Why isn’t Vander leveling up in Fire Emblem Engage?

As you begin your journey with Fire Emblem Engage, you’ll meet all sorts of characters with different stats, classes, and abilities. One of the first characters to join your army is Vander the Paladin. Vander has way better stats than the rest of your party members and will be a great asset in the first half of the game. He’s strong, has great moves, and wields axes, the most powerful physical weapons in the game. But why is it rising so incredibly slowly?

Why isn’t Vander leveling up in Fire Emblem Engage?

Vander is what the Fire Emblem community calls a hunting archetype. That archetype is Fire Emblem, a pre-promoted/advanced class unit you get at the start of the game that has much higher stats than the rest of your army. They are almost always a paladin/grand knight class and don’t gain much experience. The usefulness of these characters depends on which game in the franchise you are playing.

Vander is a Paladin, an advanced class that units can be upgraded to once they reach level ten in their base class. Advanced classes are much stronger than base classes, which means Vander will be at a much higher level than everyone else in your army early in the game. Vander gains almost no experience because he fights against enemies that are much lower level than him. He’ll gain more experience as you progress into the later half of Fire Emblem Engage.

Jagen is a character from Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, and advises and fights with Marth on his journey. He’s a paladin with great base stats but absolutely terrible growth rates, just like Vander in Engage.

A lot of players don’t like hunting characters because they suck up experience points while grinding levels that could go to other party members. Since your other characters gain a lot more experience from killing enemies, they’ll quickly outshine Vander once you get a few chapters into the game.