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At what point do you guys think a chapter goes from difficult to unfair?


ConquestVeteran
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The only truly unfair mechanic I've seen in Fire Emblem is unannounced reinforcements that move when they spawn. Losing a unit over something you couldn't predict doesn't reflect badly on you as a player (as other difficult chapters or maps do if you fail them).

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Well for me it's the same guidelines I use to judge all difficult games as in I ask one specific question "Does the game give me enough options/foresight/tools to deal with the problem at hand?" for example as much as I love awakening ambush spawns are utter bullshit and only work against the player. In some cases they are telegraphed but they usually don't tell you the type of unit that is to come nor do they tell you when exactly they'll show up. That's bad game design because the player is not given nearly enough information and tools in order to handle the problem. The only times I find it somewhat acceptable is in paralogue 10(of course I would say paralogue 10) and to lesser degree chapters 7 and 9. In the the case of paralogue 10 the ambush spawns happen fairly soon into the map and spawn a great distance away from your allied units meaning if you were paying attention you should know those spots are dangerous and react accordingly which the game gives you enough time to do because of how far away the spawn points are. In chapters 7 and 9 the game explicitly tells you what kind of unit is coming which and gives you a couple turns to formulate a plan.

Edited by Ottservia
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Throwing too many gimmicks at the player (e.g. chapter 14 in Binding Blade). Or throwing the player in a situation where they cannot reasonably expect to succeed without extreme luck on their part (e.g. Ignatius's paralogue in Fates if you wait too long, Battle Before Dawn on hard mode, Lunatic+ in general).

Edited by Shadow Mir
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Probably Ryoma chapter in Fates in Lunatic. The ninja passage is hell incarnated (inevitable end) and the lunge is bullshit (Had a Xander with 5 to 15 def)

Also freaking Takumi and I finished that one in 4 to 6 with the rescue staff (no, not attack and rescue, rescue AND attack)

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I'd say it's the moment where the reason I'm failing or not doing so well is no longer attributable to me making tactical mistakes and instead is because of the game itself. 

This could be due to a number of reasons: excessive or poorly-implemented gimmicks was a big one in all three versions of Fates. It can also be due to bad placement of enemy reinforcements, enemy spam (Shadows of Valentia, especially thanks to cantors and the self-replicating eye monster), enemy thieves having a massive head start (a late chapter in Path of Radiance, but I can't remember which one), an enemy you don't want to kill being programmed to be aggressive, and any number of other reasons. 

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41 minutes ago, vanguard333 said:

I'd say it's the moment where the reason I'm failing or not doing so well is no longer attributable to me making tactical mistakes and instead is because of the game itself. 

This could be due to a number of reasons: excessive or poorly-implemented gimmicks was a big one in all three versions of Fates. It can also be due to bad placement of enemy reinforcements, enemy spam (Shadows of Valentia, especially thanks to cantors and the self-replicating eye monster), enemy thieves having a massive head start (a late chapter in Path of Radiance, but I can't remember which one), an enemy you don't want to kill being programmed to be aggressive, and any number of other reasons. 

Conquest has it particularly bad when it comes to gimmicks. Chapter 19 in particular is extremely obnoxious.

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2 hours ago, link16hit said:

Probably Ryoma chapter in Fates in Lunatic. The ninja passage is hell incarnated (inevitable end) and the lunge is bullshit (Had a Xander with 5 to 15 def)

Also freaking Takumi and I finished that one in 4 to 6 with the rescue staff (no, not attack and rescue, rescue AND attack)

This gets my agreement, along with everyone who mentioned Ambush spawns. They are the devil.

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Any time the game hides information from the player that ends up screwing them over. Yarnes paralogue chapter infuriates me for having the full force of either army hidden from the player, which screws over my preparation planning, but it's far from the worse offender. Having enemy units appear on the map for story reasons that weren't always hinted at beforehand, adding another objective to the map that the player may have been unprepared for, or just fog of war in general, is a quick way to lead to resets, frustration, and paranoia rather than fun. There are good ways to add surprises to a level, and then there are there are bad ones.

Ambush spawns either need to be locked to the past, or they need to be given some kind of visual warning. While I still hate this mechanic in Awakening and past games, I remember that after looking up a guide and actually knowing when and where they'll appear, I actually found that they to added another layer of strategic depth to the game, where you have to debate which forts to block and which ones to leave open, and whether you should risk a unit being attacked by the current enemy or letting a reinforcement appear. I am still baffled why IS never thought to add a caution sign or the like over which forts will have a reinforcement over them, as it's such a simple addition that could go a long way.

Any time luck plays an equal or greater factor than skill does in completing either a side objective or the main one. I don't think that much needs to be said about this one.

A runner-up would be cantors. I actually enjoy fighting them, and find them a better replacement to reinforcements due it being predictable when they will spawn enemies, as well as there being several tricks to deal with them quickly and efficiently. However, even if the "cut the head off the snake" strategy is pretty broad, it does not apply to all playstyles, and I can see how cantors can be frustrating for certain players to deal with.

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Luna Druids in FE7. Or, in general: fights that are unavoidable and intrinsically luckbased in a way that a bad roll means instant death. Killer Lance Wyvern Lords in FE6 come very close to this, as well.

Edited by ping
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7 minutes ago, ping said:

Luna Druids in FE7. Or, in general: fights that are unavoidable and intrinsically luckbased in a way that a bad roll means instant death. Killer Lance Wyvern Lords in FE6 come very close to this, as well.

They're weak to bows dude. Just kill them before they kill you. Having the hazard sign for units with Killer weapons was a great way of balancing them on enemies.

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On 2/1/2019 at 6:26 PM, Shadow Mir said:

Throwing too many gimmicks at the player (e.g. chapter 14 in Binding Blade). Or throwing the player in a situation where they cannot reasonably expect to succeed without extreme luck on their part (e.g. Ignatius's paralogue in Fates if you wait too long, Battle Before Dawn on hard mode, Lunatic+ in general).

Yeah, I don't really get what they were thinking with Ignatius's Paralogue. Even with using every trick in the book, it takes a while to reach his location and he can easily get killed well before you get to him.

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I think the child chapters in Fates vary wildly in their stay distribution. I remember on my first playthrough of Ryoma's son's chapter the enemies could kill him on turn 1 or 2 without fail. Surviving the very opening turn involved a tonne of careful rescue stave useage.

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On 2/1/2019 at 6:07 PM, De Geso said:

The only truly unfair mechanic I've seen in Fire Emblem is unannounced reinforcements that move when they spawn. Losing a unit over something you couldn't predict doesn't reflect badly on you as a player (as other difficult chapters or maps do if you fail them).

Preach. I lost Lance to Rutger’s critical when he came out of the SIDE of the castle instead of... y’know, the gate. He moved the same turn, and once Lance died an archer moved right into the available space and killed Thany. FE6 was good times all around

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9 hours ago, Sentinel07 said:

Yeah, I don't really get what they were thinking with Ignatius's Paralogue. Even with using every trick in the book, it takes a while to reach his location and he can easily get killed well before you get to him.

Exactly. Shiro and Selkie's paralogue are similarly obnoxious if you wait too long (but honestly, that could be said of all of them with the exception of Kana and Dwyer).

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  • 3 weeks later...

I just remembered another one: bosses that are either blatantly overpowered for the timeframe which you run into them or require excessive luck to defeat (Hyman, Henning, Kotaro and Takumi in chapter 23 come to mind).

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On 2/1/2019 at 8:07 PM, De Geso said:

The only truly unfair mechanic I've seen in Fire Emblem is unannounced reinforcements that move when they spawn. Losing a unit over something you couldn't predict doesn't reflect badly on you as a player (as other difficult chapters or maps do if you fail them).

Definitely.

Also long range magic spam is dumb. 

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I absolutely hate getting wrecked by 6% enemy crit rates. For that reason I'd like to see crit power reduced from three times damage to two times damage. Swordmasters and Myrmidons can get a skill to increase the damage to x3 so nothing is truly lost. This would just make crits a more  natural part of gameplay without being an instant reset.

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3 hours ago, Jotari said:

I absolutely hate getting wrecked by 6% enemy crit rates. For that reason I'd like to see crit power reduced from three times damage to two times damage. Swordmasters and Myrmidons can get a skill to increase the damage to x3 so nothing is truly lost. This would just make crits a more  natural part of gameplay without being an instant reset.

Ditto. At this point it's just "who the hell thought having crits do triple damage was a good idea, and why in the name of Duma is this still a thing???"; as it is, trying to use the likes of Arthur, or any Berserker in Fates, for that matter, is just asking to get cheesed out of a unit. It also makes it such that Berserkers are way better as an enemy class than as a player class - I cannot care about their high critical chance when it's overkill, and it's overshadowed by their crit evade penalty. Of course, when you see them on the enemy side, that goes completely out the window.

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59 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Ditto. At this point it's just "who the hell thought having crits do triple damage was a good idea, and why in the name of Duma is this still a thing???"; as it is, trying to use the likes of Arthur, or any Berserker in Fates, for that matter, is just asking to get cheesed out of a unit. It also makes it such that Berserkers are way better as an enemy class than as a player class - I cannot care about their high critical chance when it's overkill, and it's overshadowed by their crit evade penalty. Of course, when you see them on the enemy side, that goes completely out the window.

To be fair to triple damage, it's still better than the double (or was it triple then too) atk before defense calculation that it was in the pre GBA games. That was so crazy good that enemies simply couldn't have crit chances unless they were packing wrath. Enemies mostly don't have crit chances in modern games too, but that just makes it more frustrating when they do. I was using Ike to fight the tempest sword boss in Naesala's chapter in Radiant Dawn and he managed to crit, dealing exactly enough damage to kill my Ike who was at full health. Unbelievable, this happened twice. Fates bosses also have screwed me with single digit crits. If crits were nerfed then they could be better implemented into the actual game, being more common and easier to deal with when they do happen as a result, rather than being the one in a thousand chance that ruins your day.

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6 hours ago, Jotari said:

To be fair to triple damage, it's still better than the double (or was it triple then too) atk before defense calculation that it was in the pre GBA games. That was so crazy good that enemies simply couldn't have crit chances unless they were packing wrath. Enemies mostly don't have crit chances in modern games too, but that just makes it more frustrating when they do. I was using Ike to fight the tempest sword boss in Naesala's chapter in Radiant Dawn and he managed to crit, dealing exactly enough damage to kill my Ike who was at full health. Unbelievable, this happened twice. Fates bosses also have screwed me with single digit crits. If crits were nerfed then they could be better implemented into the actual game, being more common and easier to deal with when they do happen as a result, rather than being the one in a thousand chance that ruins your day.

I thought that was only a thing in Jugdral? Also, I think you meant to say Path of Radiance there.

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