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Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn ReDux (v0.8.72 CH 2-2)


Dunal
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It's also being faithful and true to Micaiah's modern day exposure: FE Heroes. People going into this hack later on may be accustomed to how she's balanced/designed in that game, so it makes more sense to design her how she's intended to be. And honestly, with 'Sacrifice' being her signature skill, it makes just as much sense to delay her access to staves. Because between Mend/Restore, it becomes almost useless.

Not to say I would be always faithful to that game or others. Ilyana's new design/identity definitely trumps her old one... which didn't really exist (an otherwise inferior Soren that has... higher STR? On a unit with mediocre SPD anyway?). Plus it's an opportunity to translate Ilyana's character with gameplay (Eats a ridiculous amount of food? >100% HP growth!). Meg? She's presumably a farmer with zero combat experience but can supposedly "lift a fully grown cow". Zero SKL and huge STR. Can't seduce Zihark and on two occasions, being the first unit to be thrown towards the Greil Mercernaries in part 3... Solo...? Awful LCK.    

So even if they aren't true to their original selves, if it makes far more sense from a gameplay or narrative standpoint, it's being done. Micaiah however was originally changed to band-aid what was perceived as her worst trait (either that or her promotion timing). Instead, it makes more sense to make her original strengths stronger instead of design changes that have no context other than just making her generically 'good'. Granted, Yune's comment in Part 4; "leave most of the fighting to Micaiah" would have justified it to a degree, but there are other ways to achieve that. For example: being designed to counter the final boss.

Edited by Dunal
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Any chance of Kieran with personal Parity then? You know, since he completely ignores the actual circumstances of any conversation.

 

It's fun to intentionally prepare coutner-staff kills. Even in 1-2 you can easily get Laura to staff-kill the soldier coming behind the starting zone's armor, to save time, as well as the ruin scholer up top.

Edited by Mr. Mister
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Also, I was a bit opposed to it at first but now I like the idea of giving Micaiah access to Anima magic at tier 2. That way I see it, it's to make her first promotion more satisfying (as it should be), and especially to fill the empty void that staff access left behind with its removal from her. And to make her fare better against cats and tigers with fire since nuking Tigers with such huge HP pools would be difficult even for her later on. I also really like the idea of Micaiah/Yune having access to all magic types just like Ashera did in vanilla RD, plus staves to contrast to Ashera's weird magic Strike weapons. Definitely keep Ashera without a staff rank; staves are man-made tools and I like the aforementioned contrast, though I'm sure you were going to leave this as-is anyway.

Without the reliable healing though, I also hope that yellow Bishops in part 3 have more Physic staves at least in 3-13 especially. For the sake of challenge I can see them being without Physics in Chapter 3-6 and maaaaybe 3-12 if you're still going to have those maps be very cramped. It would also give more legitimate incentive for you to keep them safe, and maybe encourage them to actually roam slightly to make sure their range can reach your blue units. Do you get bonus EXP for protecting them? That should be a thing if it isn't already.

Also now that Ashera is on my mind... and this is a very subjective thing I'm thinking of for whether you do choose to go through with more dialogue in the game. Yune herself and maybe others in the Tellius games I don't remember say that Mist has the "spirit of order", which is what allows her to hold Lehran's Medallion. However this has always been a bit vague, I feel.

I've always kinda had this headcanon that just before the Ashera fight, one the first things she says or does is taking a look at Mist and becoming slightly fascinated by her (or whatever the unemotional equivalent of fascination is). Here, I'd LOVE for Ashera at the very end and/or Yune in the beginning of Part 4 to have a little dialogue about Mist, about how under different circumstances she'd be a "fine vessel" for Ashera. Just like Micaiah is for Yune. It would've been very useful for Ashera during the great flood.

Narratively I think it'd be great to help build up Ashera's threat and creepiness factor and highlight Yune as a chaotic figure who has made a horrible mistake. No wonder Ashera doesn't trust Yune's judgement. Whatever you think of the story, you've gotta admit that the atmosphere and tension around the medallion all throughout the end of Part 3 and beginning of Part 4 is FANTASTIC. One of the best-written things about this game. This would help even more.

It could also be explained by Mist's personality as well as her relation to Greil as one of the best fighters who ever lived, and that with time Mist could grow to be a powerful swordswoman like her brother and father and therefore physically become a strong vessel for Ashera herself. More hype for Greil, and for Mist since she's meant to be pretty legit in combat now with this patch. What do you guys think?

Edited by Carreau Diamond
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21 minutes ago, Carreau Diamond said:

I also really like the idea of Micaiah/Yune having access to all magic types just like Ashera did in vanilla RD, plus staves to contrast to Ashera's weird magic Strike weapons.

I'm more satisfied with the analogy with her sister, who can SS rank all non-dark magic, but has no staff access (because that'd be beneath an emperess).

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Hey guys! Im going to be streaming tomorrow and dunal has provided me with a special chapter to do! Be sure to tune in, were going to be tackling 3-1 as a little teaser. We will start the map around 18:00GMT , I might start earlier and do some part 2 stuff until dunal is available. twitch.tv/shadow0865 , cant wait to hang with you guys

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I just thought of something. If Micaiah isn't going to have staff access until her third tier now, is she going to be able to do more in Chapter 3-13? If she's still stuck behind the defense line, she'll need access to siege tomes or something else so she isn't useless for most of the chapter.

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6 hours ago, Elite Lord Sigma said:

I just thought of something. If Micaiah isn't going to have staff access until her third tier now, is she going to be able to do more in Chapter 3-13? If she's still stuck behind the defense line, she'll need access to siege tomes or something else so she isn't useless for most of the chapter.

She has access to all 5 siege tomes that she's capable of using by that point. Including Blizzard which has additional range. 

If Micaiah is level ~10 at this point then she'll average about 37 MAG which is some really good damage (45-50 damage against tigers with Meteor for instance). Doesn't one-shot anything by all means but chunks enemies hard enough where they can easily be killed by another unit.

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10 hours ago, Zihark72 said:

Hey guys! Im going to be streaming tomorrow and dunal has provided me with a special chapter to do! Be sure to tune in, were going to be tackling 3-1 as a little teaser. We will start the map around 18:00GMT , I might start earlier and do some part 2 stuff until dunal is available. twitch.tv/shadow0865 , cant wait to hang with you guys

Ooo does that mean in the next patch we are getting 2-3 2-e 3-p and 3-1?

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Just finished the current patch, so here's a whole boatload of feedback!

Characters

Spoiler

 

1 Laura (Incredibly OP when promoted at 1-5, healer w/ amazing combat)

2 Rafiel (Dancer/10) Micaiah (REALLY strong damage, only slows down in 1-E)

3 Sothe (Jeigan/Thief utility, Paragon is neat) Jill (Flier w/ good offense) Ilyana (Can take a hit, strong magic damage, dragon nuke)

4 Fiona (1 BEXP dump needed, otherwise really solid) Vika (Fast, high damage unit w/ good avoid and flight) Leonardo (Great chip early on, promotion fixes accuracy w/ Longbow somewhat)

5 Tormod (Laura that you don't need to train, no healing) Muarim (High move tank w/ solid damage) Volug (Fast, great move, good user of Imbue and surprisingly decent w/ cards)

6 Meg (Carries 1-4, otherwise I don't see the hype tbh :l) Zihark (Not as tanky as Edward, but is totally free)

7 Nolan (Meh)

8 Aran (Meh)

9 Edward (Please give this poor kid SOMETHING haha)

 

Didn't include Tauroneo/BK since obviously they're still a cut above the rest of your guys at this point (albeit, not as much as in vanilla).

Just to give better feedback about why I feel this way about the characters, I'll talk about the oddball rankings a little bit, starting with Laura. She's easily the best unit in this hack IMO. Being your first healer besides Micaiah ig (who would rather be attacking), she's almost mandatory if you ask me, but what sets her over in this hack is just how much easier it is to train her up. Between 1-2 range on healing staves, earlier access to some utility staves, and her ability to occasionally finish off an enemy with a staff counter since she can actually take a hit in this hack, she can easily coast through to promotion by the 1-5 Base with a little help from BEXP. Since she still gains more than enough EXP through staves and her promo bonuses are quite good, there's really no reason not to promote at Level 10 for her right now, as far as I can tell. Needless to say, 10/1 Laura completely trivializes 1-5 with Resire + Slayer + Provoke, making that map in particular a lot easier than I believe it was intended to be. Furthermore, unlike the rest of your promoted units, her levels don't really slow down any because of staves, so I wouldn't be surprised to find out that early promoting her could sort of break her level curve a bit. Shoot, I wouldn't be surprised to find out that she could be a Saint by the end of 1-E, it's just that simple to level her now. 

It's not just 1-5 she snaps though, of course. Having the option of dealing some really great magic damage (since her speed is bonkers) at will while having the flexibility to complete other utility tasks seems like it could be too much for Part One. In this scenario she has a leg up on the rest of your guys in terms of stats throughout most of the hack thanks to an inflated level, so she's not particularly frail either. Give her a forged Light and she can cripple/KO just about anything with ease, all at 1-2 range. As an example of just how crazy she gets, I was able to double that Elite Brave Sword Swordmaster in 1-E for well over half his health at about 60% accuracy per shot from a ledge disadvantage. By 1-E, on an even playing field, she doubles everything and basically can't miss while casually having ~80 Avoid at neutral biorhythm and no supports. Vika struggles to put up those kinds of numbers by the endgame, and speed/avoid are the name of her game. And all of that doesn't even consider the other useful things Laura can do, like Physic, Silencing that Tornado (or was it Arcwind?) dude in 1-E, etc. God help you if you can steal that Elsleep for Part 3...

SUGGESTION: Increase her magic cap as a Cleric while reducing the promotion bonus accordingly thus giving you incentive to leave Laura unpromoted for a bit and reduce her base Light rank to E. Just reducing her magic isn't enough IMO since there are two Spirit Dusts in Part 1, the first of which Laura makes incredibly easy to get and the second of which is easy enough to come by normally. She can easily climb back to D rank if you leave her with Discipline for a map or so, and this way she likely won't have Resire by 1-5 unless you go far out of your way to do it via grinding or whatever.

I also put Micaiah a lot higher than I think other people would, but I found her insane damage to be both very useful in setting up kills/avoiding counters as well as a ton of fun to use. 1-E is really the only map where she's not all that IMO, but since she's useful in every other map bar none, I feel like she deserves a little more love. Sure she's still not all that fast, but she's one of the rare instances in Fire Emblem where her sheer power makes up for it. Good unit.

Ilyana is really good now too, albeit she didn't impress me as much as say, Laura which is why she's a bit lower. Not too much else to add about her, really. The overhaul is nice, and a magic user that focuses on defense is interesting in concept.

Fiona is phenomenal. Now granted, I pumped her up by about 5-6 levels or so, and promoted her for 1-7, so I can't really say how bad it is to train her naturally. Either way, I think BEXP on her is good since she has a growth spread that gives you a good shot for STR/SPD levels, but I digress. Duke Knight Fiona along with Laura are really the only units that are capable of soloing sections of a map afaik, so that's automatically huge for Fiona. I legitimately had her handle the left side of both 1-7 and 1-8 by herself, and she came out on top both times. Imbue in combination with her respectable defenses make her really difficult to take out, far more so than any of your other high movement frontliners. If that weren't good enough, she also heals up surrounding allies every turn based on her respectable Magic stat, making her one of the most valuable units to have IMO. The only reason she's not right up there with Laura is because she's only playable for 3 maps. And if that weren't good enough for you, she also has +2 Move over other cavaliers, just because.

SUGGESTION: I'm not sure if Fiona is even up on the chopping block for nerfs, but if she was I'd say -1 Move. Her healing abilities feel nice to use, but she's hands down the best combat unit in the DB as is (arguably Jill ig but Fiona isn't frail) and idk if that's what you were going for. I kinda got the impression that she was supposed to support your heavy hitters rather than be a heavy hitter, you know? She reminds me a lot of Mathilda from FE15 actually, in that the weaknesses she might have on paper don't really exist, at least not as of right now. I assume there'll be more effective weaponry and such later on, so maybe that'll change my opinion of her in later parts. Really fun stuff, regardless.

Meg...isn't OP at all IMO. Now granted, the fact that I had Laura for 1-5 probably reduced the usefulness of her tankiness a bit, but still. Not to say, I think she should be buffed though, as far as I can tell she should be perfectly usable now if you wanted to train her. I'm perfectly willing to admit that my playstyle doesn't really mesh with Armor Knights, but I will say that she's at the very least worthwhile to carry to Level 10 for that promotion. In that sense, I think she's balanced in that players who enjoy using Armor Knights will finally have a decent payoff, and players who prefer faster, high movement units would still have incentive to raise her at least to General since her Butcher skill will probably be of some good use in Part 3 if vanilla is anything to go by. 

Now, for the units I didn't care for too much. First, there's Nolan. I have to say, I'm not 100% on the design choices behind him. I take it he's supposed to be a BEXP character, since his strength makes him utterly outclassed without some sort of favoritism to give him a leg to stand on. My problem with that is that it runs counter to every other character in the DB, none of which who need favoritism to function in the same way Nolan does. Wicked promotion gains or no, it's just not worth it to raise him seriously IMO since he'll only be relevant at the start of each Tier without some serious luck or BEXP abuse to keep his strength up to par. Energy Drops are in high competition and used better on almost any other character, since a Nolan with both Energy Drops would be lucky to keep up with say, Jill. Tarvos is something to consider, but until that is revealed he's average at best and that's not a good thing with everyone else getting a massive boost to usability in this hack.

SUGGESTION: 35% Strength, please. Take it out on his other growths if you have to, but I can't see a 25% STR physical combat unit being much to look at in the mid-late game, and his early game isn't so special to make up for that. Alternatively, increase his promo bonus for speed so that he could maybe function as a crossbowman or something. As is, he seems like a huge resource sink that doesn't have great returns.

Aran...idk. He seems fine and all, just not my cup of tea. Should be usable, he just doesn't really mesh with my playstyle. I will say though, that if I were looking for a tank, I think that Meg is the superior choice on paper because of her abilities and Heaven affinity actually being alright in this hack.

Edward sucks in Part 1. I read through some of the more recent posts in this topic so I understand the logic, but it doesn't change the fact that he's pretty garbage whereas at least Nolan had a few maps of being your best tank. He's not a great damage dealer nor does he have high durability/evade. He's just outclassed in every role he could fill at this point in the game. Wrath is neat, but it's sketchy and has little application on the enemy phase since his durability isn't so good that he can comfortably take hits from within Wrath range. Wrath + Gamble is cool, if gimmicky, but it's not so strong a combo to put up with Eddy's awful start. Your idea for the Caladbolg is pretty neat, but if he needs to rely on it for durability then he's really in a bad spot since it sounds like it will cut into his already shaky ability to double. I guess we'll see what happens with Part 3 but for now his viability has got to be on the lower end when compared to all the units released so far. 

SUGGESTION: Slightly increase his base stats (like +1 across the board) and increase his base level slightly to compensate. He's garbage if he can't double, and that should give the player a little more breathing room without making him RNG proof or OP lategame. He should still be a growth unit, but he needs the ability to well...grow. He can't exactly do that as is with such poor combat parameters and practically requiring his first 3 or so level ups to be above average before he even has a chance.

1) In terms of difficulty, what map(s) do you feel is too difficult for that particular point in the game? I wouldn't say too difficult, but 1-8 is noticeably more challenging than 1-7 mostly because of those damned Red Dragons. I liked that map though, so I wouldn't really change it.

2) In terms of difficulty, what map(s) do you feel is too easy for that particular point in the game? Difficulty curve in Part 1 feels fine TBH

3) Are there any units who you feel are too weak for what their purpose is? See above

4) Are there any units you feel are too powerful? ""

5) How do you feel the gold income is? Too much gold? Too little? What should be cheaper/more expensive? Gold feels just about right. Maaaaaaaybe cut a Red Gem at some point in the later half of Part 1, but otherwise it feels fine. There's enough money to give you options, while still being restrictive enough to make sure you can't have everything the second it becomes available.

6) What weapons do you feel are too powerful or too weak for what they're designed for? I feel like cards are right on the edge of being something good, but I don't want to suggest anything without trying them on Gambit Heather first. If I were to suggest anything, I'd say that an accuracy increase would be nice since I recall a few times I'd have used the Reaper Cards in 1-E if only they were more reliable. Or maybe instead they could ignore Ledge Penalties? Volug would actually be pretty sweet in 1-E if they did. Magic users can't use cards anyways so I don't think it would be OP.

7) Are there any mechanics you feel that need tweaking? Not really a mechanic per se, but since Hand Axes are so rare in this hack please make the Fighter in 1-3 that drops one spawn earlier. I was escaping with my last units as he spawned and it sucks to be locked out of one of the 2 (?) available Hand Axes in the entire part. 

8) In regards to skills, do you feel that the capacity costs are appropriate? Any availability changes you'd like to see for certain skills? Pretty good, and I like that some of the more lucrative skills like Celerity are more readily available for use.

9) 2-3 is currently the map being polished for release. Any thoughts on this map and what you might want to see? Do you feel that less enemies would be preferable to improve the pacing, or that more plentiful but weaker enemies is fine (same EXP total in both scenarios, which will be far higher compared to the original in order for the Crimean Knights to not end up under-levelled)? I personally prefer stronger, more threatening enemies. That said, from a storyline perspective they should be numerous and weaker. As long as the generics aren't like 40HKOing Geoffrey like in vanilla, it should be fine either way. 

10) 'Elite' enemies (mini bosses) are currently an experiment for 1-E. Do you believe they are good to include and would you like to see them on some earlier maps? Are the stat bonuses they receive sufficient, or should be stronger/weaker than they are? What enemies do you feel could become 'Elite' to improve the pacing/difficulty of any particular map? Great idea, please keep it. Off the top of my head, maybe make the escape point guard in 1-7 an Elite to make it harder to solo the left side with just Fiona. Bonus points for a Horseslayer. His entourage is usually enough to keep other heavy hitters from soloing, but that entire area is oddly Fiona weak, believe it or not.

 

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@Deltre Thanks for the lengthy feedback!

A lot of your thoughts are certainly valid, despite a few of them lacking certain context (but do make sense without those nonetheless). Above all else it's clear that Laura does need some changes and I've been thinking about how best to go about that. Heaven affinity (which does almost nothing to benefit her) as well as E light are obvious first contenders, but a few other adjustments may be required as well.

Some of the other feedback could be attributed to variance/RNG. Fiona can be very powerful with enough resources, but so can someone like Aran (who has Vigilance and is unaffected by Biorhythm, both of which keep his AVO consistently high). Nolan, while overall solid yet not particularly outstanding in any way, does have certain things going for him. Innate Nihil is very powerful later on when even generic enemies often have skills, and even negates focus/vigilance early on. Tarvos is super good and Nolan's preferred weapon later on is Taksh or Arbalest anyway (which do not scale from STR) where additionally his huge SKL helps skill procs in general. Otherwise, he's fairly durable to boot. Meg is really powerful from of course, her anti-beast niche along with high durability/damage and sustain (with Imbue). Honestly though, I do agree to an extent; it's why the nerfs to her were rather conservative. Thing with Meg is that she really wants to equip certain skills to patch up her weaknesses (Fortune, Celerity) or bolster strengths (Imbue, Provoke) but can only pick one -- so she's generally going to be left with missing something

Although, a lot of these units are balanced with the entire game in mind. Meg's SPD accelerates rather rapidly past a certain point, and Nolan gets access to weaponry that have huge synergy with his stat spread, even with options like the Killer Axe. What's worth mentioning is that the difficulty curve is legitimately steep to the point where eventually, units like Laura will hit a plateau and you'll just be left with a weaker army during the hardest parts of the game. Not to say that she isn't a bit too powerful early on when used a certain way. Edward is the type of unit that does need a lot of investment and some favourable RNG to shine, although he's intentionally a bit of a wildcard that gets notably more powerful with Caladbolg. That said, playtesters so far either find him to be weak in one run, to being godly in the next. I've continued to steadily buff him over time, but I feel that he's the type of unit where once he's 'figured out' after a stream of buffs, he'll just be insane. It's exactly the same with Laura who got a lukewarm response earlier in development.  

Again, it does depend on RNG and/or options available to the player. For example, Fiona's combat isn't normally stellar without certain investment or RNG (same with Aran/Nolan with less attention). It's very easy for her to miss out on a couple SPD procs that may prevent her from reaching the 19/20 SPD threshold needed to generally double a lot of enemies in 1-E. So there are a lot of factors here. Sometimes Laura fails to gain MAG which delays her promotion quite a bit. Does happen, even though her best case scenario is too good right now (Edward's arguably is as well, more so for Part 3+; but there's a case here where his worst case can be buffed in return).

(Worth mentioning with Fiona is that she only has +2 move over the norm in tier 1. She doesn't actually gain move on promotion, so it's just the +1 bonus at that point. Just means that she has less incentive to immediately promote and then goes down to 8 move in two of the three maps in part 1, which is reasonable IMO)

Of course, I'll definitely make some tweaks here and there. What's important is that the game is in a state where each unit feels meaningful and powerful regardless of whether they are or not. Even if someone like Nolan has an unsatisfying power curve in Part 1 as opposed to later on (which possibly more than makes up for it) first/early impressions are always really important for a unit. All I can say though is that I've witnessed a few players play through the game several times now, and their views can shift rapidly through separate runs.

 

Also, I enjoyed watching your LP of FE10 by the way! I've watched a lot of runs of the vanilla game as a means to understand people's perceptions of the original game and how they play etc... Judging by your own run, it's interesting to see your perspectives over the hack so far.

Edited by Dunal
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Hello! Just got done with the stream from earlier. Everything looks pretty good, the Greil Mercenaries are awesome.

Just a little feedback:
The Greil Mercenaries have VERY apparent strengths and weaknesses. They fit together and against enemies in particular ways, like very big puzzle pieces. It's very fun and I like it lots.

But I still feel that Gatrie is kinda lacking both compared to the other mercenaries, and especially as well as the other playable armors. Him simply being there kinda drags down the other units especially in the timed rout map that 3-1 is, and I still think he doesn't have much of anything to make him very comparable to Meg or Brom. That stats he does have in comparison to them don't seem to justify his use. The way I see it, he's also still very generic and boring, and his stats a bit low. He even got doubled by another general at the very get go. Sure he was wielding a Greatlance which weighed him down by 4 and brought him to 9 AS, but I don't think an armor knight like Gatrie should so extremely poor with wielding a weapon that he starts out with. He also has to worry about a warrior who can double him with a hammer in the same chapter. Ouch.

Since you like the idea of units retaining much of their original identity but better, one idea would maybe be revisiting his old stats? You briefly mentioned him having mediocre Luck and considering his luck with women that'd be great to keep. He doesn't have much need for that stat. Gatrie in vanilla RD had fairly typical armor stats all around as well as a 60% speed growth and decent Spd base for an armor. In PoR, he was also very generic as an armor but could still do that job extremely well.

I also remember you saying that he does have more skill than Meg or Brom. I do like the idea of him being much more reliable in hitting as well as proccing combat skills, especially Luna later on. With the 65% skill growth he has or more he's great in that sense.

Maybe he could have very good Skill and/or Speed, and have the rest of his stats be balanced accordingly? With very high Skill he'd be very good to use Counter and Pavise, and maybe the 50%-skill% chance of Disarm and Corrode. With high Speed he'd be great for Cancel, Adept, and Vantage. Maybe not both stats. Of course I'm especially nervous about an armor knight who will be expected to tank having high avoid as well but mediocre/low Luck could fix that. The right stat-spread could definitely make this work if you would try it, I think. If he just has very high Skill I can see his other stats being about the same.

If he has good Spd I envision, just a wacky thought:
HP: Good (Not as good as Meg/Brom)
Str: Mediocre, give or take
Mag: Non-existent
Skill : Very good
Spd: Very good, can double decent # of enemies like warriors with some levels. More about procs than dmg
Lck: VERY low, less about dodging as a unit
Def: Above average (Not as good as Meg/Brom/Tauroneo)
Res: Mediocre

Just, anything to make him more fun and satisfying to use. Even with a couple smaller buffs I don't see myself viably taking him in endgame compared to other units at all right now.

Plus, back to the Dawn Brigade, I think Nolan could use 1-2 more points of base Speed. Probably just 1 is fine. Sure his job is more about not getting doubled more than it is about doubling enemies and doing damage, but still. His Spd growth isn't bad, but with only 8 base it's very easy for him to get screwed there. His cap will keep his offense in check just fine and BExp will be slightly better for him. Otherwise I totally think Nolan is just about perfect for what he's INTENDED to do. Something I've always loved about Nolan as my absolute favorite unit in RD was how much he subverted the typical Warrior. His personality was a more calm and laidback one (from what little we see), he definitely looks more chill, and his stat spread was always about being much more reliable, especially in hitting and winning a defensive trade with enemies. Just, slightly more base speed please.

Edited by Carreau Diamond
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Would also like to add the level of variance in runs, even tho laura is hella good I managed to do 1-E without her and relied on Fiona for healing, while in other runs, laura will be a monster and fiona otherwise. Aran with provoke is also really good due to his vigilance so he is very consistent and has just as much defense as Meg sometimes more.  Granted while Nolan may look weak on paper, every run I have done Nolan has turned out okay. Even with bad level ups his promotion bonuses are good enough that he has a stat spread that allows him to accomplish his job, but the real question is how does this play out into later in the game? I guess we will see. Dawn brigade feels like there is a good spot just some minor tweaking tbh. After 5 runs of part 1 I feel each character does its specific role decently well and gets punished when venturing out of that role. 

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Huh, Provoke + Resire Laura... I never considered the latter for her, because her abysmal str wouldn't make it work well later on and I promoted her during 1-8, but combining the two would destroy early levels if she's promoted early, and she can speed past the low hit.

 

Don't underestimate Meg's mobility - armor knights only spend 1 move on ledges (whereas every other walker spends at least two moves), so on maps like 1-E she can push through the ledged path like nobody's business. I think she moves rather well on water and bushes too.

 

Edward is about the most RNG-variable DB unit, which honestly I think is fine - if he doesn't turn out allright you can just replace him with Zihark, and if he does turn out allright, ohhhh boy.

 

Dunal, is Fiona still gonna get Sol for her tier 3? Doing so would only allow you to assign her one skill apart from her locked and free ones. You could do that without affecting Astrid and Oscar, since all three are separate classes in the code.

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On 1/25/2018 at 8:05 PM, Dunal said:

snip

I can definitely give a little more context if that helps. For example most of my impressions are formed under the assumption of trying for max BEXP Turn Counts, getting all treasures/stealables barring vulneraries, etc. Pretty standard stuff, but worth mentioning still. Also, these opinions are of course only from what I've personally played, which is up through 2-2. It's entirely possible that some of these guys have a 'secret weapon' later on that I'm totally unaware of, so take these opinions with a grain of salt haha.

I like the idea of changing Laura to Heaven affinity. Not only would that nerf her ability to potentially dodgetank through the mid/late-game with the proper support, but it would also give the player another way to shore up hit rates earlier in the game, where biorhythm can make a substantial difference in reliability. Her STR is so bad that it's clear she won't be OP with Resire past a certain point, especially with a nerf to her Light Rank, so the benefit that she herself would see from Heaven is pretty minimal honestly. Good idea IMO. It's also true that she can get magic screwed, but as things stand there are 2 Spirit Dusts available in Part 1, and she is of substantial use in getting the first even with slightly subpar magic. Also worth mentioning that with her current growths Magic is one of the more likely outcomes when using BEXP, so if you're willing to throw her a bone every now and then it's really hard for her to fall too far behind even in the worst case scenario.

And since I saw others bring it up, the Provoke + Resire Laura thing is specifically to clown the lower right hand of the map in 1-5 while Sothe is busy running around stealing stuff so you never have to deal with the guys who start behind you, while also eating all the Meteor attacks from the boss. It also has the side effect of making the Boots guy run out towards you to heal the guys that Laura doesn't kill, which is nice. I can't imagine how much harder that map is without that haha. I'm sure that it's possible to do similar things on maps such as 1-6-1 as well, but her bad STR should in theory gate her from breaking the game much past that point.

That's a fair point with Aran, and I don't think he's bad per se. He didn't have that same wow factor that some other units did for me personally, but he definitely has some use. That early Horseslayer is one that comes to mind, for example, seeing as he's probably the person who benefits from it the most. And immunity to biorhythm is really great as well, as you pointed out. He's good enough early on that you'd want to bring him along for certain tasks whether you invest heavily in him or not, and I admit that I could have put more thought into his lategame potential when deciding how much I invested in him.

With Nolan, I guess seeing is believing. I will say that, insofar as Part 1, raising him to Warrior will at least allow him to contribute come time for 1-E, and I can see where giving him more resources than I did could make him a bit better than I'm giving him credit for. For the record, he was 14/1 by 1-E, and looking at it now I can see that I got a little bit unlucky with him, notably not hitting Strength one time where as when I posted my opinions on him I assumed he was at least average. It's hard to say where his potential can go without the full context of Part 3/4, but my initial feelings on him as far as Part 1 are mostly unchanged. He's still clutch early on, much like vanilla, but I feel that every DB unit, including the likes of Edward can quickly outshine him in terms of value when given the same amount of attention. Again, at least in terms of Part 1. I do like the idea of a mid/late-game crossbow specialist though, so if that's the idea then by all means. He certainly has the spread for it, but in that case I'm kind of with the person who suggested a very slight buff to his speed in some way.

With Fiona my feelings are a little bit more complicated. While I don't deny that she practically demands investment to be anywhere near the level I'm describing, I kind of based that opinion around the idea of "who uses this investment the best?" In my opinion, Fiona does a lot more with that initial investment than other units could hope to, at least at this stage of the game.Of course, I'm not saying that you HAVE to invest in her or anything, just that if you should choose to invest in her immediately the returns are insane. And while it's true that she'll never be as tanky as say, Meg and Aran, she's still a lot more durable than the numbers suggest thanks to innate Imbue, she'll get there first thanks to her great movement, and she'll be able to hold her own as well thanks to good combat stats. I guess I just felt that she snowballed a bit for me personally, where giving her that initial investment easily let her get kills and keep her own momentum going without any outside help. On the other hand, the way speed tiers are set up in this hack make it next to impossible for even the best Fiona to say, double Swordmasters or something crazy like that, which I like. She has limits, but those limits are quite high.

The fact that she really only has a noticeable movement advantage at Tier 1 is something I didn't consider though, and of course there's the fact that the actual map design of the game has it out for Fiona too. I won't say that I think she's super OP or anything, just really good and arguably low effort. Not to mention her support abilities, which can be really insane when combined with other passive healing. She makes every team better just by existing, since even the worst Fiona can support her teammates in a unique way that mostly disregards her combat stats, provided she's at least durable enough to be near the action.

Funnily enough though, with Edward, I see your point exactly. I started another playthrough on Hard, and sure enough, Eddy decided to make the most of his first few levels this time and really start to carve himself a niche. I will say that I think HM makes him more of a necessity early on which may have led to him gaining steam, but your point still stands IMO. I feel like I also undersold the amount of damage he can do with the early Wo Dao + Gamble, if luck is on your side. It's situational sure, but if you can get Biorhythm in your favor it can be a pretty powerful tool in his kit. However, it is shaky at best since the hit rates are not outstanding even factoring in Biorhythm, and you'd pretty much have to dump that first Arms Scroll on him if you want to use this combo ASAP, which is a gamble (ha) considering how unreliable the whole strategy is to begin with. There's more to factor with him than I considered, so he's definitely good at filling the role of 'wildcard' if that's the idea. 

I meant to include this in the last post, but for reference these were more or less my MVPs of 1-E by the end of the map, in no particular order:

Spoiler

1 Energy Drop, 1 Speedwing (?)

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1 Spirit Dust

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1 Energy Drop, 2 Talismans, 2 Goddess Icons, really wish I would have saved the Drop for Volug in hindsight

RFEE01-3.thumb.png.caf735424ce300e8e2a83aaaad3c299a.png

RFEE01-4.thumb.png.6bda6fb4e7235ac3e2ee4bbf01aff5c3.png

RFEE01-5.thumb.png.ae8b583077415645bd0da9c1c44f327a.png

RFEE01-6.thumb.png.9adac7e4844c5c1e8114eb2f6cd39290.png

RFEE01-7.thumb.png.274da7bbeaa4ac986314bbb0dbb4876a.png

(More speed than my 4-E Micaiah last time I played lol)

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1 Spirit Dust, 1 Dracoshield or 1 Angelic Robe (I honestly can't remember)

RFEE01-10.thumb.png.945391002ed20b7f71503f51f9a0e4d0.png

 

Obviously RNG did have some influence on my impressions (Leo got super strong quickly, and Vika quite honestly could do no wrong when leveling up), but at a glance I don't think most of my units are too far off the norm. I think Laura is dead average on Magic, if a little behind defensively, and we seem to agree she's a bit too much for example.

And thank you! That was a fun playthrough for me and I'm glad that you enjoyed watching. Don't get me wrong either, I really enjoyed what's available of this hack so far and I definitely look forward to future releases! 

 

Edited by Deltre
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I appreciate the priests having only 2-3 very high stats that make them each unique while being very low in all other regards (Laura in Skill+Spd and Rhys in Mag+Lck+Res). I like them as backup combat units, to mainly give other units last-hit experience or snipe other mages or Laguz. However we know that priests are meant to ultimately be subpar in combat compared to others, and I do feel Laura is at least a bit abuseable in that regard. She's not nearly as unreliable or shaky to use in combat as Rhys might be, for starters. Even if the game's difficulty catches up with her, she can shine so much in combat while she can without much effort (as a Priest no less!). Difficulty alone shouldn't decide how good she is in a fight; her class and her ability to heal should.

With that being said: whether Laura's combat ends up being nerfed or not, I also fear for her staff utility being outclassed by that of Rhys in Part 4. His crazy Magic alone makes his healing the best. Period. I feel Laura as a Priest should compensate with something other than combat.

So... get this... what if the range of ranged staves scaled with Skill instead of Magic? That would give her healing a unique strength over that of Rhys and tier 3 Micaiah; somewhat larger map presence at the cost of not being able to top-off heal significant injuries at all. It would also play into a new, minor theme of Laura having good range when combined with the Wind magic she gets at tier 3, with Rhys being mid-range but having great might, and Oliver having short range and... whatever Oliver does. Chapter 3-12 & 3-13 would be a bit more manageable. Maybe even the Thief staff could have a new range beyond 1 (a bit like Tina from Thracia 776), but without a large enough scaling to make Sothe's chest-opening redundant. Lastly, while Skill is an important stat in the long-run, FE's mechanics have never allowed it to feel very satisfying to get within a single level-up in the same way that Strength or Speed do. Skill has never given units big, satisfying power spikes. This would mend that a bit, in a unique way.

Edited by Carreau Diamond
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17 hours ago, Deltre said:

I can definitely give a little more context if that helps. For example most of my impressions are formed under the assumption of trying for max BEXP Turn Counts, getting all treasures/stealables barring vulneraries, etc. Pretty standard stuff, but worth mentioning still. Also, these opinions are of course only from what I've personally played, which is up through 2-2. It's entirely possible that some of these guys have a 'secret weapon' later on that I'm totally unaware of, so take these opinions with a grain of salt haha.

Yeah, with Fiona in particular I can see that you did give her some extra resource/levels which makes sense as to why she turned out like she did. But at the same time, any unit can turn out really strong given similar treatment. Fiona can be used fairly casually (for example: given one or two levels of BEXP and then set to 99 EXP with Blossom for 1-7 -- promotion after that level) and despite lower investment her utility and combat are both still decent. Same how Nolan or Aran for instance are 'decent' if steadily levelled without too much focus. However, if the same amount of BEXP (as you gave to Fiona) is given to Nolan/Aran/Meg etc... they can snowball and turn out really powerful by the end of 1-E, while still having a decent, if not stellar Fiona.

This all comes down to average stats, really. A 15/6 Nolan going into 1-E is meant to be around the same power level as a 15/3 Fiona. Given of course, that similar treatment past 1-6 is given to them. In any case, the player has the resources to either give every unit moderate investment or extra resources on a couple units. In part 1, either option is viable. Past part 1, the intention is that you can only really afford maybe one dead-weight at most, especially since a number of powerful units leave after part 1. Low-manning becomes more difficult. All units in part 3 get free deployment, so spreading resources around is actually recommended to some degree. The DB units are notorious for capping out early in Tier 2 with no Master Crown access whatsoever. So having a ~LV18 tier 2 Fiona + a benched/weak Nolan will be worse off than a level 10-12 of both (since both would be close to capping out anyway). Then once part 4 rolls around you can freely promote them both anyway.      

Worth mentioning however is that someone like Nolan can still be viable with lower investment (in part 1) due to Tarvos. While Fiona's combat won't be as good with the same. It counterbalances the fact that she may have more immediate potential.  But using Nolan a bit more in part 1 will definitely have results later on either way. 

However, the exception to all this is still...

17 hours ago, Deltre said:

I like the idea of changing Laura to Heaven affinity. Not only would that nerf her ability to potentially dodgetank through the mid/late-game with the proper support, but it would also give the player another way to shore up hit rates earlier in the game, where biorhythm can make a substantial difference in reliability. Her STR is so bad that it's clear she won't be OP with Resire past a certain point, especially with a nerf to her Light Rank, so the benefit that she herself would see from Heaven is pretty minimal honestly. Good idea IMO. It's also true that she can get magic screwed, but as things stand there are 2 Spirit Dusts available in Part 1, and she is of substantial use in getting the first even with slightly subpar magic. Also worth mentioning that with her current growths Magic is one of the more likely outcomes when using BEXP, so if you're willing to throw her a bone every now and then it's really hard for her to fall too far behind even in the worst case scenario.

And since I saw others bring it up, the Provoke + Resire Laura thing is specifically to clown the lower right hand of the map in 1-5 while Sothe is busy running around stealing stuff so you never have to deal with the guys who start behind you, while also eating all the Meteor attacks from the boss. It also has the side effect of making the Boots guy run out towards you to heal the guys that Laura doesn't kill, which is nice. I can't imagine how much harder that map is without that haha. I'm sure that it's possible to do similar things on maps such as 1-6-1 as well, but her bad STR should in theory gate her from breaking the game much past that point.

Laura's too easy to snowball with, of course. Current changes being planned are:

  • Heaven affinity instead of Wind (so no +AVO for Laura)
  • E rank light on promotion.
  • Very slight reduction to 'Heal' EXP (down to 14 from 15).
  • Base MAG reduced by 1. Promotion bonus reduced by 1 as well.
  • No more Master Seal before 1-5 (replaced with a Killer Axe?).

Considering Micaiah's 'Inspiration' in part 3, this won't be too harsh of a nerf. May even to follow up with further changes if required.

18 hours ago, Deltre said:

Funnily enough though, with Edward, I see your point exactly. I started another playthrough on Hard, and sure enough, Eddy decided to make the most of his first few levels this time and really start to carve himself a niche. I will say that I think HM makes him more of a necessity early on which may have led to him gaining steam, but your point still stands IMO. I feel like I also undersold the amount of damage he can do with the early Wo Dao + Gamble, if luck is on your side. It's situational sure, but if you can get Biorhythm in your favor it can be a pretty powerful tool in his kit. However, it is shaky at best since the hit rates are not outstanding even factoring in Biorhythm, and you'd pretty much have to dump that first Arms Scroll on him if you want to use this combo ASAP, which is a gamble (ha) considering how unreliable the whole strategy is to begin with. There's more to factor with him than I considered, so he's definitely good at filling the role of 'wildcard' if that's the idea. 

Even with just the Wo Dao by itself he performs really well with it past promotion (in which he has the second best promo bonuses, behind Micaiah). Even then, his part 1 performance isn't meant to be stellar. Part 3 is really when the investment pays off. Either way, you don't really need to heavily focus on him. LV13-15 before promotion is usually fine, as much as min/maxing on him is tempting (albeit certainly doable). I'm reluctant to give him any further changes at this point; he's a pseudo-Est that could easily be too powerful reliably. With Part 3 and 4 being notably more difficult than Part 1, then that archetype is far more relevant than the original game.  

For Nolan the added early Killer Axe should do a lot for him and I may increase his base SKL a bit to support its usage further. Meanwhile, Jill can't utilize it too well early on.

Worth mentioning with Nolan is that the game highly incentives you to promote him before 1-6 for Bowgun usage. Then you have two units who can 1-shot the Pegasus. He can help in 1-8 by doing the same. Otherwise, he's reliable in dealing with Halberdiers due to Nihil negating Vigilance. He's consistently quite relevant, which should give him more than enough EXP/resources to scale into part 3/4.

 

Also, try not to judge the game's difficulty/balance through hardmode/ReDux+. It's basically filler until I essentially re-design that mode through a separate version of the hack. Currently just exists for the time being in case you want to challenge yourself a bit more, but a more meaningful difficulty variant will be released later (making the game more difficult in ways that matter, like enemy AI/placement or adjusted scaling/resources, without inflating stats or removing features like the weapon triangle).

14 hours ago, Carreau Diamond said:

With that being said: whether Laura's combat ends up being nerfed or not, I also fear for her staff utility being outclassed by that of Rhys in Part 4. His crazy Magic alone makes his healing the best. Period. I feel Laura as a Priest should compensate with something other than combat.

I'm planning on making staff range fixed (so not scaling from MAG, where healing amounts/accuracy is more than enough). Laura does have good enough combat later on to compensate. At least, that's the design intention for now.

Or if you just want a healer that doesn't get ORKOed by longbows or something (or generally be less in danger)... Yeah Rhys is the outright the best healer (outside of 'Recover', which is very relevant in this hack since it's far more difficult to top someone off) but in endgame you have to be careful with him. And outside of that, you can use both on different teams.

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23 hours ago, Dunal said:

snip

Well, as you say, you really don't have to do much of anything to make Fiona useful. That's kind of my thing with her, actually haha. She's almost unscrewable in my mind, provided of course you're at least putting in the bare minimum of effort. RNG is of course a bit of a factor, but when isn't it right?

It's pretty clear I might need to give Nolan another look though. Out of curiosity, how much BEXP each are the Marado Knights/1-8 Prisoners worth? I feel as though they're worth enough that this might be a 'why not invest in both?' sort of scenario, but I'll be honest and say that 1-8 rocked me the first time, and I definitely could have done better saving the first wave Marado Knights too. 

Laura changes sound good, and honestly for me personally I think that Heaven is a more useful affinity for her to have, although it's true she doesn't need it. The other non-Aran/non-Muarim characters though? I think they'll really appreciate another way to negate Biorhythm, at least the Hit portion of it. There's only one Meg after all and with accuracy fluctuating (sometimes greatly) on a turn by turn basis, it'll be nice to not have to deal with as many whiffed attacks and randomness in general. Also this is kind of (potentially) an indirect buff to Gamble!Edward, so that's neat.

Curious about the Heal EXP nerf. If it's just for general balancing then that makes sense, but in Laura's case as others had pointed out the reason she can potentially level so much faster in the early game is because she's durable enough to staff-counter now and it just so happens to work out that it's a good idea to make use of that, at least a few times anyways. I was able to get her an extra level or so this way, which meant that she could juuuust make it to 10 with the BEXP I had, and well, you see how that went. With a nerf of only 1 EXP, you could counter that as easily as throwing out a Mend/Barrier once. 

Magic nerf sounds reasonable, since she'll still be a good fighter, especially if you slap Adept on her or something. She also has to choose between utility and offense on any given turn, so yeah, sounds fair.

Removing the Master Seal from 1-5 is lowkey genius. It keeps degenerates like me from trying to roll Ilyana or anyone else for 1-5 instead now that Laura's getting the nerfbat lol. 

True you don't need to give Eddy all that, just the Wo Dao is probably enough. Worth mentioning though, that if you do get him to the Wo Dao and had a decent time with his first few levels, he's potentially your best unit in 1-4. Sounds like that's only gonna get better too, since Laura can actually support him in time for that to matter, unlike Meg. Basically, I've 180'd on him since my first run haha. I still think he's random, but I can buy into the possible payoff. 

For the record, I did play through NM the first time. Playing through it again on HM is just for fun really. 

Speaking about staves though, was it intentional that you can steal the ElSleep in 1-E? I was able to snag it with Sothe when I last replayed 1-E, and I had noticed that the ElSilence guy had his items locked so I thought I'd ask. 

 

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Dunal, if you have the time, could you try and look into making the longbowman and the non-boss cav in 1-3 switch order? I want the cav to move before the longbowman, else the longbowman moves to the front of the door and blocks the sword-dropping cav from attacking Eddie (who can't move past the door else he enters boss range), holding himself and his red gem hostage and completely blocking that path if you didn't send Sothe to steal all the stuff on the other path first.

 

I ended up playing such a stupid game of chicken with that longbowman today; I just wanted to bait that cav, get his sword and retreat through the other path before reinforcements arrived...

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Speaking even more about staves; I've gone back a bit in this topic a bit and read that the Seraph Knights will have access to staves, especially Sigrun.

Do they have the same issue with staff animations as Fiona and Astrid used to, where the game would either crash or display weird poses for them? Or by chance do they share some things in common in the game's code with Elincia that allows them to safely use staves with animations turned on?

EDIT: Also, Is Bastian still going to be primarily a Wind user, and therefore a Strategist? Or is he going to be Ilyana's class now and therefore a Thunder user primarily?

Also, is Pelleas going to be a unique kind of Strategist with fire instead of wind, but still favoring dark?

Edited by Carreau Diamond
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On 31/1/2018 at 11:31 PM, Deltre said:

Speaking about staves though, was it intentional that you can steal the ElSleep in 1-E?

Honestly, if you're good enough to grab it like you did, you won't be needing it, so I'm cool with it being stealable anyway.

It was nice seeing the differences between your playstyle and mine - we both try to spend as little turns as possible while grabbing absolutely all the loot, but your best units were better than mine because you still benched others permanently, while I kept everyone up to date and viable, to see how that'll go in DB's full-deployment maps in part 3. In particular, your bigger powerhouses were much more able to take down the enemy elites quickly.

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