How do the Dodge and Avoid stats work in Fire Emblem Engage?

Fire Emblem Engage is the latest and greatest in Nintendo's popular SRPG franchise. Coming from a genre with a fairly high learning curve, newcomers will likely find themselves overwhelmed with all of the in-game possibilities. Ranging from varied units that you can recruit to the different stats possessed by each class, there's certainly a lot to take in, especially once players factor in the emblem combos and builds to synergize with their playstyle.

Before that, we need to know what the gameplay fundamentals of this title are. Fire Emblem Engage does a decent job of explaining how the basics work. However, certain complex concepts such as stats and what they can do requires a more in-depth overview as they can seem unclear at first glance. This includes the the Avo (Avoid) and Ddg (Dodge) attributes under a character's combat stats. While they sound similar on paper, they are quite different in the game.

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Here's how Dodge and Avoid stats work in Fire Emblem as well as their key differences

The two stats are separate for a reason as they mitigate different aspects of an enemy's offense in Fire Emblem Engage. Abbreviated as Avo in-game, Avoid refers to the chances of a unit avoiding enemy attacks. It can be derived by using the following formula: 2 x Attack Speed + [Luck/2]

Here, Attack Speed is the unit's final Speed stat during the attacking phase, which is determined after any bonuses and/or penalties have been applied at that point. Luck determines both how effective a unit is and how effective an enemy is against it.

It should be noted that there's another type of Avoid called Staff Avoid. This is basically Magic Evasion rate, determining how effective a unit is at avoiding an opponent's spell. This rate follows a formula: 3 x Resistance + [Luck/2]. Here, Resistance is basically Magic Defense in other RPGs.

How exactly does Dodge differ from Avoid in Fire Emblem Engage? After all, it suggests a similar process of avoiding enemy attacks. The Dodge attribute determines the ability of a unit to dodge an incoming enemy critical strike and is essentially calculated based on the Luck stat. This makes some sense, considering that Luck reduces the chances of suffering Critical Hits from foes.

To put it simply, Avoid grants a chance for the enemy attack to be a "Miss." If it does hit, then Dodge is factored in, calculating if a Critical Hit occurs or not. A higher Dodge stat would grant lower chances of being struck by an enemy's Critical Hit and similarly, higher Avoid increases the general evasion rate against the foe's attacks.

It should be noted that Avoid is affected by the terrain that the unit is currently on, while Dodge is not. This means that Avoid will have different levels of utility depending on the terrain that the player's on. While Flying units in Fire Emblem Engage cannot gain an advantage from the terrain, Covert units gain double the Avo.

To further improve Avoid chances, players might want to consider equipping a lighter weapon (determined by Weight or Wt), which realistically makes sense. Fire Emblem Engage is currently only available on the Nintendo Switch hybrid console platform.