Question about difficulty levels

[baticeer]

I might be playing these games for the first time soon and I'm wondering about what difficulty level I should start off with. (I know about the thing where Radiant Dawn's difficulty settings were weirdly translated so "easy" mode is actually normal.) How do the Tellius games compare to other Fire Emblems in terms of difficulty?

I'm not super casual but not really a hardcore player. I just beat FE6 on normal and that was right about the sweet spot for me where I wasn't frustrated but it wasn't too easy either. Somewhere around that, or Conquest normal mode, or FE8 hard, would be great.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

If FE6 is your sweet spot then I'd recommend FE9 Hard mode and FE10 "Normal mode" (the middle difficulty) since they're around that difficulty. FE9 is potentially the easiest game in the series but Radiant Dawn demands greater mastery of its mechanics. And neither game allows you to stop and grind like Sacred Stones or new Fire Emblem games. However I think both games are easy to enjoy on easier difficulties if you want to sit back and take in the story. Tellius is much wordier than the GBA games. FE10 on "Easy Mode" is still satisfyingly challenging in my opinion. And FE9's hard mode is a bit slow due to them just adding more enemies. That game's slow animations can't be fully turned off like later FE games including its sequel.

Edited September 1, 2019 by Glennstavos

[kzer_za]

FE9 hard mode is about right for you. It was actually the middle difficulty in the original release, with the much harder "maniac mode" unfortunately removed from the US version and easy mode added.

Edited September 2, 2019 by kzer_za

[baticeer]

Thanks, sounds good to me. I'll go with the FE9 hard and probably FE10 normal when I get to it. Might come back with some follow up questions or a thread on my thoughts once I'm able to get the game up and running.

[samthedigital]

If you do decide to play FE10 on hard mode you might want to consider using a code to be able to view enemy ranges. You might also want to consider getting a completed game in order to unlock the fastest battle animations. I'm not sure how you like to play though; I personally don't like battle animations, and I find that removing enemy ranges on hard mode was a poor design choice as it doesn't make the game more difficult. It just makes it take longer to beat. Either way I'm going to definitely agree that you should start PoR on hard mode. The game is far too easy otherwise.