Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia – How to Change Class or Upgrade Class

As you progress through Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, you’re going to have the opportunity to upgrade your units and move them to a new class. This will allow units like Archers to upgrade to Snipers, or Soldiers to upgrade to Knights. In this article we’ll talk about the upgrade process, how you can change class in Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, when you should change class, and where you should go if you want to change your unit’s classes.

How to Change a Unit’s Class

The first chance you get to change a unit’s class comes near the start of the game, during Act I. All of Alm’s friends from Ram Village—Kliff, Tobin, Faye, and even Gray—are all Villager class units. This means they won’t have any type of specialization, which is really nice because it allows you to really choose how you want to approach the game right from the start.

Level up

In order to change a unit’s class, you’re going to have to reach a certain level. For Villagers this level is around level 3 or 4. But, if you want to upgrade classes like the Soldier, or even the Mage, you’re going to have to reach much higher levels. The unit’s current class determines how high you’ll need to level them in order to complete the upgrade. For example, the Soldier can complete the class change upgrade around level 8, while Mages will require you to get them to level 12 before you the upgraded class unlocks.

Visit a Mila Statue

Once you’ve reach the level you need to reach to change a unit’s class, make your way to the nearest dungeon. Once there, head towards the back of the area (taking out any enemies in your way) and look for the Mila statue at the back. You can only change your unit’s classes by visiting a Mila statue. The good news is, they’re scattered all around the different places you’ll explore, and you’ll usually find them in every dungeon that you explore.

The first place you’ll find a Mila statue is inside the Thieves Shrine Interior, just outside of Ram Village. You come across this area shortly after beginning Alm’s story, and it is the first dungeon that you explore. While we wouldn’t suggest running back to this area all the time—as the enemies get moves on the world map as well—it is always an option if you find yourself backtracking to make sure you haven’t missed anything.

When to Change Class

Now that we’ve talked about how you can change classes, let’s dive a bit deeper into when you should change classes. See, after you reach a certain level with each character, you’ll unlock the ability to promote them to another level of that particular class. For example, after reach a certain level Mercenary units can be changed to Myrmidon units. Likewise, Cavalier units can also be upgraded to Paladin units. This allows them to become stronger characters, which will increase their growth with each level. We’ve included a small breakdown of each classes promotions, so you can see when these promotions unlock for each unit.

Male Villager < Mercenary, Soldier, Archer, Cavalier, Mage (Level 3)

Female Villager < Cavalier, Pegasus Knight, Cleric, Mage (Level 3)

Mercenary < Myrmidon (Level 7) < Dread Fighter (Level 10)

Soldier < Knight (Level 7) < Baron (Level 10)

Archer < Sniper (Level 7) < Bow Knight (Level 10)

Cavalier < Paladin (Level 7) < Gold Knight (Level 10)

Pegasus Knight < Falcon Knight (Level 12)

Male Mage < Sage (Level 12)

Female Mage < Priestess (Level 14)

But, just because you can promote a unit does not mean that you should. In fact, we’d actually suggest waiting a few additional levels before you promote a unit to its next class. This allows you to increase the amount of growth that they get, by acquiring a few extra points in their stats before you upgrade them to another class. This is useful, because once a character reaches the highest class type they can, and then they reach max level, you won’t be able to upgrade that character’s stats anymore.

So, try holding off on a promotion for a few levels after the character’s promotion becomes available. Of course, depending on the unit and its growth this may not be the smartest idea, so you should definitely play it by ear, and see how your units are growing each time they level up.

If you aren’t sure what growth is, it’s the number of points that your unit receives with each level. This number coincides across all the unit’s stats. For example, after Level 7, your Archer unit may only receive +1 growth in a single stat. At this point, you could continue to level that character up, and acquire a few more points in that stat, but it would most likely be in your best interest to go ahead and complete the promotion needed to reach the next unit tier.

That’s everything you need to know about changing a unit’s class. It’s really not a hard feat to pull off, and as long as you have the unit leveled to the correct level, and are visiting a Mila statue, you shouldn’t have any issues. Be sure to return to our Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia guide and make sure you check out our full guide on how to recruit all characters in Fire Emblem Echoes.