FEIF Ranged Weapons

[Florete]

Javelins and Hand Axes really needed the nerf. It's a good change for sure. No more Jagens grabbing a Hand Axe/Javelin and soloing the game.

[goodperson707]

Is the double blocking only for ranged attacks or melee as well? Between having low might and lower hit, the lack of doubling will make javelins and hand axes situational at best. Unreliable and possibly even a liability.

Do we even know that they have Low might and hit?

Also not being able to double is not always a liability it actually might help you to survive as you can take out the range guys that attack you and only have 4 melee guys attack you vs the range guys taking longer due to no doubling but the melee guys dying and then another guy taking his place.

[NekoKnight]

Do we even know that they have Low might and hit?

Also not being able to double is not always a liability it actually might help you to survive as you can take out the range guys that attack you and only have 4 melee guys attack you vs the range guys taking longer due to no doubling but the melee guys dying and then another guy taking his place.

Maybe, maybe not. I hope javelins and the like at least have good accuracy so you have a good chance of doing chip damage or sniping critical health units.

[Bovinian]

Maybe, maybe not. I hope javelins and the like at least have good accuracy so you have a good chance of doing chip damage or sniping critical health units.

I could see it making sense to increase their accuracy. A unit who focuses their energy on getting one good javelin throw would be more likely to hit per attack than a unit who haphazardly hurls them at enemies at higher speed.

[Shadow Mir]

^^ magic users can easily curb-stop things in the GBA games, its just that you needed to train them a bit.

^ hand axes were still very very useful in the gba games i just didn't overuse them, cause 1 with that usage i was afraid they would break mid battle 2 i didn't want to carry more than one for flavor reasons 3 it always felt a little cheap to overuse them.

Also gba enemies actually had defence unlike awakening where defence grows slower for everyone.

Bold: What? I'm not seeing it when in two out of the three GBA games, enemies tended to be pushovers.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

Bold: What? I'm not seeing it when in two out of the three GBA games, enemies tended to be pushovers.

IIRC, Blazing Sword's enemies' problem was because how the majority of the enemies had no Luck and tried to wield weapons beyond the means of their Con (chiefly Steel), which resulted in their already iffy Hit and Avoid being even worse than it could be, in addition to being prone to taking crits from non-Killer weaponry, all while being doubled by everything and their mother. Def/Res ain't gonna save them when they're that terrible at everything else.

[JoeyW001]

I'm hoping a full revamp on bows, or perhaps even the entire Archer class.

Perhaps debuffs like hidden weapons? Slower agility, unable to move as much blocks next turn (Arrow in the knee sort of thing).

My play through with Awakening deemed the archer class a severely under powered range unit, why not just use mages/dark mages (for high crit). Wind spells will easily take out winged units if that's you're concern.. An Assassin with the ability the equip bows works too...

The inability to attack/counter melee greatly overshadows the potential 2block range attack if promoted to sniper

Edited May 26, 2015 by JoeyW001

[DeadGame]

That's actually pretty good for weakening enemies.

But does that mean they always attack one time or can they double attack in close combat?

[Irysa]

It'd be nice to see more interactions like this on more weapons, to prevent speed from being the godstat it has been for years. Like, if a char doesn't have the speed to double, they could still be helpful by chucking Javelins at enemies, then someone else moving in front, tradeswapping them to a stronger weapon and attacking for DS etc.

[Shadow Mir]

IIRC, Blazing Sword's enemies' problem was because how the majority of the enemies had no Luck and tried to wield weapons beyond the means of their Con (chiefly Steel), which resulted in their already iffy Hit and Avoid being even worse than it could be, in addition to being prone to taking crits from non-Killer weaponry, all while being doubled by everything and their mother. Def/Res ain't gonna save them when they're that terrible at everything else.

Exactly - it didn't help that enemies in FE7 and FE8 didn't grow fast enough to keep up with player units. Oh, and I seriously doubt they were even that good defensively in FE7, too.

Edited May 26, 2015 by Levant Caprice

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

Hmmm, yeah, I'm unable to check stats directly at the moment, but reverse-engineering some screenshots, seems the early Normal mode fodder only has around 3 Def, like many of Awakening's. Of course, Dual Strikes greatly enhance a unit's damage output, so that could be skewing perspectives when comparing Blazing Sword and Awakening. Or maybe it's the bosses, since, proportionally, Blazing Sword's bosses are still about as tough as any of Awakening's and usually get to sit on a Throne or Gate to make the fight a bit iffy.

I'm hoping a full revamp on bows, or perhaps even the entire Archer class.

Perhaps debuffs like hidden weapons? Slower agility, unable to move as much blocks next turn (Arrow in the knee sort of thing).

My play through with Awakening deemed the archer class a severely under powered range unit, why not just use mages/dark mages (for high crit). Wind spells will easily take out winged units if that's you're concern.. An Assassin with the ability the equip bows works too...

The inability to attack/counter melee greatly overshadows the potential 2block range attack if promoted to sniper

Don't forget Warriors, whose Awakening iteration are absurdly powerful. They easily outdo any Sniper for versatility and killing power. Longbows (especially with how late they show up in Awakening) just can't keep up with something like that. Come to think of it, a rebalanced Longbow might be help give early Archer(s) an edge. Like, perhaps if they gave it really good stats overall with a very light drawback and have one show up very early in the game. Granted, this wouldn't help what looks to be the bow-only Thieves, but at least they should have the utility of chest/door opening to keep them relevantish.

[Mayus]

Come on, NMotE Ryan is the best base Foot Bowman in the series without any gimmicks brought up here. Klein and Igrene weren't bad.

Unpromoted Foot Bowmen should just be better at dealing damage, and there should be much more properly dangerous enemies that they are the best equipped to take down.

Edited May 26, 2015 by Mayus

[Jedi]

Come on, NMotE Ryan is the best Foot Bowman in the series without any gimmicks brought up here. Klein and Igrene weren't bad. Jamke and Faval were held back by the map design working against them.

Unpromtoted Foot Bowmen just need to be better at dealing damage and much more properly danagerous enemies that they are the best equipped to take down.

Shinon was also solid. Bow units don't need gimmicks they need good stats like the examples you gave. Snipers are usually good because of their established bases. But archers have such a crappy start its odd.

Also I'll add that Faval is one of the safer options to kill Julius with and that Klein and Igrene are pretty clutch on hard mode.

Louise is also fairly decent.

Edited May 26, 2015 by Jedi

[Mayus]

On the other side, Rolf and Leonardo both didn't have much going for them even with Crossbows, Longbows, a permanent range boost, and the Double Bow. Shinon was really the only foot bowmen worth bringing up.

Edited May 26, 2015 by Mayus

[arvilino]

IIRC, Blazing Sword's enemies' problem was because how the majority of the enemies had no Luck and tried to wield weapons beyond the means of their Con (chiefly Steel), which resulted in their already iffy Hit and Avoid being even worse than it could be, in addition to being prone to taking crits from non-Killer weaponry, all while being doubled by everything and their mother. Def/Res ain't gonna save them when they're that terrible at everything else.

I'd have to disagree, the majority of FE7's enemies don't have decent defense stats. The only unpromoted enemies with relatively high defense are the Wyvern Riders(even enemy Armoured Knights have relatively low defense for their level to the point they're usually much less survivable than the Wyverns). I think its only the Morphs that had zero luck and they don't really show up that often.

Binding Blade's enemies had pretty high defense stats though, notably the Cavaliers. In chapter 4 on Hard Mode they have the sort of defense you'd see the enemy cavaliers in Chapter 28x on Hector Hard Mode in Blazing Sword.

[Jedi]

On the other side, Rolf and Leonardo both didn't have much going for them even with Crossbows, Longbows, a permanent range boost, and the Double Bow. Shinon was really the only foot bowmen worth bringing up.

Rolf at least in FE10 has a really good strength growth and can do what Shinon does with some effort (not really needed mind you but still), people may argue for Leo because of his decent prf, but yeah he isn't anything to write home about. (Plus his personal skill is lol worthy for an archer to have).

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

I'd have to disagree, the majority of FE7's enemies don't have decent defense stats. The only unpromoted enemies with relatively high defense are the Wyvern Riders(even enemy Armoured Knights have relatively low defense for their level to the point they're usually much less survivable than the Wyverns). I think its only the Morphs that had zero luck and they don't really show up that often.

Binding Blade's enemies had pretty high defense stats though, notably the Cavaliers. In chapter 4 on Hard Mode they have the sort of defense you'd see the enemy cavaliers in Chapter 28x on Hector Hard Mode in Blazing Sword.

I already acknowledged that I was remembering wrong in terms of Def/Res above. And yeah, the 0 Luck is just Morphs, but they do show up in fairly large quantities over the course of the game, even if not in raw chapter count. They're the mid-late game enemy that's supposed to be tough (at least the story plays them up that way), but just add more failings that make them pushovers. The wielding of weapons beyond the means of their Con still applies to many of the other enemies once Steel becomes a thing, though (and those with the Con for it tend to have poor base Spd, leading to almost everyone getting doubled).

[Paperblade]

In FE7, all non-boss enemies have 0 luck, and all Morph bosses also have 0 Luck

This means the only enemies with Luck are bosses other than a select few (Sonia, Denning, Limstella, Kishuna, Light friends)

[Mayus]

Rolf at least in FE10 has a really good strength growth and can do what Shinon does with some effort (not really needed mind you but still), people may argue for Leo because of his decent prf, but yeah he isn't anything to write home about. (Plus his personal skill is lol worthy for an archer to have).

The point is that just giving Archers 1-3 range or whatever won't fix them.

They should be treated as a full out offensive unit like Fighters, but faster.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I think 2-3 range fixes them pretty easily. The only knock on Rolf is his start (and even then he strikes me as fine), and for Leonardo the main knocks on him are the fact that his Str/Spd (i.e. by far the most important stats for an archer) are both bad and he has to wade through two tiers before said 2-3 range.

That said, IS needs to accept that 2-2 range is not good, and could only be remotely justifiable if the units with said range have good offensive stats to compensate, which they almost never do.

Edited May 26, 2015 by Dark Holy Elf

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

In FE7, all non-boss enemies have 0 luck, and all Morph bosses also have 0 Luck

This means the only enemies with Luck are bosses other than a select few (Sonia, Denning, Limstella, Kishuna, Light friends)

Oh, wow, I was only remembering half-right, then and that makes my original vague statement unwittingly more right than I thought. >.> Thanks for the correction. I dunno if they intended it or not, but that's some pretty tragically funny meta-commentary on those poor, hapless schmucks who cross blades with Lyn, Eliwood and Hector's crew.

[Augestein]

I hope this means Javelins and Hand Axes are getting a buff in might. They can still be weaker than standard iron weapons, but not to the extent of 2 might.

They might have more 1-2 range weapons.

[Neofranky]

Personally, I think Javelins and Hand Axes got nerfed mostly to indirectly buff Bows. Now having hit reduction to sword users, bows need something so they can be relevant, and now they are at least the earliest way to attack from range with physical damage AND be able to double.

[Luninareph]

I think 2-3 range fixes them pretty easily. The only knock on Rolf is his start (and even then he strikes me as fine), and for Leonardo the main knocks on him are the fact that his Str/Spd (i.e. by far the most important stats for an archer) are both bad and he has to wade through two tiers before said 2-3 range.

That said, IS needs to accept that 2-2 range is not good, and could only be remotely justifiable if the units with said range have good offensive stats to compensate, which they almost never do.

I don't think 2-3 range "fixes" archers so much as it renders them easily exploitable. Archers' real problem is that they have a dramatically gated experience flow because they functionally have no enemy phase. This is particularly notable because they're often either prepromotes or really low level, so their stats suck even if their growths don't and they're stuck with them forever because they can't level quickly. 2-3 range gives archers a niche use of outranging everything, allowing them to plink-plink at stationery bosses, but it doesn't fix their decimated ability to enemy-phase. What archers SHOULD have is either huge amounts of evasion to help them dodge all incoming attacks, meaning they at least don't need to be protected even if they aren't going to retaliate, or extreme player-phase strength so they can punch through big targets worth a lot of experience to balance out quantity of kills on enemy phase.

At least, that's my take on it.

[Bovinian]

I don't think 2-3 range "fixes" archers so much as it renders them easily exploitable. Archers' real problem is that they have a dramatically gated experience flow because they functionally have no enemy phase. This is particularly notable because they're often either prepromotes or really low level, so their stats suck even if their growths don't and they're stuck with them forever because they can't level quickly. 2-3 range gives archers a niche use of outranging everything, allowing them to plink-plink at stationery bosses, but it doesn't fix their decimated ability to enemy-phase. What archers SHOULD have is either huge amounts of evasion to help them dodge all incoming attacks, meaning they at least don't need to be protected even if they aren't going to retaliate, or extreme player-phase strength so they can punch through big targets worth a lot of experience to balance out quantity of kills on enemy phase.

At least, that's my take on it.

RD Shinon was a good example of a great Sniper because he essentially fulfilled the two criteria you listed for good archers. He came with excellent bases so not only did he dodge consistently, but even when he was hit he could tank them well (and sponged hits like a boss with dat Provoke). He also had good offense because of his starting Killer Bow + class crit bonus, and Silencer is an amazing weapon. 2-3 range after promotion just made him even better, and a Marksman with Double Bow is probably the best infantry class in that game.

From the little we've seen of If's status screens so far it seems like bows may have received overall buffs in might, but don't take my word for that. You're right that archers in general suffer from slow exp gain because of little to no enemy phase - if IS isn't going to considerably improve the starting bases of early archers, they should consider giving archers accelerated exp gain so they can actually keep up with your other units, and not be doomed to fade into obscurity after a couple chapters of contributing chip damage.