Aethereal

I think once you get a hang of the differences in gameplay, it's not too difficult. If you haven't gotten used to it, I don't blame you, most of the more modern FEs play drastically different. You have a lot more threat of dying on EP in FE4 than in some other games, so the key is to lure enemies in with durable units/by ending turns at the edge of enemy ranges, and engage them on player phase. Certain bosses hitting for 40~ sucks, but you can usually do the same thing back. Enemy armies gang up on your units and canto away, but you can do that too. PS: The ring is nice I suppose, but it's not the end of the world. Plus, you've prolly put hours and hours into this, it'll feel good to finally get it beat. Keep trying.

Yahn's the only mamkute from FE6 that wasn't created by Idoun, unless I'm misremembering, or am misinformed. The rest are the "war dragons" or whatever Yahn calls them. Also, Ninian and Nils are mamkutes, as they have dragonstones that are referenced. You never learn how Zephiel breaks Idoun's seal, but Yahn says Zephiel learns of Idoun in an old book in Bern Keep. I'd imagine that whatever it was would be meant for descendants of Hartmut. Or something. I dunno. Yahn says "Why did you awaken the demon dragon" or something to that affect(Effect? I fucking hate these two words.) and Zephiel responds by asking who Yahn is. If Yahn was the demon dragon, I doubt Zephiel would have asked who Yahn is. This is all from memory mind you, but I've played both fairly recently, so I doubt it's too far off. Could be wrong though.

More desirable magic users. Flying mages, mounted shamans, not having crappy move/being replaced easily by hand axes/javelins. Anything to make the casters more interesting and balanced.

Yeah, I know, just didn't expect it. Don't think I've heard fans of the series call it boring before, but that's what 2 of the 3 people who commented on it said. Then again, not like I have a feel for people's opinions on any of the other games.

I'm really surprised FE7 is losing.(...Winning? Whatever)

There are also gaidens attached to certain chapters, including Lyn's, that unlock by doing other random stuff. Ya might wanna go back and do it again, eventually.

11. I can't keep myself interested, at all. I actually love FE's plots and characters, and having neither well developed made me feel really disconnected from the game. I finished it once, and each time I try to start again, I end up bored and disinterested. =/

No offense meant, but this kinda seems like grasping at straws. I mean, I guess there's no way I can prove the idea wrong, but I feel it would be more strongly implied if that was the idea.

According to the canon? I'd say The Black Knight was. In FE10 Zelgius says that he let Ike escape the encounter in the castle (Can't remember the name... Gados? Feels wrong, but meh.) and was holding back, because he wanted to see Ike after he'd spent more time perfecting his swordsmanship. I suppose this doesn't completely imply that Zelgius was stronger than Ike at the time, but I believe that was the implication. Either way, comparing this with Ashnard who not only falls to Ike, but falls to Ike after being buffed up by Lehran's medalion, seems to me at the time of Ashnard's death it was Ashnard<Ike<Black Knight.

There's a page or two of people saying why, and I don't really know Crash, so I don't think that's influencing my perspective. People have given reasons as to why they think "hiding" is not so bad. You should give thorough responses to specific points instead of saying it's bullshit.

Ah, so you can't enjoy the game without the growths displayed? Because that IS what I said, that you can still enjoy the game, while some other person may stop enjoying it. If you indeed can't enjoy a Fire Emblem game without the growths displayed in game, I'm very sorry you've had such a not-fun time playing as many fire emblem runs as you've had. This isn't true, or the point. The numbers being there can not only make the game feel less immersive and less like role playing, and more like a math equation, but it can do so subconsciously. Every one in the world is affected by things that they don't quite realize affects them, and subtly influences their experience, and games are no different. Just googled "Fire Emblem 7 Growth Rates" as an example of how long it would take to find, took me about 1 minute. Is that really such a big deal? (Also, unsurprisingly, Serenes Forest was the second result, and the first good one) "No matter what" is a pretty close minded view on a topic as subjective as what makes a game good. =| People are explaining reasons why it wouldn't be as good, even if you don't agree saying "no matter what" is just dismissing the entire conversation. Why have a conversation if your mind is so made up you won't listen to others' reasoning?

By exposing more information than is necessary, you take out a large part of the casual gaming experience. A lot of people play RPGs casually to be immersed in the activity, and play for the sake of goofing around, instead of methodically mapping things out. When you expose percentages on growths for characters, and other things of that nature(Like the combat formula, and exactly what each stat does towards it), a casual gamer's reaction could go from "Cool, this guy is fast and strong, but has light armor" to: "Well, this is just a math problem.". Yes, ultimately, it IS a math problem, but the perception of the person who isn't exposed to a bunch of numbers, percentages, and formulas can be very different from that of somebody who IS exposed to it. For those of us(Myself included) who want to know the formulas and growths, either because we're past the simple joy of goofing around and playing a game and want to challenge ourselves, or we just enjoy the planning that comes with knowing formulas ahead of time: The information is pretty readily available. Obviously some one has to hack into stuff (Although, iirc the nintendo guide books have all the growths available, so the information will be out and online pretty damn fast anyways.) and that kinda sucks, I guess, but nobody is forced to do that, and it is not a necessary thing to enjoy and experience the game. TL;DR: Some one who likes knowing the growths can still enjoy the game if it is not displayed, while some one who likes to not know the growths may stop enjoying the game if they are displayed. Me having to spend 2 minutes googling my answers<<<<<<<Some one else enjoying the game.

Entertainment in my pants. =X

And everybody who understands how to play would make sure their archers ended their turn with the 1-2 Bow equipped, which means they would be exactly the same on enemy phase. The difference between bows and every other physical weapon, despite the fact that bows are usually underpowered, is the only meaningful functional difference in the game. Giving functional differences, when balanced correctly, makes games a lot more interesting. Bows can be balanced, as shown by FE10!Shinon, and apparently FE11 Snipers(Just going off a few comments here, I don't know FE11 balance well) while keeping their unique role, which seems good to me.

Celice discussed "making judgements" on Micaiah's actions, which is to weigh their moral worth. Maybe we've been misusing the term, but I don't think the cruelty of the action was being discussed so much as wether it was "right".

Dismissing the probability that she is not a villain because some one else believes she is is a much larger problem. I am perfectly capable of believing Micaiah's a reason. Why don't you try using logical reasons to support the claim that she's villainous, as opposed to trying to make the point that she's a villain because some one said so. There's this crazy concept about people, especially when they have beliefs about things that they do not have sufficient knowledge to claim: they can be wrong. If you're firmly of the belief that the matter is purely subjective, and that their opinion makes her actions right or wrong, you may want to look up ethical relativism to figure out what you're implying. It's a pretty extreme stance to take. Edit: Elaborating, because I'm positive you'll either misunderstand me or ignore my point. When you imply that things can be right relative to the person, your stance literally makes the concept of morality useless. All of a sudden, how moral or immoral an action is is a completely worthless discussion, and there is absolutely zero way to critique any sort of action at all. Moral decisions are only ever based off of any one's moral beliefs, and no one ever could be considered a morally good, or morally bad person. There is absolutely no room for discussion, because logic is tossed the fuck out the window, and all you can say is "well, I believe X" and leave it at that, no matter how heinous a fucking act is because you are giving up the concept of morality as a logical end, and make it some crap about beliefs. Not only that, you're sitting over contradicting yourself within two freaking sentences: your two statements are asking for a complete tolerance and inclusion of other's opinions, and earlier you were claiming that each opinion held just as much weight as the next. That's a stance that you can take, but you contradict yourself by saying other people have a "problem" of intolerance. You cannot tell some one else what they ought to do while taking the stance that morals are relative, because not every one may agree with tolerance and inclusions of others. Not only that, but other people's opinions don't matter at all if morals are completely subjective, as you've very clearly implied: After all, I can no more speak for them than I can turn into a fucking space ship, and every single thing any one says would be from the standpoint of "I believe". You are making a huge contradiction, stopping the discussion, all the while looking down your nose at others.

A couple people said that, and were then told "You're wrong because some characters in FE don't think so."

I actually enjoy Ike's character a lot more than some of the other lords, but I don't think a character's circumstance really defines his personality, and I think Banzai's quote is an example of Ephraim's circumstancial differences from Ike. Ephraim invaded his enemy's country while Renais was being conquered, Ike invaded after Crimea had already been conquered. There's no reason for Ike to feel guilt, because his circumstance never lead to him making a bad decision. Would Ike have made a different decision had he been faced with the option of invading Daien or defending Crimea? Would he have felt differently, even if events unfolded for Crimea the way they had for Renais? Maybe, but that quote doesn't illustrate that, and I don't think we have a way of knowing.

I know what you mean. I liked FE4's plot more, but I think that was just because of how much I liked Alvis and Sigurd, and how much betrayal there was on such a grand scale. As far as character depth goes, yeah, FE7 did an incredible job, easily better than any other game in the series.

Nevermind, I'd rather not have my counterpoints ignored any longer. I completely agree. FE7's plot may not have been the best thing in the world, but I loved how easy it was to sympathize with some of the villains. People from the Black Fang like Uhai, Brendan, Lloyd, and Linus in particular are great at this, adds another layer of awesome into the game.

I think there were some points where reinforcements were just overwhelmingly outnumbering a group with a single durable unit. I'm really grateful for the healer either way, though.

I wasn't particularly interested in wether you cared for the characters in the game, but in whatever moral beliefs you may or may not have that lead to you calling her villainous. The stance that she's villainous because she's viewed as such by the characters in the game is a weak one, because she's just as often seen as a saint, and the two are conflicting. Are you making the stance that the people that she "harmed" view her as villains? I don't think that needs to be said. Additionally, the idea that Micaiah is a villain because she is thought to be one by others, and that that stance cannot be usurped or negated as you said, is another weak point. Take a random person, X, who was viewed as a hero by some, does that mean that he could never be considered a villain? But if he's viewed by a villain as others, does that mean he can not be considered a hero? How do you reconcile this fact? How do you reconcile the fact that people can be biased, for unrelated reasons? How do you reconcile the fact that people may not always have all of the information involving this person and the morality of their actions or views? What if X had killed a large amount of his people's children, then told his people that they were killed by some enemy of his. An enemy he has for entirely selfish reasons. His people may consider him a hero for going to war with that enemy. Does that make him a hero? How does it NOT make him a villain? Obviously you can usurp the stance of the people who do not have complete knowledge, or have incorrect logic. Obviously some people are biased, obviously some people are wrong. As a third party observer with considerably more knowledge on the context of an action than say, some random Begnion soldier who was caught up in this, and has absolutely no knowledge of what happened except that Micaiah dumped oil on his comrades, would you not say that you have more available to you that lends itself to making a knowledgeable and logical judgement on wether or not Micaiah's actions are just?

How badly have the enemies been nerfed? Obviously it's your guys' game, but I only ever found the enemies an issue in chapter 3, or whatever it was. And that was more about quantity than quality, and the fact that without a healer I felt as if I was spamming potions. Oh and the fog of war chapter with Gabriel. That one may have needed a nerf. =X

Why is that a problem exactly? In FE6 and to a lesser degree FE7, Iron is not always<Steel. And even if it were, why is that an issue? The drawback is money, more money for better weapons is just logical. In games where they give you too much money, or you can buy too many strong weapons, obviously that is an issue, but that's an issue with too much funds, and not an issue with the weapons themselves.

Calling some one a 'villain' is dependent on your set of personal moral values, which most people have very loosely defined. It sounds to me like you're an absolutist in terms of morals. Do you really believe there is only one answer to moral dilemmas-in this case to follow the rules and regulations of war? Absolutist beliefs like this really cut out any kind of context for the action. If one of the rules of war is to not cover your enemies with oil, then set them on fire, then let me ask you a question. Assume you were in 1940s Nazi Germany, and had the means to stop Hitler's entire regime, but could only do so by covering him and his men with oil, then setting them on fire. Is that morally indefensible? If so, why? If not, why is Micaiah's action morally indefensible?