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Is Fire Emblem too easy of a series?


The Void
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That Thracia 776 topic led to me thinking about this.

Would you agree FE could be more difficult than it is now? And that FE hasn't been all that difficult through the years? With even T766 not being all that difficult if you aren't going in blind?

What would you say are FE's problems that lead to the series being too easy (if you say it is)?

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Well, it's only too easy in Awakening/Sacred Stones because of the level grinding, and Radiant Dawn's battle saves. Other than that, I find it to have just the right balence, not to hard, not too easy.

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I feel like it's easy for us veterans, but for people getting into the series it's not that easy and it's sometimes easy to forget that. I remember dying multiple times on FE8 EM (which is pretty unthinkable of an idea now) and a friend I've introduced into the series is a bit stuck on ENM on Pale Flower of Darkness, and he's hardly a bad gamer. I think the multiple difficulties system is fine, where Normal is easy for us veterans but can still provide new players a challenge, and then there's stuff like Hard and Lunatic. Lunatic could stand to get harder, though.

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you did basically the same thread like last month dude

http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=42578&hl=difficulty

copy pastaing my post from that thread. the only thing I would have to add to it is that as a series, the systems are ideal for self imposed difficulty, and that in itself is what adds a lot of longveity to many of the games even today.

Its reasonably difficult when considering the fact that outside of one or two titles, you don't have readily available facilities to gather resources indefinitely. Key mistakes in losing some units or not distributing EXP properly, not finding/buying all the important items cannot really be undone once you've moved past them, so the game has to have some leverage considering that not EVERYONE plays FE with efficiency, no deaths, and all recruitments. If you become proficient at the games and understand how to optimise, then this leverage becomes generally rather abusable.

Advance Wars is harder because individual units aren't really getting stronger or weaker, and your available resources on any given map are already planned out. Every map can be designed on what's available, not on what you can hope to expect the player has available. This is why also I personally tend to enjoy the early chapters of an FE game the most because they have to basically guesstimate a lot less based on what a player has available, making early maps feel a lot more "puzzle like" than endgame sprawly stuff.

Shadow Dragon's system of Gaidens is sort of an attempt to alleviate this problem, because you do not get access to extra resources of Exp and extra characters/items if you have not lost enough units to probably require some help. Everyone hates it though.

I think FE is sort of held back by it's own pioneering. The randomness of the game promotes replayability and unique experiences, choices on who to use and the like too. But these inconsistencies mean it's hard for a developer to say something like "you should definitely have a trained dark mage for this map" without it giving you an acceptable candidate (prepromo or bases or a quick reclass etc) or making it more flexible.

Yggdra Union (probably my fav SRPG), as a character growth style game without grinding, pulls this off pretty well. Characters have set level ups, but the MVP system and Items allow for a degree of flexability and randomness for each playthrough. There's also far less units, but greater distinction between all of them (although honestly that's a defining trait of most of the game period, they cut down on LOADS of flack to focus on the puzzle/strategy elements and optimisation). The game is challenging enough because of your limitations in card use/turns, but it's very hard to totally screw yourself over since cards are only a limited resource on a map, not between them all, and their base power and abilities mean you should never be completely screwed.

To be honest I could write for ages about all the neat things in YU, and I almost did before I realised this post was getting REALLY WORDY so I stopped.

Edited by Irysa
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Considering the history of the series, it should probably stay easy in order to encourage the new blood to keep buying the game and IS to keep localising it. Older players can play the hard modes or use self-imposed challenges.

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Easy? Everywhere I go people say FE is one of the hardest SRPGs!

Considering I have problem on Hard (which is considered "Normal" mode in Japan), I would hardly call it "easy". If you do a no-grind run there's too many things to consider such as correct pairings and experience allocation, on top of the battle strategy of course.

I've never been too fond of higher difficulties in any strategy game, though. Enemies are rigged to have unobtainable skills and upgrades to create artificial difficulty. Good players can overcome it, but most people not. Which is why PvP in strategy games is so appealing, since you're bound to your own skill level.

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Easy? Everywhere I go people say FE is one of the hardest SRPGs!

Considering I have problem on Hard (which is considered "Normal" mode in Japan), I would hardly call it "easy". If you do a no-grind run there's too many things to consider such as correct pairings and experience allocation, on top of the battle strategy of course.

I've never been too fond of higher difficulties in any strategy game, though. Enemies are rigged to have unobtainable skills and upgrades to create artificial difficulty. Good players can overcome it, but most people not. Which is why PvP in strategy games is so appealing, since you're bound to your own skill level.

If you're talking about Awakening, any difficulty except Luna+ can be soled with the Avatar. Pairings only slightly matter postgame.

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Yeah, I had a friend who found fe8 beatable but challenging, and who just threw their hands up at fe7. The opinions on sf of the series' difficulty aren't exactly universally representative

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As long you are looking at your enemy stats/items/range this series is not so hard, even if we are talking about Thracia.

FE in one phrase: "Throw Jagen/other broken character in middle on battlefild and win!'.

Edited by Nicolas
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I think FE is only "easy" for the veterans of the series who have analyzed the game enough to know why you are capable of using a unit like Dagda for the entire game when most people would be initially turned off by someone like him in the long run. The average person/beginner to the series will still have some difficulty, and part of what makes FE fun is the rules and limits you set for yourself while playing the games, considering such rules is how the ranking system works anyway.

Also, the fact that FE has permadeath honestly makes it one of the more difficult SRPG's for that alone IMO.

Edited by Blademaster!
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Yeah, I had a friend who found fe8 beatable but challenging, and who just threw their hands up at fe7. The opinions on sf of the series' difficulty aren't exactly universally representative

The vast majority of people who consider the games really challenging have some sort of agenda centered around restricting themselves from trivialising the game, like spreading exp far too thin and avoiding using prepromotes. I considered FE7 a far harder game when I was still a noob and never used Marcus and tried to use EVERYONE, but Marcus can solo the game for a really long time even on HHM, and it's not even complicated, you just run him at enemies and he won't die and he kills everything.

Edited by Irysa
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To me, the fun of FE is seeing how far you've come (and how well you've survived) from single 7 damage attacks with unpromoted units, to a reliable army of double attacking, critical hitting power players, and adapting tactics for different situations. It isn't so much the difficulty; even some of the hardest maps just throw a lot of enemies at you and tease you with a carrot item to discourage turtling. It's about the learning curve, to me, and the better FE games are the ones that give you a real sense of being a tactical badass.

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Overall I think it's in the dead centre with a few exceptions. One reason I prefer this series so much over other Srpgs like Final Fantasy Tactics is that enemies don't take as many as hits to kill. It makes winning battles a lot clearer and it makes victories more visually appealing. A much larger reason why I prefer this series over games like Final Fantasy Tactics is that isometric maps while cool to look at can slow down your ability to think critically and sometimes become obstacles in the planning process. There have been way too many instances where I tried to walk up to a character I wanted to attack and was like 1-2 spots away, turn ends(based on speed rather than your whole party) and my guy gets beat up instead. Has anyone who has played the tactics games like this feature? I think it's good on paper but it's not always clear who's always faster than whom.

If more mainstream Japanese strategy rpgs had a "flat" grid map like Fire Emblem and Shining Force I would play more of them. I just think these two franchises share a lot more aspects with western strategy games than. I had a blast playing X-com a fun months ago, they're both really fun strategy games but they both share a common principle in common. Be as colorful and creative as you like, but make the layout clear. I understand there might be a drive to be unique or add flare to a game in different parts of the world, but if I have difficulty traveling through a map in even the most basic levels, I might not even bother with the harder levels. I don't dislike games like final fantasy tactics but I'd prefer to play strategy games where I know I can clearly reach points A to B most of the time.

On a smaller sidenote you get a menu before you decide to attack. I don't play on the really high difficulty settings but if the Civilization series had this feature I would never send my tank against an archer or spearman(it's only funny the first time).

Edited by Gregosa
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no

no it isn't

if you think FE is too easy then you've been on SF too much.

And why not?

Do you say that as somebody who doesn't "handicap" yourself (as in going out of your way not use Jagen characters that much, going out of your way to use Rolf and other units that much, etc.)?

Edited by The Void
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Every single-player game becomes really easy after you become very familiar with it and know exactly what will happen and what to do. As Fire Emblem fans, of course we'll find it easy, we're not playing blind anymore.

Actually, I still have trouble with the non-FE8 hard modes, so I feel FE isn't even as easy to learn as some other games.

Edited by Axie
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Here I was expecting people to say "yes, it's too easy," but clearly I wasn't giving people enough credit. It's been a while, but I had gotten used to people always saying the FE games were "too easy," even stuff like RD's Hard mode, without realizing that the only reason they find it so easy is because they know it so well. If you're not a series veteran, it can be pretty challenging. I remember years ago before FE8 was out I wasn't even able to beat FE7 HHM, but now I can blow through it (and S rank it). The series most definitely is not "too easy." I remember initial critics citing RD's easy mode as even being surprisingly challenging.

It could be harder, but no matter how hard it gets, the veterans will always find a way to make it "easy." As things stand, the series has a good mix of easy to difficult.

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No I think it is the right difficulty for newcomers right now. FE veterans are more used to the series. I think the tier's we currently have suit the series well. I doubt most new to the series who play the game pursue the no reset run right off the bat. Which is always challenging for me: to get no deaths with no resets. However, I do think Awakening's Lunatic is too difficult (for me), and Lunatic plus is just crazy. I'm content with FE13's hard mode though.

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personally i have no trouble just blowing through basically anything easier than fe12 lunatic but objectively it's probably one of the harder series around just due to the lack of outs you get compared to a lot of other strategy games

Edited by CT075
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