Who do I want to win A Hero Rises 2024? – Fire Emblem: Heroes

It’s that time of year again. The voting gauntlet for the A Hero Rises 2024 event has begun!

I’ve been saving my orbs for the past few months after finally completing +10 Askr. I’m currently at 1,000 orbs and expect to be at about 1,200 by the time the actual banner rolls around. I also have maybe another 100ish orbs in the easy and hard levels of the story, and some in the lunatic chain challenge and squad assault maps. I usually do a multi-hour-long chain challenge and squad assault marathon once a year since I don’t usually need the few orbs it gives me for all that trouble and stamina.

What happens in the voting gauntlet?

To summarize for newer players, the heroes that win in the first round of this voting gauntlet will be put on a banner. This is important because the Fire Emblem: Heroes community can gather all of the best heroes and put them all on a single banner, making this one of the most valuable banners to summon on.

Here were the votes for the top 8 heroes. This is what decides who gets to compete in the gauntlet.

Here’s the voting gauntlet matchups that we have. The seeding strategy used is the same used as in the NBA.

Heroes Breakdown

Here is my thoughts on each of these matchups

Winter Edelgard vs. Attuned Peony

• Winter Edelgard is a strong armored unit that can attack up to 3 times in a single turn. Both winter and summer Edelgard get [Charge], except Winter Edelgard also gets extra movement, so the winter one is much more mobile. She is especially good in Aether Raids, where the defense meta is pretty much all some sort of 2-range unit with 3 movement line, either being infantry with extra movement, cavalry, or fliers. The main issue is that the previous way to deal with that is to tank it using save units. However, since most of these recent units are able to defeat those tanks, the most consistent strategy to use is to wipe out the enemy team using Galeforce and Wings of Mercy. Many players still do not have a proper Galeforce team set up, and having Winter Edelgard will help make a lot of players’ Aether Raids matchups easier.
• Winter Edelgard has decent fodder. She comes with Armored Blaze, Atk/Def Prime, and Def/Res Ploy 3.
• Attuned Peony is an attuned unit. Very similar to the Mythic Peony, she grants Atk/Spd to allies in cardinal directions, and her dance grants all allies in cardinal directions [Orders]. the big upgrade here is that the Attuned Peony also gets Orders herself through her X skill, and that her dance instead of granting the neutralize debuffs status to allies in cardinal directions, grants [Canto (1)] to all allies in cardinal directions.
• Attuned Peony has amazing fodder. She comes with Atk/Spd Unity, Rockslide Dance 3 (which grants [Dodge] to the target), Cross Spur Spd, and Atk Oath Echo. She is also a melee flier, meaning she can duplicate skills like Guard Bearing 4, Flier Guidance, and No Quarter.

I don’t have either of these two. But, I would rather choose Peony since I have Summer Edelgard and she’s still usable in Aether Raids. If I encounter a unit that she can’t beat like Anankos, then I’ll switch over to Gullevig that I got from the CYL free pick. I also really don’t like constantly needing to switch my Duo Azura’s blessing in the Arena, so having Peony would help with that. I’m also not in particular need of any super high-scoring units in the arena. I am able to maintain T20.75 with what I currently have.

Mythic Gullevig vs. Winter Dimitri

• Gullevig gets multiple actions, same as the blue one. Like Edelgard, she can have multiple actions per turn. No access to Galeforce, so maximum of 2 actions in a turn. On top of that, her extra action condition has a 3-turn cooldown (2 turns in between). The Mythic one cannot be used in Aether Raids offense, which limits the modes we can use her in. This Gullevig is a cavalry unit, whereas the blue one is a flier.
• Gullevig has really good fodder. She comes with Flared Sparrow, Occultist’s Strike, and Def/Res Smoke 3.
• Winter Dimitri is a unit that can pierce damage reduction with his special. He gets special acceleration based on the number of spaces the opponent moved. Most nukes nowadays have some sort of damage reduction on initiation. Winter Dimitri disables the damage reduction. He has [Distant Counter] due to the [Prime] skill and gets the [Vantage] effect to himself after combat. I’ve seen my entire Aether Raids defense team get wiped out with Winter Dimitri many times.
• Winter Dimitri is the only unit with this coveted special. He comes with No Quarter, Atk/Spd Prime, and Panic Smoke 4.

I don’t have either of these two. But I would rather Dimitri win because Gullevig is not useful for Aether Raids offense. Dimitri can help make Aether Raids offense exciting again by offering a vantage strategy, which I haven’t seen anyone use for a very long time. Neither of them score well in Arena.

Legendary Camilla vs. Wind Tribe Claude

• Claude is unique in the fact that he gets the special acceleration allowing him to hit Lethality twice in a single combat. He also comes with [Canto 1] and he inflicts [Gravity] on the target and foes within 1 space of the target. If your target is a melee unit, they can never reach you.
• Claude has decent fodder. He comes with Lethality, Atk/Spd Prime, and Atk/Spd Oath 4.
• Camilla deals ridiculous amounts of pre-combat damage. She also grants 50% damage-reduction shredding to allies within 2 spaces.
• Camilla has great fodder. She comes with Remote Sparrow and Deadly Miasma.

I have Camilla and don’t have Claude. I already have two +10 Water Legendary Heroes in Byleth and Azura. They’re both scoring on the low-end so having a more recent unit will help in that aspect. Claude doesn’t score well, and also due to his lack of pre-combat damage, he just isn’t strong enough to take out the most recent units, whereas Camilla can, and can support other heroes to defeat the enemy if she can’t.

Legendary Alear (F) vs. Duo Sanaki

• Alear comes with a dual-phase brave weapon and comes with 100% damage-reduction piercing for her and her support partner. She also comes with a bunch of damage reduction herself.
• Alear has great fodder. She comes with Atk/Spd Finish, Null-C Disrupt, and Atk/Spd Pledge
• Duo Sanaki is mostly seen on Aether Raids defense. She has damage-reduction piercing and true damage both based on the highest penalty total on foes within 2 spaces of the target. Her attack is also extremely high and she has a brave weapon. Her duo skill is the same as Duo Corrin and Elise’s duo skill. It dances herself, but only if she attacked this turn already.
• Duo Sanaki has great fodder. She comes with Flared Mirror, Sabotage A/R 3, and Def/Res Ploy 3.

If the three previous selections were all-red, then I would go with Duo Sanaki. However, I really would like to see an all-green banner so Alear would need to win. I do prefer the original Alear’s art over the legendary one, as she looked much better in the original Fire Emblem: Engage game. Duo Sanaki is a much better unit than Alear, considering that Alear is supposed to be more of a tank, however, her survivability could use some extra work.

Why All Green?

An all-green banner gives the players the most amount of 5-stars for the orbs spent. In Fehology’s recent video, he went over the average number of 5-stars that you get by spending 1,000 orbs and sniping only green.

My goal is to get units to +10. I will rarely use them otherwise.

If there are 3 greens and one red or 3 greens and one blue, choosing both green and the other color will significantly reduce the number of orbs you need to +10 a unit. I explain this in my other article here on last year’s red A Hero Rises event. Pretty much, if there is a non-green appearing, choosing to only pull green orbs and ignore the other unit will increase the chance of you getting the unit to +10.

If you’re a player who’s just looking to get one of each, then the color sharing might actually be a downside because you get a different hero. However, the point still remains that the average cost per 5-star hero decreases the more units share the same color. For me, I’m not really aiming for any particular unit. I’m just going to spend all the orbs I’ve saved up and hopefully get some new +10 modern units.

Even if all-green doesn’t happen this year, the banner will still be good value regardless, so it’s not the end of the world if one non-green hero makes it in.