gbafe The issues IMO with the mechanics and gameplay of the GBA FE Games

[Fates-Blade]

EDIT: Changed issue #4.

EDIT: Changed the issue and reason for #5.

EDIT: 14. Bow range isn't high enough.

Explanation:
Not only can magic counter bow attacks at 2 range, they can also hit the user up close at 1 range so there isn't a counter attack, and throwing weapons can do the same thing, bows are the only weapons that can't attack either without a counter attack, the range should at least be 2-3 IMO.

EDIT: 15. Mounted units should be unrescueable, should be able to rescue unmounted units, but shouldn't be able to move again without the Savior skill.

Explanation:
Mounted units are very if not too good.

EDIT: 16. Boss weapons should be unbreakable.

Explanation:
I see little reason for the change to be done in the vanilla game if issue #1 on my list isn't done, but if it is then it needs to be done.

EDIT: 17. One or all the stat boosting items need to be nerfed, especially the Angelic Robe, maybe (please don't quote me on this) to +3 instead of +7, and to +1 instead of +2 for the rest, then make them more available through unique acquirement circumstances, like a hard to reach chest on a limited turn map, a hard to reach village, a unique purchase from a NPC merchant etc.

Explanation:
Stat boosting items can fix a weakness (or weaknesses) in a character that make them distinct and unique among the cast, while I think they should stay I also think they should be nerfed, especially the Angelic Robe, and then players can acquire more in the game as a reward for something impressive they do.

EDIT: 18. Most classes should only use one weapon.

Explanation:
If characters could use multiple weapons it could allow them to have the WPN Triangle advantage almost always which makes things much easier for the players especially if they are in good terrain.

1. Weapon and stave uses are too high, making the uses redundant (hence Fates Infinite uses).

Explanation:
It allows you to stack weapons in your inventory and never use them,
(we've all been there,) and allows you to just use silver weapons or
Killer weapons with little worry, with reductions of the problem it
makes the sell prices go down a lot more per use, so if you acquired
a new weapon by exempli gratia an enemy drop, selling it could be a lot
more useful than just chucking it into the supply.

2. Vulneraries and Elixirs have too many uses,
they should have only 1 use IMO.

Explanation:
This gives too much forgiveness to the players and allows them not only
to heal three times but to heal, then have another unit trade it to their
inventory and heal them, and then rinse and repeat once more or more depending
on the number you have, compared to the enemies who can do it
only once if that, or if a boss has an Elixir/Vulnerary and is a tank
it just prolongs his/her inevitable end (imagine Lunatic Grima with a 3 use Elixir
**shiver**) when it could have just one use
and bam use it once they can't use it again.

3. Terrain gives too much avoid.

Explanation:
This is again so the player gets less favor from the
mechanics because the player will reach the better terrain first,
but this also helps the players if an enemy Swordmaster
got in a mountain or forest which is unlikely, if you're a
good FE player but it's still something.

4. Most GBA playable characters base stats are too high, except characters who already have low stats like Nino, Amelia and Ewan.

Explanation:
This is so leveling up is a lot more varied,
even until the end of a players level ups and of course
**because of the 30 stat cap,** I don't want enemies or players
to be capped in every stat by the end because that takes away
from the variability of the game, when members mentioned
'stat inflation' I set out to fix the problem, here it is.

The 30 stat cap GBA limit is also why
Nerf > Buff for the GBA. @MeatofJustice

5. Weapon stats aren't balanced.
But specifically all weapons may need more
hit rate maybe 5+ or 10+, and I guess the Killer weapons need to be nerfed,
also I think the iron weapons MT needs to be reduced or bronze weapons need to be added.

Explanation:
Most enemies have low skill and luck, giving more hit to weapons
will balance out this difference and make the players hits more likely
to succeed and the enemies, not just the players, this way if the
player had an 80% chance of hitting they would have 85 or 90 instead,
and when it comes to already high
percentages higher is even better,
the Iron weapons MT being reduced or Bronze weapons being added makes the Def or Res stat better and armor knights as well.

also MT of weapons can be in the player's favor as well, like
the Silver Sword, which does unusually high damage
(only one less of the Silver Lance???) and is
a weapon the player will mainly be using, specifically
the protagonist.

6. Important enemy boss character stats aren't high enough on Normal and higher difficulties, **this does not apply to easy mode.**

Explanation:
If there is an important boss like Lyon for example, without strong units I don't think surviving his attacks should be guaranteed because that makes him dangerous and rewards players for good strategies. **this does not apply to easy mode.**

7. Defense and resistance stats maximum at 30 isn't high enough.

Explanation:
Weapon MT being too high causes this to be a problem.

8. Weapon MT is too high and goes past 30 Atk too easily to 40-50, and so makes beating a general easy because of the 30 Def/Res cap.

Explanation:
I agree with Zmr nerfing weapon MT or class Str caps isn't a good idea.

9. Base classes should have varied class caps, so that a base class can't go too high in every stat.

Explanation:
Stat boosters are what can make this a problem
if a player with a Mage got two Dracoshields and kept first/one turn resetting
for Defense they could have about 10 or 12 Defense, or if they got two
speedwings could have 16 or 20 Speed which I feel is too much.

10. Weapons, staves, and items don't cost enough.

Explanation:
Most of the time at the end of the game you have
too many weapons in the inventory and haven't used many,
this will reduce how many weapons you can keep and makes
enemy weapon, stave, item drops, and chests, much more appreciated.

11. Class base stats, need to be balanced better.

Explanation:
Most Magic classes have odd very low Atk or Magic stats,
the Soldier class is pathetic, the Assassin class has the OP
lethality and odd bases (that are just as good as a Theif's? W-what???)
The mercenary classes base stats are too high etc.

12. (For FE7-8 only.)
WPN TRI. improves/reduces Hit and Avoid too much
at 15+ or - Hit and Avoid, I recommend 10+ or - Hit and Avoid.

Explanation:
Enemy and player balance again.

13. The text speed options aren't useful, and the
normal text speed is slow.

Explanation:
The Slow and Normal option is what I'm
talking about here I should have mentioned that, who
uses those two options? I think everyone can read just fine without the slow text speed,
and the FE6, FE8, and JP FE7 text speed I still find slow on normal.

**----------------------------------------------------**

Here are some of my opinions on the issues with the GBA games, they are of course also some small problems I have with: The Sacred War and Project Ember hacks. In case anybody is working on a hack and wanted to improve the gameplay of their games, some issues to consider could be here.

Concerning why I consider these problems:

Let me start by saying for me I feel most FE games
unfairly favor the the player, with broken weapons
(like the killer, silver, reaver, and throwing weapons)
and characters especially because of there high base stats
and high growths, I feel the 'strategy' element of FE
is made too easy to disappear because of the problems I've pointed out,

and so you know, I'm talking about the GBA FE games on
their Normal difficulty level, Hard or higher can be just as easy IMO, but takes
more grinding, if you don't farm EXP you could have a very annoying time
finishing the game, and might even get stuck mid playthrough,

a very good example of that is the final chapter of PoR on Hard mode
but it's BEXP LV up resetting instead of EXP farming,
(assuming you didn't know about the Wrath and Resolve combo
and didn't get Nasir)

if you weren't carefully increasing
Ike's stats and getting certain scrolls you can get stuck at the end. 

If you played on Normal, of course, the beginning has medium difficulty, but as you play through the strategy element disappears or reduces, the player becomes laidback and IMO
just slogs through the game with boring bosses and enemies,

to make characters even better you have broken stat boosters that
can fix pretty much any stat, especially the Angelic Robe
which gives a large HP increase of 7,

think about Seth, Ike or Ryoma only FE playthroughs.
The reason why I want most of these changes is so that the game
favors the player less and favors the CPU more, and as a result
makes the gameplay more balanced between the player
and the CPU, so that on any difficulty having a single
character playthrough is more difficult, and on
the hardest difficulty without farming impossible.

Edited August 9, 2021 by Fates-Blade
To add edits

[eclipse]

Y'know, if you have THAT MANY PROBLEMS with the GBA games, make a patch with all of these implementations, then play it yourself.  Stuff like editing weapon/item usage/MT is easy enough.

[Solvaij]

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

Y'know, if you have THAT MANY PROBLEMS with the GBA games, make a patch with all of these implementations, then play it yourself.  Stuff like editing weapon/item usage/MT is easy enough.

Just wanted to second this, and link you to FE Builder. It's a really clean editor that's super easy to use, especially for little things like stat increases, weapon uses, money, ect.

Go wild and post what you come up with (if you want). I'd probably try it!

 

[X-Naut]

Spoiler

1. It's not that far above Shadow Dragon, not a big deal

2. I'd say one use for Elixirs but Vulneraries? No thanks

3. Under 2 RN, yeah

4. It's more a case that enemies scale poorly, play FE6 and you won't say this for most units

5. The only big imbalance is steels get sandbagged, Killers' problem is that crits are busted

6. Not really

7. It's plenty high enough and you're rarely reaching it

8. This isn't a healthy way to buff armors, they want %-based damage reduction

9. Not much of a purpose for this if stats go below 20

10. Counterpoint, silvers are too expensive

11. Yeah definitely, I'd say model after the stronger classes

12. Agreed

13. This is true but more QOL than gameplay

14. Welcome to non-Echoes/3H in general

I'm gonna put my responses in spoilers to keep this short

As others have said make you're better off making your own patch and playtesting it or taking it to a more discourse-friendly area than ranting about it here. (And reformat your arguments to make them easier to follow past your initial points.)

[AnonymousSpeed]

Geeze guys, let the guy have criticisms of something. It's okay to point out what you think it wrong with stuff.

Edited February 18, 2020 by AnonymousSpeed

[eclipse]

3 hours ago, AnonymousSpeed said:

Geeze guys, let the guy have criticisms of something. It's okay to point out what you think it wrong with stuff.

A bit of play-testing with these ideas would do a far better job of explaining what I want to say.  And it really is trivial to program it all, instead of make what's essentially a topic filled with criticism that have no logic behind them.

[SwordsDude]

Your not supposed to grind in a gba fire emblem game or any fire emblem game actually except for the modern ones on certain difficulties.

If the games are to easy for you even on the more difficult modes if you grind to much that's all on you

Grinding in especially the older fire emblem games kills the difficulty and gameplay imo. 

There is a reason why arena and boss abuse are not considered normal gameplay. you usually only have few units at max lvl by the end of the game with normal play or not even that. 

Withouth grinding you can also just clear the more difficult modes and actually need to have some strategy. Optimise your lvl ups etc. The games where designed with the exp given to you in the maingame. if you grind you get way to much exp killing the difficulty. ofcourse the games are going to be childs play than.

I really miss those days of old school fire emblem. FE shadow dragon mystery of the emblem and radiant dawn older kinda games.

Also being stuck in certain chapters since you fucked up with the lvl balance or that to many of your good units died. I loved that rarely any other games are that punishing. that's one of the main things about the older fire emblem games that I loved. if you play badly on the higher difficulties you have to restart from chapter 1 if you don't have any other save file and decided to keep on playing while losing stuff.

awakening and up kinda lost that classic FE punishing survival aspect even on the more difficult modes.

also you seem to like the difficulty in path of radiance.

If where talking classic fire emblem games before awakening, path of radiance is by far the easiest game in the series. so yes it's allot easier withouth grinding even on hard but that's not saying much. all fe games where perfectly doable withouth grinding some games just needed more strategy and for you to recognize wich units have great potential growths and wich units where better left on the bench.

I love path of radiance btw but the difficulty in that game was a minor nitpick. and the japanese version had a harder maniac setting wich might have fixed that issue so that's quite a shame that all western releases did not get that, it was japan only.

20 hours ago, Fates-Blade said:

 

and so you know, I'm talking about the GBA FE games on
their Normal difficulty level, Hard or Higher can be just as easy IMO, but takes
more grinding, if you don't grind you could have a very annoying time
finishing the game, and might even get stuck mid playthrough,

also say like secret shops to buy stat boosters. if you don't arena abuse you can barely buy any of those anyway they are so pricy you need to buy weapons for the army aswell after all. money wasnt that plentyfull in a ton of the older games after all. not to mention that most people missed those secret anna shops during play throughs anyway. GL finding those withouth a guide

Edited February 18, 2020 by SwordsDude

[Ackron64]

First of all, your complaint about boss weapons durability is completely arbitrary. Anyone who slows the game down enough to break any boss's weapons are clearly not looking for a challenge as it is, so changing that would change practically nothing about how people experience the game. 

The next thing I want to touch up on is bases being 'too high'. A simple counter to that is that these games need to be beatable even if the player gets RNG screwed. You're practically proposing for every character to be like Nino, even though Nino is universally considered to be a terrible unit. In order for Nino to be any good, you have to slow the game way down and practically baby her for her to have any use as a unit. If anything, having access to high base low growth units, and high growth low base units gives the player a variety of ways to experience the game. Your idea would make the games feel monotonous, and would basically offer the player no safety net if their level ups go horribly wrong. If a player is put into a position of not being able to beat the game simply because of RNG, that's bad game design. Units with high bases are essential to keep the game beatable under any circumstance.

Your proposed changes for stat boosters would also defeat the purpose of having stat boosters. I can maybe agree with +7 hp being too high for angelic robes, but taking it down to 3 is over-correcting. For example, if a unit gets 3 hit KO'd before using an angelic robe, a +3 boost to hp would very likely not do anything to change that. As for all the other stats, I must reiterate that stat-boosters exist for a reason. A +1 change to any stat wouldn't be much of a boost at all. Any instant gratification the player feels from using them would go away, and they wouldn't really make a noticeable difference, and it's not like you get enough stat boosters in the game to make any meaningful difference if they only gave +1. This would practically force the player to invest all of their stat boosters into one unit in order to notice any real difference from using them. For a series that thrives off of being enjoyable in a variety of ways, this would go completely against that model. You mentioned that players can save-scum and continue to reset the game until they get an increase in defense, and then stack that with draco-shields to have high defense, but again, players who resort to methods that slow the game way down are not really looking for a challenge. 

Weapon durability/cost: in your post you wanted weapon durability to go down, and for weapon cost to go up. If this were to happen, the amount of gold a player would need to spend throughout a playthrough would shoot through the roof, and I'm not sure if even the best players could keep up with that kind of change. Changing only one of these things would make a noticeable increase in difficulty, changing both would be beyond excessive though. Even then, I'd argue that both of those things are fine where they are. First of all, weapon durability is fine where it is. Silver and killer weapons are not cheap at all and have lower durability than most weapons in the game. You're effectively paying around 1,500 gold per 10 enemies you kill with these weapons, and that's a lot of gold for such few enemies. The units who man your front lines will burn through these weapons quickly, meaning you'll need to buy even more which will cost you quite a bit of gold. Maybe you can afford to use Silver and Killer weapons more sparingly with units like Franz, Seth, Cormag, and any other mal cav/flier because they will likely have enough strength and con to consistently kill with lesser weapons. However, female fliers basically require these weapons in order to consistently kill, because the speed penalty of steel weapons is too much for them. Silver and killer weapons are even more important for female fliers like Vanessa, Fiora, and Shanna because their low strength makes iron weapons almost useless for them. So yeah, weapon durability and cost are just fine if you ask me. Also, in FE6 and 7, you don't have access to any sort of overworld where you can purchase high-end equipment at any time, so the player might not necessarily be prepared enough to actually be able to make full use of the shops in the maps. And yes, FE7 dedicates an entire paralogue to a huge supply run, but you only have two chapters after that anyway, so it's not a game-breaking supply run anyway. But before I get too off topic, the main point is that the demand is really high for the weapons that have the least durability and cost some of the most gold in the game, and these weapons will only survive around 10 rounds of combat each before they need to get replaced, and all that adds up quickly.

And I'll quickly touch on your point of the games 'favoring the player too much'. I really don't see how this is a bad thing. Videogames should be fun, and a lot of players wouldn't have fun if it felt like they were constantly fighting an uphill battle with the games. Even some of the most skilled and experienced players never seem to get bored with the series, and seem to find an endless amount of ways to enjoy the games. If very skilled players can still have fun with Fire Emblem, then that seems to tell me that the games aren't too easy, and can be enjoyed in a variety of ways.

So yeah, to sum it up, a lot of your proposed changes range from removing the variety of ways that Fire Emblem can be enjoyed, to recklessly changing the balance of certain game mechanics. On top of that, some of these changes seem like they're meant to make the game more challenging for players that aren't looking for a challenge. By doing this, you would end up giving something to only a portion of the player base something that they don't want, and would end up affecting the game experience for all the other players in a very unnecessary way. Honestly, I don't think it would be a bad idea to try these changes in a hack as the others have been saying. 

On 2/17/2020 at 7:45 PM, AnonymousSpeed said:

Geeze guys, let the guy have criticisms of something. It's okay to point out what you think it wrong with stuff.

They are. If they didn't let him have his own opinions, then they wouldn't be telling him any ways or methods for him to actually try out some of his proposed changes himself. Also, this is a forum, not an echo chamber. People would not post their own opinions on forums if they don't want anybody disagreeing with them. The OP won't die from people in the thread disagreeing with him, don't worry.

[Fates-Blade]

18 hours ago, Ackron64 said:

First of all, your complaint about boss weapons durability is completely arbitrary. Anyone who slows the game down enough to break any boss's weapons are clearly not looking for a challenge as it is, so changing that would change practically nothing about how people experience the game. 

The next thing I want to touch up on is bases being 'too high'. A simple counter to that is that these games need to be beatable even if the player gets RNG screwed. You're practically proposing for every character to be like Nino, even though Nino is universally considered to be a terrible unit. In order for Nino to be any good, you have to slow the game way down and practically baby her for her to have any use as a unit. If anything, having access to high base low growth units, and high growth low base units gives the player a variety of ways to experience the game. Your idea would make the games feel monotonous, and would basically offer the player no safety net if their level ups go horribly wrong. If a player is put into a position of not being able to beat the game simply because of RNG, that's bad game design. Units with high bases are essential to keep the game beatable under any circumstance.

Your proposed changes for stat boosters would also defeat the purpose of having stat boosters. I can maybe agree with +7 hp being too high for angelic robes, but taking it down to 3 is over-correcting. For example, if a unit gets 3 hit KO'd before using an angelic robe, a +3 boost to hp would very likely not do anything to change that. As for all the other stats, I must reiterate that stat-boosters exist for a reason. A +1 change to any stat wouldn't be much of a boost at all. Any instant gratification the player feels from using them would go away, and they wouldn't really make a noticeable difference, and it's not like you get enough stat boosters in the game to make any meaningful difference if they only gave +1. This would practically force the player to invest all of their stat boosters into one unit in order to notice any real difference from using them. For a series that thrives off of being enjoyable in a variety of ways, this would go completely against that model. You mentioned that players can save-scum and continue to reset the game until they get an increase in defense, and then stack that with draco-shields to have high defense, but again, players who resort to methods that slow the game way down are not really looking for a challenge. 

Weapon durability/cost: in your post you wanted weapon durability to go down, and for weapon cost to go up. If this were to happen, the amount of gold a player would need to spend throughout a playthrough would shoot through the roof, and I'm not sure if even the best players could keep up with that kind of change. Changing only one of these things would make a noticeable increase in difficulty, changing both would be beyond excessive though. Even then, I'd argue that both of those things are fine where they are. First of all, weapon durability is fine where it is. Silver and killer weapons are not cheap at all and have lower durability than most weapons in the game. You're effectively paying around 1,500 gold per 10 enemies you kill with these weapons, and that's a lot of gold for such few enemies. The units who man your front lines will burn through these weapons quickly, meaning you'll need to buy even more which will cost you quite a bit of gold. Maybe you can afford to use Silver and Killer weapons more sparingly with units like Franz, Seth, Cormag, and any other mal cav/flier because they will likely have enough strength and con to consistently kill with lesser weapons. However, female fliers basically require these weapons in order to consistently kill, because the speed penalty of steel weapons is too much for them. Silver and killer weapons are even more important for female fliers like Vanessa, Fiora, and Shanna because their low strength makes iron weapons almost useless for them. So yeah, weapon durability and cost are just fine if you ask me. Also, in FE6 and 7, you don't have access to any sort of overworld where you can purchase high-end equipment at any time, so the player might not necessarily be prepared enough to actually be able to make full use of the shops in the maps. And yes, FE7 dedicates an entire paralogue to a huge supply run, but you only have two chapters after that anyway, so it's not a game-breaking supply run anyway. But before I get too off topic, the main point is that the demand is really high for the weapons that have the least durability and cost some of the most gold in the game, and these weapons will only survive around 10 rounds of combat each before they need to get replaced, and all that adds up quickly.

And I'll quickly touch on your point of the games 'favoring the player too much'. I really don't see how this is a bad thing. Videogames should be fun, and a lot of players wouldn't have fun if it felt like they were constantly fighting an uphill battle with the games. Even some of the most skilled and experienced players never seem to get bored with the series, and seem to find an endless amount of ways to enjoy the games. If very skilled players can still have fun with Fire Emblem, then that seems to tell me that the games aren't too easy, and can be enjoyed in a variety of ways.

So yeah, to sum it up, a lot of your proposed changes range from removing the variety of ways that Fire Emblem can be enjoyed, to recklessly changing the balance of certain game mechanics. On top of that, some of these changes seem like they're meant to make the game more challenging for players that aren't looking for a challenge. By doing this, you would end up giving something to only a portion of the player base something that they don't want, and would end up affecting the game experience for all the other players in a very unnecessary way. Honestly, I don't think it would be a bad idea to try these changes in a hack as the others have been saying. 

They are. If they didn't let him have his own opinions, then they wouldn't be telling him any ways or methods for him to actually try out some of his proposed changes himself. Also, this is a forum, not an echo chamber. People would not post their own opinions on forums if they don't want anybody disagreeing with them. The OP won't die from people in the thread disagreeing with him, don't worry.

The reason for the boss weapons having infinite uses is because of issue #1.

 

I should have said I wasn't talking about characters with low stats already like Nino, Amelia, and Ewan, but most of the characters instead.

 

I said in the post the game should give more stat boosting items to make up for their low increase, having more stat boosters allows you to give them to more units, and fix any of the RNG level up problems with your characters, but allows the creator to allow the fixes when they want them to happen.

 

I should have said that enemies should drop more weapons and gems, and their should be more weapons in chests and more chests because of the durability and cost.

 

While a videogame should be fun it should also be fair to the player and the CPU for a challenge, if it favors the player too much it might as well not be a strategy game, because it's like taking half the opposing player's chess pieces, and then it's not chess anymore, and the thing is, their is always an easy mode, if people want easy then pick easy.

 

Edited March 19, 2020 by Fates-Blade

[eclipse]

. . .did you ignore that thing I said about implement your own fucking changes?

Get off of SF, and get to modifying that ROM of yours.  Tell us how it goes.

[Ackron64]

On 3/19/2020 at 12:02 PM, Fates-Blade said:

I should have said I wasn't talking about characters with low stats already like Nino, Amelia, and Ewan, but most of the characters instead.

Even so, this doesn't change my disagreement with this point. If every unit was changed to be more like Nino, then there wouldn't be much unit diversity at all. What I like about the GBA fire emblem games is that units of the same class as other units bring different things to the table. I like the fact that Erk, Pent, and Nino all feel vastly different from one another. If these units were to be made more similar to one another, it would limit the various ways the player can experience the game. And to elaborate on what I said in my last post, lowering the bases and increasing the variability in stat outcomes opens the door to RNG ruining a playthrough. The reason why you have units like Pent and Athos is because the game still needs to be beatable if your units happen to get RNG screwed. Getting rid of high base units eliminates a healthy safety net for players to fall back on, and if you get too carried away with lowering the bases of units, then it might even lead to a player soft-locking their game because their stats are not good enough to progress through the game. Even in less extreme cases, new units should feel enticing to use. Recruiting new units throughout the story would feel kind of pointless if they all had bad bases, because why would you want to use a bunch of units with bad bases when you can continue to use units that you've been training up already? One Nino in a playthrough is enough, but nobody would want to go through the trouble of grinding out several Ninos (unless if it's the Sacred Stones, but Tower of Valni is a poor design choice anyway). In either case, I think it really shows how high-base units are essential to Fire Emblem. It's easy to say that people can simply choose an easier difficulty setting if they don't want the game to be too hard, but the culmination of all the changes you've proposed would give a lot of hard mode players more than what they bargained for. 

[Fates-Blade]

On 3/20/2020 at 11:12 PM, Ackron64 said:

Even so, this doesn't change my disagreement with this point. If every unit was changed to be more like Nino, then there wouldn't be much unit diversity at all. What I like about the GBA fire emblem games is that units of the same class as other units bring different things to the table. I like the fact that Erk, Pent, and Nino all feel vastly different from one another. If these units were to be made more similar to one another, it would limit the various ways the player can experience the game. And to elaborate on what I said in my last post, lowering the bases and increasing the variability in stat outcomes opens the door to RNG ruining a playthrough. The reason why you have units like Pent and Athos is because the game still needs to be beatable if your units happen to get RNG screwed. Getting rid of high base units eliminates a healthy safety net for players to fall back on, and if you get too carried away with lowering the bases of units, then it might even lead to a player soft-locking their game because their stats are not good enough to progress through the game. Even in less extreme cases, new units should feel enticing to use. Recruiting new units throughout the story would feel kind of pointless if they all had bad bases, because why would you want to use a bunch of units with bad bases when you can continue to use units that you've been training up already? One Nino in a playthrough is enough, but nobody would want to go through the trouble of grinding out several Ninos (unless if it's the Sacred Stones, but Tower of Valni is a poor design choice anyway). In either case, I think it really shows how high-base units are essential to Fire Emblem. It's easy to say that people can simply choose an easier difficulty setting if they don't want the game to be too hard, but the culmination of all the changes you've proposed would give a lot of hard mode players more than what they bargained for. 

I don't believe high base stat units are necessary when you have stat boosters.

On 3/19/2020 at 1:46 PM, eclipse said:

. . .did you ignore that thing I said about implement your own fucking changes?

Get off of SF, and get to modifying that ROM of yours.  Tell us how it goes.

(Sour.) No, but I haven't finished the ROM, this is a thread for discussing my opinions on the mechanics of GBA games.

If you don't like it you don't have to participate.

[eclipse]

Just now, Fates-Blade said:

(Sour.) No, but I haven't finished the ROM, this is a thread for discussing my opinions on the mechanics of GBA games.

If you don't like it you don't have to participate.

No.  If you aren't willing to put your "suggestions" into practical use, I'm going to lock this thread until you do.  To put it bluntly, you have no idea what the hell you're talking about, and the fastest way to get you to understand that is for you to stop shooting your mouth off, implement those changes, and actually play through a game like that.  Then tell us why you're so good at redesigning games.

And for change #13?  Go to the Options menu ONCE, change it, and it's never an issue again.  Which is even more ridiculous than everything else you're proposing.

[Fates-Blade]

3 hours ago, eclipse said:

No.  If you aren't willing to put your "suggestions" into practical use, I'm going to lock this thread until you do.  To put it bluntly, you have no idea what the hell you're talking about, and the fastest way to get you to understand that is for you to stop shooting your mouth off, implement those changes, and actually play through a game like that.  Then tell us why you're so good at redesigning games.

And for change #13?  Go to the Options menu ONCE, change it, and it's never an issue again.  Which is even more ridiculous than everything else you're proposing.

On issue #13, I was talking about Slow and Normal, the choices are nice but I think they just aren't useful, I would use Fast instead, The Sacred War hack team uses Fast too probably because they thought normal and slow is too slow and I think so too, also the Fast option can automatically be activated at the start thanks to the FE8 Essential Fixes, I'm saying I think they should be more useful.

Edited March 23, 2020 by Fates-Blade

[Integrity]

man i play faster than anyone and i can't imagine that gba max text speed is unbearably slow

 

[Fates-Blade]

32 minutes ago, Integrity said:

man i play faster than anyone and i can't imagine that gba max text speed is unbearably slow

 

The Max text speed is as fast as the text can get, and is great for what it is, it's the Slow and Normal options I think aren't useful.

I'll update the topic.

[Integrity]

that has nothing to do with anything, some people read slowly unlike us speed demons

for instance, my wife probably actually reads text at about the gba normal text speed, so whatcha gonna say about that op

EDIT: note that there is a correct response to this challenge, and an incorrect one

Edited March 23, 2020 by Integrity

[Fates-Blade]

Just now, Integrity said:

that has nothing to do with anything, some people read slowly unlike us speed demons

 

I wouldn't want to speed up the slow option too much if people needed it, but how can they need it when there's the A button prompt to continue the text?

That button prompt can stop the text for anyone to read, and thankfully IS has supplied FE with lots of them in the text.

[Integrity]

Just now, Fates-Blade said:

but how can they need it when there's the A button prompt to continue the text?

see what this is telling me is that, like me, you genuinely don't understand the viewpoint of people who use the less than max text options, which makes you inherently flawed from a games design perspective except for if you're designing for powergamers of your level

 

i'm not even attacking the op full of stuff i could say is bad games design, i'm just noting this as a symptom that you aren't thinking at all as a person making games for people, you're thinking of making games for guys who are already really good at fire emblem

 

like me

[Fates-Blade]

3 minutes ago, Integrity said:

 

 

i literally cannot make up how badly you're missing the point, dude

33 minutes ago, Integrity said:

see what this is telling me is that, like me, you genuinely don't understand the viewpoint of people who use the less than max text options, which makes you inherently flawed from a games design perspective except for if you're designing for powergamers of your level

 

i'm not even attacking the op full of stuff i could say is bad games design, i'm just noting this as a symptom that you aren't thinking at all as a person making games for people, you're thinking of making games for guys who are already really good at fire emblem

 

like me

I don't see how I could understand, sure I could put myself in slow readers shoes but Wiki says that's for complex text, IS hasn't said a reason for how slow the (slow) text option is, or given an examplewhy they added it (as we know they in fact remove them all together in Awakening, Fates and onwards I think), and I do intend to keep the slow option and easy mode for all beginners, just increase the speed slightly so experts and beginners can find effective use for it.

 

EDIT: What's your advice for the text speed options?

Edited March 23, 2020 by Fates-Blade

[Integrity]

2 minutes ago, Fates-Blade said:

sure I could put myself in slow readers shoes but

 

2 minutes ago, Fates-Blade said:

just increase the speed slightly so

 

i literally cannot make up how badly you're missing the point, dude

[Specta]

I don't feel like things like text speed are something we need to find "effective use" for. It's not really a deep-thinking game mechanic. It has no purpose besides letting you decide what's comfortable for you to watch text scroll by. It doesn't need to have a purpose beyond that. Slow for people who enjoy a leisurely scroll and increments up for people who get antsier but want to watch the text. There would be nothing gained by speeding up the slower text speeds because people who want fast speeds won't even be using those, so they literally do not (or should not) care how fast the slower speeds are

I could see adding an Even Faster speed if the fastest speed isn't enough for some, but not taking away the option for the people who have no overlap at all with that demographic to have text scroll as slowly as it does

Edited March 23, 2020 by Specta

[Integrity]

i'm doubleposting because for some insane reason you responded to me by editing instead of, like, responding and i happened to click back in to stroke my own ego

15 minutes ago, Fates-Blade said:

EDIT: What's your advice for the text speed options?

the text speed isn't the point; the point is that you're showing through your responses to the text speed options that you're completely unable to pull yourself outside of the mindset of a fire emblem powergamer, which means your critiques of the mechanics as you present them, for instance in the case of the entire op, are inherently massively flawed because you're taking things that Do Not Appeal to you and are presenting them as flaws with the system when they literally are not

 

it's the same deal with those losers who lobby against accessibility or easy modes being added to games like dark souls or whatever have you; i think most of the fire emblems, up to the lunatics and even including in some cases, are easy as fuck to get through, but this is by far not the majority experience and these games shouldn't be designed with me in mind

 

EDIT: i'm not doubleposting specta mvp

 

EDIT from Specta: you're welcome

Edited March 23, 2020 by Specta

[Lightcosmo]

2 hours ago, Integrity said:

it's the same deal with those losers who lobby against accessibility or easy modes being added to games like dark souls or whatever have you; i think most of the fire emblems, up to the lunatics and even including in some cases, are easy as fuck to get through, but this is by far not the majority experience and these games shouldn't be designed with me in mind

This is me, as I am admittedly really awful at fire emblem as a general, challenge doesnt appeal to me, so a game designed around it would turn me away. I agree with easier modes should exist for those who arent as "strategic".

[Integrity]

Just now, lightcosmo said:

This is me, as I am admittedly really awful at fire emblem as a general, challenge doesnt appeal to me, so a game designed around it would turn me away. I agree with easier modes should exist for those who arent as "strategic".

fuck yeah brother easy modes in story-based games are the shit