Fire Emblem Heroes Wiki talk:Build Center/Boey: Skillful Survivor

Hi, I appreciate you taking note and sparking discussion on my build. I left out some information as I wanted to keep my notes somewhat 'succinct' and remain objective about the capabilities of this build. But in particular, Reinhardt is effectively shutdown with this build (neutral Reinhardt hits for a total of 7x2 damage, and Boey naturally doubles him for 32x2 damage plus the 17damage from bonfire.) This is actually quite fun, as well as funny, in the upper tiers (15-18) where Reinhardt +6-10 is extremely common, but also the quickest unit to erase from your opponent due to the 3 move which guarantees you'll be within his range on the first turn (give or take a draw back/reposition). I've never lost a reinhardt matchup in the 706-710 point range to date.

I was *very* particular about this build, down to the seal, so let me break down other caveats of it's performance for my play-style. Specifically 1) a tank who (key point) confidently does not initiate 2) survives, if not wins, as many rounds as possible against blues, 3) serve as a soft counter to all greens 4) and survive as many match-ups globally (that are non-red). I'll contrast my analysis using the same nature, and skills, swapping in only Gronnowl (if you'd like to compare a different build i'm open to that too)

Stepping back from that single blue, and putting ALL blues (32 units) into scope: He wins the round against the 9 mages + F!Corrin with Gronnraven; while he can't secure the F!Corrin KO with the Gronnowl. But Gronnowl vs Gronnraven for blue-on-blue coverage is moot, as you've stated, but for my point #2, that additional win makes Gronnraven the winner here.

Breaking down green coverage, it's very close again. Gronnraven: 7 wins, 2 losses, 18 baits; Gronnowl: 6 wins, 3 losses, 18 baits. But that single victory is very important as it's Julia-- a very heavy meta presence. With Owl he can't win that matchup.

Things start to diverge when you pit him against the Colorless roster (16 units). Gronnraven: 15 wins, 0 losses, 1-bait; Gronnowl: 11wins, 1 Losses, 4 baits. He's completely unscathed against 7/9 of the Archers (10/16 overall) and never drops below 30HP by any other colorless unit-- Check and bait! :)

So in terms of overall performance as a wall/tank, Gronnraven is superior. The perceived potential of Gronnowl is not lost on me though, the risk just doesn't outweigh the reward (In Arena, more so than Story). You cannot slack on AI-manipulation in the upper tier for pursuit of t-formation, especially if you want to go flawless for the season. If you can't reliably shutdown the enemy's sweeper, pick off the dancer, or isolate a wombo-combo, then you're jeopardizing a run, and those specific maneuvers become second priority when your leverage depends on Owl buffs for advantage. To reiterate: -Owl is good, but there are other priorities as you scale in Arena.

Finally, since the banes on his other relevant stats are -4, I think this is the best nature and consequently the best build for it.

Let me know what you think!

--Reply time: First of all, I agree with the rest of your build as being a good build. TA3 on anyone as Tanky as Boey is a good call, G Tomebreaker makes it so he can combat the other green mages who normally nuke him, and so on. The bane/boon makes sense, as well.

He does better against Julia with Gronnowl than he does with Gronnraven, though. Gronnraven has a single point more MT is all, which is made up if you're standing next to a single other unit on your team. Considering you yourself said the goal is to get attacked first then follow up next round, it's easy to position at least one other unit of your team next to Boey if he's your bait. According to my calculations, enemy initiate into you following up against a neutral Julia survives Gronnraven+ G-Tomebreaker Boey with 1 HP, while Gronnowl+ Boey with one nearby ally defeats her with 14 HP left (if he's got neutral IV's. He'd actually do slightly worse against her with your preferred IVs). Something else to consider is Gronnowl is necessary for him to compete against Julia if she also has G-Tomebreaker. Positioning-willing, having two allies nearby gets you into double territory against her without the breaker, so if you're going to cancel each other's B's out, it's necessary for the win.

It's not realistic to think you can simply never engage and only defend, so I think it's important to see if you'd win on the counter-attack on your turn.

All Raven gets you is wins against colorless opponents. That's useful-ish, and it's usefulness goes down at higher arena play. Unless you're running into Quad Setsuna, +Atk Klein, or Kagero on the regular (which I rarely encounter anymore now that I'm consistently fighting T16-18 on advanced), Gronnowl is just a superior tome. Remember, a *single nearby ally* is the equivalent of Fury 2 without the bleed.

Another thing to think about is Blárblade+ users, as opposed to Reinhardt. The TA3 will help you significantly against Reinhardt, but any of the common Blárblade+ LND3 users you run into arena-wise, with a single compliment of quad-buffing from Eirika or Ephraim, defeats Boey with Gronnraven+ and TA3. Hell, they defeat him with Gronnowl+ too UNLESS! You get two nearby allies. Then you win all those matchups. Ursula/Olwen with horse buffs still beats you. UNLESS! You get *3* people next to you when you bait. Then you still win *those* matchups.

Important to note, you win most of those based purely off the enemy charging into you. It's important because if you bait and don't finish off the stuff you really should finish off, you risk having a flying circus pop into your face because of Wings of Mercy.

Maybe I am so biased toward Owl because I think it's really easy to build a team around because at the highest arena levels, you need proper bait. It's just better for that against the common matchups you encounter.

---Srsfacei8c (talk) 10:54PM PDT, 5/25/2017

--

A lot of good & practical points here^. Quick side-note regarding Julia: I do state that '...Threaten Res WITH ATK plus 1 seal is mandatory to pick up the Julia (kill)...' in the description.

The viability and power of Gronnowl is apparent, and depending on play-style, either build can be the 'right' choice. I tried not to get too deep into specific/arbitrary match-ups (ie. Julia) but its a relevant point when outfitting someone with Gbreaker. In a scenario where she's equipped with Gbreaker, you're correct, he's no longer the (soft) 'check' but still good 'bait' if need be. (In reality you're sending a red/brave/desperation/DC unit to take care of her at this tier, so its moot?).

Again, trying not to go down a rabbit-hole for arbitrary/situational match-ups (and it's getting late), but those colorless units, excluding kagero, need 50 atk to begin dealing damage to this Boey-- a very high entry threshold with a brave weapon. +ATK Klein only reaches 47 with Deathblow.

The rest really comes down to play-style. The AI is pretty rote with it's actions so splitting a buffer from the sweeper or forcing the dancer to send them out of reach is a tactic that should be mentioned in the same respect. Getting rushed by buffed Horse Emblem on the other hand is a difficult matchup regardless of your team.

I definitely like that you brought attention to WoM as it can definitely become a burden to tanks that don't ORKO.

Overall I'm glad there's another Boey user out there with strong conviction to his theorycraft.

-- I also use Boey with Breath of Life 3 and the Breath of Life 1 build. It has worked well for me for a long time. As Butterbeancd's description says, Breath of Life 3 and the Breath of Life 1 seal stack for a combined 10HP restored on everybody crowded around him (which as also increases his bonuses on every stat through his weapon). If you have all three of your allies around him and also are in range to attack someone else, you can do 10HP restoration on 3 allies and your Atk/Spd/Def/Res is all +6, obviously that can very rarely happens, but the point is he is often in a good position to attack and defend when he is arranged to restore with this build. When you are not in the position to restore by attacking you can instead donate with Ardent Sacrifice and know that it will be only 1 turn at the most before you get that 10HP back. He attack. He defend. But most importantly he brown, tsundere friend. I am proposing a name change, because I think the power of the Brown Crown That Won't Go Down is vastly underestimated and the people need to know. ---Raster_museman (talk) 6:08 EST, 9/5/2017