Hey everyone. I've been a Fire Emblem fan for a long time, but never really had a reason to do much more than lurk on this forum until now. I recently played the current release of Staff of Ages and, whilst I really liked what I saw for the most part, there was one thing in particular that bothered me which, upon doing a search of this thread, I was surprised to find that no one had seemingly brought it up yet:
What's the point of of giving the player an épée in one of the Act 1 finale chests? You'll get to use it for all of maybe half a chapter at most (and that's assuming your first one has even broken, which mine hadn't because I was suitably conservative with it) before Belle gets booted out of the story for what seems from appearances like it's going to be the entirety of act 2. Speaking of Belle getting blended by a tornado, I have to admit that whilst it made complete sense from a story perspective, from a gameplay perspective I'm not a huge fan of that design choice. Considering several of my best units were five or less levels from promotion at the end of Act 1-F, I greatly fear that she'll be hideously under-leveled by the time we get her back and go from being an excellent unit to being a flying Eirika or Roy. A burden to be babied along and mostly left out of the fight because she just can't compete.
Now don't get me wrong, certainly FE 7 and FE 8 did something similar, but in FE 7 you only lose access to Lyn for five chapters (six in Hector mode), and after you get her back there's still well over half the game still to go. In FE 8, both the chapters leading up to the route split and the route split itself are shorter and involve smaller, less intense battles than their Staff of Ages equivalents for the most part, meaning whichever lord you leave behind isn't quite so cripplingly under-leveled when you get them back as I fear Belle will be when she eventually returns.
Moreover, Lyn and Eirika were pretty much just middling and downright lacklustre (respectively) myrmidons, who gameplay-wise really didn't offer anything all too unique, so losing them for a while wasn't as much of a hit. Owen and Sawyer too are very similar units to at least each other, so whilst I'm not huge on losing one of them either (and the risk of coming back under-leveled applies to them just as much), they at least, if nothing else, leave less of a hole in your lineup when one of them departs. Belle, on the other hand, was unique with her flying swordie routine, offering a nice trifecta along with Lily's lances and Kate's axes and unique gameplay opportunities that are lost for as long as she's bed-ridden (unless you intend on introducing another flying swordie, I suppose). Plus it seems a shame to go to so much effort to make those lovely animations for her only to sideline them like that.
Of course, I may be biased because, from a cursory overview of the thread, it seems that I'm one of the few people who actually really likes Belle as a character (along with Oona and Charles), and doesn't particularly care for the other main protagonist quartet or the first act's main villain duo. But that's just how I feel about it and it somewhat discourages me from using Belle a lot in act 1 once this hack's act 2 becomes available.
I would also like to say that the combination of the hero standing in front of Seneca and the Dulam druid behind him is really obnoxious. I'll have to see if I can find a way around it on a second playthrough, but on my first run there didn't seem to be a good way of drawing out the hero without having a very good chance of the dulam druid polishing off whoever they went after, which means you either roll the dice (which are loaded against you), or stand around baiting out the dulam for several turns. The guy with the hexing rod, strangely enough, never actually used it. No idea if I just got lucky or if that was a bug. Also the main map tracks from the second half of act 1 and the finale of act 1 really grate on me, but you should ignore that because my taste of music is weird and unpredictable.
I also want to give this hack its due praise as well. The story's already (from what I can see in this thread) being further worked on and whilst the character portraits aren't as good as the ones in Last Promise, they're perfectly serviceable. Beyond that, Staff of Ages is really promising so far. You definitely have a knack for level design and the clever layouts and enemy placement are easily this hack's strongest points, along with the balanced character roster. Almost everyone has a niche they fill nicely. Even Stark, in a series where archers are often considered to be a bit of a joke, actually feels very necessary at certain points and generally seems to be a good unit. The only characters I would say lag significantly are Axel and Elijah, who are really just outshone by Eagle and Charles. My Harold and my Grace also felt a bit lacklustre, but not unusably so.
Speaking of Charles, he's da MAN! Seriously, I don't think I've had this much fun with an axe user since I played Path of Radiance and had Astrid maining axes after she promoted. His accuracy is a bit shaky, but he's one tanky mutherfucka by cavalier standards and creates fabulous amounts of damage when his often times ~70% to hit co-operates. Other units I like include Sawyer (whose excellent speed worked better for me than Owen's excellent attack), Stark (aforementioned), Lily (a slow, bulky pega is a nice, unique idea, and works extremely well when coming up against enemy pegas that are either being slowed down by heavy horseslayers and steel lances, allowing her to double them, or else don't hit hard enough to really threaten her), Aurora (those Festal staves were an amazing idea), and, of course, Belle (who is everything you could want out of a flying myrmidon provided she doesn't get strength screwed, which mine most definitely did not).
I find the lack of a Jagen (and pre-promotes in general for that matter) curious and refreshing. Hard mode will be tough to balance without one, but given what I've seen so far, I'd say you're almost certainly up to the challenge.
With a bit more polish, this hack will really be going places, I think. Keep up the good work!
