—Sanaki
Sanaki, full name Sanaki Kirsch Altina, is a non-playable character in Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, and a playable character in Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. The empress and Apostle of Begnion, Sanaki is said to be the vessel of the goddess Ashera. She is a descendant of a long line of Begnion empresses, notably Altina, Meshua, Yoram, and Misaha. In Radiant Dawn, Sanaki is revealed to be the younger sister of Micaiah.
Sanaki is aged 10 in Path of Radiance and 13 in Radiant Dawn. The fire tome Cymbeline is unique to her.
Profile
After the previous empress' death, Sanaki was backed by the public in the year 640 to become her sucessor despite being just five years old, with the senate appointing senator Sephiran guardian to the young empress. It is later revealed that Sanaki was installed to be no more than a puppet for the senate in order to quell domestic unrest. However, thanks in part to Sephiran, both he and the young empress not only had the public opinion in their favor, but kept the manipulations of the senate at bay.
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance
At first, she treats Ike and Elincia coldly and with disdain, but it is in fact a ruse, as she needs Ike's help in uncovering a Laguz slave-trading ring that other Begnion nobles are participating in.
After being confronted with the truth around Serenes Forest, Sanaki bowed her head to the herons and begged for forgiveness. Her intentions were deemed genuine enough that even Prince Reyson of Serenes felt his cold feelings toward the beorc lessen.
Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn
She escapes Begnion when the Begnion Senate, led by Duke Lekain of Gaddos, seizes control of the Empire; she subsequently forms an alliance with Gallia, Crimea, Phoenicis, and Serenes to reclaim her throne. Lekain later reveals that Sanaki once had an elder sister: only the firstborn daughter of Altina's lineage can hear Ashera's voice, they claim, and so Sanaki is a false Apostle. Sanaki later joins the Silver Army on the march on the Tower of Guidance. Upon defeating Lekain, she discards the title of "Apostle" and rules only as Begnion's Empress. Unlike her older sister (who is later revealed to be Micaiah), Sanaki did not inherit the brand and therefore she cannot hear the voice of the goddess Yune.
Personality
Sanaki is very concerned about manners, and is often put off by Ike's lack of respect in his speech. However, she appears to be very respectful to Laguz, unlike most of the Begnion nobility who disrespect the Laguz and call them sub-human, likely due to being raised by Sephiran, whom she has a very close relationship with.
She does occasionally display an attitude that is appropriate for her age, often acting impulsively and sending those under her servitude into a frenzy.
In-Game
Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn
Availability
| Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Endgame | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| P | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | E | P | 1 | 2 | 3 | E | P | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | E | P | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | E | A1 | A2 | A3 | A4 | A5 |
| ◎ | ◎ | ◎ | ○ | ○ | ○ | ○ | ○ | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
◎=Forced ○=Available □=Available for selected △=Reinforcement
Base Stats
| Starting Class | Affinity | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Empress |  Light | ||||||||||
| Level | HP | Str | Mag | Skl | Spd | Lck | Def | Res | Con | Wt | Mov |
| 1 | 28 | 2 | 33 | 22 | 23 | 32 | 10 | 28 | 4 | 4 | 6 |
| Skills | Weapon | Starting Items | |||||||||
 Shove Flare |  Fire - S Thunder - A Wind - A Light - A |  Cymbeline Arcwind Arcthunder Elixir | |||||||||
Growth Rates
| HP | Str | Mag | Skl | Spd | Lck | Def | Res |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 70% | 40% | 60% | 60% | 35% | 55% | 30% | 50% |
Biorhythm
Overall
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Subjective: The following part of this article is based upon the editor's personal experiences and opinions, and therefore may not be applicable for all readers.
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Sanaki is a potent force offensively; rivaling the best of magic users in terms of sheer power. Her personal tome, Cymbeline, is the second most powerful Fire Tome available with an unparalleled Durability of 45 points. Despite this, Sanaki's offensive potential is crippled by her low Strength; though it does not affect the power of her attacks, it causes most Tomes to Weigh her down considerably, preventing her from performing double attacks on all but the slowest of adversaries, and allowing even moderately swift units to double attack her, which is likely to be fatal, considering her low Defense and HP. Sanaki is capable of attaining an SS-Rank in Fire magic, granting her access to the most powerful of Fire Tomes, the SS-ranked Rexflame (However, Rexflame is also a very heavy Fire Tome (second only to Meteor), and even its +3 boost to Sanaki's Speed hardly negates the penalty for her having such low Strength). Unlike most Magic users, Sanaki cannot use Staves, further inhibiting her usability. On the other hand, Sanaki can attain an S-Rank in all Magic except for Dark magic, allowing her to use a wide variety of Tomes.
Statwise, Sanaki is very powerful but also very fragile when recruited, being capable of dying to a single hit due to her paltry HP and defense, though her HP will develop quickly due to her 70% growth rate in the stat. Assigning her the Shade skill is recommended to offset her low durability, as it gives her much greater chances of avoiding being targeted by enemies during their Phase. Sanaki will also be very slow when recruited due to her paltry base strength causing her to lose Weapon speed from her already low speed; giving her an Energy Drop will lessen the penalties from her powerful personal tome, Cymbeline to just a loss of a single point of attack speed, though this can also be remedied by assigning her Bonus Experience the moment she is available in Part 4 Prologue.
Quotes
Death Quotes
—Sanaki
—Sigrun
Fire Emblem Awakening
SpotPass
| Starting Class | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Sage | |||||||||
| Level | HP | Str | Mag | Skl | Spd | Lck | Def | Res | Mov |
| 5 | 33 | 1 | 25+2 | 18 | 20 | 28 | 10 | 23 | 6 |
| Skills | Weapon | Starting Items | |||||||
 Magic +2 Focus Rally Magic Luna |  Tome - C Staff - D |  Arcfire* | |||||||
*Enemy only; joins unequipped
Fire Emblem Heroes
- Begnion's Apostle
- Empress of Begnion. Known as the Apostle, voice of the goddess. Young but dutiful ruler. Appears in Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn.
Base Stats
Rarity: ✯✯✯✯✯
 | Title | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Begnion's Apostle | |||||
| Group | |||||
 Infantry | |||||
| Level | HP | Atk | Spd | Def | Res |
| 1 40 | 15/16/17 30/33/36 | 8/9/10 34/37/40 | 6/7/8 23/26/30 | 3/4/5 13/17/20 | 7/8/9 31/34/37 |
| Skills | Weapon | ||||
 Cymbeline Harsh Command |  Tome | ||||
Skills
| Type | Name | Prerequisite | Default | Unlocked |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Fire | - | - | - |
| Elfire | - | - | - | |
| Bolganone | - | - | - | |
| Cymbeline | - |  | - | |
 | Harsh Command | - | | - |
| A |  Triangle Adept 1 | - | - | |
 Triangle Adept 2 | Triangle Adept 1 | - | ||
 Triangle Adept 3 | Triangle Adept 2 | | ||
| C |  Hone Atk 1 | - | - | |
 Hone Atk 2 | Hone Atk 1 | - | ||
 Hone Atk 3 | Hone Atk 2 | |
Overall
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Subjective: The following part of this article is based upon the editor's personal experiences and opinions, and therefore may not be applicable for all readers.
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Base Set
Sanaki is an extremely powerful Red Infantry Mage boasting one of the highest Atks for the class type for a period of time. Her Res was also among the highest at the time, making her an excellent check for Green mages. Her low Spd was a bit of a heavy downside as she could not dish out as much damage as many later units could and her physical bulk is absolutely horrendous. For the most part, Sanaki has been able to co-exist in the growing unit pool of Heroes. Still, her relevance diminishes due to the sheer increase of powerful abilities available to these newer units. Luckily, she was blessed enough to receive a Resplendent form, giving her +2 to her all of her base stats, helping to catch her up with the increased base stat totals of units introduced long after her.
Sanaki wields her Cymbeline tome which grants a visible +4 Atk buff to allies she is adjacent to when she initiates combat. While a decent buffing tome, the specific requirements needed to activate it made it a bit cumbersome to user, especially when Hone Attack exists and merely requires her to be adjacent to an ally at the start of a turn rather than having to initiate combat next to them. With the Weapon Refinery, she gains a much better tome effect as now she has a Drive Attack effect, giving +3 Atk to allies who are within two spaces of her. Its unique bonus effect gives her +5 Atk/Res if she is within two spaces of a flying ally, making her extremely powerful with flying units, especially notable strong Flier units like Legendary Azura, Peony, and Bridal Fjorm for example.
Harsh Command allows Sanaki to invert any visible debuff forced onto an ally she uses the skill on, useful for counteracting Res stat relying Ploy skills and Panic Ploy. Triangle Adept further increases her effective damage against Green units, but drastically reduces it against Blue. Finally, Hone Attack grants adjacent allies +4 Atk at the start of the player's turn.
Counters
Sanaki's physical bulk will lead to her demise whenever she is forced to combat a physical unit, including Dragons that have adaptive damage. Ideally, she should avoid combat against units who cannot counterattack her at range or whom she cannot kill in a single hit. High Res blue units like Selkie and Mathilda can easily absorb a hit from her. Fjorm is a strong counter given that she can counterattack from a distance, has the color advantage, and has Ice Mirror, which benefits from taking Sanaki's attack to bolster hers.
Skill Inheritance
Sanaki can either go for a one-hit kill unit who focuses on launching a singular, powerful attack or be a magic tank unit. Sanaki's better off taking Draw Back or Reposition for her Support skill to move allies out of danger. Glimmer allows her to use her raw damage to further boost itself (especially when allies can buff her) or just use Iceberg for consistent damage off of her excellent Res. Her Skill C is flexible as she can maintain her Hone skill, use Odd/Even Attack Wave to self boost herself on certain turns, or use Ploy skills as she has excellent Res
Sanaki is a prime nuke unit as trying to salvage her Spd is a pointless endeavor, so she should focus on obliterating her foe in a single hit. Death Blow ensures that she launches a powerful neutral 57 Atk (59 with Death Blow 4) for regular Sanaki and 59/61 for a Resplendent Sanaki. Special Spiral accelerates her cooldown so she can constantly have it charged to pummel her opponent.
If seeking the Magic tank, Attack Resistance Bond increases her two key stats for this build so long as she is adjacent to an ally. Chill Attack or Chill Resistance either cripples high damage units on the enemy team so she or her ally can take the hits better with the former or softens higher Res enemies so she can better deal with them with the latter.
- Apostle in White
- Empress of Begnion. Known as the Apostle, voice of the goddess. Curiosity led her to participate in a festival about brides. Appears in Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance.
Base Stats
Rarity: ✯✯✯✯✯
 | Title | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apostle in White | |||||
| Group | |||||
 Flying | |||||
| Level | HP | Atk | Spd | Def | Res |
| 1 40 | 15/16/17 32/35/39 | 9/10/11 33/36/39 | 7/8/9 26/30/33 | 2/3/4 12/16/19 | 6/7/8 30/33/36 |
| Skills | Weapon | ||||
| Nifl Frostflowers Draw Back |  Tome | ||||
Skills
| Type | Name | Prerequisite | Default | Unlocked |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wind | - | - | - |
| Elwind | - | - | - | |
| Rexcalibur | - | - | - | |
| Nifl Frostflowers | - | | - | |
| Draw Back | - | | - |
| A |  Atk/Res Bond 1 | - | - | |
 Atk/Res Bond 2 | Atk/Res Bond 1 | - | ||
 Atk/Res Bond 3 | Atk/Res Bond 2 | | ||
| B |  Def/Res Link 1 | - | - | |
 Def/Res Link 2 | Def/Res Link 1 | - | ||
 Def/Res Link 3 | Def/Res Link 2 | |
Overall
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Subjective: The following part of this article is based upon the editor's personal experiences and opinions, and therefore may not be applicable for all readers.
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Base Set
Bridal Sanaki is a green flier tome unit and the first of her kind. She is only marginally different than her base form, so she retains her high Atk and Res at the cost of mediocre Spd that is slightly better than her non-resplendent base form and low Def. She does have the security of having incredible mobility and access to Flier specific buffs, though in most regards, Pegasus Nino is her superior in nearly every option, including the fact that she is always available in the summoning pool as a pity breaker while Bridal Sanaki is stuck as a seasonal, limited time unit. Nonetheless, if seeking to destroy opponents in a single powerful hit, Bridal Sanaki is an excellent option.
Nifl Frostflowers gives her an innate +3 bonus Atk on top of its 14 Mt. In a manner similar to her base form's Cymbeline, she gains +2 Atk/Spd for every ally within two spaces of her, maximizing at +6 for each stat. Due to this, Bridal Sanaki, can surprisingly reach incredible damage output and even score follow-up attacks on enemies, albeit needing to have her allies positioned correctly to fully reap the rewards of the effect.
Draw Back allows her to pull allies one space in the opposite direction she interacts with them for an excellent unit positioning support skill. Attack Resistance Bond grants her +5 Atk/Res if she is adjacent to an ally. Defense Resistance Link grants herself and the ally she uses her Support skill on +6 Def/Res.
Counters
Bridal Sanaki's counters remain the same as her base form as any sort of physical unit will easily destroy her. Bows are essentially a death sentence. Being green also leaves her vulnerable to the host of powerful Red units who have color advantage over her plus the numerous Red units who pack the ability to counterattack at range.
Skill Inheritance
Bridal Sanaki is best suited for offensive builds as she can utilize her access to Flier buffs for Gronnblade builds or just stick with Nifl Frostflowers. Death Blow or Swift Sparrow pushes her offensive stats for either raw damaging nukes or potential double attacks. Desperation ensures that she can immediately perform her double attack in case she has to engage an range-countering enemy while her health is low or use Chill Resistance to weaken problematic high res units. Skill C can be filled with Wave and Ploy skills for buffing or debuffing respectively, especially since he Res is decent enough to inflict it on a number of units. Alternatively, if used on a flier skill, she can use skills like Goad Fliers or Hone Fliers to buff her fellow fliers.Quotes
Heroes
Possible Endings
- Holy Empress (聖帝 Seitei)
- Sanaki elected to guide her people in a world without the goddess, and made treaties uniting the continent.
Non-Canon Appearances
Fire Emblem 0 (Cipher)
Sanaki is illustrated in the trading card game Fire Emblem Cipher with the following cards:
Etymology
Sanaki's middle name, Kirsch, is the German word for "cherry".
Trivia
- In the American version of the game, there is a notable typo in the Unit Profile referring to Sanaki's class as Emperor. It should be noted, though, that in the original Japanese version, Sanaki is likewise known as (皇帝 Koutei) which usually translates to the male "Emperor". Female forms of the word such as (女帝 jotei or 皇后 kougou) are not used in the game.
- The Falcon Knights in Sanaki's SpotPass team in Fire Emblem Awakening represent the Holy Guard.
- One of her quotes in Heroes implies that she has already met Micaiah and has a strong bond with her, but still refers to herself as the Apostle. This is a contradiction due to the sequence of events in the Tellius series. Additionally, her Heroes quote "The truth is... I cannot hear the goddess's voice" also supports this claim.
- There exists unused concept art of an adult Sanaki for Path of Radiance.
- In internal files of Path of Radiance, Sanaki is known as Black Sanaki.
Gallery
- See main article: Sanaki/Gallery.