FE12 Lunatic: Unbalanced and Broken or Challenging and Fair?

[Zetsubo]

FE12 is an FE game that is close to my heart, for some reason, but playing it on Lunatic has made me question its balancing choices. Do you think it's broken or do you think it's the pinnacle of resource management, or are you somewhere inbetween? Shall we discuss?

[pnt]

Challenging and extremely fair. You've got to plan out every move, study AI behavior*, figure out reinforcement zones, use Starsphere shards intelligently, promote your units at good times (i.e. if you're waiting until 20, you're making the wrong choice), and make good use of Rescue as a movement tool. You also need to be aware of weapon rank bonuses, be smart about your forges, and use the drill grounds when you can.

Even H4 (reverse lunatic) is fair. I do think that FE12 H3/4 are the hardest difficulties in the entire series, so players not used to doing so much math may struggle.

 

*FE12 AI will always try to do the most damage possible, and also treats non-zero crit attacks as guaranteed crits. You can use luck to manipulate the AI this way.

[Shadow Mir]

I'd say it's much closer to being an unbalanced and broken mess than anything else. It falls into practically all the pitfalls Awakening's Lunatic fell into (pretty much mandating the use of certain characters if you want to succeed and rendering everyone else nigh unusable, among others).

[pnt]

33 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

I'd say it's much closer to being an unbalanced and broken mess than anything else. It falls into practically all the pitfalls Awakening's Lunatic fell into (pretty much mandating the use of certain characters if you want to succeed and rendering everyone else nigh unusable, among others).

I strongly, strongly disagree. FE12 H3 unit viability covers far more units than Awakening Lunatic does. I've seen General Etzel used effectively on H4, not even H3, runs.

This is @Ziggy McDougal's H4 (Reverse Lunatic) SOYO roster.

Edited March 21, 2019 by pnt

[Punished Dayni]

So, I will say it's kind of all the above. I mean, @pnt just pointed to one example there of how viability is not impossible for pretty much anyone not named Bantu (RIP), but I'll get to explaining where I think it fits all four adjectives. 

Unbalanced? I mean, Kris is a powerful unit and all, but not your be all and end all honestly. Yes the utility of some units is clearly higher than others, but it is absolutely possible to use those "Free Silvers" in at least some way. Broken? I feel like where it most applies would be covered under balance honestly and so this adjective doesn't quite fit, but I mean Lunatic Reverse literally breaks the rules to add a challenge. Challenging? Oh my it is on higher difficulties, I tip my hat to those who can do Lunatic Reverse with bad units. Fair? On the one hand the situations in higher difficulties are utterly nuts, but the game gives you ways to get around issues on the trickier challenges (the stat boosters and Rainbow potion being the most blatant) and knowing how to do these things is absolutely learnable, this game is nowhere near as RNG reliant as it might seem (I'd say that this is probably one of the least RNG reliant in the series).

[Zetsubo]

1 hour ago, Dayni said:

So, I will say it's kind of all the above. I mean, @pnt just pointed to one example there of how viability is not impossible for pretty much anyone not named Bantu (RIP), but I'll get to explaining where I think it fits all four adjectives. 

Unbalanced? I mean, Kris is a powerful unit and all, but not your be all and end all honestly. Yes the utility of some units is clearly higher than others, but it is absolutely possible to use those "Free Silvers" in at least some way. Broken? I feel like where it most applies would be covered under balance honestly and so this adjective doesn't quite fit, but I mean Lunatic Reverse literally breaks the rules to add a challenge. Challenging? Oh my it is on higher difficulties, I tip my hat to those who can do Lunatic Reverse with bad units. Fair? On the one hand the situations in higher difficulties are utterly nuts, but the game gives you ways to get around issues on the trickier challenges (the stat boosters and Rainbow potion being the most blatant) and knowing how to do these things is absolutely learnable, this game is nowhere near as RNG reliant as it might seem (I'd say that this is probably one of the least RNG reliant in the series).

You have to play FE12 as though everything will hit you, because it will. I just wish it was easier to bail out a unit without being forced to use the rescue. Insofar as RNG goes the only major problem with it is that your hit rates are simply not as high as the enemy, and if you miss on H3+ you're not gonna have a fun time. Imo this game could have used some hard mode bonuses on characters like Sirius or Ogma. Saving Jubelo and Yumina on that chapter is not fun, and my Ogma died too. Castor wasn't recruited either. That aside I appreciate that FE12 punishes you for turtling, hard. You have to play to your strengths.

 

[pnt]

56 minutes ago, Zetsubo said:

You have to play FE12 as though everything will hit you, because it will.

You hit the nail on the head. FYI Rescue tile priority is down -> right -> left -> up; some chapters (chapter 7 immediately comes to mind) can greatly benefit from using Rescue to move.

From the sound of things, you're close to success! Just keep calm and carry on go faster :P .

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

1 hour ago, Zetsubo said:

You have to play FE12 as though everything will hit you, because it will. I just wish it was easier to bail out a unit without being forced to use the rescue. Insofar as RNG goes the only major problem with it is that your hit rates are simply not as high as the enemy, and if you miss on H3+ you're not gonna have a fun time. Imo this game could have used some hard mode bonuses on characters like Sirius or Ogma. Saving Jubelo and Yumina on that chapter is not fun, and my Ogma died too. Castor wasn't recruited either. That aside I appreciate that FE12 punishes you for turtling, hard. You have to play to your strengths.

 

Yeah, i will say most of FE12 Lunatic become "easy" er when you know the game inside out

 

But Yubelo and Yumina chapter is the one true glaring exception to that. Its hell incarnate in every way possible, and your better off promoting a fed Palla/whoever is fed during prologue/Kris here just to make it much less of a headache

[Zetsubo]

12 minutes ago, JSND Alter Dragon Boner said:

Yeah, i will say most of FE12 Lunatic become "easy" er when you know the game inside out

 

But Yubelo and Yumina chapter is the one true glaring exception to that. Its hell incarnate in every way possible, and your better off promoting a fed Palla/whoever is fed during prologue/Kris here just to make it much less of a headache

Also the desert maps were not fun on hard, so I'm kinda afraid of lunatic lol.

Any tips for them?

 

[Zetsubo]

Also here's a cursed image for all of you. Luckily my Luke is blessed, otherwise I would be in a very bad spot. I made him an armor knight to get past to prologue. He'll be a fine dracoknight but getting him there is.... Rough, to say the least.

 

Edit: Heading into chapter 7. I want those master seals, Marisha is almost level 20 now so she will promote soon. Draug will be a berserker. I may make Caeda a falconknight but more likely she'll be a paladin or dracoknight. Linde is rather underwhelming, so I'll probably just use Etzel instead.

Edited March 21, 2019 by Zetsubo

[Shadow Mir]

10 hours ago, pnt said:

I strongly, strongly disagree. FE12 H3 unit viability covers far more units than Awakening Lunatic does. I've seen General Etzel used effectively on H4, not even H3, runs.

This is @Ziggy McDougal's H4 (Reverse Lunatic) SOYO roster.

Be that as it may, a game where about 80 to 90% of units start out behind the curve and require bonkers amounts of resources for me to NOT feel like I'm shooting myself in the foot does not deserve to be called "fair" in any sense of the word.

[Nobody]

Challenge and fair. You need to know the game to win, but that's it. Only thing bad about it is same turn reinforcements and the fact that most units are unusable, BUT the game gives you plenty of great units anyway.

You need to strategize and know the game's mechanics to win it, and that's it. I wish more Fire Emblem games had difficulty setting as good as FE12's lunatic, the only other that comes close is Conquest.

Edited March 21, 2019 by Nobody

[Scraiza]

You have enough resources to make basically every unit work despite the insanely strong enemies.

Sure, some units are better than others, and the game suffers from a cast that is 70%ish mediocre, but the game gives you more than enough tools to make nearly everyone usable with reclassing, statboosters, drill grounds, forges, etc. You've got the tools, just need to use them right.

Hell, I was able to pull of a generic replacement run in H4 myself, the game is so ridiculously flexible that you can do whatever you want if you know how to.
 

9 hours ago, Zetsubo said:

But Yubelo and Yumina chapter is the one true glaring exception to that. Its hell incarnate in every way possible, and your better off promoting a fed Palla/whoever is fed during prologue/Kris here just to make it much less of a headache

Ch4 is actually crazy easy to cheese with 2 fliers, you can bait the reinforcements around to just never really get close to them, and with proper player phase movement you can even kill the thief going for the village with Ogma+Yubello in H4

Also base promoted general Palla works to hold off the attack, just give her some vulneraries and a forged hit javelin.

 

EDIT: The ambushes can be really evil sometimes, but I understand why they were done.

FE12 enemies hit hard and have no bulk, having them spawn without moving right away would make killing them off very trivial, and make them not a threat at all.

Edited March 21, 2019 by Scraiza
Added info

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

3 hours ago, Scraiza said:

You have enough resources to make basically every unit work despite the insanely strong enemies.

Sure, some units are better than others, and the game suffers from a cast that is 70%ish mediocre, but the game gives you more than enough tools to make nearly everyone usable with reclassing, statboosters, drill grounds, forges, etc. You've got the tools, just need to use them right.

Hell, I was able to pull of a generic replacement run in H4 myself, the game is so ridiculously flexible that you can do whatever you want if you know how to.
 

Ch4 is actually crazy easy to cheese with 2 fliers, you can bait the reinforcements around to just never really get close to them, and with proper player phase movement you can even kill the thief going for the village with Ogma+Yubello in H4

Also base promoted general Palla works to hold off the attack, just give her some vulneraries and a forged hit javelin.

 

EDIT: The ambushes can be really evil sometimes, but I understand why they were done.

FE12 enemies hit hard and have no bulk, having them spawn without moving right away would make killing them off very trivial, and make them not a threat at all.

how exactly do you maintain the Ogma-Sirius side step by step? I always burned rescue there lol

 

So the idea is to have a flier bait up the fortress at the start and reinforcement?

[Scraiza]

2 hours ago, JSND Alter Dragon Boner said:

how exactly do you maintain the Ogma-Sirius side step by step? I always burned rescue there lol

 

So the idea is to have a flier bait up the fortress at the start and reinforcement?

Woah, just did some Ch4 testing for screenshots and it turns out that the AI on those north fort pirates-hunters is weird, and will always go for ogma's squad even if there's something closer, what I just told you works for every moving enemy EXCEPT for this case

Then yes, it seems you either need to rescue someone up there or let 'em die

EDIT: By this I mean, if they can attack nothing, they go for ogma's squad even if there's something closer, but if they can attack something else then they go for that.

Really weird stuff, no other FE12 enemy that I know does this.

It works on all enemies on the map except for ONE pirate and ONE hunter, and that's just enough to obliterate that party

Edited March 22, 2019 by Scraiza
Clarity

[pnt]

Hey Scraiza, mind taking a screenshot and pointing out which units specifically? I don't recall having to deal with enemies mobbing the Ogmiriusminabello (lol) group...maybe just a hunter...but then it's been a while since I've revisited H4.