Hi guys, welcome to the latest New Unit Analysis! Today we'll be talking about Tiara, the water representative for this batch and one of the game's dedicated healers.

We'll be seeing how she compares to the othe primary healers and then we'll have a discussion about where she fits in the current metagame and her role in the future.

Let's get started!

Disclaimer: As always, I try to keep these as objective as possible, but they're ultimately my opinion and yours may differ. Please read them with an open mind and a view to make your own decisions. :>

Final Apostle Tiara vs. Rashil, Phoenix, Altri, Lancia, Elimo

Tiara's Stats:

Lord: HP 5435 ATK 1559 DEF 1768 REC 2233

Max Imp Bonuses: HP 1000 ATK 200 DEF 200 REC 200

LS: 50% boost to ATK of all allies when 5 or more elements are present, BB gauge fills slightly each turn (2BC/turn)

Hit count: 7 (drop check count 2/hit)

BB: Gradually restore HP of all allies over 3 turns and adds Water element attribute to the attacks of all allies for 3 turns (20BC to fill)

SBB: 12 hit multiple target Water elemental damage, gradually restore HP of all allies over 3 turns and adds Water element attribute to the attacks of all allies for 3 turns (33BC to fill, damage modifier 350%)

• While compared to the general population of units, Tiara's stats are fairly mediocre for a 6* unit. Her HP is below average and so is her ATK, but her DEF is solid and her REC is out of this world. For a Healer however, she's actually pretty strong, she has the highest DEF of any healer in the game thus far and her HP ranks 3rd making her fairly bulky. She's also the most offensively oriented healer in the game with her actually semi-useable ATK stat and damaging SBB. She's also a fairly capable rainbow leader, though her leader skill pales in comparison to the other rainbow leaders of her batch since the additional effect isn't particularly strong (particularly compared to Lodin). Her hit count is fairly average and the most disappointing thing about her is that she heals over time as opposed to immediately, which is a style of healing that's moving out of favour the more we move into the future. Still pretty useable now though. However she does give the cool water element attribute buff allowing her to remove elemental resistance from non-water units and she has an actual attack attached to her SBB which allows her to aid with BC generation as she heals.

• First up for comparison is Rashil. Rashil's our only 5* unit up for comparison today and I was going to leave him out but figured I might as well include all the premium healers for completeness sake. Compared to the eccentric scientist mage, Tiara has better HP ( 640), ATK ( 235), DEF ( 155) and REC ( 525). As you can see, as a unit of a higher evolution tier, she beats him in every stat making her definitely the superior unit statistically. Comparing their BBs, Rashil has a burst heal which is a point in his favour and a crit buff which is another (it's fairly weak, but crits are one of the most powerful damage augmenting effects in the game so it's still significant), however Tiara can assign the water attribute and has a MT attack with access to her SBB, allowing her to contribute some damage and generate BC as she heals. Plus her SBB heal is pretty powerful (heals over 2k damage a tick, IIRC). Even though Rashil's a burst healer, he probably doesn't quite match up to Tiara who is of a higher evolution tier, however he's obviously still solid for mono-thunder.

• Next up is Phoenix, probably the most comparable unit to Tiara since they're healing mechanics are basically identical. Compared to the overgrown chicken, Tiara has better ATK ( 195), DEF ( 200) and REC ( 400) but less HP (-380). In short battles, Phoenix is probably slightly bulkier since 200 extra DEF translates to about 60 extra damage mitigation per attack, which would require Tiara to be hit 7 times before she starts to beat Phoenix in effective HP. However, in longer fights, this is actually realistically achieved so Tiara fares better in those situations particularly considering her stupidly high REC, and longer fights is probably where Heal over Time (HoT) shines more. In addition her ATK advantage is actually significant since both of these units have an offensive SBB and Tiara can actually do noticeable damage with hers. Comparing their BBs, I'm not sure who actually heals more but they're probably pretty comparable in that respect (EDIT: Tiara heals more, according to Ushi's testing which is what I suspected in the first place), however Tiara's SBB probably hits harder than Phoenix's and has more hits for BC generation (12 hits for Tiara vs. 8 hits for Phoenix), plus she also has the water element attribute buff for utility so she just out right beats Phoenix in pretty much every department. I guess for what it's worth, you can think of Tiara as Phoenix Reborn reborn.

• Altri is next and compared to the giant floating continent, Tiara has better ATK ( 255), DEF ( 65) and REC ( 915) but less HP (-645). The HP difference here is large and completely outscales Tiara's DEF advantage. Though the fact that she beats the Tree in DEF at all is pretty impressive on her part already. Tiara actually has somewhat of an offensive presence with her ATK stat while the Tree is entirely lacking in this department and Tiara's REC stat is obviously way better than Altria's mediocre sustainability. In cases where neither unit is getting one-shotted, Tiara's superior REC and offensive attributes probably mean she has the better overall stat distribution but the large HP advantage Altri has probably means that he would survive a few hits that Tiara wouldn't so I do like his distribution better than Tiara's overall. Pretty close though. In terms of actual healing capability this is where Tiara starts to fall apart since Altri has a great burst heal and can also purge and prevent status with his SBB while Tiara's HoT just doesn't stack up particularly well and while being able to generate BC with her SBB is nice, it doesn't do a lot of damage in the grand scheme of things and unless you're using a BB spam team (who often don't need healers in the first place or would rather use someone like Luly or Alice or Leore for more damage), you won't be using her SBB all that frequently anyway. Altri's status removal comes in much more handy in more situations so he's definitely the superior healer.

• Now we come to Lancia, our second fire element healer. Compared to the chef, Tiara has better HP ( 55), ATK ( 80), DEF ( 290) and REC ( 175). Like I said, statistically, Tiara really does quite well compared to the other healers, outclassing Lancia in every stat. Not by huge amounts (the DEF advantage being the most pressing though) but definitely superior. Unfortunately again, Lancia's burst heal probably outscales Tiara's HoT in most situations and to make matters worse, her SBB also has its own (weaker) Heal over time component meaning that from a purely HP restorative perspective, Lancia definitely comes up on top. I actually think Tiara's water attribute buff and MT SBB is probably better than Lancia's weak attack buff overall so she's not completely outclassed but if I was looking for a healer, I'd probably go with Lancia over Tiara in most situations.

• Lastly we have Elimo who is from Tiara's own element. Compared to the genius mage, Tiara has better HP ( 95), ATK ( 240), DEF ( 245) and REC ( 50). Again, similar to Lancia, Tiara is pretty impressive, beating Elimo in every department with significant differences in ATK and DEF. In fact she probably performs slightly better statwise in comparison to Elimo than with Lancia, however stats are only a small part of a unit's overall value and again Tiara's HoT probably loses to Elimo's burst heal. More importantly, Elimo's DEF buff (though it's fairly small overall) and Elimo's fantastic 25% damage mitigation buff on her SBB tip her over the edge as the best pure healer in the game. In comparison, Tiara's water attribute buff (which is at peak usefulness on non-water teams, while a healer would normally like to match elements with her team so they can use Seals) and MT SBB probably just don't cut it in the long run. Tiara tries to be a hybrid between an offensive unit and a healer and she performs neither role to peak capacity while Elimo's fully defensive focus gives her a fantastic niche.

• As critical as I am of Tiara, she's actually not bad at all. Her stats are amongst the best a healer has access to at the moment (Rashil will probably overtake her once his 6* is released though and Themis in the future) and her water attribute buff is actually cool (lol) but HoT itself isn't very good and her damaging SBB isn't particularly threatening coming off less than 1.6k ATK and only really useful for BC generation. She's still a capable healer at the moment and definitely the best user of HoT so if you've only get her as a premium healer, she's still a solid choice, plus she doubles as a rainbow leader which is nice but she's just not going to be a top tier unit at any point.

Tiara: Indepth Look

• Her stats are phenomenal for a healer (most healers are cursed with pretty terrible stats), only real competition is Altri who has pretty good defensive stat distribution at the moment.

• In the future, Rashil will probably beat her statistically and Themis (from the next batch of new units) almost definitely does as well.

• Her Leader skill is... okay, but to be honest, probably beaten by every other rainbow leader skill in the game. It's okay for the Arena, but she herself, being a healer (and not even a burst healer) with mediocre offensive capability is pretty terrible in the Arena and there's Lodin who beats her in every single way as an Arena unit. A shame though, since being a water unit, if she has the 1.2x fill rate leader skill, she could be used as an Arena leader with Farlon, Ophelia, Lira and Uda (when he's released) as her teammates. Opportunity lost.

• I didn't really talk about her hit count but it's pretty average at 7 so it's adequate at BC generation but the slow start up makes it a tad difficult to spark with.

• Her BB is heal over time, which used to be a pretty acceptable way of healing and still is to an extent but is slowly becoming more and more useless compared to burst healing (and even that is less useful now that many teams don't even need healers or can get by with pseudo-healers). It's still okay at the moment, but it doesn't scale well for harder content.

• The water attribute buff, like the rest of her batch is a very useful, often overlooked buff. It removes elemental resistance from play for all non-water units and ensures that your party will deal significant damage to fire units. Elemental weakness/resistance modifies actual damage, not base ATK so the damage contribution for hitting super effectively or neutrally vs. not-very-effectively is very large.

• Her SBB tacks on a 12 hit MT combo, which is actually pretty nice, not because it does damage, but because it contributes 12 hits of BC generation (more if there are more enemies) while healing at the same time. This actually makes her a fairly good choice if you need a dedicated healer for frontier hunter since you don't lose your hit count as you heal.

• Unfortunately, Tiara's SBB probably won't see a lot of use (you'll use her BB more if you need healing) outside of BB-spam teams, and BB-spam teams prefer "healers" like Alice, Luly or Leore who can actually contribute significant damage (and often heal more per turn anyway) when they heal. And that's IF they choose to run healers at all which they often don't.

• In terms of future prospects, things get worse for Tiara as HoT gets worse in comparison to other methods of healing as time goes on and harder content is released. Themis being released in the next batch of new units (whenever that is) is also bad as she also has a Rainbow Leader Skill with arguably a better effect (HC drop rate increased), bestows the dark attribute buff which is nicer than water (which doesn't remove resistance against Thunder units) and has a burst heal with better stats and a rare REC buff to boot.

• However when Lily Matah comes out, Tiara might get a very specific niche back since she IS still the best user of HoT by then. Lily Matah does no damage herself with her BB/SBB but bestows every BB gauge buff in the game including her own unique one (BB fills every turn, BC drop rate increased, BB gauge fills when hit) and has a leader skill that fills the BB-gauge upon hit as well. More detail once she arrives in global and I formally analyse her, but in brief this means that Lily Matah is probably outclassed as an offensive BB spam unit (does no damage) but as a defensive unit, she's fantastic since she can passively generate a lot of BC even when your team guards. Tiara's a great addition to a Lily Matah team since she can lend passive HP generation to the mix and contribute offensively and generate BC at the same time with her SBB. Probably a very viable team archetype, but VERY niche.

• Other than that, it's difficult to incorporate Tiara into teams with so many better units out there, but if she's your only premium healer, she's still quite viable so don't you worry too much. :>

Typing Discussion

• As always, the most important thing to note here is that if typing is the only thing holding you back from using a unit, you should definitely just go ahead and use them. Please don't discard units because their typing isn't 'optimal'.

• Anima for Tiara for sure, HP scales better than DEF defensively and her REC is way too high plus she actually has use for her ATK stat

• Guardian next since she's a healer and healers need to live

• Lord next since she doesn't lose defensive stats with this typing

• Breaker fourth since again, she actually can utilise her ATK stat somewhat. The drop in DEF hurts though.

• Finally Oracle since like Rickel, the LAST thing she needs is more REC with an HP penalty on top of it.

That's it guys, thanks for taking the time to read this, hope you enjoyed it!

As always, I welcome your comments/criticims/encouragements. If you liked the read/found it useful, please drop an upvote on your way out. I'd definitely appreciate the support. <3

Until next time!

Links to previous Analyses