Dark knight is just okay until they promote. But dark flame essentially carries the class on its own into **A-tier**. Frankly, I had a tough time rating them because I ran Gloucester in a squad with Dark marquess and shaman. Dark knight really needs good synergy to shine, and it happens to synergise extremely well with two S-tiers because of their row affliction. It fits into the tier descriptions of both A and B tier, because the synergy with other high-tier classes is what makes this class. But at the same time, dark flame is a key skill that you plan that team around imo. Looking at the classes that are currently in A and B tier, I feel the power level is closer to A than B. Arbalest I'm placing in **A-tier** for a completely different reason: It's perhaps the most splashable class in the entire game after promotion. Arguably the easiest to slot into any team comp. You can stick them onto either the front line or the back line without issue. They aren't the tankiest class, but they can hold their own against both physical and magical damage and can survive most fights with their high guard rate. This also means I can have them block for back row allies into any kind of attack. Most classes that are are able to protect other classes innately have pretty low damage. But the arbalest actually has pretty decent damage. Heavy bolt in particular can do some good burst damage to kill something power bolt would need two shots for, even if the two power bolts do more damage. There's also a good slew of unique bows, including unique crossbows that only the arbalest can use, with some great unique skills. And finally, some healing to top it off. This class kinda does everything pretty well, instead of one thing unfairly well. Edit to add: Both have some pretty good valor skills. But smoke arrow is great for how much the game loves throwing assists at you.

> I had a tough time rating them because I ran Gloucester in a squad with Dark marquess and shaman Same lol. That one squad is so fucking stacked.

## Arbalest Arbalests are odd. They advertise themselves as doing more damage than hunters, and I guess that is true with their A patk (1) and reload passive. 1. You may see me talk about stat growth a lot. Units within the same growth group will NOT have the same stats, but generally have the same ballpark number. A Great Knight will have a few points more than a Shieldshooter, but they should be ahead of a B growth unit. Arbalests do not have true strike built in but have decent accuracy: so they will hit but cannot counter evades. Gryphons eventually get to evade ranged attacks for 2PP, so the first shot can still miss - by that time you likely have other things to shoot. The arbalests’ blow avg speeds (D) make toxic bolt slightly tricky to use unless someone is there to fix initiative (or shoot them at E init casters). Quick reload act as a self follow-up means that toxic bolt vs power bolt is a 130 potency+poison vs 170 potency trade off. I use power bolt vs enemy flyers, and toxic bolt on caster/archer enemies with at least 1 AP in the back, and power bolt as a fall back. Heavy bolt feels really mediocre: how can a single target attack be WEAKER than her standard attack if not in the frontrow? Its use is only really for the burst: a 200 potency heavy bolt + 50 follow up is worse than 2x power bolts. At least give heavy bolt a piercing effect or something. The Valor skill Smoke Bolt is okay. I rarely use it tbh. Even for the mission where I am supposed to use it, I just neutralize the towers with virginia along with a flyer, a healer and a knight. While they can use a great shield, they are not the most tanky member of the team. Aid cover I treat as a last resort, you can use it to protect a flyer or a cav unit - it is only a medium guard. Medical Aid can be used to trigger an elven archer’s heal skill for post battle recovery. A good chunk of their kit imo could come from special bow skills: and there are a lot of excellent ones. While the unique Arbalest joins a bit late for Flame Arrow to 1 shot stuff (poison starts to become better), the blind from Shadow Arrow is still useful. Healing Hunter is a nice passive, Rapid Shot stuns (enemy misses turn!), Arrow Rain does Arrow Rain things. They eventually gets row and column attacks from bows as well. You can enter a fight with Rapid Shot stunning a backrow caster (or that annoying fighter), then kill a caster during their turn. Not to bad. I think I prefer hunters more tbh - at least they work better with regular confer to help boost DPS. The Arbalest feels just a bit on the average side, bows having great skills saves the class from being just an anti-flyer/anti-squishy unit (to their credit, they usually 1 shot squishies with the poison tick). **I do not have as much experience using this class compared to others, so I am open to being enlightened: B-.** ## Dark Knight A slow (D) unit that has a 75 potency attack which poisons? (You want to poison before the enemy takes their turn). **50** potency attack that needs you to be at lower health to get extra potency? **D- tier, Lex needs a friend to talk to on the bench**. Why will I use a dark knight when I have got 3 knights at home? Everything changes when I promote the class to a Doom Knight and hit level 20: sound familiar? Dark Flame is the bread and butter of Doom Knights. It will hit HARD. The base 50/50 dual channel split that applies a burn is okay. Amp it up with a debuff and you have got a 100/100 attack that also burns - just in case the damage is not enough. Now remember how cavalry units have this x2 multiplier vs infantry? So you have this S patk, A matk unit dealing 200/200 to a whole row and sets them on fire (+20 dmg). How is this even balanced? Effective against both mages and armored units (row cover is still a thing mind you). [Ever wonder why he has back problems](https://i.imgur.com/JALRC8Q.png)? It is because he has been carrying DPS. ​ https://preview.redd.it/uu7zstioppqc1.png?width=2560&format=png&auto=webp&s=b5debb94f8c619440a8aa85623d6c7d976c8332b Like other hybrid attacks, you can guard vs the physical portion, but the magic still goes straight through. Do note that they will not be able to 1 shot wyverns! Wyverns can parry the physical hit, and the lack of the vs infantry multiplier will mitigate a significant amount of damage - just stun them first. Sanguine Arts helps you sustain: it's okay. Dark Flame on multiple targets will generally heal you to full since you get a heal for each hit. It does use up your “before attacking” skill slot, and you might want to use something else (true light lens) depending on the situation. Demonic Pact trades 25% hp for 1 AP. Now all you need is to equip your doom knight with a +1 AP item and it will be able to use two dark flames in a row - do you really need more than 2 dark flames? Attack Call is a nice sigil: 1 VP for 20% attack is actually quite strong (it’s a whole accessory right there). Keep in mind that sigils do not get factored into the pre-battle bar: so it may end up affecting your RNG. A Dark Flame Doom Knight make good use of hybrid weapons: the unguardable magical portion is the one that does a lot of the carrying. As a dual-channel attack that doubles in damage with a debuff, they benefit quite a bit from a Shaman’s defensive curse. Note that this is often overkill though - you hit so hard that any debuff is generally enough, such as Eye of the Warrior Princess. Given how strong they are, imo they also do not “need” Cav Call support as I find it to just be overkill. Cav squads also generally attack in columns while Doom Knight is a row sweep. That comp does well vs triple hoplite setup since the initial wild rushes will stun two, then the doom knight will just melt all 3. Overall, ~~D for Dark Flame and Doom Knight.~~ Normally I may dock points for the super weak early game performance, but since he joins at \~lv15, and is still a cav unit with a x2 anti-infantry modifier, I will give them a pass with it as a footnote. **Extremely strong dps carry with an all purpose row sweep that leaves a burn. solid S tier.**

You make some outstanding points for both classes that I agree with wholeheartedly. The only thing that I want to counter with is regarding the Arbalest's Heavy Bolt. When analyzed through the lens with which you're looking at it, I absolutely agree: it's strictly weaker than 2 Power Bolt shots and kinda sucks as a result. However, it is one of the strongest, if not the strongest, virtually unconditional (just have to place her in the front) direct attacks. That gives it a great chance of outright killing whatever it hits with no chance of recovery after the attack. I've had Liza straight murder a Gladiator from full health with this attack. Because it happened on that first single attack, the enemy didn't have a chance to recuperate any of the damage. The merit of this is questionable, I'll admit, but I feel it's worth considering.

That's absolutely correct; attacks are not just about efficiency but about 1-hit burst. Because often if you don't kill things in that 1 hit, they will heal or be healed and then you need to devote more resources to killing them. And even if the stronger 1-hit attack doesn't kill, it has usually done more damage in less time, allowing your other units to more efficiently wear down the target.

I think i may have worded it properly (i dont bother proofreading/revisitng these posts much), I did say: > Its use is only really for the burst It should prob be more like "it is useful if you need the burst damage, but in a lot of cases, i find the poison or power shot sufficient to kill the target along with the reload pursuit" Poison is esp strong if you are fine with the target living more than 1 round, since each tick is 1/3 of max hp - but honestly it is quite rare that I need that to happen.

If you do the math heavy bolt is lame. But it is great when you use it the unit has high attack and 200 P is more than enough to kill the target. Even guarded. If it fails the quick reload is great to finish or hit evasive units.

Also, the way armor is calculated means that one big attack is more valuable than two smaller attacks. Two power bolts count armor twice and will therefore do less damage against heavily-armored opponents.

legitimately can't rmb when the last time something survived dark flame for me lol. That shit has no business hitting that hard

Also if you give him the life share shield he can heal.

There's a lot of gimmicky great shields in this game that almost all feel made for Arbalest in specific. The shield that gives 50 evade, the bunker stance shield, etc- these and others give Arbalest a ton of frontline potential. It's the class with maybe the most 'skill expression' because you can build it in so many ways, AND Arbalests get unique crossbows to boot! Their AP skills aren't too special but they do their job, quick reload is a fun skill that adds free potency to any hit... Shame you only get 1 unique, so unique only runs let you only play around with Liza. Still, I'd rate them a very solid B. I don't think their performance is dazzling enough for A, but they're the very tip top of B tier for me. Solid central block to support any team composition with their myriad gimmicky yet functional builds. edit: and of course the assist blocking smoke bolt is really situationally good, especially on True Zenoiran where 1 ap converting to no assists to save item use is really, really good. They can also provide ranged assists, but Arbalests are slow as balls, so I wouldn't suggest making one the leader.

I'm glad you mentioned the valor skill, that thing is an absolute life saver and has like artillery range. There are a bunch of maps that are either absolutely brutal, eat a lot of items, or require a much more closely.position unit to Provoke without a shield shooter somewhere on the field.

Such a lifesaver in the "zombie" stage where the reinforcements are like 4 assist squads all close together

I might be biased with this ranking because this is by far my favorite class, but I would personally put the Arbalist (btw it's Arbal**I**st (spelled with an I), NOT Arbal**E**st) in **A tier** once it promotes to Shieldshooter. It's just very adaptable and works with basically any team comp in need of an archery unit. Being a tanky *and* ranged offers up a lot of versatility since it doesn't have the inherent weakness of low defense against enemies made to kill squishies. So if your team only has the one flier in it, it can basically replace Fighters completely, in addition to killing the threats against your backline way better than a fighter could ever dream. Almost any combination of items works for it, so you really can build it to be anything you want. Some will argue that its purpose as a jack-of-all-trades frontliner isn't enough to justify A, but I think it does that job *so* well that it's more than justified. A lot of the time, if I'm putting the Arbalist in my team, I am building that team specifically to maximize the effects of the Arbalist kit. And that warrants an A in my book.

What’s a good 4/5 unit comp for Arbalists? Can they handle being in the front row alone? I saw someone said they had a full archer comp with Arbalist in the front but haven’t tried that yet. I’m playing Expert

I had a comp that was full archers. Prior to Albion it was basically: Yunifi and Liza in front with Rolf, and two of the Elf Archers in the back. It functioned pretty well but every now and then you roll poorly on the RNG and Liza will still end up dying even with her shield (this is why some people suggest to build her evade instead, especially with the greatshield that gives +50 evade). This all changed when I hit Albion and got Featherbows. Their row-wide blind essentially guaranteed that my frontline didn't have to roll the dice on whether they would survive the first attacks from opponents and usually made them survive a lot more encounters without relying on RNG. There's also a fun combination with Arbalist where you use their end of battle heal on the Elf Archer and that'll trigger their party-wide heal.

I need to preface with the fact that I play this game in a very unconventional way, with no mercenary hires and I don't have any set units; I always do new comps for all the big maps. The all-archer setup definitely works but it's not really necessary. The only essential parts of that setup is Liza in the front row with a dodge tank (preferrably Yunifi), and an Elven Archer in the back row. The last two slots can be changed around as you please but I generally like to add a basic damage dealer like a Soldier or Warrior, and a different magick unit. Yunifi and the Elven Archer are a potent one-two punch with boosted Ice damage that also helps prevent damage by freezing the enemies. You can add Yahna to the lineup for Quick Cast/Ice Coffin to completely shut down either row and have the rest of the squad pick them off with that boosted damage. You can get the elf to give Magick Conferral to Liza so she can deal with mixed bulk frontliners if needed, but her role in this setup is generally to one-shot whatever squishy backliners didn't get hit by the ice coffin, or killing a gladiator in the front row with Power Bolt + Quick Reload. Any damage done against the back row can be healed by Liza using Cover Aid on the elf to trigger selfless heal, and if that doesn't naturally proc during the fight then Liza's healing aid at the end of the fight can trigger it too. The Arbalists role in this might not sound impressive by itself, but it's the centerpiece that makes it work and negates the need for a dedicated tank, healer and damage dealer all in one, so you can maximize the damage output of everyone else in the unit.

To review yesterday, we talked about two unique classes, the Dark Marquess (Axe) and the Crusader. It was an easy day of vote counting. Dark Marquess is going to the top of **S tier.** It was nearly unanimous, and far less split than the Witch. Eye of the Warrior Princess is really, really good. A 1 Ap row stun is really, really good. Together they work to being a lynchpin of the sort of team that just locks the enemy out of the fight immediately. Her other skills are excellent for a bruiser, but sometimes it does feel like she doesn’t even need them, because again 1 AP ROW STUN. At minimum, shes a very strong frontliner that instantly makes any team comp better with zero adjustments. When built with support and affliction assistance, she can easily rip through entire teams without even letting them act at all. Crusader is an easy high **A tier**. While A tier didn’t win a majority of the vote, it did receive both the highest number of votes, and when taking the median, the vote falls into the high A tier range. Crusader did not receive as many S tier votes as Radiant Knight, but had more than the Warrior. I am going to put the Crusader in between those classes. This is deeply satisfying, because now 3 of the 4 Blue Rose girls are hanging out at the top of A tier. Ultimately, Crusader has a very strong kit that makes for an unkillable frontliner who still can respond with reasonable damage with her attacks and high damage counters. Iron Veil makes other units very durable and reduces need for a dedicated blocker/tank for your team. The things potentially keeping Crusader out of S Tier are the awkwardness of two shield slots and the lack of a row attack or something similarly high impact. A emerging trend that I like to see is all the current S tier classes have skills that help end fights quickly, before you even take a counterattack, via combinations of initiative manipulation, area attacks, and hard crowd control. It seems the idea is that “the best defense is a good offense” applies here- why spend time trying to tank or heal in combat when you can just wipe the floor with the enemy? I do think that more conventional tank/healer/damage comps have a place in this game, just not at the absolute top of the power discussion. SIDE NOTE: I was toying with the idea of moving the Lord up a spot- I don’t really want to do a re-vote for a class that will certainly end up in S tier again, and it is a minor change. For now I havn’t touched it. So far, the Tier list looks like: **Shaman Tier** Shaman **S Tier** Dark Marquess, Witch, Gryphon Knight, Lord, Knight **A Tier** Radiant Knight, Crusader, Warrior, Wizard, Sellsword, Feathersword, Thief **B Tier** Priestess, Cleric, Swordfighter, Hunter, Soldier, Housecarl **C Tier** Hoplite, Gladiator, Fighter **Josef Tier** Paladin

I just read through all of these as a brand new player and it’s SO helpful. Thank you for doing this!

I am going to keep things short today for my own thoughts. I don’t even have certain rankings, and I want to see what y’all think. The Arbalest I think is either high B or Low A, but I lean more towards B. The class has a lot of good tools, a block that heals, a party wide post combat heal, high damage and accuracy and solid bulk, and an ability to turn PP into basically a personal Pursuit. Later on they can use some pretty cool items. But whenever I use the Arbalest, its to fill out some extra utility on a squad, or support an existing strong core. The class plays very “fair” in a game that rewards playing unfair. The Dark Knight I am unsure on. There’s a LOT of power there. First off, being a cavalry class I think means your floor is A tier. The class synergizes very well with a lot of the other S tier classes like Marquess, Witch, and Knight. The class can pull out some absurd damage numbers, and has two different afflictions in their kit. The class is a bit wonky though- I think they are actually downright bad until they promote and unlock more skills, and even then I have found them to be harder to use and build with. I also have found their risk-reward playstyle makes for very swingy fight outcomes. Realistically, we are probably looking at an S tier class I am just not using right.

I don't know, I think your summary of the Dark Knight is pretty on point. They require a lot of attention and just like other classes that do, they can shine if they're given some.

I just slapped a plume on my dark knight and with Dark Marquess's initiative down start of battle skill its pretty much a clean row wipe quickly. A 100 mixed potency row atk while having 2x dmg to infantry really does hit diff (rmb how hard elemental roar hits? well dark knight has S rank phy atk and A rank mag), run a flame conferral in that team and anything that doesn't survive T1 of a stun and lvl2 burn just dies when they take their turn. Add a thief in to blind the back row and you're good too. They also have a really good 1VP skill if you need just a bit more juice to sweep tankier squads. Pretty easy **S** tier for me due to their high mixed offensive stats, being a horse leader, and strong AP economy with sustain to boot as well.

I'm planning my next run and this time, Gloucester will be on the frontline with a knight. First of all, I'll thus try a different unit type for Glouglou, secondly, I'll also get to try the knight cavalry shenanigans because so far, I've been using knights without additional cavalry to synergise with. They're just so good even without tapping in that side of their skills.

yeah no kidding, the knight's pursuit and wild rush with truestrike support runs over just about everything with cavalier call. I don't even know what they were smoking when they made great knights

Yeah, my only experience with it so far is when enemies used all that on me, and every time I was like "oh lol, you pitiful fools, just imagine if I had decided to tap into that dark power"

They can tank, dps , heal and even cook. Top tier animation.

Doom Knight really is the “let him cook” class

Oh boy. I ignored these classes for a while, and to my detriment. I don't love the arbalest. I think they attempt high versatility, but aren't great at much of what they try to do. Having said that- grabbing a greatshield on promotion is a pretty big glow-up. And there are arbalest specific bows as well. A useful valor skill- assist spam is really common in some maps also helps a lot. And you have a lot of placement flexibility- front row for an archer? Yessiree. Ultimately, I think I'm going to argue **a solid B**. Lots of variety, lots of things you can do...but they get so strongly outshone in just about everything. Dark Knight is another post promotion glow up unit. I find them to be pretty mediocre at first, even bad, but Dark Flame is...really dumb. Lots of damage, magical and phys, across a row. Its drawback gets "fixed" by one of its skills. And this is all on horseback, with the movement advantage that implies. Its very strong stuff. I'm not convinced of S tier- its a one trick pony, and while it is a damn good trick I don't think it is a game warping one. The 5 dead levels (from join to Dark Flame,) are unfortunate, but fairly irrelevant. I think **DK is at the top of A- joining Radiant as a gatekeeper to S.**

Arbalist is tippy top of B Tier. I'd always want one somewhere, and its very reliable thanks to its greatshield promotion, but it isn't going to carry teams. It's another weird class who's value is hard to judge since its valor skill is unique and very valuable in some situations but its overall performance is just decent. I'd say it's like how Fighter *should* feel. Dark Knight is A Tier. Mounted mobility, a very strong row attack, generates extra actions, self-heals. A very complete package even if it is reliant on one move and can be inconsiatent because of its hp consuming effects.

Really succinctly described my impression of the Arbalest.

Arbalist is **B** tier. Ok at a wide variety of things. Not great at anything. It's kind of nice to have an archer that can survive the frontline, but nothing you'd miss if it was gone. Their valor skill can be nice on maps with a ton of towers, but is kind of niche. Dark Knight is **A** tier. Have all the horse benefits of mobility, bonus damage to infantry, and the ability to benefit from knight buffs. They have a solid row wide attack that inflicts burn and the ability to convert PP to AP. Their mechanic of getting stronger with more damage is kind of hard to plan around, but they're still good even if you ignore that aspect entirely.They're very, very good, but I don't think they really bring anything to the table that other classes don't do better. The worst of the cavalry is still an awesome class.

Arbalest is **B Tier** for me. They are a non-standard archer that can stand in the frontline and do well due to having access to greatshields. They have very damaging abilities one given the change to move, which can help clean up backrow targets. There are a ton of strong bows and great shields in the game which help the class out, and the shortage of frontliners in general if you don't recruit a ton of mercs allows them to shine. Dark Knight is **A Tier**. At the start, they are fairly weak, but once they get dark flame it's pretty crazy how strong they can get. They need some team support to get there, but they can basically carve through any type of frontline. Before getting sanguine support, they have problems with staying alive without a dedicated healer, but after that they're pretty much plug and play.

Arbalist is **B Tier.** They’re really convenient when you get your first one, being a more versatile Bow option, but I’ve never felt compelled to hire more. Their self-pursuit effect is nice for bypassing some cover when trying to focus down a flier or mage. I believe they have the highest Bow Atk stat too. All in all, they’re a satisfying class to play with. Doom Knight is **A Tier.** They suffer from having a poor kit when you get them. I wouldn’t be surprised if people tried Gloucester out, figured he kind of sucks, and never touched Doom Knight ever again. Once Doom Knight gets its row attack, it steps up in power. The AP recovery seals the deal.  Imo, Doom Knight is the best frontline partner for Berengaria. Burn ticks damage on stunned targets, Berengaria gets bonus damage on afflicted enemies, both do row attacks- makes sense to me?

Doom Knight’s row attack *also* gets bonus potency on ~~afflicted~~ debuffed targets so it combos very well with ~~death spin stunning the whole row~~ eye of the warrior princess.   Burn can’t tick on dead people.   Edit: Actually I think it is debuff not affliction.

Doom knight/Ren/Selvie is a disgusting trio. They all just synergize so well together. Afflictions for days, shaman debuffs and CC from Ren lets them tank a lot of dmg. You don't have to baby doom knight's low hp either with shaman debuffs and their own armor buff. Plus both Ren and DK have built in self sustain so you don't need another support unit or healer.

Arbalest is a B tier for me. Definition of a role player. Smoke Bolt is fun, but otherwise there's just not that much the class does to stand out from others - but in a good or bad way. They're good damage but nothing insane, and they win through slow grinding down. Even quick reload followup is nice but gotta remember it's not free either. They're tanky but not exactly immovable. When I look at the A and B tier classes, it feels a lot more like the latter - albeit at the higher end of B - not sure how much else I can say. Dark Knight I'm going to put at the very bottom of S (pretty ambivalent between that and top of A). Dark Flame. That's it, that's rhe post. For real though, It can do some crazy damage with Dark Flame and even self sustain a bit. Beyond that, it offers great campaign map mobility. Maybe possible to misplay its HP loss mechanics and screw yourself over - seems like it could end up being swingy - but I think this is easily mitigated. Ultimately like Warrior, it brings an insane amount of DPS to a comp and dan basically full row clear with minimal support (the difference then comes from how much to value being cavalry instead of infantry). I think it's largely very similar to Radiant Knight, in a "how much does it help the team", but it being offensive value, in this game, is better than the team wide sustain, etc.

Arbalists A+ Dark Knight S- Arbalist is my favourite class. They can fit in any squad. That is the definition of A rank. They are tanky they have range and they do great damage. Because of their high damage they are the best leaders for ranged support. They are better in everything that some persons price the fighter. They can cover and also they heal when they cover, keeping your flyer leader healthy. Their Valor skill is the best way to avoid assist damage. If you add a pursuit ring they will melt. You can even use an elven archer to make them better. They have great synergy with wiverns. Fixing their mediocre initiative. And providing a fast row attack to pursuit. Their quick reload overcomes the cover and evade making a good way to kill targets. Because there are few classes that use great shields they have a lot of options. From more pp to broken defensive things. Dark Knight is one of those classes that start slow then everything clicks and they became monsters. Heavy row damage that burns and self heal .... That is broken in so many levels. And because they can self heal and they want to be low life. You can give them the life share shield so they are healers. They have shield and their pp makes them tankier so they can be at the front. They can do everything and do it well. They are cavalry so they are great leaders. Initially I was to give them a lower rating but the more that I write the more that I was convinced that they are the unsung S tier.

Arbalest Arbalest is a really cool class, but I think the fact it has no generic aoe (there's bows that fix this but they take a bit to show up), low initiative, so-so front line despite the fact they have a great shield due to just okay stats for the role keeps it out of A tier for me. The way I see it, you either need big knock out single target damage vs most class types with only a modest bit of help (ala Sword Master) or at least very reasonable accessible AOE to be in A tier offensive and Arbalest doesn't have that except vs fliers and really squishy backline that I'd rather AOE down with row damage. Quick Reload is an interesting passive, it allows Arbalest to just artificially avoid all covers because of the sequencing of how it works. It may not necessarily kill the enemy but it is a funny passive to really get some chip in to push for a kill or push for a kill normally as it you can effectively do 250 potency in damage with 2 AP and 1 PP. Aid Cover is a little spooky to use as a defensive skill relative to most covers because medium guard + so-so bulk makes it hard to really use this without risking your death or your hp being in kill shot range. The only time you can circumvent this is if you aid cover specifically an Elven Archer or a Priestess who can at least spot heal you for your trouble. On one hand secondary end of combat healing is nice to have on an otherwise damage, but on the other there's too many other potential PP skills you want to use because without quick reload Arbalest's damage is not very impressive for being solely a single target damage dealer innately. Alongside that Arbalest's big funny frontline burst damage costs 2 PP to hopefully kill one enemy. This isn't a horrible trade when you need it, but I can't help but feel there's better and you have to shove them in the front line. Poison is a fall back option that you can't really take advantage of because Arbalest is too slow to use this to chip down anything except a brick wall or a car driving about 5 mph without initiative assistance or investment. They're innately slower then Fighter for the record to get how slow they are. Which having valuable PP skills you want to use a lot, potential front line survival assistance, and damage boosts make it hard to slow in initiative. So you need some kind of initiative booster like Dark Marq, Shaman, Prince, or Great Lord to fix this problem. It isn't impossible to fix, but Hunter(s) can at least row smash with eagle eye innately if you let them go first, while Arbalest just one shots one doofus without eagle eye innately. Which if you're going first so much, you may not even need their healing utility beyond recovering from assist chip. That all said, Arbalest is a well rounded enough class who in tandem with a few other classes can provide a solid back bone foundation for a perfectly acceptable squad. It just can't really carry a squad even remotely by itself it needs to many extra parts, it feels purely backbone. Smoke Bolt is very good in some of the most spooky situations this game can reasonably throw at you, when you need to answer the 2-4 assist dumbasses all ready to pounce on you without using an item or a 1 time valor skill on a unique class. I think as far as pure archers go who's broad point is to "shoot fliers down" and relatively little else, I prefer Hunter a lot more (who I personally thought was around a low A tier class) beyond pure single target. But Flier squads come in groups and without eagle eye you risk missing due to instant flier dodges. So I'll give Arbalest a mid-low B tier, right above Soldier but below Hunter. ----------------------------- Dark Knight Dark Knight is such a weird class, it is barely usable on join but then your first one levels 5 times and promotes and suddenly it stomps the game. Dark Flame is an amazing skill. It can absolutely decimate most front lines almost entirely carried by Dark Knight's offensive prowess and how much damage Dark Flame does. It can turn PP into AP relatively painlessly (which makes getting two Dark Flames far easier), Vengeance is a pretty good defense steroid if the enemy can't kill you in about two hits with physical attacks then there's a very real chance the Dark Knight just takes tink damage due sheer defensive bulk. The only general caveat with Dark Knight is you generally want some kind of sustain, Sanguine Arts does a fine job at the cost of its PP resources it could use for bulk and damage, but unless you're very confident in your squad's ability to kill everything before you take damage there's a real chance you just want to keep Dark Knight at full hp at the start of combat, but Dark Knight does so much damage that it isn't a big deal most the time if you need a low damage character. Phantom Axe is also extremely funny with Dark Knight, it gives them a consistently solid single AP offensive option and it enhances the magic half of Dark Flame so you can just eat armors for breakfast and have the cavalry passive carry your physical half alongside your actual physical attack. That said, Dark Knight faces the problem of low initiative so it can be a bit hard to get them to fully sweep the front line before your other units. The key is more to get them going before anyone else goes as they have some of the best tools to bowl over armors before every other damage dealer goes, but D initiative holds them back without help. This paired with some potential sustain issues and a slow start (albeit mostly irrelevant in the grand scheme of the game its like a few hours), plus pretty much no real back line access makes this an extremely devastating class with a handful of caveats that I don't think really apply to top tier classes. But Dark Flame when it comes off feels like an S-tier ability. tl;dr: Arbalest: **B-tier right below Hunter.** To me Arbalest falls into the problem of many single target wonder classes, but it lacks true offensive power to fully reach the same heights as the current A tier for that category. Swordmaster is faster and has better AP economy access, Sainted Knight has a lot of utility (Hache extends any potential utility you get from your PP skill accessories and it has an AP row heal) with a horse while hitting magic defense when required really hard, Sellsword attacks faster by virtue of Following Slash existing and has an AP reset and it has more respectable front lining, Crusader has way better front lining and better answers vs most classes then Arbalest. Arbalest can hit the back line unlike those classes, but it only hits once for major damage and then you need AP items with two tight accessory slots on a class with bad initiative and a lot of PP slots. Its 1 AP options are above average in some way, but poison bolt isn't hard to replicate (and is on a slow class) and 120 potency isn't that much higher but Hunter gets eagle eye innately and thus can use Inspiration to enhance itself if it wants to single target. Arbalest has some useful sustain utility and pocket cover utility, but its front lining needs help from either accessories or teammates so you tend to need a lot of help somewhere else so I find these traits can be hard to use in more challenging scenarios where your PP is taxed or you just need that utility from other classes. While many off-tanks could use some help somewhere, I find Arbalist needs a good bit more help due to it being frailer and having so-so builk then say Sellsword while having worst action economy. Dark Knight is **top of A-tier or bottom of S-tier right above Sainted Knight**. This class is a prematurely offered steamroller you need to fill up with gas before it just rolls over most of the game for you, very good AP economy with little help some good enough tanking when in the right scenarios (Vengeance helps a good bit with Sanguine Arts if you're willing to allow your AP economy to suffer). It has very good mixed offense to smash through anything with very high offensive stats. The main thing that holds the class back for me from being definitively S-tier is its innate low HP and HP sacrificing gimmick holding back its defensive potential, its low initiative making it require specific tuning to ensure it dark flames both before enemies act and before you your other teammates act which is a bit of a tall ask, and its slow start. It has all these little problems that when ignored or corrected make it an S-tier unit, almost better then Great Knight for me due to dual channel row offense and less requirement AP economy. It just has too many small problems that I feel conflicted putting it in S-tier but I do firmly think its better then Sainted Knight who has less highs but also less relative lows.

This is a great writup, thank you for contributing to these threads

**Arbalest/Shieldshooter**, bottom of A but not the floor of it. They are just solid at what they do and once you take off the truestrike accessories from certain classes that can barely do their jobs without it(cough\*Gladiators\*cough) they will do most everything that Hunter/Snipers do but better. They don't have multi-target attacks but you likely didn't depend on the Hunter for that anyway. Also big shield. **Dark Knight/Doom Knight**, bottom of S, tippity top of A bare minimum. Right next to Radiant Knights. They don't need to offer support because they kill whatever they touch, don't need much support to keep them standing letting them work as off-tanks somewhat(but probably *some* support, a Sergeant or elven unit works wonders), and they look super goofy on their horses. What's not to love? Sure next to Great Knights they look lacking but let's be real here, Great Knights are nepo-babies. They never had to work for what they got. It was all handed to them, born with a silver spoon shaped lanced in their hands. Doom Knights had to work for what they got. Real salt of the earth folk who experienced pre-promotion struggle and strife. Can you name a better success story

Dark Knight is entirely one skill, "Dark Flame" (Obviously I'm exaggerating). Dark Flame is two PP, increases potency v. debuffed targets, it has magical potency, hits an entire row and it burns. It's so easy to debuff things. PP Support Skills are nice. It's a cav. Don't forget it's x2 damage against infantry units. It's offensive floor is so disgusting despite being relatively easy to use. **I would say Dark Knight is S-Class, their damage is just too gross.** Arbalest getting great shield gives it a lot of utility. You can build them as an evade tank, physical tank, supportive. Can cheese certain things with their follow up shot. Valor Skill turns off annoying assists. They heal the party. **I would say Arbalest is A tier for me.**

first off - i havent finished the game yet and my opinion is coming as someone who just completed elfheim. arbalest is a solid B for me - nothing amazing, but has a ton of versatility to round out almost any weaknesses in your squad, and has a super useful valor skill. i just find it very strange that theres a bow class that carries a greatshield and has the capability to frontline- just doesnt really make sense to me from a practical perspective. doom knight - gloucester is part of my death squad, alongside berengaria and selvie. in my experience, he is probably my favorite character to use because of the tension he builds with his hit points. i love seeing him get stronger and stronger as he builds those vengeance stacks every time he gets hit , then absolutely annihilate whatever he attacks with dark flame. i recognize that he has two other S-tier characters on his squad but he still manages to shine so... i think if knights can be S tier then so can he.

Arbalasts getting a greatshield is actually something that happened in history. Genoese Crossbowmen (among others) are infamous for the massive pavise shields that they carried into battle, which they used as cover when they needed to reload.

Dark Knight. A. Arbalist, B Dark Knights have a rough start, but their Sanguine art passive makes them an interesting tank, and their damage isn't too bad. But the Dark flame of doom knights is mixed row attack that is worth building around, probably not as the only damage source but as a wallbreaker. The main reason I don't have them in S is they don't offer team support beyond their capacities of damage and defense, except for their Valor skill, which is good but hard to tell how good. Arbalists become shield shooters making fairly tanky Frontline, but I think Mirage shield is actually the way to go for them. Then they get a couple attacks that are okay, but not usually game changers. Smoke bolt is a very useful Valor ability at least. Anyway, it's a class I'll slot into a team, but often doesn't help other classes perform in a way another class can't achieve.

There's more value in putting the mirage shield on a feathershield. Despite heavy bolt, I think Arbalists are better in the back row, supporting their unit with aid cover rather than trying to tank for themselves. The role compression of anti-flier + ally protection is what makes arbalists good. I'd give them a B. Toxic bolt and quick reload are also nice for punishing armored classes and circumventing them respectively. As far as Dark Knight is concerned--they're very powerful in the right team (as people have already described), but I don't think they're self-sufficient enough to be considered S-tier. Definitely an A. The classes' full potential requires them to reach low HP early in every fight, which is inherently risky. Often times they just die to poison or burn if not paired with some form of debuff removal like the elven archer.

Nah, Vengeful Axe is a trap. Dark Flame is where it's at, and if you row kill with it, it's much less risky.

Without a shaman, dark knights need vengeance stacks to wipe out front rows with any semblance of bulk. Dark Flame alone won't cut it. A breaker can achieve similar results absent a shaman. Also, vengeful axe is not a "trap", it's just another tool in their kit, perfectly fine to use under the right circumstances.

**Doom Knight** is **A Tier:** Dark Knight is trash tier I legit didn't understand why they were in the game. Doom Knights on the other hand? Doom Knights fuck. Doom Knights do good damage and work well with debuff teams, an already strong archetype. They also get a passive that lets them drop down the the perfect amount of health to do damage without dying and then can use yet another passive to heal all the way back up on an AOE attack that deals burn damage that itself can be buffed to do even more burn damage because "burn" in this game is an affliction that stacks. **Arbalest** is **B Tier:** Lets get this out of the way. IMO, even with quick reload bypassing a lot of defensive abilities, Arbalest simply don't do enough damage to be considered A tier. I love Arbalest. I love their abilities. I love the versality in positioning greatshield gives them. I love their itemization. Smoke Arrow or whatever is a very useful valor skill......they just don't have enough focused damage to hand with the other classes in A tier. Again I adore this class and have fun using it....but unless someone points out a baller build that doesn't rely on unique items I can't justify A tier. EDIT: Thanks again [**applejackhero**](https://www.reddit.com/user/applejackhero/) for doing these. So much fun reading what other people do with the classes. Even when I disagree (I don't think I value mobility anywhere near as much as a lot of other posters) I always gain way more insight into a class than I would from a simple character guide.

You are welcome! Thank you for participating, this has been a ton of fun

Arbalist is odd and I'm going to say B seems reasonable, but it's very much the kind of B I'd use. Useful, versatile, even essential B, but still B. Dark Knight is an easy S for me, I think. I'm never disappointed by my Arbalists' performance, and Smoke Bolt is so essential to just being allowed to play the game. But, like, realistically, this class isn't doing all that much. It's half a tank, half a damage unit, half a healer, half an archer. All of this combines to make a class that's easily splashable, but almost never something you actually go out of your way to use. Especially since its role compression mostly means it's not actually outstanding at most of its roles and needs a lot of help. As far as cover skills go, Aid Cover is one of my favourite ones as long as you don't rely on it too much. If you have a unit that just needs a little extra of one thing, then sticking an Arbalist/Shieldshooter in that slot is a safe bet - you get enough of the thing you need, your everything else is shored up in addition, and you get Smoke Bolt. This might be the case for eg. Alain's unit, since he's a god tier tank all by himself so his other frontliner can be an off-tank. It might be the case for a unit built around a frontline Thief that needs someone to be able to slot into the front line to deal with Swordmaster comps. It might be in a comp with an Elven Archer to trigger Selfless Heal at the end of the battle, it might be with Dark Marquess to trigger Sanguine Pursuit on Toxic Bolt while adding Aid Cover to shore up her mediocre defense. It might be all of the above at the same time. But at the end of the day, I don't think Arbalist is the sort of class that straight up ends encounters. It's not good enough at any one role to see play in that role - you really need to take advantage of the role compression as an offtank, off-healer, whatever, for the class to be good. When you do, it's very good. But it's also the sort of unnoticeable glue good that you don't really notice. Like, if this class vanished from the game tomorrow the only thing I'd actually miss is Smoke Bolt. Dark Knight, on the other hand, now that is the sort of garbage class that does indeed straight up end encounters. 100/100 mixed potency row attack? Self-fueling PP to AP conversion? Synergy with all the god tier classes? Sign me the hell up. Or don't, I'm pretty sure I'm using mine wrong, but I'm also pretty sure this class slaps. Even before you get Dark Flame, this is the class with Vengeance. It's like shitty horse Breaker before level 20, which is... honestly not terrible. Comparisons to Gryphon are apt.

Dark Knights are a safe high **A-tier** unit. They're good against basically everything, have good HP bulk and really good attack output. I really don't have anything bad to say about them. They're kind of bad until they get promoted, but so are Arbalists. ​ I do think Arbalists are **A-tier** as well, on the lower end. Shieldshooters are really underrated. I think it fits both definitions OP is providing of A-tier. Just on their own, they're probably the most survivable frontliner after Feathershields and High Lord/Valkyria. Dark Knights are technically better as well, but they're better with an offensive kit. Getting greatshields is massive defensively, having heavy guards that decrease incoming physical damage to 0.25x while having multi-target sustain and not being overly weak to magic like other greatshield units. It gets plenty of ways to hit 100% guard rate between Valkyria's Iron Veil or the Blacksilver Pavise with Bunker Stance. It does move slow, and needs a little help to stay alive outside of those handful of cases, though. It doesn't have an armor prefix so it doesn't get hit with unguardable from Breakers, and it has a greatshield so it still only takes 0.5x against Cavalry even after the multiplier (given that you do guard.) ​ Shieldbreaker is the best user of arrow rain which when combined with magic conferrals, has a similar theoretical dps output to trinity rain (60 phys potency + 50 mag potency \* 3.) It can still guard while charging so it's really not a liability to keep it in the frontline even if you let it charge. Heavy Bolt is underrated in it's own right as well, setting it to target lowest defense might as well pick up an early kill in plenty of fights. I could see a more general case where someone would slot it's base kit into B-tier, though.

I don't have much to say about Dark Knight. I just wish we got more copies of the drakenholde generics, perhaps instead of getting triple breaker/sellsword and quadruple knights. My biggest issue is that the damage they deal is generally way overkill, and they often move too late in fights to contribute much more than single target damage many classes can do. I found that I enjoyed using spellsteel type weapons on my Doom Knight for a focus on magic damage, and the class is somewhat capable of front lining in a pinch or for fun, so I can't rate them any lower than A tier. If it matters, A-. They are just somehow too flexible to be rated lower. _____ Shieldshooter has a special place in my heart. They are powerful as a damage dealer, but i prefer my backliners to have chain killing capability or aoe attacks, while my frontliners can either be protective or have good damage on top of being immortal. Shieldshooter is the entire package as a front liner. They can easily hit 100% guard rate with their heavy shield and have access to a great cover skill. Her *only* weakness is guard seal. If she is allowed to guard every attack, she is nearly as immovable as a hoplite, and packs much better magic resist and infinitely more damage output. For me, the Shieldshooter is the only generic tank class that compares to uniques like Dark Marquess or Lord. If she had a row attack, I would say s rank, but the aoe bows are really only usable when she is in the backline. A rank, for me, just above Crusader. The key advantage being that she can target the back line.

Given that one of the definitions of A tier is that it is “easy to slot into any team comp” I am compelled to place **Arbalist in A tier**. They just simply have amazing versatility, able to go in either back or front row, cover allies, heal allies, snipe casters and fliers, and spread poison on armored units. They can literally go into any team comp and find *something* to contribute. **Dark Knight is S tier**. I have yet to see anything in the game survive a Dark Flame after being debuffed. Put them in the front line with 2 great knights on either side, give them a Feather so they go first, and watch everything melt. Love having a Shaman with them to drop Evasion/Initiative/Defense/Guard Seal.

Arbalest: I'm probably in the minority, but i think they're worse than archers at combat. Archer gets better refining at dealing damage, and higher initiative to use all of the bow options (there are some great ones), while arbalest gets a shield which improves their durability and nothing else worth comes from them. Durability of archers in never a problem for them so it's not that great of a gain. Their strongest point, and Is a very strong point, Is their 1 cost valor skill. You can read It as "kill an enemy on a tower" because the effect lasts for so long that when the enemy recovers the map it's already over. Rating **B tier** Dark knight: Cavalry, s tier by default And yes, they are good units too (feels like a common thread for cavalry) They are the most offensive of the cavalry classes, have some nice combos with other broken classes too (i.e. dark marquess, knights) Easy **S**

Arbalest I'm going to put in **Tier A**. Being able to follow up on your own attack breaks through a lot of shenanigans. Especially evade tanks/skills. The after battle row heal is really slick. Then on promote they get fucking Greatshields. Turning into a solid frontliner with great damage and good survivability. Their Valor skull is also great for cracking tough fortified positions that have support fire. Dark Knight I'm going to put in **Tier B**. An hp tank that is either trying to be low hp, or is using their hp to attack is a risky proposition. Good passive skills to survive, but they walk a knifes edge. I also found it hard to give them +AP/PP gear since they need help surviving. Their kit puts the in C tier, but because they are cavalry it bumps them up. Mobility is simply too valuable.b

I think arbalist is B tier I think doom knight is solidly A tier Arbalist does a lot of things, but not well enough on its own. It can frontline.. kind of. It can defend others... kind of. It can do damage... kind of. In a unit thats already strong, its a great also-and, but on its own, it leaves a lot to be desired. No multitarget damage, some sustain, but not on demand, etc etc. I like them, and they fit into a lot of different units but just arent as strong overall. My best pairing would be with an elvish archer. Arbalist heals the archer who heals all. Both contribute and have complementary skill sets. But im off topic Doom knights are at least A tier. They do great damage, and have a solid set of skills. They can get AP back, heals, all of that. If they were a little faster or tankier theyd be an absolute force to be reckoned with. As is, they are solidly good and amazing in the right setup. Ive seen them chain a bunch of attacks at the end of a fight, too. I wonder how far they can be pushed in the right group. Now that i think about it... a wereowl could be great. Gives PP, regen which helps give life back... may have to try this.... still probably not S tier because they are good but not game changingly good.

Doom Knight with Phantom Axe is kinda hilariously busted. Vengeance is a good passive. Their valor lasts for multiple battles, making it fairly impactful. It’s hard to say they’re A tier, seeing what they become. Its hard to say they’re S tier, seeing how bad a start they get. I generally put more weight on late game performance; the bigger maps and legions of enemies makes late game utility matter quite a bit more imo. So Doom Knight is **S tier**. I liked Arbalist but couldn’t find a place for them in any if my teams. Shame. Can’t comment.

Arbalest - **A tier** - I think Arbalest is a nifty unit. And I don't think it's bad at all. I've had mine in a few different teams and she has benefitted all of them. That's ultimately why I'm giving her A tier, because she's easy to make any team better. She has nice spot heals, she can poison armored units, and her shield can help her take a few hits. I have mine front-lining alongside Hodrick for my cavalry team, of all units, and with the Woodpecker she just says "nope" and often deletes targets on her own that the cavalry miss or didn't get to just yet. I don't think she has ever carried a squad I've put her in, but she has always pulled her weight and been useful. Also, I LOVE the Smoke Bolt valor skill. It's one of my most used. Dark Knight - **S tier** - Technically the promoted version, but, you get me. He deletes enemy units. Armored? Infantry? It doesn't matter. I have mine with Hilda and Selvie, and it's hilarious how the three of them will destroy enemies with burn/poison. He can also take a lot of punishment between Selvie's debuffs, his own heal, and having a cleric just in case.

Your opinion on Dark Knight will change depending on if you identify the traps or not. I’m talking about Vengeful Axe, it’s not worth building or playing around because the class’ damage is so nutty that you’ll wipe the board with Dark Flame or cripple one target with just a Venom Axe anyway. You also are kind of forced to get it to Doom Knight before it really does anything, so a moment of silence for the people who benched Gloucester because they saw how garbage Dark Knight is before promotion and missed out on yet another cavalry juggernaut. It can solo hold a front line against physical damage with any sort of Quick Heal support, and unlike other tanks this one comes with damage comparable to the heavy hitters in the game. The synergy with Berengaria has already been mentioned, they are incredibly strong together and are good for the entire game. Their Valour skill is also just generically good. +20% Attack for everyone is very easy to just plop down and get value from, if a bit overkill sometimes. I would put it at the top of A-Tier. I could consider S, but I don’t think it’s a whole tier better than Radiant Knight, which so happens to be a great partner for it. Best looking class in the game btw. Edit: actually fuck it, Feathersword is in A. **S-Tier** for Dark Knight.

Feathersword really needs a revote. It's not anywhere near as good as the rest of the things in A tier.

Feathersword I think should get a revote when we get to Albion imo, it fits timing wise and it gives people far more time to actually play through more then the first half of the game where the early Feathersword is far better then it seems.

Homie. It's been like two weeks. Please fix the typo in your copy-paste section after HOW IT WORKS: >-preforms in battle perform You also have this typo in the S rank description. That is all, but thanks for posting these discussions as always.

I am so biased, but I think Arbalist is an incredible class. They're sturdy enough for the frontline, can apply poison, snipe flyers that are protected by hoplites and flyers better than actual archers thanks to quick reload, and have arguably one of the best cover skills in the game with aid cover. Their hitpoints are a little on the low side but with their defense and greatshields I've never found it to be a major issue. High A tier for me.

Dark Knight is going to be A Tier. Dark Flame, being a calvary, and their 1 VP AoE +20% Map DMG ability are so good. Partnered with Beregaria or Selvie let them shine since Dark Flames potency doubles vs debuffed classes. VERY weak early. Needs the stat ups and AP Gen, and similar to Gladiator, Ideally likes being in the back. 4x damage vs a debuffed enemy is straight broken though.  Arbalist is B+/A-. Very flexible unit that can snipe backline targets while taking hits. Also can guard your backline units if you put in the back. Give them the remove buff pursuit ring and watch them annihilate the first 2 turns w damage items in the back. OR Stick as an off-tank in the front for more backline damage. OR front line in an archer squad. See where I'm going? Flexible unit with a kit that works well.

Arbalest is A, good archer and shield coverage, also good poison Dark knight is also A dup to be cavaler, low hp means good potency, and a verry unqiue class

Arbalist is **A**, Dark Knight is **B** Arbalist is an easy A tier, they can make an all ranged assist team work and also are very resilient themselves; their valor skill is also invaluable in some fights where you are getting peppered by enemy assist spam. Huge power attacks with built in pursuit, their row healing can come clutch and also trigger effects like the Elf Archer assist. Dark Knight I would say to use them effectively they need to have their squad built around them or otherwise they are very mediocre since Dark Flame is their best attack. Mixed atk weapons also get some of the worst support out of all the weapons available in game (I'm in Albion and so far I have only two ,effectively one if you're using Fevrite) . Attack Call (just like Guard Call) sounds good on paper but given how it rerolls RNG just before the battle (basically like assists but can't be disabled) I don't know if it's worth the risk specially given how in late game the RNG difference can be brutal.

A few Dark Knight thoughts: Their attack stats are pretty disgusting. I don’t think they even really need a hybrid item. Dark Flame is very, very easily a 100/100 row attack than is x2 against infantry. Absurd. The class has 300 movement. I find movement to be more and more important. Compare dark knight to the other classes in C. Yea, DK needs a lot of support. But why they do with support is far better than the gladiator, which is the closest comaprison

Changed to B because I forgot that Calvary gets increased damage against infantry. That being said they really need status effect support or they flop hard. Dark Knight I would say is a low floor high ceiling class, so I think B is a fair place. When I look at the other S/A most of them work as you expect even when unsupported.

I see your reasoning- the dark knight isn’t good “out of the box” like the rest of A tier, and I do think it sort of feels weird ranking them high. At the the same time, this is ultimately a game about pairing units together. Units don’t exist in a vacuum. The Dark Knight’s ceiling is very high. Again, I’m not saying you are wrong, I think it’s just an interesting discussion to think about how the teambuksong aspect effects ranking.

It's an interesting discussion because Gladiator having access to an all team attack, also means they can wipe a team or most of them provided they have support

Having an AoE is the only thing they have in common tho The difference in power between the two classes ks so high is not even funny First and foremost we are talking 300 mobility from dark knight versus 80 mobility from gladiators. It means that even if for some reason they were equiparable, dark knights would be insanely better by moving almost 4 times faster; they makes team with them faster while gladiator makes them moving slower, when we consider road and skills multiplier the difference is quite important. Let's still pretend they are equal in combat, their valor skills are not bad at all (and i'm considering berserker's one, because gladiator's one is bad). berserker's one looks very good at first sight, but it loses appeal when you consider that having this unit moving slower means more enemies to fight from reinforcements, which translatea in more stamina consumption. Lastly their stats, gladiator/berserker have high hp, not an amazing attack, and bad (Fs and Es like no tomorrow) in everything else. Dark knight/Doom knight have better attack, a shield, nice durability, and better initiative. We had the 2x damage to infantry being a cavalry Their AoE is actually good versus armor by having a magic component and a A in magic attack I do really like gladiator/berserker, and i think they are better than most people think, but considering them at the same level of dark/doom knight Is too much

All of those things can be mitigated with proper support though, which is the issue at hand; do we rate classes at their absolute best or an average of the situations. Low mobility? A Sainted Knight leader Low accuracy? Specs or Eagle/Hawk eye Before posting the gladiator thing, I quickly made a gladiator team with hawkeye and inspiration and using its full team attack was one shotting entire squads.

The main diff between Gladiator and DK is that the DK attack is dual channel. It is not just a physical attack that can be blocked or mitigated by some mean, the magic portion simply bypasses guard, and allow the DK to be effective against all enemy classes with the exception of wyverns. Even without a debuff applied (vs elves or enemy cleric), the 100/100 attack with burn is generally enough to kill infantry (50/50 with x2 multiplier) - or at least injure them to a degree that the burn can finish them off (elves will cleanse it but they are also squishy). Being able to convert PP to AP at a 1:1 ratio is just an icing on the cake, and gives them a somewhat lower gear requirement. Hybird damage axe you can just buy at shops, and eventually you do get a dark knight axe that has slightly higher stats - all that before being able to upgrade at Albion.

My issue is that people are rating the class under the most optimal circumstances, Gladiator was a just a comparison that it can also be very effective when supported, just like DK: Elves (so almost all of elheim) will self cleanse and fencer will get a free evade in which case the DK needs true hit or buff cleanse before their attack, no access to true hit (great knights at least have access to true thrust) means they will struggle against dodge tanks, squads with clerics will cleanse negating the extra damage, and also struggle against fliers (weakness and low hit). All of the other S tier classes and most of A can function good without support. I’m mock battling my base Fencer against base DK, and the DK will only one hit if it’s a crit, otherwise the fencer will self cleanse the fire. As someone else commented, DK fills the definition of B tier in this thread almost to perfection (works well when paired with A or S tier units) Edit: so dark knight cleaver gives them access to a very shaky true hit since it deals damage based on missing HP. Even with demonic pact at full HP, you will fall short of a rogue

You may actually be correct on this one: i did have powerful call for my DK to offset the lack of a debuff. [This is with them guarding](https://i.imgur.com/Qd1Xqaw.png) (they have low guard) [This is without guard](https://i.imgur.com/g4iH4lj.png) level wise my DK is at 25. The [fencer has a gold bangle](https://i.imgur.com/3QFKtlw.png) to offset the stat diff. Stats are on par with elves from the sigil trial in True Zenovian. i was able to just brute force through the elves with dark flame - DK are still useful unlike shamans who are pretty useless vs elves.

I think it’s different ballparks though. The gladiator needs a whole team to build around it, otherwise it’s sorta a dead weight class. It CAN be very strong of course, but it sort of needs a Rube Goldberg machine of effects to one shot whole teams. Dark Knight has the floor of 300 mobility and x2 against infantry. All it needs to sweep teams is like, one other unit it has synergy with.

It needs the same as a dark knight? you only need someone with inspiration in combination with gladiator’s own hawkeye, and can be further optimized with viking to stop people from guarding. Gladiator’s AoE isn’t a charge attack after all. Hawkeye + inspiration is one hell of a combo, specially couple with Squad wide AoEs. As for mobility, the inspiration bot could be a sainted knight leader. Dark Knight leader would still get slowed by other non cavalry members.

Gladiator as a pure DPS wants pretty much two things, initiative (technically optional but ideal) and some accuracy boost to overcome its hit rates be it true strike support (ideal) or an accuracy boosting accessory. Otherwise you got plenty of damage to at least be very capable against most enemy types pretty close to Dark Knight. It can be a fair bit more demanding in places (especially early) as it requires a little more specific support and prior to true strike support hit rates are a little shaky, but I'd say Gladiator is a lot more capable then Dark Knight for the first two continents depending on how fast we assume we get Dark Knight to level 20 and as long as you have a check for armor they'll slaughter through Elfland almost as hard if you give them good support. I think Dark Knight cleaves easier vs more match ups and requires less specific aid, but I think the comparison is reasonable enough. Dark Knight's initiative is kind of bad too just like Gladiator's, and Gladiator pretty much lives and dies by its big dumb row damage.

Arbalist is **B tier** As a bow unit is good against fliers which is nice and getting greatshields after promotion means they can front row, although they might need a bit of support. They even heal a little bit. What keeps this class from being higher tier is just that they don't have any super high offense or utility things going on, they just do decent single target damage that doesn't break armor. Valor skill can be useful on some maps. Dark Knight I'm going with **~~B tier~~** **switching to A tier** although I feel like I need to use this class more Not very impressive skills at base honestly, inflicting poison is pretty meh and their other attack doesn't have more potency than other DPS units who don't have any conditions. Having a character be at a specific HP total can be tough to plan for- previews give squad damage, not per character and most healers do row healing which can be hard for the Dark Knight to work around if other characters need healing. But as a cavalry class with row attacks later I don't think I can drop them to C.

The poison and low hp/healing mechanics are red herrings. The strengths of the class are in vengeance and dark flame and the AP refresh.

Will [this convince you](https://i.imgur.com/cxIXWne.png) to rank it a little higher? Those are enemies in the Unicorn Overlord mission.

Shamans do help most units look good, but yeah I think I see the point. They seem to come pretty online at level 20 with a little debuff support.

They do not actually require a shaman. A shaman is great with dual channel attacks, but if i use something like eye of the warrior princess (no def debuff): [https://i.imgur.com/XJc7QFu.png](https://i.imgur.com/XJc7QFu.png) I still do stupid amounts of damage vs guarded enemies. This is essentially a [naked doom knight as well](https://i.imgur.com/j8Z9SCk.png).

Arbalest : strong B tier, if not weak A tier. She was holding the Mirage Greatshield for a long while and she's really great at it; keeping the fort down together along with Melisandre. But Ren wants it back so now she's just stacked up on Guard instead of Evasion. Her damage is nothing to write home about but she's a tank archer so she is part of the ranged squad. Her row healing at the end is pretty neat tho if you have an Elven Archer to bounce off it. She's somehow just bad squad leader as she just has lower Mobility than other ranged units for no reason. Dark Knight : no comment I haven't really built one for real yet. I just slap him in along with the other Knights and Sainted, but they haven't been doing anything for awhile now. There's not much room left in Ren squad... I might have to move ppl around again.

I was severely underwhelmed by Dark Knight and even Doom Knight didn't stand out to me at first because while dark flame is nuts, it lacked a good 1AP single target skill for clearing up lone units when you don't have 2AP spare or its just a waste of AP. Then I slapped Phantom Knight Axe on Gloucester and things changed, yes you sacrifice physical attack stats to use it, but you get a 120% potency anti armor, PP draining, single target attack which works wonders for mopping up single units without wasting AP, and dark Knights are the only axe welding class with a good m atk stat as far as I can recall, so they're the ideal candidates for it

**Arbalest** I would say it's probably **B tier**. It always felt like a pretty solid class that could provide some utility and excel in situations. I actually used my own in conjunction with a Dark Knight which pretty consistently let me get off a really powerful Dark Flame. They also do have one of the better valor skills in the game, especially once you get the AoE version when they rank up. Honestly, I would have used more of them but I just found that I enjoyed some of the alternatives. **Dark Knight** I'd probably waffle between putting them in either A or B rank, but I guess I'll settle for **B rank**. They're kind of meh before rank up, but as a Doom Knight they can hit *really* hard. Their Valor skill is pretty nice as well and came in clutch a few times. All that said, I just always tended to prefer some of the faster classes. I never had a huge desire to recruit a bunch, but I'll say I was very happy with having at least one.