Micaiah is the MOST UNDERRATED Unit In The Franchise
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 ก.ย. 2024
- / danidoyle
/ discord
Micaiah is commonly cited as an example of a bad unit, due to her frailty, low movement, and generic enemies having res stats. However, I believe Micaiah is one if the stronger units in Radiant Dawn, and does not deserve the frequent insults. In this video, I intend to try and convince y'all that Micaiah is actually a very potent member of FE 10's cast.
Music Used
Path of Radiance-Ike's Resolution, Father's Back
Radiant Dawn-Echoes of Daybreak, Bearer of Hope, Backsliding, Map Theme 3, Cats At Play, The Black Knight Lives, The Pledge, Tibarn's Theme
Hat In Time-Scooting Through Clocktowers Beneath The Sea
Runescape-Gnome Theme
Octopath Traveler 2-Normal Battle I
Papers Please-Main Theme
Bravely Default 2-Seth's Theme, Gloria's Theme, Elvis's Theme, Adelle's Theme
Triangle Strategy-Resolute Heart
![[Live] ศึกมหึมันส์มวยไทยสังเวียนเดือด เวทีมวยชั่วคราวสวนสยาม | จันทร์ 30 กันยายน 2567](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/pM1k6f7JXUc/mqdefault.jpg)
tl;dr Turns out that being a force--deployed staff-bot is always at the very least more useful than whatever the fuck Roy is doing.
To her credit, since she has a combat option from the get go, she's far easier to train up than the usual stat bot. That counts for a lot in FE10. And really, as a combat unit, she's hardly any worse off than any other mage. She won't be doubling but she can still hit plenty hard, especially with thani, which gives her better one round potential than other mages. She won't have any issues capping her magic either, so she's guaranteed to be a highly effective user of any ranged staff.
Like yeah, she's not a map soloing juggernaut in a game that's filled with them, but she kind of doesn't need to be. Sacrifice is pretty useless for most things once you have Laura (especially since she has horrible hp), but it is a potential xp abuse option.
@RyanJW001 Sacrifice is also great for getting her to Resolve or even Wrath range easier than most units
poor roy :(
Roy doesn't have to deal with biorythem
@@RyanJW001 It's not bad for status effects if you don't have a restore staff
Since this is radiant dawn I will be taking a shot every time I hear megs name
Meg 💜
Um.... shut up Meg.
eww@@DaniDoyle
meg
Meg
Slighlty related but I love Micaiahs design. It has this absolutely wonder mix of simplicity while still being memorable and distinct.
Seeing her in Engage really shows off how much the style of the series has changed and how overdressed many of the engaged units are
Micaiah's design is top tier, a very good less is more approach and I like it, also the fact that all her tiers are very visually consistent, her scarf turns into a cape, her side sachel turns into a weird 3/4s skirt held up by jewellery so on and so forth
Engages designs are very visually loud but I enjoy them in the context of "this is a celebration of the entire franchise" since its a big party and love letter to the fans.
I still love every artist designs and interpretations, they make every game stand out and be unique in their own way
@@thatonejoey1847 Is it? Its a celebration to the fans? Because if its supposed to be, it does a very bad job at it.
Regardless of the quality of the game, the Emblems are for the most part reduced to FEH one liners and non-sequiturs that honestly feel like cheap pandering than anything special. Even marth, who uses half the box art's space, is entirely irrelevant to the game outside what gameplay benefits he can pass down.
@@torashiki5646 the emblems being simplified is more to do with them having voiced bond lines with every character, writting words is cheap, hiring VA's is expensive specially when you have a big names in both Japanese and English.
There are over 2500 voice lines for the bond dialogue along, to maintain the emblems character intact you would need add more than a simple sentence, which would make the VA budget balloon out of control, which means you would need to cut down on bond convos either only adding them to few preselected characters or making some of them not voiced (which wouldn't sit well with the new direction of story and supports being fully voiced).
And we can't disregard the gameplay when it is clearly superior to the slog that was three houses, yes the story was better but on repeat plays when I already know the story I won't really care about it except the big moments I'll rewatch because they are hype.
Three houses gameplay is so sluggish and maps so repetitive it made me never want to play three houses again, and I'm the type of weirdo that enjoys the vast plains of genealogy because I'm always thinking about things in the background while I move the army.
It did its job, you might not have liked it and that's fine, you can have your own opinion
@DreamyShyShy micaiah was always the very gentle and caring person who was too nice for her own good (she let Jarod go to bury his friend and so he can face trial in begnion instead of acting as an executioner), in the localisation (I cannot tell in the original jp script because I can't read Japanese) she has more sarcastic and sassy lines, the famous "Father of Sothe's children" is a pure localisation thing added to show her displeasure in a more direct manner, in the original script Ike is never mentioned till this sentence were yhe context around her makes her sound like as if she is sighing and rolling her eyes when referring to Ike.
In the localisation her personality can best be described as a beautiful rose with hidden thorns, I don't know Japanese so I can't tell what's her personality and what script IS chose to use when making engage.
Also in addition her personality in act 3 is not her normal self, she is stretched to her very limits during act 3, broken down and beaten continously, resulting in her doing more and more despicable acts to try to maintain her army and their morale from shattering because she knows that Daein is done for if they lose.
She goes catatonic when she thinks Sothe died when Tibarn was doing some 300 iq brinkmanship, it's Tauroneo who has to shout for a general retreat, not micaiah, she is currently on the floor unresponsive.
Every major character basically has their own version of "How is she the same priestess of dawn that liberated Daein?? Has she lost her mind? Has she gone insane?" Act 3 micaiah is so out of character that if she didn't have her friends anchoring her to reality she would have gone insane.
If you want actual insanity with wack writting look at Roy, since IS can't seem to decide if they like his Smash bros personality or his fe 6 personality and with fe6 there is no localisation to muddy the waters.
@DreamyShyShy Micaiah's interesting traits are brought out by her circumstances in RD. Her home country has been devastated by losing a war, the citizens are so impoverished that she has to lead a militia to keep them safe and she eventually has to come face to face with the guy responsible for all that, who just also happens to be the protagonist of the previous game. Throw in the whole deal with Pelleas and the blood pacts and her occasional use of dirty tactics in times of desperation and you have a pretty unconventionaly lord. None of those are really an issue in Engage, so she gets to be a lot more relaxed. I see Engage Micaiah as who she would be if she didn't have the weight of Daein on her shoulders at all times.
I personally take much more of an issue with Eirika's dialogue being 90% about her brother. My poor Renais twins, you both deserved better.
I think Micaiah and Leif Type lords that focus more around utility and support rather than raw stats are more intetresting. It shows that people around follow them out of respect for both them and their ideals, and would do anything to make them a reality
Tysm for this video, Micaiah is one of my favorite protagonists in any sort of media, and i really hope future games/Romhacks try to do smt different like her, because it's always a treat
I keep hearing people say Leif isn't good. Maybe my Leif was blessed.
I really appreciate you standing for Micaiah's role in gameplay as thoroughly and as analytically as you did. When you tackle the context of the maps, which is very much story-based, it emphasizes far more her uniqueness instead of her apparent badness, which was intended to be a goal with her overall design, so they did a great job.
Still, Yune's comment about "leaving the rest of the fighting to Micaiah" at the Tower will never be not hilarious.
challenge accepted
drive.google.com/file/d/1MyXpNf1JIcuMqHhRGYH2ksH2Hi2AWHb2/view?usp=sharing
I’m surprised this is still a relevant topic and that she’s still viewed as a bottom tier lord. It’s pretty obvious her utility puts her way ahead of like at least 5 lords
Hopefully this video helps put the issue to rest
A healing lord in a game with 8-use vulnaries sadly...
@@chaseong9560 Giant physic range though
I’ve been agreeing with the video so far, but this comment made me realize that all the GBA lords except Hector and Ephraim I have to force myself to use, but Micaiah always gets used no matter what.
@@chaseong9560 Well, Sigurd is a mounted lord in a game where a significant chunk of your gen 1 army (Alec, Noish, Lex, Midir, Erinys, temporarily Finn/Quan/Ethlyn) are also mounted but nobody disputes how powerful he is. Being a healer just means that your banged up units don't have to spend their turn on vulneraries and can use other actions.
For 1-9, I think the best thing you can do is just keep Michiah and the BK in their starting positions, then unequip the BK's sword. Even if they stand no chance of harming him, this still leads the enemy mobs to attack him over Michiah whenever possible. Then Miciah can pick the enemies off one by one with her magic. It is true that there's a lot of 1-2 range units, but so long as miciah can take one hit, she should be ok. I like to put resolve on her here, as it ups her speed enough to double most everyone.
I can appreciate miciah being a supportive lord, and being the second magic lord in the series is cool. I just will never be able to enjoy a force deployed unit with the defenses of an origami crane. The amount of weapons she can use is also kinda limited.
I'm at the 3-12 section and remembering my female only playthrough where I just had a stupidly overinvested tier 3 Jill Leroy Jenkins down the cliff and murder everything while Micaiah occasionally physiced her.
Wait... So early game is just micciah Laura Ilyanna and Meg until you get Jill 😳 that's so scary/funny
@@DaniDoyle It was rough until I got Jill. And by then all the others were ridiculously overleveled.
@@DaniDoyle To be fair I did make my ruleset fairly lenient to make it possible. My rule was that no male unit was ever allowed to be optionally deployed or gain a level on a force deployed map.
It's an old joke, but suddenly hearing Fiona and Meg while running off a list of "combat goddesses" got verbal laughs out of me
I haven't gotten the chance to play RD, but I really do like Micaiah. Her design is great, very cute and simple but clean, I really like her being a mage lord and her unique powers like future sight are pretty cool. If only these games were more easily accessible because I've developed quite the soft spot for her
It's easy to emulate tho
I see this focused entirely on gameplay. I'm more interested in character analysis rather than utility as a unit (you did not need to convince me at all) but I appreciate how in depth you went. Vitriol against Micaiah seems overblown, from the last time I bothered to interact with the FE community at least, so I'll take anything pro Micaiah at this point haha. Nice video
I do character videos too (theres a playlist of them on my channel, i th it only has 2 rn but more coming soon) but this one was more unit based, ye
Due to Micaiah's required status in the tower, I have always tended to train throughout the game (I feel like it is relatively easy to 20/20 before entering the tower). And I have to agree so many DB maps feel much more manageable when I utilize Micaiah for her strengths.
Honestly, this convinced me that Micaiah would be an incredible lord in Binding Blade to replace Roy. High hit, high magic into enemies with much lower res, triple effective tome all sound great. Basically Lilina with a unique utility and effective tome. There are a few things I would change about Micaiah and the game around her:
-Her growths are extremes. While that tends to be a good thing in RD (Mia, Nephenee, Aran, Haar), the ones she chose to invest in are… interesting. Her growths are highest in Magic, good attack stat but Tellius does limit Magic’s power a lot, luck, a stat that caps at 30 when in a tier 1/2 class and 40 in her tier 3, and resistance, which someone told me recently is the worst stat in Fire Emblem. I could say just give her more speed, hp, skill, and defense and call it, but not only would people who use her probably not want that, I don’t think she needs that. Quite literally, just lower the caps a bit in her classes. She usually doesn’t hit level 20 in those classes so the lower caps don’t really reduce how much magic she might have when endgame rolls around, it just gives her a way to patch up her weakest areas with bexp, a tool a good amount of the roster can use very well but she cannot.
-Micaiah has such little HP at base for someone with a power that benefits off HP. Quite simply change Leonardo’s Draco shield to be a Seraph robe. It doesn’t innately make her better or buffed, but it gives her a tool she can make good use out of early (would +2 def save her life? Probably not. Would +7 hp do that? Maybe, with the added benefit that it might also save someone else’s).
-Part 3 sucks for grinding her up. Her best way to kill is to Thany bomb armor knights, but she has a whole 1 chapter where there’s even armor knights in the first place. This combined with her promotion only setting her to C light magic means she might not even get to use Purge on 3-13. 3-12 also has Pegasus knights, which aren’t that bad for most of your army, but high speed and res are really all you need to spook Micaiah. Either restructure things in Part 3, or even Part 4 so enemies aren’t so dense, dangerous to her in particular, and aren’t as far away or surrounded by so much terrain that you just say screw it and send Jill and Haar to do everything.
-Tower is fine for her, she could even Nos tank and double some of the red dragons on my last run. Just feels bad to be a good unit surrounded by a combination of 10 of the greatest units in the series or grinded up combat gods, a dancer, and Ike.
cope@@butteredsalmonella
... it's been a long time, but I definitely remember consistently giving Micaiah a Seraph Robe in part 1 somewhere. It does so much for her.
... where did I get it? >.>
@@someguy1ification ch 4, apparently
I played RD at launch, well before joining the FE community. Initial impressions of Micaiah were bad and on my first run I didn't even use her enough to get her to Physic or Purge by 3-13 where she's locked behind the defense point.
Over time I definitely come to appreciate her far more, though. Light mage lets her contribute from safety reliably and is exceptionally accurate. Sacrifice negates the need for a restore staff, Thani does the rapier job better than any Rapier variant in the franchise, and Dark affinity is really valuable for avoid and attack, helping Sothe early and a unit of your choice later on, since she's force deployed anyway you may as well make use of her.
I think you got Mandela Effected, Micciah gets physic at base (its C in radiant dawn, as opposed to B from the GBA games)
Regardless glad to hear you're coming around to the church of micciah
🤓actually the FE1 Raiper is super overpowered, and easily the most successful version of the weapon. 🤓
Just because a unit is deployed shouldn't be reason to use them; simplest way to prove that is if a game gives you a unit that does 0 damage, can easily die, and has 0 utility access and costs 10% of your current Gold to move or attack with, you'd simply be better off not using them. You should use them for a better reason, the simplest one being you like the character.
@@hazelv.a.7976 if a unit is force deployed and can do anything worthwhile not using them for it is waste.
to be fair, Micaiah blows pretty hard on easy mode because her "unique utility" simply isn't needed there. Its an interesting case of a unit actually being *better* on higher difficulties (and not as a result of having stat boni on hardmode like FE6 Rutger)
I think it's because a "Lord" or any protagonist should have an outstanding feature during the story, at least to most people (I don't agree with this notion, but general opinion is important to take into account).
Gameplay makes this harder because you have to take into account balancing (Lest you get Nosferatu Robin tanking). She's definitely "Usable", but a protagonist being usable isn't exactly something that a player would like. It's the reason why Roy is vitriolically loathed by almost all of FE6 players. Normally, you can just bench units that are hard to keep alive, but the fact that you are essentially "Burdened" with Micaiah makes her good aspects not balance out the burden of needing to keep her alive. You are never thinking "oh man, that was a SICK heal Micaiah!" you are instead thinking "Ugh, is there anywhere she can heal where she won't even get NEAR an enemy so I don't have to deal with resetting this stupid chapter?"
She's probably one of the biggest victims of "Unit feel" imo. Just interesting to think about WHY players react the way they do to certain aspects of the game.
TL;DR Micaiah is not a bad lord, it's Radiant Dawn that is a mess. They should have made her the lord of Sacred Stones instead
I'm playing through Radiant Dawn again, and I have been appreciating Micaiah
"Everyone's favorite combat goddess: Fiona."
😂😂😂
It's also so cool that a mage that can heal at base along with a thief that does not need a lockpick are your starting lord & Jagen. I immediately was so on-board for a change in the sword fighter & paladin template
As someone who thinks that radiant dawn is not only peak FE but one of my favorite games of all time, I am always happy to see some micaiah love. She is by far the most interesting lord in the whole series
imo FE5 Leif/Leaf can keep up with her in terms of being interesting, but other than that, she certainly is. I think that having your lord character be a unit that isn't good at combat but has certain unique supportive aspects going for them works really well in fire emblem. It turns that lord into a unit that you have to protect but also *want* to protect as doing so allows you to reap the rewards of that lord's utility.
5:55 A Leo Cancel proc psychic damage. Whichever joker in the dev room gave that to the archer instead of pretty much anything else needs to do some soul searching.
I actually just finished a video about Leonardo (it won't be up for a month tho) and I mentioned how evil cancel is
@@DaniDoyle When the game first came out it kind of pissed me off but it's grown on me and nowadays I think its one of the funniest things in the series. I did a gimmick run years ago where I went out of my way to proc it in situations where it actually stopped him from taking damage. Good times.
I just recently found you and I like this because she is one of my favorite characters in the series
I'm surprised there was no mention of the various Sacrifice + Low HP skill strats! These may seem like a gimmick but, if you consider all of them at once, they make Micaiah a much more versatile (and fun!) unit than she may otherwise appear to be at first glance. All of these strategies are something that is essentially unique to her in Radiant Dawn, and I happen to love talking about them.
There are many reasons why you may not wish to keep Wrath on Edward, regardless of whether you want to actually use him, and there are stretches of the game where you can simply assign the skill to Micaiah instead enabling her to score kills here and there that she otherwise wouldn't have been able to. She is already so frail that it's difficult to let her tank even a single hit, so not much is lost by giving her the skill instead of, say, Nolan or Zihark (or keeping it on Edward himself) who may very well suffer from success and get themselves killed by a poorly timed Wrath critical.
My favorite map to do this in is 1-4, as that lets her score OHKO's on some tigers, lightening the load for the rest of the team as well as awarding her with a nice amount of additional experience.
Another skill that is more realistically helpful is Resolve. It's a 15 capacity skill that Tauroneo joins with; the only units who can equip it other than him are units with at least 20 capacity, as unequippable skills always cost at least 5 capacity of their own. The speed boost it grants is of no use to Tauroneo himself: he already doubles any enemy in Part I without it, not to mention he isn't even deployable for most of it, despite being in your army. That leaves you with any early-promoted units, Sothe, Zihark and Volug who can use the skill. There's arguments to be made for each of them to be given Resolve (Volug may need it for his speed to stay competitive in late Part I; Zihark, Sothe and similar units could stack avoid to some effect or increase their proc chances for other skills). However, Micaiah is always an option regardless of team composition and because of her generally lackluster speed stat she stands to gain the most from it, doubling her already impressive damage output.
Of course, she will always be limited to making use of this during Player Phase, but if you're feeling really spicy she can even dodge-tank enemies with shoddy accuracy, provided she is supported by Sothe (+15Avo), terrain bonuses and perhaps even biorhythm. It's definitely not something she can do every playthrough, but it's fun to pull off! One place she can do this is Chapter 1-6-2, on the western side of the map against the cavaliers that attack with ranged weapons. There is a patch of grass she can use to great effect for this and Sothe already has some business there to pick up the hidden Master Seal.
Finally, she is the only Tier 1 unit who can equip Paragon! You can certainly give the skill to any character you choose to early promote in order for their experience gains to stay relevant and let them continue to improve, but because of its limited pool of potential users there's some gaps where Micaiah can take it instead. She doesn't even need to fight for it to be relevant, as Sacrifice already gives some experience of its own. It's pretty neat!
Usually, I give it to her for Chapter 1-7, as Jill is unavailable during it and it's an indoor map with some helpful ledges as well as a good amount of enemy armor knights for her to OHKO with Thani. This is usually enough to ensure my Micaiahs reach the level cap before the end of Part I, which isn't essential but it's nice to maximize her chances of being useful even later on. Of course, Paragon on Micaiah is also free for Chapter 1-9, but she may not make too much use of it given the circumstances.
These last two skills are particularly helpful to allow Micaiah to stay on-level during Part I, which translates into more chances for her to hit nice thresholds in later parts of the game, even without having caught up to the Greil Mercenaries yet. Her magic stat has a tremendously high growth, so even if the Resolve thresholds late into the game remain out of reach for her, she can still aim for oneshots (4-P is a good place in which she can use either approach, as most enemies are horse units and thus slow enough to be doubled or, sometimes, even OHKO'd outright). To this end, her A support with Sothe is also useful. It's 2 points of damage, but those *can* make a difference!
As one last note, one often overlooked aspect of Sacrifice is that it cures status conditions and can be used even if Micaiah is silenced or if the target's HP is at max. This is mainly helpful in 4-3 and 4-E-1, as enemy status staves can be a big annoyance and this frees up your restore staff to be used by another healer, essentially nullifying most of the potential status effects you'd otherwise have to deal with. It's small, but it's something you always have access to for free and it's an extra convenience!
anyways this was a nice video :D but you didn't need to do poor edward so dirty like THAT
This! I love giving her Wrath and then later Resolve and a better support. Volug, Nolan and Zihark are all ideal candidates to give her more avoid than Sothe, and she really doesn't need the hit as Light tomes + her high skill and luck growths are overkill. At first these skills help her one-round many units she can't otherwise double and Sacrifice makes setting that up free where other units need to get hit to potentially trigger them.
In part 3, you can give Resolve to her support partner so they can be safer at the front lines while she heals, but I also like to give her Wrath back here so she can score some kills with crits.
The thing with her growths is that they lean so heavily on magic, skill, luck and resistance that she caps those with relative ease and can then use bexp to get her speed and defense up. In part 4, she can take resolve back and stand on a +def tile and with her support she can actually fight. On Normal this is completely safe and I have done the same on Hard. I like to use the BK map to train her as the other units have had the maps before the tower to reach a high enough level already but she can also take on part of the first tower map especially if you put her next to Kurth for the defense boost.
Of course this is favouritism but it's the safest way to make her contribute with more than just staves, even though I agree that just staves and Purge alone make her a good enough lord.
I understand wanting to point out Micaiah’s strengths, but is this really an opinion that isn’t already pretty prevalent? I feel like Micaiah is one of the most straightforward to understand units in RD. She’s a good staffer who can occasionally be used as a delete button with Thani, and she dies to a stiff breeze from a physical unit. While I suppose people do debate over how useful staffing actually is in RD, I think people will correctly rate Micaiah according to however useful they feel staffing is, plus her early Thani combat contributions. She just doesn’t really scream “underrated” to me.
I gave a Micaiah cosplayer a hug in 2014. Micaiah supremecy.
I think what people miss out on is that staffers are kinda similar to dancers, just their stats do matter a bit more, but they’re good because they do something that benefits your other units, their stats and combat don’t necessarily matter outside of staff calculations or if you find yourself unable to keep them safe. And staff utility isn’t as inherently powerful as dancing. So like, her being effectively one of 2 healers in her army for a large part of the game should make it obvious that she’s good at least. But that’s just my take.
I agree with the overall idea of "good in earlygame, is mostly just a staffbot for the rest of the game". But I don't think that puts her as high as you seem to think she is. She's fine, and she's not a complete escort mission like roy. But if she wasn't force deployed, I'd drop her in pretty much every playthrough like a lot of other mediocre lords. But beyond that, the fact that she's a glass cannon that can't even kill people past part one really leaves her with a really bad taste in many people's mouths.
If she wasn't forced she would be worse, but forced deployment makes her free during the the point in the game where slots are tightest. Her lord status is an upside, not a downside.
@@DaniDoyleyeah I think that’s the weird thing, I see how you look at performance first numbers second. Force deployment means that you may as well let a unit contribute in whatever way they can.
I think it’s definitely a better way to look at the game, because Micaiah is a force deployed unit inarguably. Even if some other staff unit has better stats.
People are like ''Micaiah is so bad'' and then ask how to cheese a game with staves.
Edward slander kills me, I use him every run!
Must have had really bad luck with Edward because he is almost always great in my runs.
"She's much more of a Chrom than an Eliwood"
So what you're saying is that she's a harem protagonist?
looking to sothe and pelleas* ...maybe?
I mostly agree with the analysis, but those were some bold statements at the end. Arguably top 15? Not just better, but significantly better than Mia and Gatrie? Maybe if you’re leaning very hard into the argument that harder maps = better contributions (which I don’t buy into myself) but I don’t see how your arguments mean she’s better than Mia at all, much less significantly better (Gatrie maybe there’s a case for better, but definitely not significantly better)
Mia is fine but she's quite overrated (pretty girl syndrome)
This is a really good analysis! You brought up a lot if points i never really considered, like how she helps deal with that really scary boss in 1-4.
I always thought micaiah was alright in the early game but falls off HARD like nearly the rest of the dawn brigade after part 1. But im surprised about the things you said she could do in part 3!
The first 3 times I played the game she was my MVP
Pretty good for me. Without investment she deal good damage. Can kill or setup kill for other units. She had her utility and finally had some plot armor where some boss in the tower can't hurt her
It always struck me as weord that the unit that gives you a game over if they die is also a frontline fighter in all other fire emblem games.
Micaiah is far more fitting for a commander, actually supporting her army instead of leading the charge
Good gameply
I mean effective tome weapon, staff access, and a lot of availability is good. Pretty sure its just because of how radiant dawn was setup is why her and all the dawn brigade was disliked.
the BK map is just free EXP for micaiah whenever I play.
So you're saying she's basically Pent?
/s
Yes
No she has no horse pursuit or bows
This is a common mistake
micaiah is my guilty pleasure unit. i LOVE using her, and she is my favorite lord gameplay wise. but i fully admit she is not a good unit, which sucks especially because of how tailor made she is for bonus exp abuse.
She has a few flaws
1. she's very squishy. she dies to anything, which is fine because thats just part of being a magic unit, but this game is packed full of only physical units.
2. Shes a caster in radiant dawn. i dont know if its just magic sucks because the tomes are bad, too far into the game or if its just enemies has way higher resistances, but mages seem to deal very very little damage in this game.
3. oh my god is this girl SLOOOOOW, and i mean even a hillariously speed blessed micaiah is likely not doubling much. but it goes even deeper, i had a run recently with a micaiah with capped speed, and she STILL couldnt double anything in the endgame outside of generals and some red dragons.
4. bad promotion times, you mentioned it, but it really needs to be sold how awful her promotion times are. she gets her promotions right before the game gives you some MASSIVE difficulty spikes. Her first promoted map is 3-6 a map FILLED TO THE BRIM with physical units that all likely one round her unless you banked all of your bonus exp in part 1 to spend on her here and all have a massive movement lead on you. now she gains access to staffs here, but that doesn't feel like enough. then her third promotion comes right before endgame starts, and again, runs into 3 maps with lots of physical units that all almost one round her.
5. low skill capacity. this is part of the promotion times problem, but you cant almost never really abuse any strong skill combinations on her because she is never in tier 3 to have enough capacity to use multiple skills.
6. light mage/light sage/light priestess are all just bad classes, light magic outside of thani is all just generally bad thanks to its low might and high costs to forge, and the stat caps feel..... lackluster at best. she is essentially a saint with a slight magic cap boost, and a slight speed cap boost, which mind you, saint isnt a very strong class either.
7. micaiah's biggest crutch is her staff utility. but this is a game where almost every other magic unit in the game starts off with staves, and thus doesnt need to promote to use them, but not only that, they almost all come with higher staff ranks than micaiah gets after she promotes.
The investment unless you really like her, just isnt worth while. even a fully stat capped micaiah is a little dissapointing compared to even an average physical unit.
I dont think she earns much from being the 2nd best unit in the dawn brigade as she barley is. Id argue nolan is better for part 1 and shes barley better than illyana or Leonardo for most of act 1. Act 3 she is basically a staff bot which while helpful is not best unit material when compared to jill who can fly around and solo a part of the map with some vulns. Part 4 she also is just a staff bot except its less special now. Tower is no different unless you bless a purge in which she can be quite useful for ranged chip. Basically the dawn brigade is soo bad she barely manages 3rd best because she does Slightly more damage at Slightly more accuracy. Compared to ike who while not the best or even on the podium for the greil mercenaries, thats more due to them being much stronger and doesn't mean that ike isn't super strong hes just Slightly worse than his peirs which for greil mercenaries is still an accomplishment
Micacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacacah
Very harsh on path of radiance ike throughout. Ike is a good unit, has the speed to avoid, the defence to tank and can hit like a truck. His real sin is being overrated, since he is a sword locked walking unit. absolutely not being bad though.
Miccaiah as the argument you made probably isn’t actually a bad unit but she feels bad since her death is a loss condition and she is so frail she gets 1 shot by most enemies int he game. Because of that, there is a feeling that she is bad since despite being your lord, you need to hide her away and just use staves.
While I totally agree she’s underrated, I do think she’s quite missable throughout the game. Her being able to do anything on the most difficult chapters of Maddening- it being so difficult because every character has very limited weapons and items usage before you can better equip them, is essentially a bare minimum expectation. She would be the worst Lord if in her debut she couldn’t function at all.
Edward and Aran on Maddening certainly require extra work to be viable, but their viability isn’t questionable, whereas Micaiah is just a glass canon that has very poor timed Class changes.
It’s probably easier to only use her for random sacrifices or random kills than to put effort into her over stronger combat units. I have had playthroughs where she is class changing at low levels and it didn’t hinder me.
The one strategy I love doing with Micaiah is that if she gets really good speed stats early on, you can give her Resolve and if she’s in low health, she will not only dodge a lot of enemies (especially if you’re with Sothe and have the Daunt skill equipped) but she will automatically one round most enemies on Enemy Phase.
Now if you want see Micaiah just being straight up S tier, Radiant Dawn Exalted is your bag
23:21
I find it offensive to name this axe “Boucheron.”
That axe actually does damage and hits the enemy.
Its a clever reference to the fact boucherons most valuable contribution is you can give his axe to someone else
If you give Micaiah all of the stat boosters… and keep her next to Sothe… her insane luck and earth infinity get her quite dodgy. Tried this once and it was pretty darn fun
i played RD and finally commited to finish it and god i loved it, micaiah as a lord is pretty amazing, simple design but has it charm and good lore and development shes so pure and really cares about her people and does everything for them
She's worth the effort to make the most of the unit slot she will always take, similarly to her sister. I think she's great anyway though
Is that Fiona replaced with the model for a generic Bengion soldier? 🤣
I was just thinking about this. When I first played, I thought the speed was regrettable but like she deals big damage and heals.
It's a great design and a creative take on a lord unit and despite endgame potential the Dawn Brigade is just fun to train!
Yeah, there's no way having 2 range and staves allows Miciah to share a tier with Roy.
2:47 Why is that? His averages according to Serenes Forest are great!
I didn't even need convincing.
24:55 *true gamer, used the japanese name
That's cool and all but Lyn is the best lord
Micaiah is my favorite character in fe.
Thani bombs are so satisfying imo
First of all: Sorry if this comment share ideas from others. I don't want to check 100+ comments for that matter.
Second, Soren is better than Yliana unless you invest a lot, a LOT.
Third and most important, she's not a bad lord in the sense of filling a forced deploy slot with staff utility. She'd be bad if Lords weren't forced deployed (Lyn/Eliwood 👀).
4th would be that to sum it up she is bad unit because I'm always setting up kills for her trying to get lvl 20 before promoting unlike other lords that stay at 20 for a while.
5th Aran is better not from the start but on Meg's joining chapter or next if you don't like low % crits.
6th Part 3 Ch 13 healing and purge could still be used for 2/3 turn but aside that she can reach the tiles above the ledge for physic.
7th Archsage on tower can do better with bolting, flare for melee sometimes, and heal more on the last map as someone needs to heal her or heal more another unit.
To finish, Micaiah is forced utility that I take for granted.
You know you don't need to get her to level 20 right? She promotes automatically, and her stats are practically irrelevant for anything after part 1, so if you choose to set up kills for her, that's not really an indication that she's a bad unit, since she doesn't need them to function.
As far as arcsages in the tower, I disagree that they would be better even if she wasn't free (again I don't think stats matter for your healer) but it's beside the point because she doesn't take up a slot in the tower and they do. You generally don't need more than one staffer in the tower and she is a free staffer in the tower, inherently making her better than them at the "tower staffer" role because she doesn't cost a team slot.
@@DaniDoyle
I know she promotes automatically. It's the feeling between not getting lvl 20 on a lord to staying at lvl 20 for a while. That her combat doesn't seem to improve over the time is dissapointing. And it's not just not reach lvl 20, it's also weapon rank. I wanted to Nostank but she usually needs an arm scroll. (and speed to not get double).
I need someone to heal her from AoEs. And sometimes fortify isn't enough. Of course Elincia is the better choice. I like 1/2 range but can't commit to not blessed Amiti.
In Tower, I equipped all magic user with siege tome. So they get unlimited uses of siege tomes XD
It's very fun!
wait why Lyn bad? yes shes glass cannon, but she rarely gets hits and would crit/double everyone.
Most of the cast can double fe7 enemies, and lyn does not reliably dodge or crit (she doesn't even have a crit bonus) meaning she deals very little damage and is often one or two rounded
I literally always made ilyana my #1
Whats the music at 29:30?
In 1-P, Edward is guaranteed to double the first chunk of Brigands, and then can also double the ones who roll up on speed (if any) if he gets a speed level along the way himself. That's not guaranteed, of course, but his overall expected damage output is a lot better than Micaiah's. With careful positioning and healing item use, he can just about solo the map, though obviously there's no reason not to use Micaiah and she definitely contributes significantly.
Aran might not be great but I love to train him anyway
Honestly that's so based 💜
Strap-on in??
I definitely agree with your conclusions about Micaiah. She a very good player phase attacker and support character whose utility drops off but never really goes away as long as you keep up investment in her. Her biggest flaw is being a mage, being in an entry that really nerfs magic, and being in an entry that also has some of the series's most broken units. Everything else is that Radiant Dawn is really trying to have the story match the game play conditions, which really, really works against gameplay for the Dawn Brigade. You're entire discussion of the Dawn Brigade itself had some interesting points, including some that I never hear talked about and some that I simply hear talked down. Though this did expect me to learn something new about Fiona; it took me a bit to realize that was sarcasm.
As for 1-9, I think the map has an extra level of puzzle to it: for everyone in the Dawn Brigade, experience is a very valuable resource, and this map is the a big old dump of experience straight onto Micaiah... if you use her. The puzzle isn't just keeping her alive but also maximizing her experience gain which means minimizing kills given to the Black Knight. Now, the Black Knight always takes the most kills, but Micaiah can get much needed experience her, especially if you're planning for it and have leaned into training other units more so before then. Knowing that 3-6 is coming, I always try to get Micaiah as close to level 20 as possible and everyone else as close as possible by the end of 3-7 so they can promote during Part 1 End Game. This is much easier to do on easier difficulties, and more an ideal to strive towards on Hard.
While I do think Micaiah is underated overall I think you are highly overrating her in this video. You don't mention the early dracoshield and energy drop, which you will generally give to Nolan or Edward to improve their performance. Another issue is that while she may be more accurate early on, you typically will want to have her chip the enemies since she can't be counter attacked, while somone like Nolan can. This makes it difficult for her to keep up exp wise since she won't get kills. She will also be unable to one shot armour knights if she she misses too many magic level ups, or is not kept approiatly leveled. One final point is that she cannot make use of forges, since tomes are incredibly expensive to forge for some reason. So while she is overall decent, she is just is not that great in part one, and whoever you train in part three will become far stronger than her.
Her magic growth is 80%. Assuming she misses "too many" magic level ups feels unfair in an analysis of a units expected performance. Anyone will be worse off if stat screwed, but even at base she one shots knights tor a while. As far as stat boosters, those are also debatable. Honestly giving them to Edward or Nolan feels like a waste, since those are units whose usefulness is mostly confined to the early game (especially Edward) and neither gains a lot from a minor stat boost at that time. i typically save them for Jill or Zihark, as both units benefit from minor stat boosts quite a bit, or send them to the Greil Mercs if I feel spicy.
@@DaniDoyle On hard mode she will typically do around exact damage on armour knights in the latter half of act 1, so her being just one or two points below average will actually prevent her from one shotting (which was my orignal point, sorry I wasn't clear). As for the stat boosters while I see the point in waiting to give them to Jill, giving them to Nolan can make the early game much easier. Making part one easier is a much better use of those items, espically if you find chapter 3 the hardest chapter.
In casual runs I like to spam sacrifice with paragon equipped on Micaiah in 1-7 for easy experience. Especially if I’m training goddesses Fiona, Meg, or untransformed Vika.
It’s funny to have Micaiah solo 1-9 with Resolve.
I like hearing that, Triangle Strategy music at the end? Has a similar audio esthetic to Radiant Dawn's soundtrack too.
you can equip Micaiah with a slim lance and slim sword/ poison sword so the Black Knight doesnt one shot everyone
Leonardo is a good target for XP? I have played through RD multiple times and never once has Leonardo turned out well for me, and not for lack of trying
I like to think that Micaiah is their take of early game Louise and Pent from FE7 though asahme that there isn’t lot of dark mages in vanilla radiant dawn where Micaiah shines the most. Heck no reversal light times against anima either :/
I will never understand why hard mode gets rid of weapon triangle.
Weapon Triangle is a mechanic that almost always benefits the player (its rock paper scissors but you know what move your opponent is using) so removing it makes the game harder.
@DaniDoyle It does, but it's also rewarding to use, and it felt like a core mechanic
Micaiah is okay but when it comes to underrated FE lords
ROY IS MY BOY!
Considering this is the Fire Emblem game that hates Mages, it is something that Micaiah can still perform pretty well. I admit I used to hate Micaiah from both a character and unit perspective, but I've come around on both ends on her. She's hardly my favourite in either regard, but I definitely like her more than the likes of Roy.
I love that you named Jill’s axe Boucheron 😊
Wow, I really disagree with giving Micaiah exp over Edward in 1-P. I mean, do what you want obviously, but Micaiah doesn't need investment to do what she can do (chip damage, Thani bombing, and staff botting later on), whereas early Edward level ups can help quite a bit in the next few chapters.
I do think getting Leo to level 10 is nice, though the Lughnasadh is generally good enough in part 3, especially if you have Crossbows on Nolan.
I also disagree with Edward as the weakest unit in 1-1. I would put him second behind Nolan. Yes, you can have Nolan occupy one-tile chokepoints and not use Edward at all, but it's a lot faster and more effective imo to use both of them - Edward on one-tile chokepoints where he takes one hit and counters, and Nolan can face 2-3 enemies. This leaves more space for Micaiah and Leo to chip from the back. Also, I'd have to check the enemy stats (which are variable anyway), but I think if you've focused your 1-P exp on Edward, he's reasonably likely to double some of the axe users in this chapter. I would agree with rating Micaiah ahead of Leo, though.
Haha and I also disagree with putting Micaiah on the same level as Nolan in 1-2. Nolan is on the struggle bus for sure, but you'd be absolutely hosed without him. No one else can really take hits until Sothe shows up - certainly Micaiah can't. Edward can a little bit, depending on whether you've invested in him and enemy stat rolls, but not on a repeated basis. And while Nolan's accuracy is deplorable, he does have the highest non-Sothe damage output as well. I can see the argument for Micaiah >= Edward for this chapter, though mostly I think it just doesn't matter - Nolan saves the rest of the team from getting pulverized, and then Sothe shows up and wipes the map, and no one else's contributions really matter much. The only caveat to this is that if you want to move quickly and get the bottom two chests (i.e. Sothe is too busy to do it), Edward is generally the only one who can go down and engage the myrmidon without getting doubled.
Also, imo Sacrifice is basically irrelevant from this point forward. Honestly I'm not convinced it's ever really relevant. It's generally better for Micaiah to be dealing damage.
The A Support is definitely relevant in general, but not so much in 1-2. Sothe can deal enough damage with the Kard to one round every enemy except the boss if that's what you want him to do, and Micaiah is far enough away that he's going to have to twiddle his thumbs to wait for her to be in range.
Thani's great but giving Micaiah credit for it in 1-2 is odd, you can just ignore the boss, and the main value of killing him is Micaiah exp, which is kind of circular to the argument of her being good.
Micaiah killing the boss in 1-3 is also not very important. If you go down the right side of the map it's pretty easy to never need to fight him (also this just makes the map easier in general and I think it's very much not the hardest map). Also, he doesn't drop his Discipline scroll if you kill him, so the easiest way to deal with him if you want it is to bait him with Sothe the turn before you escape, then steal with Sothe and have Micaiah escape.
Getting Micaiah to level 8 or 9 by 1-3 is wild. I guess I can see why you'd look favorably on her performance if you're showing her that much favoritism. If you're playing quickly it's quite easy for her to earn less than one level per map.
Overall, really nobody other than Sothe is doing much of importance here. Enemies are strong, everyone but Sothe is garbage, much better units are on the way in a couple chapters, so all that really matters is getting whoever you want to Master Seal to level 10 (and Nolan starts really close anyway). I could see Micaiah being the second best unit simply for supporting Sothe and her ability to kill the armor knight on the escape tile, I guess.
You really don't need anyone but Sothe to wipe the enemies in the south in 1-4. Beast Killer lets him one round everything, and the enemy density is low enough that he's never really in danger so long as you use a vulnerary at the right times. Plus he's got a solid chance to crit and avoid a counter attack on player phase. Thanks to the pits, it's even possible to have him do a lot of the combat in range of Micaiah's support without putting her in danger (though that will generally mean she isn't contributing any actual attacks). This leaves the rest of your army free to choke the point at the top, which is valuable b/c the additional units up there mean you can get through the enemies and to the northern chests more quickly, so that Sothe can focus on picking up the Master Seal and the Beastfoe (just ignore the Pure Water).
If you approach the chapter this way, I think Nolan and Micaiah are pretty similar in value - which is to say, most everyone but Sothe is pretty interchangeable and unimportant. But I think if you are playing the chapter more "normally", Nolan easily outperforms Micaiah with access to forges. Being able to actually take hits is valuable, and means he can effectively deal significantly more damage thanks to enemy phase (given the right matchups, though if you're investing heavily in Micaiah rather than Nolan, I suppose he might not be able to take so many hits).
1-9 is trash and I agree that it doesn't make too much sense to hold it against Micaiah.
When you kept saying Edward was like the worst on these maps i was like:
Wait Edward doesn't suck that bad!! He-
Oh wait... Weapon triangle doesn't exist on the highest difficulty... Yeah Edward sucks lol.
to be fair, he would suck with the triangle as well.
Literally my fav game as a teen
Micaiah's strength growth is too low for my liking. (Women with high strength growth make me feel funny.)
Really nice breakdown! Michaiah has been one of my favorite units in all of FE since my 2nd playthrough of RD :) Her design choice is so interesting, and she comes with a lot of utility while still forcing you to protect her. Most (all?) other lords are either destroying swathes of enemies on their own, or getting benched with no utility beyond seize/convoy.
Michaiah actually does have really decent stats if you train her (and I'm always a sucker for Ests), especially because she hits a couple caps super early so she can reliably bexp abuse to max speed and get some much-needed bulk. This can let her feed a lot of exp on 1-9, so I've usually gotten her all 20 levels before her forced promotion. If she's getting all her levels, she definitely can contribute in part 3. With support and some grass, I'm often comfortable frontlining her because of her avoid.
Sacrifice is also such a great skill. For one, it can double the exp gained from healing, if your other healer has nothing better to do. It replaces the recover stat (although that option is not so significant in RD because you have more slots, and there aren't a ton of status effects anyway). Sacrifice also sets up wrath/resolve with purge, which is one of my favorite ways to play part 4 :)
Enjoyed your analysis. Stay safe out there
33:58 Glory to Arstotzka!
i need to know, what is the romhack at 45:00
Code of Burger King
I think another funny thing to point out in Micaiah's favour is that Thani, her personal tome that she gets 2 of in Part 1 (for *!!90!!* uses total), is the second strongest light tome in the game (that the player can use) before we even take its supereffective damage multipliers in to account.
It is also as strong as Arcwind (and thus 1 mt stronger and weaker than Arcthunder and Arcfire, respectively). And with how slow Radiant Dawn mages are, Micaiah being 10 points behind the rest really doesn't matter - none of them are doubling anyways, and shouldn't be getting hit.
She is easily as effective if not better than any other magic user you could possibly be putting on the field at any point in the game.
ALSO! 24:51 not a fake gamer because Ettard is the Japanese name of the Black Knight's sword. Localisation arbitrarily just changed some of the names around for no reason.
Micaiah was my only character to max her stats in every category, and she did so at around 20/20/10.
... now I have to go check to see how her stat caps are relative to everyone else, lol.
edit:... and I definitely remember using a Seraph Robe on her in part 1 when I played, so she wasn't always in danger of dying and could then vacuum up tons of xp on 1-9.
If you know what you're doing, Micaiah is so fun and unique. I like to give Micaiah infinite Nosferatu for Endgame 3. With resolve, vantage, and support bonuses from Sothe (I give Sothe Shade/Stillness and he's fine), she can take on all the dragons by herself (not the boss tho). I love running Micaiah on the front line in that chapter. I also had her solo over half the units in Part 4-Prologue.
used to do that as well but figured that you don't really need the infinite nosferatu. Just having the two nosferatus is usually enough for me.
And it allows me to instead go for infinite purge
Eh, as somebody who has played RD countless times on all difficulties I personally don't have any issue using Micaiah, or any members of the Dawn Brigade as they've turned out good most of the time I've played.
Micaiah does a have a few flaws like being really slow, fragile and support dependable but they're pretty forgettable when I think about what she contributes to the team.
Overall, I think she's a great unit who just needs a bit a of patience from the player to get used to.
Shes fine but the games availability issues and how late she promotes holds her back. Shes also very squishy
It feels weird to penalize her for availability considering she's around for every chapter of the dawn brigade. Its like saying Sigurd or Seliph have bad availability, for missing half the game. Radiant Dawn is just structured differently than a traditional fire emblem.
@@DaniDoyle it's an issue with a lot of characters in radiant dawn, even the ones with high availability can be very hard to properly train if the chapters they are available for don't give good combat opportunities.
In part 1 shes incredibly squishy and a very high risk unit to use so its difficult to get her in good combat scenarios, and if you do level her enough to reliably fight.
When you get her back in part 3 is where the issues begin because two of the missions you get her in, its functionally impossible to even use her apart from some healing, the worst way to gain exp. She'll inevitably be way behind by part 4 so you end up having to dump huge amounts of exp into her to keep her viable, and even then her speed is so low that she will never double.
By the end of part 4 she might have gotten to a point where she can enter the final chapter as a level 1 third class, a mere 10-15 levels behind what the rest of your army is likely at, and in the final few acts of the laster chapter you're almost entirely fighting enemies with crazy high resistance.
So while she can deal decent damage if you level her up well, and sacrifice is a very nice skill to have, she ends up being only available at times she's not an ideal unit to use, and once you do get her good shes fighting enemies she can't damage.
I mean I definitely disagree whith that assessment. As I broke down in the video, the part one match is structured in a way that are very conducive to Glass cannons, and her stats don't especially matter when she transitions to a utility role.
@@DaniDoyle if she's only a utility role then pretty much every other staff user is better than her. It's not a good showing for a lord of the game. You have much more opportunity to train Laura for staff use. You get Elincia in part 4 who is objectively the best staff user due to flying super canto. Usually the main character of a fire emblem game is among the top units in the game and she ends up being kind of mid.
Laura is around for less time than micaiah, does not get a free slot in the tower, has lower stats and slower experience gain. Micaiah gets physic at base I'm confused what Laura offers over micaiah. As far as Valencia she's missing for the majority of the game and also takes up a tower slot. I agree that if you bring her in the tower she's better at being a rescue user, but those are the only maps where she overlaps with micaiah, and the free slot utility from micaiah is its own form of outside. Micaiah isn't as good as someone like Chrome or Byleth, but she's by no means a bad unit, and significantly better than most Lords who come before her.
Finally SOMEONE speak the truth!
(that being said, if/when they remake Radiant Dawn, I hope they buff her, like Sacrifice also heals Status or something)
It actually already does that
Micaiah is probably my favourite character in the whole series so I’m going to pretend this is an episode of srpg sapphics
There’s no evidence she’s queer but I just KNOW she is
(I’ve also been saying she’s pretty good for a long time so it’s good to get some validation on that)
she is like 30, surrounded by men, and single. that is most likely not an allocishet woman
Micaiah is and always has been my favorite lord. My first time playing RD I loved the idea of a magic lord so naturally dumping bexp and a forged high crit light tome onto her left a great impression on little me
Around that same time I finally had free internet access and much to my surprise people hated Micaiah especially on early serenes forest and gamefaqs forums so much of my love for Micaiah stems from spite
Society if Micaiah was the lord of literally any game besides FE10 🏙
Path of Radiance Ike is the best character in the game. Ike with provoke, supported with Oscar and Soren was my carry in the hardest difficulty of path of radiance(japanese version).
Also Ike was still very useful even as a un-promoted unit. He was clutch in many early chapters as both a tank and dodge tank because I put all the seraph robes on him and many times I unequipped his weapon to act as a wall in choke points.
I think you should relook at Ike Danni because like I said he was my hard carry in Japanese Lunatic. I'm not the most skilled player but Ike steam rolled the game for me.
The thing with Ike though is as a ranger you have to train him and feed him most kills to get him to level 20 as fast as possible (and feed him some seraph robes and the odd booster). Then you can use him as a tank/dodge tank to set up kills for everyone else.
Also Soren should have shade, Ike should have a 3x support with oscar, 2x support with Soren. This makes them all unhittable.
I haven't played path of radiance, but I'd imagine that having limited 1-2 range access severely cripples Ike's enemy phase potential, whilst also being footlocked in a game where horses are supremely overpowered. Units like Titania, Oscar and Marcia would probably be better candidates for best units.@@Keon994
Before watching: I've always called her mid personally. Her staff utility and player phasing are pretty good for a free deploy, but some of the maps just hate her guts, 1-9 and 3-13 particularly stick out as rough for her due to gimmicks. She's super frail, which is never good for a lord either. She particularly shines in act 1 and tower, my god is she good to have for tower. Her main issue is she's a well-rounded unit in a game where everyone better than her is broken and everyone worse than her rubs elbows with meg