 marcus stat hold up until chapter 13 or 15 included in hard mode which is, no matter the ending, the half way point (desert map is bad for all your cavs) and stay relevant a lot longer in normal mode, while fe9-Titania don't fall of stat wise especially backed up by axes but cav movement start to get overshadow slowly but progressively by flyer movement around chapter 15, while as you mentioned eyvel and sothe both fall of because of yet another two different reasons, because most games have a lot of unique things or new spin on existing things.
The oifey archetype seems mostly made up by people who might not even have played FE4 in the first place, nor the majority of the FEs, and just looked at some games playable characters's base lvl, growths, joining map and 20/20 stat without context and often biased against low growth and/or prepromote, just to arbitrarly put them in completly subjective box, this could be said for a lot of archetype.
I remember when FE first hit the States and before I even got into it, I read in Nintendo Power at the time that Titania was broken and the most OP FE character.
I wanna Invent a new Archetype called the "Eyvel" Archetype, where there's one unit who's around for the beginning of the game, leaves the party for a long time and the minute where said unit rejoins the party, the unit is already outclassed by a bunch of other units.
How many examples of this are there even? I don't think something can be rightly considered an archetype if there's only one or two instances of it
@@DaniDoyle Eyvel in FE5, Shinnon in FE9, and Lucia in FE10
gunter in conquest doesnt leave for quite as long, but he still isnt all that great in terms of direct combat
@@TheLegendaryFUSRODAH true dat
I feel like a lot of the fire emblem archetypes really started with the Awakening boom in the playerbase.
Because of that people's feeling about the Jaigen archetype is characterized by their first experience being Fredrick a unit that "does" fall off due to his growth rates. Which is probably part of the reason why the community thought to separate the archetypes into Jeigans and Oifeys. (This doesn't explain to me why Oifey is the poster unit for Jaigens that don't fall off, never understood that)
the archetypes discourse actually predates awakening by a long time
@@DaniDoyle I remember on GameFAQs, FESS, and FEP back in the day everyone talking about it, and even trying to make up new ones that were real stretches.
Seth actually has the 6th highest growth total in the game not the 2nd highest. L'Arachel has a total of 330, Ephraim has a total of 345, Eirika has a total of 350 and Tethys has a total of 355. Seth only has a growth total of 325 which puts him as the highest pre-promote unit in the game easily though.
Oh WOW, I wasn't expecting Age of Mytholy music today. THAT brings back memories, great tastes in music overall. Excellent analysis, love your analyses and work!
im glad someone recognized it! its peak music
Dani. I have to be completely honest with you. I was NOT expecting this one to be a for real video essay, but I’m glad it is.
You must remember a lot of these tropes were named back in the early 2000s (I'm sure the Japanese fandom pointed them out before that, but for the West). And people back then played the games very differently from now. Back then final strength of a character was the be-all end all, which is why common advice was "don't promote before 20" and "Don't use Jagens" or "Infantry is better than mounted because they have higher caps" and growths were valued over bases, the narrative surrounding Jagen was broken by units such as Oifey, Seth, etc. which is why the term was made for those ones. Of course these days it's funny to look back and laugh at people actively making the game harder and thinking it was the "right" way to play just because only the final chapter might be slightly easier, but that's how it was then.
All that said, I have noticed a bit of a reverse recently, with decent units being called trash because they aren't good in a low turn count run.
Jagen Smith: how can oifeys be real if our archetypes aren't real?
I think the jagen in fates conquest is Camila she just shows up 4 chapters after branch of fate
Hmm, I hadn't thought of that before... Interesting
This is def one of my favorite videos of yours so far!!! Loved it and learned a lot ❤
Great video! It is my duty as a berwick elitist that while Ward's growth total is low at 62%, it's actually far from the lowest with Izerna having the worst at 35% and a few others in-between. As you point out growths dont really matter in berwick anyway.
That's kind of hilarious, I haven't finished the game yet and as a result I haven't looked at everyone's growth rates but it's hilarious that he isn't even the lowest. But as we agree it doesn't matter haha
I gave it some thought, and considered a "Jagen" as a low-growth unit, as in the worst growths in the game. Meanwhile an "Oifey" is a high-growth unit, often with the highest growths in the game to offset their promoted class.
But then I realized that Oifey wouldn't fall into my definition of "Oifey", since their growths are still considerably lower than multiple units (I compared him to Fee, just as an example of someone who could have no holy blood). In comparison, Seth was only beaten by a few units (Eirika, Tethys, etc.) by only about 10-30 points, rather than upwards of 100 for Oifey. This doesn't count Myrrh, who's Myrrh.
Oifey is just cope by bad players who are ashamed of using their strongest units because they keep saying Jagens are bad
oh no, reading the fe wiki
I should't be surprised by FE wiki, but saying "these units" are Oifey it's so strange to me. Because the Oifey definition is too imprecise
Game context matter way more than having good growths.
For example:
Sothe being an oifey lmao, he doesn't get xp to benefits from good growths,
FE9 Titania: sure, she has good growths but her average str is significant lower to our expectation and she struggles to do damage with hand axe.
Frederick: Trying to train him later on lunatic is a pain because he doesn't get enough xp to redo the whole training arc again
Basically, wiki doesn't look to the game context, just growths
Yes, berwick 3-M footage. 3 path escort mission, loved the idea
I love how Ward is so great due to his base stats (including weapon level) and his "chain guard" skill. Endgame ready. And to balance him, he just don't participate in side quest, however, we must deploy him because he is too good to be benched.( I don't remember if he is forced deployed because I always use him)
The idea is simple:
Oifey archetype was created because people are afraid of using units who "steal xp"
I love the 10 mov Jagen because he can reach the fort, and set up the kills with iron sword. It was all calculated
Arran in FE12 is a strange case. I see him as a unit who can do multiple jobs with reclassing if your team is limited (draft). Even if it isn't a draft context, high move and good weapon ranks are still good to do some combat until you get your 12 units to your final team
What I like about Vander is he teachs you about break. Swordfighters will break him a lot, but his HP is high enough to tank a sword critical and a normal hit, so you can still use him as a bait
It's so funny the idea of "Jagen who fall of", but i think who trully fall off are Titania, Sothe and Frederick.
I think Vander is better long term compared to Titania and Sothe because I played a lot of drafts and Ike Vander is my favorite build for him. He is bad enoguh to be free, but engage tools make him usable the entire game
25:50 I'm pretty sure FE11/12 Dracoknights have 10 move, just like FE1/3. Unless Serenesforest and my memory are both just wrong. The only classes that got more move in FE11 were Hero and Swordmaster.
You might be thinking of the the enemy-only(well, enemy only in FE12) Wyvern class, which has 12 move in both FE3 and FE12.
Only early in to the video, but Jagen and Oifey isn't based on whether or not the unit is "Good", or how well they hold up, but how much they benefit from investment and exp. Oifey's typically have high growth rates, and as a result benefit strongly from experience, whereas Jagens have lower growth rates, and as a result giving them EXP is less beneficial. This has significant impacts on how you actually use the unit during play - which should be what defines an archetype in general.
The way a unit is utilised is what makes the distinction, not something arbitrary like stats, growths, or join time.
I would argue that Jagens aren't (or shouldn't be) utilized differently based on how well they hold up long term, as they all still function as an early game crutch character and should be used as such. Seth has a better long term than Orson or FE6 Marcus, but they all play relatively the same, doing the heavy lifting combat-wise in early chapters and typically taking boss kills. Seth's good growths/long-term aren't the reason you give him kills early on, but rather because he's the unit most capable of getting kills. In fact, its often unbeneficial to give Seth kills that weaker units could take as his experience gain is minuscule compared to Artur and Vanessa, and he makes due just fine on the kills he naturally gets through advancing towards map objectives. Conversely, FE6 Marcus actively does want kills to raise his Axe rank for ch4 Halberd Access (as kills double weapon experience in fe6) meaning he's a very good target for early investment despite his weaker long term performance.
@@DaniDoyle Again though, it isn't just about how well they hold up, its about how well they make use of EXP and other resources. A unit that makes good use of exp opportunities is one who you actively want to give kills too - particularly boss kill. With a Jagen you usually want them setting up kills for your units who see more experience benefits to take. This isn't really the case with an Oifey, and you will want a lot of experience actively going their way.
As Jagens and Oifey's are your best boss killers, this is a huge impact. Seth will basically sweep up every boss kill in FE8 as he is both the best candidate for the job, and still a very strong beneficiary of this experience, but with a Jagen, giving them the huge pools of EXP from boss kills will often leave you worse off in the long run, because they wont see the benefit from this.
The fact you refer to a Jagen as an "Early game crutch" is why I think the distinction is so important. Because whilst units like Vander or Jagen do function in that way, units like FE7 Marcus or Seth are so much more than that. To boil Seth down to an "Early game crutch", or to imply he functions similarly in a FE Playthrough to Vander or Jagen, feels like it just isn't reflective of how the units actually work.
The crux of my issue with just calling them all Jagens is that somebody like Jagen does not play similarly to somebody like Titania. What is the point of an archetype if not to group together units who play similarly to each other?
I think you're misunderstanding my comment, as I directly addressed your point of making use of resources like experience, providing an example of a unit who makes very good use of resources and investment who I doubt anyone would consider an oifey (FE6 Marcus), as well as pointing out how and why I don't think Seth is a good target for investment, despite his long term viability (as he still performs as your best without being targeted for investment). I really do not think that the units labeled as jagans and wifey's play differently from each other at all, both of them should usually be focused on accomplishing the objective of the map rather than self-improvement, and should be the units that you rely on for accomplishing those objectives. As such, FE9 Titania and FE11 Jagen play basically the same.
I do want to say however that the argument of not using Jagens for boss kills feels flawed, as you end up making the hardest part of the game (early game) harder on yourself on the theoretical promise of making an easier portion of the game (midgame) easier on yourself. Given that experience caps at 100, using a weaker unit to kill early game bosses gives at most 1 level (though often less than a full level), which in the grand scheme of things is rarely if ever impactful, given the binary nature of stat level ups, the fact that most games give you many competent pre-promotes in the midgame, and the fact your weaker units can gained plenty of experience fighting standard enemies and thus won't fall behind from missing early boss kills. It's notable that the games where who you give early boss kills to is the biggest choice are Conquest and 3 Houses, both games that lack a "true" jagen and have fewer lategame pre-promotea, and thus rely more heavily on building up early game units.
@@DaniDoyle
Unless I am missing something, I don't see how the Marcus example is relevant to him getting kills or exp. All he has to do is use axes, no - whether or not he is killing opponents is irrelevant, so the question of "Is he a good target for EXP sources" isn't affected by this?
"I really do not think that the units labeled as jagans and wifey's play differently from each other at all, " - I could not disagree more. You are telling me that using Vander in Engage or Jagen in FE11 feels like you are using a similar unit to Titania in FE9 or Seth in FE8? The latter two units bulldoze through the early game, and use that as a baseline to carry on their strong performances throughout the experience. The former two are not nearly as dominant early, nor do they see the same advantages from this investment I can honestly say I have never used Vander and thought "This really reminds me of using Seth". Hell, FE6 Marcus wasn't reminiscent of FE7 Marcus, to be honest.
"both of them should usually be focused on accomplishing the objective of the map rather than self-improvement, and should be the units that you rely on for accomplishing those objectives. " - This applies to every unit in Fire Emblem. They should all be focussed in helping you complete the objectives on the map, and in particular, being "a unit you rely on for accomplishing those objectives" can be any strong early game unit. Is Balthus a Jagen? How about Sigurd, or Kris? If we wanted a really extreme example, would this definition make Lena a Jagen?
"I do want to say however that the argument of not using Jagens for boss kills feels flawed, as you end up making the hardest part of the game (early game) harder on yourself on the theoretical promise of making an easier portion of the game (midgame) easier on yourself." - Not sure if I didn't make my point clear but the idea was that one of the biggest benefits of boss kills, the huge pools of exp, is wasted in one scenario where it isn't in another. The "Early game being the hardest" is also **highly** game dependent, and definitely isn't the case for many games in the franchise - I don't think anybody considers the early chapters of FE7 harder than BBD or Cog, as an example.
"It's notable that the games where who you give early boss kills to is the biggest choice are Conquest and 3 Houses, both games that lack a "true" jagen and have fewer lategame pre-promotea, and thus rely more heavily on building up early game units." I'm not sure I agree with this, but regardless, the reason this isn't a choice in a game like FE7, 8, or 9, is because the choice is incredibly obvious - you give it to the Oifey. They do it the easiest, and still see substantial benefit from it. I don't claim to be in tune with the meta's of these games to a high degree, but I don't think it's standard play to intentionally give Vander your boss kills in FE17? Wouldn't these usually go to a unit like Alear or Chloe?
Regarding Marcus: just because the primary benefit he gains from kills is weapon rank doesn't mean those kills don't count as investment. What would you define investment as if its not taking a limited resource (units to kill) away from others. It is also worth noting he does also want exp to a lesser extent as 1 point of speed lets him double ch7 wyverns. I'm actually curious what you define as investment, because you mentioned that the units you label Oifeys are such because they are good targets for investment and not because of their long term, but I'm not fully sure I understand what you mean by that. For example, I think Titania is a terrible target for investment when it comes to fe9 as the most competitive form of investment is BXP and she simply wastes it, whereas Oscar Kirean Marcia or Astrid can use it to surpass Titania's combat by around chapter 12-16 (depending on which unit you Target). Conversely, I don't see how Marcus getting kills isn't investment.
Regarding units playing the same, yes I do think that Jagen, Seth, Titania, Fredrick, Marcus (Both versions) etc feel very much the same to play with. With the exception of Gunter and Aaran, Jagens always feel like the unit I can most rely on to do important combats, have the highest survivability, and often the most mobility. In games with lower enemy quality, this makes them nearly idiot proof, while higher enemy quality games you need to be more careful, but this distinction carries over to all units. Franz is less likely to die from a careless placement than Alfred, Boyd is less likely to die from a mistake than Wade, etc, this isn't a result of the Jagens playing differently than the games overall playing differently.
Regarding Jagens being the units you use to most reliably accomplish map objectives, this kinda feels like you are strawmanning me. I am not claiming that any unit who contributes to the map is a jagen, but that the unit who is most capable of putting in the majority of the work for clearing early maps is the jagen, and that they all play similarly by being your primary means of accomplishing this objective, doing most of the heavy lifiting. Im this manner, they do not play meaningfully differently from each other, Jagen does the heavy lifting in fe11 early game, Eyvel does the heavy lifting in fe5 early game, Marcus does the heavy lifting in fe6 early game.
Regarding boss kills, I think the biggest benefit of killing the boss is the boss being dead, not the experience you get from doing so. As a result, I wouldn't call the experience "wasted" if it went to a short term unit, as long term units have plenty of opportunities to earn experience, and will likely end up around the same level long term regardless of getting early boss kills or not (given the diminishing returns from combat at higher levels)
Regarding Early vs late, while it is true that there are hard mid/endgame maps in most entries, I typically find mid/endgame to be easier due to the number of resources you have being much higher. You have many more strong units (both projects and pre-promote), and often some or all of legendary weapons, movement staffs, dancers, and skills/abilities that you did not have access to earlier.
I mean, i agree that feeding boss kills to Marcus Seth and Titania is an easy choice because they are best at it, but I don't think their long term performance is a factor in my choosing to kill with them, simply that they are best at doing it. This is the same reason Eyvel is the go-to boss killer when I'm playing FE5 early game or Sothe is the go-to in FE10 early game. The decision isn't "who benefits from this most" but "who is capable of doing this" and in all cases the answer tends to be the Jagen.
Yooo, that age of mythology music is so nostalgic for me, and I must say, I have enjoyed this video a lot. I'm subscribed now, cheers!
Aoifye is pronounced
Eefee
And is an irish name (iirc it's typically a woman's name)
This has almost nothing to do with this video.
Trans Oifey real?!?
I was watching this video at like 2am and "speaking of worst things in the series, FE7" made me guffaw incredibly fucking loudly. Thanks
Jagen is the only archetype I think is worth anything gameplay-wise. A pair of cavaliers, an edgy swordsman, or a plucky young mage are running themes but they dont mean anything.
Conveying to someone that a character is a level above your army at the start but is slowly overtaken is a worthwhile piece of information to convey. Saying "Lugh is a Merric" only tells you that Lugh is an earlygame mage
And even then it’s only because FE usually balances a unit to be the designated Jagen, vander wouldn’t fit the Jagen arc if his internal level didn’t mean he can’t grow. And Jagens that are exceptions to that still don’t grow very fast on paper. Seth still needs boss kills.
Minor fairly off topic comment about Maid/Butler in Fates: Maid and Butler are functionally extremely similiar to Master Ninja, and so they’re definitely not bad combat classes, with relatively minor changes to stats that can easily be fixed due to the ease of reaching thresholds in Fates with Pair Up, Tonics, Meals, weapon forging, Rallies etc. Neither will use their secondary weapon too much, though those with decent magic may get some niche use of Staves and Live to Serve to keep themself and another unit able to stay in combat in combat as Maids, while swords do little except some situational player phase combat on MN against Axes and Bows, which can also be done with the Dual Shuriken in BR and Rev by both classes.
As for skills, Maid has Res+2 and Tomebreaker to benefit itself, both of which are nice ways to patch up Maid’s worse Res compared to MN, with the advantage of Jakob and Felicia getting Tomebreaker around Ch13 because funny levelling mechanics, and Demoiselle/Gentilhomme and Live to Serve are actually very nice to have on a unit who is able to endure combat on the front lines. MN comparatively gets Locktouch (something very useful but not that necessary on a combat unit), Poison Strike (again, useful but not that necessary on a primary combat unit who wants to be taking kills for the exp rather than setting them up), Lethality (actively detrimental to guard gauge timing, and takes precedence over better skill activations like Sol when it does activate), and Shurikenfaire (fantastic to have, but obtained far later without Jakob or Felicia marrying a Ninja).
It is necessary to note that MN also gets a passive +5 boost to Avo, Crit, Hit and Dodge, but the crit bonus is also actively detrimental in a lot of enemy phase situations, so it’s not unreasonable to say that Maid is still on the same level as a combat class than Master Ninja, though of course Troubadour is infinitely worse than Ninja because staff lock
If you ask me, Quan is the Jegan of fe4 gen 1. He has better bases than most other units, he can set up kills for you weaker units, and he falls off partway through (around chapter 4, and then really bad partway through 5)
😭 chapter 5
The first Orson is Quan, not Eyvel.
I've always considered Jagan and Oifey as different but not for the reasons that fandom normally does. I've always considered a Jagan to be a pre-promote that joins early near the start where as Oifey is generally the first pre-promote around the start of the mid-game. Jagan(obviously) and Seth being good examples of Jagan, but Isadora and Libra being considered as Oifeys(Though these are 2 examples aren't meant in terms of their usability because god do most of us know how, at best, mid Isadora can be. Just references for a pre-promote's join point).
At that point, the term "oifey" encompasses too many units to actually be useful shorthand for anything though.
Can’t wait for the video on the Gordin Archetypes
the Wyverns that have 12 movement in fe12 are flying dragon enemies, not the playable class. Those ones only have 10 movement
Oops!
The Jagen for Gaiden and SoV is the Levin Sword, makes any Myrm do safe set damage, letting weaker units take the kill sometimes like a Jagen does (mostly a meme but it does help a lot)
I have said this exact thing before that I don't believe Jagens and Oifeys are separate archetypes and I am glad someone made an over one hour video justifying my opinion on that
Weird footnote:
I never really fell into the whole "Never use Jagen units cuz they steal exp" shtick even when I played my first FE game (Path of Radiance through emulation) because... well... let's just say that the Jagen character in Path of Radiance is 'of my type'.
Fandom? They can't be trusted on much of anything with that many ads.
this isn't related to this video's point but the Tower of Guidance doesn't actually give mounted units the -2 movement penalty. Titania still isn't very good in the tower because of her class's speed cap.
oh gotcah, you can see how often ive brought paladins into the tower haha
Was gonna comment this. I'll also note Titania is still decent for the Tower because she can use Hammers for the abundant Generals in 4-E-1 and Wyrmslayers for the dragons in 4-E-3 while still being fast enough to double those enemies, far from ideal but she can contribute if you're lacking in better trained units, especially if you do a no Laguz Royals run.
on the part where you ask if you should talk about rom hack jeigans, yes, that would be interesting to see
I probably bought into the Oifey thing way back when I was a little moron on Serenes Forest but I had already long since given up on it before even this video.
Clearly a lot of them play differently and have different levels of power and "falling off" but it's too nuanced to just stick them in two buckets named after units that don't really fit in those buckets to begin with.
Probably the one through-line between younger me and current me on this topic is that I genuinely dislike the stupidly broken "wreck the whole game" ones in the Seth mold as being bad game design.
I love how the phrase "Oifey Jagen" sounds straight out of Finnegans Wake
1:07:37 it's more about how Engage's weapon rank works. Since weapon ranks are set to the class. Giving Vander a Silver Axe kinda also means giving it to Boucheron or maybe axe second seals way too early on since I think the first silver axe comes with Bunet in his join chapter.
With Hilda's Relic, Felix's relic defiant strength, defiant defence, hit +20, Axe proficiency +5, vantage and a great knight. You can fix most of balthus' problems. Balthus has dumb growths in defense and strength. Fed him a couple Def boosters, an he legit kills everything in one hit, can hit reliably and can't be hurt by anything but magic once he loses half health
Put a comment again as i finally watched near the end of your video. I read comment somewhere silver snow edelgard was the jagen of 3h. She fell off so hard in the mid game.
I subs for your video essay. I have watched couple of your essay. Really enjoy it.
I like Gunter in Conquest a lot as a Jagen, because it feels like he gets the full Jagen experience twice over. He's pretty classic Jagen for the pre-route split chapters he's there for, and when he comes back in Conquest he has surprisingly good Str, Skl, and Def, horrible growths, and like Jagen he can temporarily shine in combat from very high weapon ranks. Like really, he can use a Beastkiller out the box and his base stats are absolutely perfect for Ch19's Kitsune even in Lunatic. It's also 4 chapters after he rejoins, so you don't really expect him to suddenly wow you like that in actual combat instead of just being on the bench or a stat backpack.
I was losing my mind in the first 20s of the video trying to figure out what the hell that music was and at 0:24 my brain immediately went "Proseche" (or whatever they say =p)
Based
I'll be upfront in saying as of 10/7/23 (date of posting) I have not played through FE4.
But, from everything I've heard and know of FE4, Oifey is just a Jeigan. He's just the Jeigan of Generation 2. As was mentioned in the video, Oifey is pretty good, but compared to the paired child units, he fails to keep up in comparison to the likes of Seliph in the long term. He has better growths than the average Jeigan throughout the series, but even comparing him to just Seliph, his only stand out feature is him getting HP every level, and Seliph can do that better, getting 2 hp 40% of the time. Oifey doesnt exist as an archtype. Oifey is just the Jeigan for the 2nd part of my 2 part Fire Emblem game.
My definition of a Jagen had always been about their relationship to "soaking up" experience points. It's not so much about whether they fall off or not, but the idea was that if you lean exclusively on your Jagen, you won't end up with a trained army. Even Jagens that don't "fall off" still present the unique pitfall of hindering your other unit's growth.
and about the video: for what it's worth, when I did an all substitute run of fe4 Oifey was able to keep up a bit better. still kinda gets outclassed by the child units you're guaranteed to get though.
Marcus from fe6/7 never falls off in any mod other than him, but even there, he's really good for really long time
I think Sothe actually goes kinda hard. You think of Jagens as not gaining that much exp, but he gets a flat amount of experience that no one else has access to thanks to the steal skill, and he transitions into a more supporting role as a thief instead of as a carry. There was an old patch of FE7x where Eagler got a flat 10exp for using Sacrifice, now there was an awesome Jagen.
It's worth noting that some jagens are in a more supporting role and some jagens are interested in curbstomping the game. I like Oifaye, one of my favorite characters, but he's not Seth or Titania or Frederick by a longshot.
I would recommend against giving Arran any statboosters or growth orbs. Or anything that might cause you to grow attached to him.
What do you think about Zeig from TRS? He's got insane growths, great abilities, and nutto stats, but he definitely has a fall off point, a little bit of Kaga Trolling.
I Disagree about sothe, because there's really not any thief utility after part one, and even if you get his experience high by abusing steal, his weapon type in class caps hold him back so much more than his limited experience
@@DaniDoyle I think you underestimate just how giddy I am to yoink a Steel Lance at any point in the game
True! tellius theifs are fun (even though they're bad :()
One hour video about Oifey? Better grab my popcorn!
Make sure Arvis heats it enough
...too soon???
If I were to try to distinguish between the archetypes, I'd say a Jagen relies on the early level advantage to stay good, while an Oifey does not.
In FE7, base Marcus is about as good as a Kent that promotes around level 15 or so. This makes him an Oifey.
If Engage, base Vander (internal level 15) is about as good as an unpromoted level 8 Alfred. This makes him a Jagen.
The raw growth rates are misleading because even with good growth rates, early game pre-promotes gain stats very slowly since they're only getting 3ish exp per engagement.
The massive level advantage eventually wears off, and your pre-promote starts gaining stats like a normal unit. Even if growth rates are below average, it's typically enough to be fine at this point. But this is the point in time where you can tell if an early pre-promote is approaching retirement or not.
But all Jagens have a level/stat advantage over unpromoted units, so what is the distinction
@@DaniDoyle The level advantage diminishes over time. The distinction is how good the character is once the level advantage wears off. Here's Marcus in FE6 and 7, and a freshly promoted level 15 Paladin of similar stat strength, and the level they promoted at to get those stats. Rounded for clarity.
HP S/M Skl Spd Lck Def Res
Marcus(FE7) 31 15 15 11 8 10 8
Kent (15) 34 13 14 15 13 10 6
Marcus (FE6) 32 9 14 11 10 9 8
Lance (10) 30 11 12 15 7 7 11
In FE7, Base Marcus is roughly as good as a that just promoted at level 15. In FE6, Marcus is clearly worse than a Lance that just promoted at level 10.
FE7 Marcus also has the advantage of crazy good weapon levels A, A, B, allowing him to be better than his stats may suggest. In FE6, Marcus has D, A, E, which is much less remarkable.
While the initial shared definition stated that Oifeys have lower bases than Jagen's, I assert the opposite.
Oifey's have tended to also have better growth rates than Jagens. But Engage introduced our big exception. Vander's growth rates are not horrible. But his stats compared to other internal level 15 Paladins are. And when playing the game, he clearly feels much more like Marcus from FE6 than Marcus from FE7.
Oifey's are just Jagen's that were made too powerful for their flaw to manifest properly.
Whether to call that a real or fake archetype, a simple matter of opinion. I think I found a way to somewhat objectively classify them based on which archetype the community decides to toss them in. People can decide for themselves whether that warrants a separate category or not.
Personally my favourite Orson archetype is Silver Snow Hubert.
A one hour video essay manifesting on my recommended for a series I don't even play like a phantom in the night. I fucking love UA-cam
lmao thats hilarious. the agorithm is usually very good but sometimes it fucks up like no ones business
@@DaniDoyleWatched the vid, loved it. God is good
@@DaniDoyle If you say "don't reccomend this channel" on a lot of recommended videos you start getting things like videos of people counting to 10,000. Honestly I think the algorithm is pretty bad lmao
I like your choice of musik ... aom hits every time
Audio Balance is kinda off here making it hard to fully hear the discussion. Music is really loud compared to how soft and quiet your voice is
Titania is generally considered the best unit in FE10 behind the Wyverns, ahead of Ike.
She is so close to her promotion level that she can get exp funneled into her for Third Tier Unit combat extremely early compared to everyone else, and she never really gets caught up to by most of the cast at all.
I’d argue Fredrick is also an example of a jagen who falls off; his class & skill selection is mediocre and in a game with crazy high growths it takes very little time to supplant him as strongest overall unit. With his abysmal exp gain he really doesn’t keep up at all without depromoting him to wyvern to let him use his good bases and get levels consistently. Awakenings enemy’s scale pretty strongly too even on the standard hard difficulty meaning unlike say Marcus fighting his first prepromoted enemy and getting a fair challenge that levels him up, Fredrick get violated and puts up zero resistance. Realistically his potential as a unit is not actually that achievable in a normal play through and doesn’t offset this like Donny does who starts ass but becomes a mid-late game monster, and is a fantastic father due to passing down Pegasus knight to daughters as well as making anyone have a positive luck cap, most likely enduring armsthrift lets them use forged glass weapons like common weapons.
Wyvern and Paldin lines are Great classes though, what class line would you think he prefers?
Paladin is pretty middling in awakening, generally out done by most other mounted options due to better weapons skills or flying to help slower units more reliably. And inheritance plays a factor with many gen 1 units (ricken being a great example as he’s got chroms meh options with no skills you’d want outside bowbreaker, meaning libra with much better classes and skills preforms better as a father and overall) wyvern while great, by the time it’s available in the plegia maps that’s a lot of time for anyone else to catch up. It’s less wyvern isn’t good enough and more “why not just use sully, who has THE SAME options, most assuredly better stats, a kid as a big motivator to invest in, and discipline to offset the one advantage you might give Fredrick”. And this is ignoring the real argument of giving the first seal to Donny who infamously is a mid game behemoth that offsets how shit he starts out as with effectively infinite forged glass weapons and mid 20’s stats across the board when 17 is considered high for a stat, AND passes down Pegasus knight.
Fredrick is just realistically a unit you baby to be viable still. It’s not like Titania where level ups determine how useful she is at endgame from ok enough to really great, Frederick simply needs Donny’s level of investment but isn’t half as good as that investment becomes. Especially considering how great other prepromotes are like Anna and say’ri who are real investments because they just get normal exp and don’t get fucked up by generic heroes.
I mean Frederick is usually going to have better stats than Sully (or insert unit here) for quite a while, unless you just choose not to let him see combat. At minimum he gains eight experience per kill, and his bases are so far ahead that if he's fed as much as she is he'll still have a stat lead for quite some time, especially considering that his growths are quite good. You'd be surprised at how well Frederick keeps up if you just let him get experience in the early game, it's kind of absurd how long he maintains his lead. He definitely doesn't have a lead in endgame but for at least half of the game he's still a phenomenal and even after he stops being phenomenal he's still usable
@@DaniDoylehis bases are a lot worse than you really remember. You have to remember EVERYONE is a growth unit in awakening. By ch4 with decent investment robin legitimately will be on par with him. He only has 2 more points of speed than chrom and 8 more hp. And sully has generally the same stats as chrom, and every 3 kills she’s getting 3-6 stats. Fredrick every THIRTY excluding bosses gets 3-5, with one of them likely being two points to hp. Units grow REALLY fast in awakening and Fredrick has it harsher than sothe when it comes to not having the exp to properly keep up even with growths that seem good on paper. He’s by all means usable, but he’s kinda just memed in how good he is. Fredrick beats everything is a fun joke, but as someone who’s beaten true apotheosis with no losses I’m pretty confident in saying outside of being an absolute necessity in lunatic and lunatic+ he is probably the unit I’ve had the most trouble getting long term value in.
Mine would be story based. They both keep the same gameplay type (early promoted unit with higher bases). However, their story role would be slightly different. I’d view Jeigans as much more veteran knights; like ones pushing retirement age. While Oifey’s are more “traditionally aged” knights but obviously quite a bit older than the Lord. Basically Jeigan’s are usually in the “old enough to be my parent” age while “Oifey” is “definitely older than the Lord, but not so old that they’d be parents”. Basically, if the Lord and the veteran knight are both of the gender the other attracts, how off putting would the romance be? 😂. And I guess since this includes Sothe, this can also refer to the “appearance” in age 😂. Meaning Jeigan’s should treat the Lord like their child, while the Oifey treats the lord like a younger sibling.
I never would have considered Sothe a Jagan, then again I also view Jagan as having a certain story archetype as well (Typically being either a retainer to the MC, or a captain of the knights that is tasked with protecting the MC but being a type of knight as a result was a requirement for me). That being said my real issue with Soothe wasn't so much that he fell of perse, it was more so that whisper absolutely crippled him and Heather. So many units they would proc the whisper skill leave it at 1 hp then immediately proc it again not killing said unit. It would go to enemy phase and that would be 4 procs of it in a row no kills, or they would die from the fact they were allergic to killing.
That being said I've always considered Jagan's role to be the mega training unit. Take off weapons so they draw aggro, have them specifically finish off problematic units, or deal with side objectives. I don't typically feed them levels until other units start hitting level 10. Then just depends on if I'm vibing with them that game if keep them in the party or not (Or a lot of units just got cursed instead of blessed with stats.
I’ve already hated the “Oifey archetype” if only because it’s named after Oifey. He’s literally not even that good in gen 2 relative to everyone else. Meanwhile this is the same video game as fucking Sigurd who fits the definition more than literally any other unit.
Titania falling off in RD? Maybe I just got lucky with RNG because on my most recent playthru she's maxing several stats and is still one of my most destructive fighters, right up there with Gatrie and Haar.
Without a speed wint or a very lucky speed proc, her combat gets pretty bad pretty quickly.
On the topic of Fates debated Jagens
Gunter is funny cuz he doesn't even have good personal bases. 0 str and 0 def base before class lol, which, mind you, is worse than that of the resident refresher Azura (at 2 personal str and def). So he's pretty much relying on just his status as a promoted unit with bases from promoted classes to put in any work. It is far easier to never use his combat and just use him as a support unit since he has Shelter and Forceful Partner. In which case he never really falls off, that support is just consistent throughout the game.
And Jakob/Felicia... Bad growths can be a reason to classify them as Jagens, but it's ehhh half-true. They actually have personal growth rate totals on par with some of the other regular units. They even have higher growth rate totals than Arthur, a unit that I'd say has great growths. The difference between them however is how those growths are distributed. Jakob's highest personal growths for example is HP (55%, decidedly above average) and then Lck (45%, only slightly above average) but then he has disappointing Str (30%) and Spd (35%) growths. Acceptable growths but also at the same time not good growths lol.
This but with Cains and Abels for some reason excluding Kaze and Saizo and Clanne and Framme
music is to loud