What do you think about the reclass feature?

[Dragrath]

22 hours ago, Sasori said:

To me it depends. I did't like the way shadow dragon did reclassing. I thought it made the characters as a whole less unique.
 

I thought the Awakening first gens had the right idea with reclassing. It was limited to only two other classes and they mostly designed those with personality in mind. Chrom fanboy Ricken gets the same options as Chrom, Henry gets the morally ambiguous classes and Cherche's healing classes get explained in her backstory.

Yeah I have to agree here the issues with Awakening were really all the all inclusive inheritance (and free partial level reset) which was honestly pretty broken 

If the Avatar and children were made to have limited choices from the pool of options (and enemies were to have received similar treatment and preset skills rather than random) the game could have been far more fair and balanced with reclassing...

Fates gave a more balanced reclassing system but over complicated the set up with allowing the Avatar to cheat and the heart seal/partner seal shenanigans...

Shadow Dragon had a super bland reclassing system that really didn't let any units stand out...

[Nazarre]

I'm personally not a fan of reclassing... if we are going to have it, I did like how Gen-1 of Awakening did it, where most units have a few similar class choices. I didn't use it in Shadow Dragon at all, and for Awakening I only used it for skill collection (and ended up using everyone's default class / the promoted version of their base class that fit their personality most when I was done.)

Part of the characters' personality is in their class, and changing that just feels... wrong. From a mechanical standpoint, I can see where people can have fun with it, but I'm pretty anal hesitant about deviating from the norm for a character.

[Lord Tullus]

I like reclass.  Everyone says that it ruins the character.  No.  I disagree.  Reclassing is in the game for more than just "Unit A picks up weapon E and runs with it".  It's in the game for replay value, adding new strengths to failing characters, and just goofing around with it was never an issue to me. Fates and awakening made it a bit of a hassle with seals, but I can't deny that it made the reclass system more in tune with specific character traits. 

I think it worked best in shadow dragon, however, because most of the units you had were personality deprived, near-generic units who got the most use out of reclassing.  Plus, it was fun to just go into a battle reclassing anyone I could into any class that seemed unfitting, and trying to complete the chapter with handicaps and forged weapons just for funsies.  And guess what?  It was hella fun, and didn't force me to think about how it impacted character personality.

One thing that does bug me is this: Reclassing in the same game as branching promotions.  Seriously, IS?  Really?  Pick one.  Reclassing completely undermines branched promotions.  You are modifying the unit to fit specific traits that the player likes, and there's no real incentive to stick with it.  If I were to implement reclassing in a future FE game, I'd make it that once a character is reclassed (and I'd make it so Lords can't reclass, like in shadow dragon) you can't do it again.  Only one time per character. Maybe go back to the original class after promotion, but once you reclass, you need to stick with that decision.  This will encourage players to use characters in their base class on beginning playthroughs, which will give people an incentive to learn a unit's strengths and weaknesses, and also it doesn't impact character personality when you;d try to get to know the story and cast the first time around.  Let's be honest.  How many times do we replay FE games for the story after we've read it once or twice?  If reclassing was a one time thing per character, it would mean that any class diversity could lead to screw ups on the battlefield.  Meaning players would really need to think twice before reclassing.

Edited March 17, 2017 by Lord Tullus

[Thinks Their Own Way]

With Friendship Seals and Partner Seals; for the former, I like how it gives an incentive to collect same sex supports; and with the latter, the partner isn't completely forgotten in favour of the child (this applies to games with both children and re-classing). Personally I enjoy re-classing, it's not forced upon me; when I re-class I do it because I want to. And at the end of the day, it's still an optional feature, the main campaigns are still doable with out classing.