Does FE6 have the most balanced units?

[Dunal]

Wouldn't say it's FE6. There's a lot of disparity with units and classes. The extremes are some of the worst in the series as well. I don't think there's a bigger power gap in the entire series compared to Gwendolyn and Percival. 

Although, if you disregard hard mode bonuses, then I suppose that FE6 is pretty good overall since there's no longer anything that's overly too powerful. You still have the awful side of the units nonetheless.

I'd say it's FE7. I suppose with FE7 it's initially hard to say because enemies do not scale very well, but if they did, the balance actually shines through rather than the contrary. Marcus would fall off earlier than usual and Nino's scaling would actually have some kind of value now. Wallace's base 19 DEF (+ a robe) possibly becomes rather clutch rather than pointless and the emphasis on movement on pegs/cavs become less important when enemies are strong enough that you can't just charge ahead. Dorcas inability to double becomes less of a problem when a lot of other units are suddenly not doubling anymore. Raven's bad luck might actually matter when enemies have more SKL etc etc.... There's still some imbalance here genuinely speaking, but FE7 has an excellently balanced cast (where most of the imbalance comes from who can abuse the weak enemies the most... and maybe Raven/Harken's HM bonuses?). You still have the two archers and Nino (maybe Bartre and NoLynMode!Lyn) but that might be about it.

Conquest is up there as well. And Thracia is underrated in this department too. Birthright is pretty well balanced aside from Ryoma, I guess.

FE8 is just FE7 with more extremes. Seth and Ewan are more exaggerated versions of Marcus and Nino on the scale of good or bad.

Gaiden/Echoes is okay -- but I feel that units are so defined by their classes that individuality is less prominent -- so while the balance is there... it's less remarkable.

FE10 is "Availability = Viability: The Game". (kinda). Awakening is whoever can abuse the busted EXP formula and pair-up the most. FE12 is mostly free silvers (FE3 is better here but only because the game is far easier) I mean, most of the cast could have done with 2-3 more bases with half the growths, and it would have been significantly better for the most part. I suppose FE11 is fairly decent outside of skipping? Could be wrong though (something something Wing Spear?). FE4 is... FE4. Rev is... Rev.

FE9 I'd have to think more about. I think it's similar to FE7 in that while the unit balance is very good, the difficulity doesn't show that. However, BEXP and the higher-than-GBA-growths just mean that increasing the difficulty only encourages abusing the best units even more, possibly. If you remove BEXP though, it could be up there with FE7. Someone like Marcia would end up average.

Edited July 18, 2017 by DLuna

[Just call me AL]

35 minutes ago, DLuna said:

FE10 is "Availability = Viability: The Game". (kinda).

Wouldn't some units give someone ammo to challenge that claim? I mean, for example, Zihark joins later than Edward, but by no means is he worse than Edward.

[Dunal]

23 minutes ago, Just call me AL said:

Wouldn't some units give someone ammo to challenge that claim? I mean, for example, Zihark joins later than Edward, but by no means is he worse than Edward.

Obviously it doesn't apply for every unit. It's just a general case. Mostly in regards to each unit's standing come part 4.

To be fair, each army is isolated from each-other until that point. So until then it doesn't matter. But part of the problem is how low-manning is necessary for a lot of units to remain relevant/good (outside of Normal Mode).

The game's balance still isn't that great though. Between said availability, EXP formula/speed (when necessary for some units with low bases) for certain units and just general tuning. In part 1 alone it's all over the place. No FE has given you units like Nailah/BK that crazy early on (I mean, units like Seth/Sigurd are up there but...). Let alone Tormod & Co or Volug. And then there's Fiona. Ike's Army then really highlights the availability issue.

There are worst games, but FE10 is a weird beast. It often feels like the developers had good ideas for unit balance at one stage... but then just used a dartboard to decide who's going to be available at random points in the game.

Edited July 18, 2017 by DLuna

[Shadow Mir]

14 hours ago, Flee Fleet! said:

Just a question, but when talking about balanced units in Fire Emblem, should we just not consider Ests at all? (and I mean real Ests, like Est herself, Zeiss, Nino, and not "Ests" like Sophia who still remain pretty useless despite training).

Ests are made to be weak, and to come lategame, but with really good growths, after all. There's going to be at least one of them in a Fire Emblem game.

 

iirc, the weight of the least heavy tomes (of all three magic types), which are Fire, Thunder, and Wind, are 11, 7, and 4, respectively. Those are quite the difference in numbers, and pretty much the weight of all Fire tomes is in the tens.

Wind is so OP....

Discounting remakes, when was the last time we could say we had an Est? Radiant Dawn, which was way back in 2007?

 

Actually, the weights were 12 (fire), 7 (thunder), and 2 (wind).

14 hours ago, Slumber said:

You could dual wield Thunder AND Wind, and you'd be matching what Fire wielder have to put up with. 

But yes, wind is super OP. Genealogy devs were smokin' something when they decided to make swords and wind flat out better than the other weapon types. 

Actually, you'd still have less AS loss than a fire user.

8 hours ago, Reimu Hakurei said:

Honestly I find lances even worse in FE6.
Axes are somewhat reliable against knights and the slow peggies while lances have only advantage against the fast classes, myrms and mercs, who have high evasion anyways.

Except those are hardly common, particularly pegasi. And there's the matter of no good first tier axe users...

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Quote

Except those are hardly common, particularly pegasi. And there's the matter of no good first tier axe users...

Depends on the route you'll go.
Axes are alright in earlygame because soldiers and knights have low evasion. Lot, not Ward, has the base speed to ORKO them all.
He's good till chapter 8 at least, but also alright iater on because of his balanced growths.
And unlike Gonzales he has still "ok" hitrates against lanceusers. 


FE5 is really balanced because of the generic caps and scrolls, but it also kills the point of individual classes. Seeing generals having the same speed as swordmasters and mage knights having the same strength as warriors (theoretically) is dumb for me.


FE7 and 9 are really balanced. I don't think one particular unit really sucks in this game. 
Maybe the availibility of certain units like Wallace is not the best. With his bases it's very hard to keep him alive.
Sothe joins level 1 late with lowered exp. gain which makes him very vulnerable against the enemies. 
 

[Flee Fleet!]

6 hours ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

Discounting remakes, when was the last time we could say we had an Est? Radiant Dawn, which was way back in 2007?

 

Actually, the weights were 12 (fire), 7 (thunder), and 2 (wind).

Oh, my bad then. I didn't check the archetype list on the wiki so I assumed all the games had one.

Thanks for correcting the weight of the tomes too.

 

 

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

I just noticed the comment.
Who is the "Est"-character in FE10 because no one comes in mind?
 

[ping]

Kurthnaga, maybe? His averages are generally better than the other dragons', he comes late and he takes effort to raise, especially since you can't BEXP his strike rank. Other than that, I can't really think of a fitting candidate.

[Flee Fleet!]

2 hours ago, Reimu Hakurei said:

I just noticed the comment.
Who is the "Est"-character in FE10 because no one comes in mind?
 

 

1 hour ago, ping said:

Kurthnaga, maybe? His averages are generally better than the other dragons', he comes late and he takes effort to raise, especially since you can't BEXP his strike rank. Other than that, I can't really think of a fitting candidate.

the wiki states it's Kurthnaga as well as Pelleas.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

I don't the exact definition of an "Est"-character but I assumed that these lowleveled units in lategame should have good growths.
That's the case for neither.
Also Kurthnaga is trash in HM. Gets doubled by all the generals. Brave axe / sword general reinforcement in E-1 will ORKO him. 

[Interdimensional Observer]

I'm not really sure if RD truly has an Est, but Kurth is one of the closest things around (particularly with Paragon + Blossom). Sanaki, Vika, and Elincia too I guess- Elincia's bases are lovely for Part 2, but she's hurting when she rejoins in P4 and needs babying to catch back up via her monstrous offensive growths. Sanaki needs babying and Paragon to overcome her weak start, and Vika has pretty good growths for a Laguz, but will in all likelihood be terribly underleveled in P4.

[Jotari]

Firmly believe Thracia has the best cast balance of any title in the series so far. Sure if you have a prf weapon you're going to be able to murder anyone on command but in general killing enemies isn't difficult and the game provides a load of other traits that make stats less crucial for balancing. At best you can say staff users are inherently better since staff combat is so crucial but even then you don't really field staff users exclusively, one or two will do (because you still actually need to have the staves to make use of them, ie its the staves that are vital, not the stave users, aside from weapon ranks most characters are interchangeable for that niche).

Edited July 19, 2017 by Jotari

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Kurth: Joins late with low level but great bases and potential at first sight. They're just fake. His base speed is abysmal and his growths aren't good, better than an average Laguz, but still not worth the effort.
Pelleas: Joins late but just has normal bases and growths. Still the only dark magic user besides Lehran.
Sanaki: A weird one. Starts third tier but has bases in several stats of a first tier unit (HP, strength). Her growths are above average aside of speed. I wouldn't call her as an Est though for being third tier already.
Elincia: Starts third as well with abysmal bases but terrific growths which equal her bad bases. Since she's only really playable in part 4 she struggles with her bases. Paragon will make her a beast. The only Beorc who can ORKO an aura without TA. She'd be an Est for me if she wasn't third tier.

 

[Dark Holy Elf]

Elincia doesn't feel like much of an Est. Sure her bases on join aren't the best but she isn't underlevelled (her join level is higher than Ike will be at the time, and only a few of the higher-levelled Greil Mercs are likely to be significantly higher than 20/20/1), and she has a 15-might brave sword and staves. She's not at all bad on her first map in Part 4, which is kind of a requirement to be an Est in my books.

Sanaki similarly isn't underlevelled, and while she's certainly less useful than Elincia on join, she never really gets that much better either; her growths keep her stats in roughly the same place relative to the enemies for the entire rest of the game, Rudol Gem notwithstanding (which felt like a patch to keep her being OHKOed by Ashera's long-range physical).

Vika and Tormod IMO are the Ests; the joing midway through Part 4 as early tier 2 characters (or something similar, in Vika's case). They're much more comparable to Ests like Nino and Sophia. Pelleas kinda works as well I suppose. Vika and Tormod are weird cases because they had stints as pre-promos too! One of my friends observed upon playing Radiant Dawn that it felt like Tormod had been both Pent and Nino in one game.

[ping]

I seriously wouldn't call Sophia an Est, though. Sure, she's underleveled, but her growths and averages are about as high in total as Raigh's. Her growth total is very slightly higher (280% vs. 260%), but that get completely negated by Raighs superiour base stats. Not to mention that Sophia's stats are distributed much more awkwardly - the only stat in which she beats Raigh by a significant margin is friggin Resistance.

Honestly, I feel that the "Est" label gets used way to liberal to a point where the only criteria for a unit is to be underleveled.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, ping said:

I seriously wouldn't call Sophia an Est, though. Sure, she's underleveled, but her growths and averages are about as high in total as Raigh's. Her growth total is very slightly higher (280% vs. 260%), but that get completely negated by Raighs superiour base stats. Not to mention that Sophia's stats are distributed much more awkwardly - the only stat in which she beats Raigh by a significant margin is friggin Resistance.

Honestly, I feel that the "Est" label gets used way to liberal to a point where the only criteria for a unit is to be underleveled.

I agree. Low bases and high growths are the real defining feature. Even though Kliff joins at the start of the game I'd still describe him as an Est due to the way he grows. Being unprompted or under levelled are just about how many levels a character has to grow. Lucia in Path of Radiance comes as a level 12 promoted unit but I'd be more inclined to call her an Est more than Sophia due to her above average growths and below average bases.

Edited July 20, 2017 by Jotari

[Flee Fleet!]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

I agree. Low bases and high growths are the real defining feature. Even though Kliff joins at the start of the game I'd still describe him as an Est due to the way he grows. Being unprompted or under levelled are just about how many levels a character has to grow. Lucia in Path of Radiance comes as a level 12 promoted unit but I'd be more inclined to call her an Est more than Sophia due to her above average growths and below average bases.

In my opinion, that besides for low bases and high growths, a character must also join late in the game to be considered an "Est". If a character doesn't have any of these traits, they're not an "Est", in my opinion. 

[Shadow Mir]

8 hours ago, ping said:

I seriously wouldn't call Sophia an Est, though. Sure, she's underleveled, but her growths and averages are about as high in total as Raigh's. Her growth total is very slightly higher (280% vs. 260%), but that get completely negated by Raighs superiour base stats. Not to mention that Sophia's stats are distributed much more awkwardly - the only stat in which she beats Raigh by a significant margin is friggin Resistance.

Honestly, I feel that the "Est" label gets used way to liberal to a point where the only criteria for a unit is to be underleveled.

I have to agree that Est is used way too liberally, to the point where it's more of a buzzword than an archetype (it doesn't help that archetypes in general have been disappearing from the series).

[Dark Holy Elf]

Ests don't really necessarily have amazing growth rates. They're usually solid (because a growth character without growth rates would be garbage) but I wouldn't consider that a requirement. Est's growth rates in FE1 and FE11 are pretty comparable to Catria's for instance.

Ewan is absolutely, 100% an Est if that definition is going to be useful at all and he actually has quite bad growth rates (offset by the fact that he gains more levels, to be fair).

[Harvey]

Ok so a quick question here.

If Roy had been promoted earlier, would it fix the balancing issues that the game has?

 

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Harvey said:

Ok so a quick question here.

If Roy had been promoted earlier, would it fix the balancing issues that the game has?

 

Well I made this thread some time ago (though not so long ago that a new post in it would be a necro, nudge, nudge)

Common consensus was that Roy would still kind of be bad even with earlier promotion.

Edited July 26, 2017 by Jotari