Can we talk about how Binding Blade is kinda a huge mess?

[IntrovertnamedAri]

I haven't even finished this game. I'm on chapter 8. But chapter 8 does a great job at representing most of the problems I have with this game. First of all, the amount of units it gives you it nonsensical. Every single level I'm picking up 2-3 new recruits. This wouldn't be... entirely strange on its own, but what is odd is how a lot of these units seem to be units of classes I already have. Going chapter 8 I had:

4 cavaliers (I'm sorry, Social Knights)
2 archers
2 priests 
2 fighters
2 Paladins
Okay, thats a few too many duplicates. But then chapter 8 gives you

2 Armor knights

An additional thief

Another, likely weaker mercenary than Dieck

And a second mage. WHO IS LEVEL 1.

This is a very into my next problem. By chapter 8 they were still giving me low level units who would need to grind a lot. Wendy and Lilina (thats what they're called in my translation of the game, idk if those are the right names) are level. Freaking. 1. Characters introduced in chapter 8 who are presumably far weaker than the rest of your army, and are thus relegated to never be sent into combat. And other additions to the team tend to invalidate using already present units. In chapter 7, your are given 3 cavalry units, 2 social knights, and a paladin. So why use Lance and Alan? Unless you've trained them both up, they'll be outclassed by a level 7 Noah, and a level 1 Zealot, who is a random and unnecessary prepromote. And never am I ever gonna use Ogier, unfortunately, because I already have a level 9 Dieck. Even if Ogier's growths are better, it doesnt matter. Not only is he a weaker unit with a lower level and base stats, I've already got two sword users competing for my one Hero Crest I got from the last level. And then there's Astolfo, who immediately beats out Chad for his spot as the parties thief, starting at level 10 for chrissake. And this is just regarding the spread of classes and units. This game has some of the wonkiest RNG I've ever seen, aside from Sacred Stones on hard mode. And chapter 8 is an unnecassarily long corridor filled with enemies. Nothing creative about it. It takes forever to get through, and is tedious as hell, which kinda sums up the whole game in my opinion.
(Yes, I did make an account just to rant about this.)
 

Edited April 4, 2020 by IntrovertnamedAri

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Seeing lowleveled units join in midgame isn't FE6 exclusive.

However in this case some of these are indeed terrible to use, but it comes by the weapon balance.

In this game axes, lances and bows have a nerfed accuracy for no reason.

Swords and magic are amazing.

• Lilina is extremly fragile, but not hard to train, if you keep her out of enemies's attack ranges.
• Oujay is a worse Dieck due to its lower bases and con, but not a terrible unit in the long run because sworduser.
• Wendy is considered as the worst existing unit in FE........ for good reason

 

I can barely see that the class variety in early game is kinda low sinceall the cavaliers and sword users belong to the best in the game.

 

FE6's prepromotes belong to the best in the series, at least if you play on hard mode, so they're not unnecessary at all.

 

I don't like this game either, but it's mainly because this game is very inbalanced.

It gives not much replaybility since some units are classes are simply unusable even if you really want to use them since ressources like bonus exp. or forging don't exist. 

[X-Naut]

Yeah older FEs definitely have a problem with level pacing, both for player units and enemies. FE6's enemy curve is stronger than most but it'll peter out halfway through the game. It's understandable to have some units underleveled but FE6 does overdo it. One particular example you'll see later that bugs me is Melady, she's the head of Guinevere's guard and joins level 10 unpromoted when the enemies are level 13-14 on average. (Granted, she's a contender for best unit in spite of this.)

I don't mind the duplicates that much because I like having a starting party too big to count on one hand and class variety is a bit overrated.

As a forewarning, you're also going to notice a promotion item squeeze on anything but fliers. Before Chapter 16 there are:

2 Knight Crests (cavalier and knight)
2 Hero Crests (sword and axe infantry)
3 Elysian Whips (flying classes)
2 Guiding Rings (magic classes)
2 Orion's Bolts (bow classes)

One of each also has a special requirement to fulfill to get it.

With these you'll only be able to promote all your fliers (though a fourth joins in 16). Orion's Bolts aren't too bad because there's little incentive to use more than two archers, but if you double down on cavs, mercs/fighters or mages you'll be falling short. Mages have it especially hard because they all have to share one item. You get more past this point but any post-16 promotion that isn't the fourth flier is awfully late. Chapter 16 does have a Secret Shop that sells them though.

[Shadow Mir]

One of the biggest problems I have with this game is that there's little to no reason to use most of the units you get because you likely already have better units by that point. I mean, why the hell would I want to torture myself trying to raise Zeiss when any other fliers I bothered to train all run rings around him by the time he joins, especially his sister??? And don't get me started on Cath, Sophia, or Wendy. Long story short, there's a good reason why I think it's one of the most unbalanced games.

3 hours ago, IntrovertnamedAri said:

In chapter 7, your are given 3 cavalry units, 2 social knights, and a paladin. So why use Lance and Alan? Unless you've trained them both up, they'll be outclassed by a level 7 Noah, and a level 1 Zealot, who is a random and unnecessary prepromote.

I assume you meant Treck and Noah, who join in that chapter, instead of Lance and Alan (the latter two are often considered among the better units in the game). Also, Zealot is needed to be alive to access the side chapter if you go to Ilia.

Edited April 4, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[ping]

I reckon the duplicates are still a remnent of Kaga's original idea, i.e. that the player shouldn't reset after non-lord deaths. Treck and Noah are replacements for Allen and Lance - but a little worse to reward the player for keeping the initial duo alive. Although, come to think about it, sometimes the second unit of a class is better than the first (Astore vs. Chad, for example) and I doubt that Lilina is just meant to be a replacement unit (she is actually fairly different from Lugh - the power mage to his speed mage). Still, the roster is so big and with sufficient prepromotes mixed in, player units dying doesn't make the game unwinnable (unless you kill literally all your good units ) and I think that's the point.

Speaking of prepromotes, many of them are great (or at least reasonably good) temporary filler units, including Jerrot. It's better to field a prepromote than a growth unit that you're not planning to use long-term and you're definitely not expected to use all the growth units. "Good now" is better than "would maybe become good if I invested more into them".
For example, I find that Allen and Lance outclass both Treck and Noah, especially if you don't play at lightning pace. They're among the better units in the first chapters (only really beaten by Marcus and Deke e: and Rutger when he joins), so I tend to have both of them at ~lv 10 when Treck and Noah join. And their growths are better than either Treck's or Noah's, so they're better in the longterm, too. As a result, I will rather deploy Jerrot/Zealot and Marcus than those two, if given the choice - they're both still quite good at this stage of the game.

RNG is the same as in FE7-13, it's just that weapons have lower accuracy and enemies have higher stats than in other games. Try to have a backup plan for whiffed attacks whenever possible.

FE6 certainly plays differently from newer entries - both because it can be rough around the edges in some areas and because of different design philosophies. I don't think it's a perfect game (if I haven't addressed something in the OP, it's probably because I think that you may have a point there), but I still think it's a lot of fun if you go into it without expecting it to do things like the newer games do. And yes, ch.8 is one of the worse maps in the game.

Edited April 4, 2020 by ping

[PyroPlazma]

But Wendy/Gwendolyn is the best unit in FE6! /s

[DragonFlames]

"Balance? What's that, some type of food?!?" ~ FE6 creators, most likely.

Yeah, some of FE's design choices, particularly in these older games when unit balance is concerned (though newer ones aren't exempt from this either... *stares at Fates in contempt*), are pretty bizarre. I have beaten FE6 only once so far (didn't enjoy it, but that's beside the point), and even then I could immediately tell that the bias towards certain units was pretty blatant.

[eclipse]

. . .how 'bout you finish the game before complaining?  Because most of what you're talking about is:

1. the least of this game's problems
2. have nothing to do with the game itself (but you'd really need to know the guts of the GBA games)

EDIT: I'm just enough of a bastard mod to make you figure out the first one yourself.

Edited April 4, 2020 by eclipse

[Ertrick36]

There're more pressing issues in Binding Blade than simple unit balance.  Namely, there's level design.  Most Binding Blade maps are designed to be extremely roundabout and long-winded (chapter 8 being a prominent example), but there's one level that gets on my nerves and it's Chapter 14.

In Chapter 14, you have:

• Fog of War which requires either thieves, torches, or healers with torch staves to even be able to navigate in
• Desert which severely limits mobility for most units, including the main damn character
• The recruitment of a horse-mounted mage... who is slowed down by all the goddamn desert tiles, rendering her basically useless here
• The recruitment of a low level shaman who actually can move swiftly in the desert but is extremely weak and is likely to get destroyed when encountering more than one enemy
• Mages and wyvern knights every-f***ing-where - all of whom are easily able to see you
• On top of all of this, a time limit which, if it runs out, will cut you off from the game's true ending, because not only do you apparently deserve a swift kick in the crotch, but also to have lemon juice poured directly into your eye sockets

And apparently things get even worse in chapters 17-20 if you choose to use the two nomads you get more than the two pegasus knights you get.  Then of course there's Roy's belated promotion, which is beyond ridiculous.

That isn't to say FE6 is devoid of redeeming qualities, but damn does it go out of its way to make sure you don't enjoy playing it sometimes.

[sailtheshipacrossthesea]

Part of the fun of Binding Blade is having such a large cast to work with. Not only do you have infinitely better replay value than most of the other games, you have so much room for experimentation. Not a big fan of Lance's personality? Well, if you want a similar unit who may be slightly worse but is someone who you might be more interested in, you can use Treck or Noah. Wolt dies on the last turn of chapter 5? You get Dorothy the next map, so you don't have a headache over whether to reset the whole map for him or continue on. Few other games have a cast this large, and few other games entice me as much as Binding Blade. 

Regarding chapter 8, that's an extreme example of a bad map in this game. In my opinion, Binding Blade has some of the best map design in the series, with multiple objectives on just about every map and unit positioning that encourages deep strategy instead of "Rush in with your strongest fighter, use emulator speedup for enemy phase, and repeat". Every game has bad maps, including Binding Blade, so it's unfair to discredit a specific game just for a bad map. 

The original goal of fire emblem wasn't to reset every time your units die, and that's what confuses so many newcomers. With the extremely small cast of the newer games such as three houses, you're basically forced to reset if a unit dies or else you'll struggle heavily later on. With these older games, you get a steady supply of replacement units to ensure that you'll never be stuck for not resetting. Marcus dies in chapter 8? You have Jerrot to fill his place as a strong pre-promoted paladin. Once Jerrot stops being useful, you get another paladin who is even stronger.  

 

[Fire Emblem Fan]

Eh, I don't really think it's a huge mess. I actually like that Binding Blade gives you all those characters, because unlike Radiant Dawn and the Marth Land games, quite a few of them get genuine character development in their supports. There's several hidden gems in there and I find it fun discovering them all. Only just recently I've come to start really liking Lugh and Zeiss, for example, after actually reading their supports.

[Shadow Mir]

15 hours ago, Rejoinable said:

Part of the fun of Binding Blade is having such a large cast to work with. Not only do you have infinitely better replay value than most of the other games, you have so much room for experimentation. Not a big fan of Lance's personality? Well, if you want a similar unit who may be slightly worse but is someone who you might be more interested in, you can use Treck or Noah. Wolt dies on the last turn of chapter 5? You get Dorothy the next map, so you don't have a headache over whether to reset the whole map for him or continue on. Few other games have a cast this large, and few other games entice me as much as Binding Blade. 

Regarding chapter 8, that's an extreme example of a bad map in this game. In my opinion, Binding Blade has some of the best map design in the series, with multiple objectives on just about every map and unit positioning that encourages deep strategy instead of "Rush in with your strongest fighter, use emulator speedup for enemy phase, and repeat". Every game has bad maps, including Binding Blade, so it's unfair to discredit a specific game just for a bad map. 

The original goal of fire emblem wasn't to reset every time your units die, and that's what confuses so many newcomers. With the extremely small cast of the newer games such as three houses, you're basically forced to reset if a unit dies or else you'll struggle heavily later on. With these older games, you get a steady supply of replacement units to ensure that you'll never be stuck for not resetting. Marcus dies in chapter 8? You have Jerrot to fill his place as a strong pre-promoted paladin. Once Jerrot stops being useful, you get another paladin who is even stronger.  

I disagree with a lot of this. I find it hard to appreciate the replay value when a lot of the cast is such that using them is more akin to shooting yourself in the foot. Also, I find it hard to settle for replacement units when the replacements are likely too poor to last very long themselves (See: Wendy, Sophia, etc.). Also, I'd say that more units tends to mean worse unit balance, and this game is the poster child for that, even compared to Radiant Dawn, Revelation, and New Mystery, all of which have more units than this game.

I would say the map design only goes downhill from there - it's like Genealogy all over again. This game loves its long, winding maps too much, and the map design suffers for it. 

See my first point. If the replacements suck so much that getting them going is a struggle, what's the fucking point? That worked in the Archanea games, not so much when certain units must be alive for the sake of getting the true ending.

[X-Naut]

22 hours ago, Ertrick36 said:

There're more pressing issues in Binding Blade than simple unit balance.  Namely, there's level design.  Most Binding Blade maps are designed to be extremely roundabout and long-winded (chapter 8 being a prominent example), but there's one level that gets on my nerves and it's Chapter 14.

In Chapter 14, you have:

• Fog of War which requires either thieves, torches, or healers with torch staves to even be able to navigate in
• Desert which severely limits mobility for most units, including the main damn character
• The recruitment of a horse-mounted mage... who is slowed down by all the goddamn desert tiles, rendering her basically useless here
• The recruitment of a low level shaman who actually can move swiftly in the desert but is extremely weak and is likely to get destroyed when encountering more than one enemy
• Mages and wyvern knights every-f***ing-where - all of whom are easily able to see you
• On top of all of this, a time limit which, if it runs out, will cut you off from the game's true ending, because not only do you apparently deserve a swift kick in the crotch, but also to have lemon juice poured directly into your eye sockets

And apparently things get even worse in chapters 17-20 if you choose to use the two nomads you get more than the two pegasus knights you get.  Then of course there's Roy's belated promotion, which is beyond ridiculous.

That isn't to say FE6 is devoid of redeeming qualities, but damn does it go out of its way to make sure you don't enjoy playing it sometimes.

Chapter 14 is more the equivalent of a jump scare than genuine BS. It looks overwhelming on the surface, but when you take a moment to think you realize the game gives you all the tools you need for it:

• Up to three thieves who have more movement than unpromoted infantry, ignore the treasure RNG check and can stack with torches for huge vision.
• Three fliers who ignore terrain and can make other characters ignore the terrain with them.
• Multiple infantry mages, including two staff users who can use Torch or Restore (which the horse mage can also use, useless my ass).
• It's a relatively small map and the 25-turn limit is extremely lenient.

It could certainly be executed better but you make it sound worse than it actually is.

[sailtheshipacrossthesea]

2 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

I disagree with a lot of this. I find it hard to appreciate the replay value when a lot of the cast is such that using them is more akin to shooting yourself in the foot. Also, I find it hard to settle for replacement units when the replacements are likely too poor to last very long themselves (See: Wendy, Sophia, etc.). Also, I'd say that more units tends to mean worse unit balance, and this game is the poster child for that, even compared to Radiant Dawn, Revelation, and New Mystery, all of which have more units than this game.

I would say the map design only goes downhill from there - it's like Genealogy all over again. This game loves its long, winding maps too much, and the map design suffers for it. 

See my first point. If the replacements suck so much that getting them going is a struggle, what's the fucking point? That worked in the Archanea games, not so much when certain units must be alive for the sake of getting the true ending.

Definitely not shooting yourself in the foot. You mentioned Wendy as a replacement unit even though Barthe is right next to her the turn she appears, and is much better. Percival, a paladin joining you in the middle of the game, is one of the strongest units in the game. Unit balance isn't really that big of a deal, unless it's lunatic-awakening tier. Sure, you can use all of the top tier units if you want. But there's so much more to the cast you ignore due to "Mr. Efficiency said they were bad, I better not touch them". Fun units like Gonzales may be bad in the grand scheme of things, but are a blast to use. 

Long maps > shorter maps. Example: Chapter 13, despite being one of the longest in the series, is one of my favorites due to all the choices you get to make. Do you want to go the top bridge or the bottom bridge? Do you want to split up your army to get both villages and all the experience or stick to one route? Do you want to take a few rounds in the arena at the end of the map? All of these choices they present to you make it far better than many other maps in the series.

The "replacement units" rarely outright suck (Sophia and Wendy are just the prime examples people use, they're two units in a massive cast!). Noah, a cavalier joining you after getting Alan and Lance, is regarded as a good unit because of his high level and ability to promote fast. Shin, recruited after getting Sue (both of them nomads) is regarded as one of the best hard mode units and a good normal mode unit. If you close your eyes to all the potential the game has, you'll definitely be disappointed. Don't continue whining about how two units are terrible when the cast is one of the largest in the series; there's bound to be some units better than others.

 

Edit: I'd like to add these low-res works of art: https://m.imgur.com/a/ZNN2Sqm

Edited April 5, 2020 by Rejoinable

[Shadow Mir]

19 hours ago, Rejoinable said:

Definitely not shooting yourself in the foot. You mentioned Wendy as a replacement unit even though Barthe is right next to her the turn she appears, and is much better. Percival, a paladin joining you in the middle of the game, is one of the strongest units in the game. Unit balance isn't really that big of a deal, unless it's lunatic-awakening tier. Sure, you can use all of the top tier units if you want. But there's so much more to the cast you ignore due to "Mr. Efficiency said they were bad, I better not touch them". Fun units like Gonzales may be bad in the grand scheme of things, but are a blast to use. 

Pointing out Barthe doesn't really disprove my point - he's also a crappy armor knight; admittedly, Bors sucks too. All of them suffer from being low move units in a game that has really big maps. Wendy has it the worst by far because she comes underleveled with crappy bases right before an axe-dominated portion of the game (as if bad bases and being underleveled weren't enough of a kick in the teeth). If I have to go completely out of my way to raise someone who has the entire deck stacked against them, the payoff very damn well better be worth it. And it ain't when they only turn out interchangeable with another crappy unit who joined far earlier than them. And she's not the only example of this, either; Cath and Sophia have the same thing going on. It's pretty telling that some people tend to kill the former when she first shows up. So I ask again; what the hell is the point??? Also, I would say that the unit balance pretty much comes close to lunatic Awakening tier - most of the good units either join early or have mounts, or both. Niime is about the only exception to this. That being said, it manages to not be the worst unit balance wise only because Genealogy of the Holy War somehow manages to be worse.

19 hours ago, Rejoinable said:

Long maps > shorter maps. Example: Chapter 13, despite being one of the longest in the series, is one of my favorites due to all the choices you get to make. Do you want to go the top bridge or the bottom bridge? Do you want to split up your army to get both villages and all the experience or stick to one route? Do you want to take a few rounds in the arena at the end of the map? All of these choices they present to you make it far better than many other maps in the series.

That doesn't excuse overdoing it, which this game does. Especially when the game is essentially one giant escort mission. Hell, for how much it gets bashed in the map design department, even Gaiden/SoV has better maps than this.

19 hours ago, Rejoinable said:

The "replacement units" rarely outright suck (Sophia and Wendy are just the prime examples people use, they're two units in a massive cast!). Noah, a cavalier joining you after getting Alan and Lance, is regarded as a good unit because of his high level and ability to promote fast. Shin, recruited after getting Sue (both of them nomads) is regarded as one of the best hard mode units and a good normal mode unit. If you close your eyes to all the potential the game has, you'll definitely be disappointed. Don't continue whining about how two units are terrible when the cast is one of the largest in the series; there's bound to be some units better than others.

They're not the only ones; there's the aforementioned Cath, who starts at level 5 about the halfway point of the game, and even with hard mode bonuses, she's still far inferior to Astolfo. And Zeiss, who comes at level 7 right before a route split where both sides suck for him. Not to mention he needs his sister, who's guaranteed to be running rings around him by that point (not to mention being one of the best units in the game and needing to stay alive for a side chapter), to recruit. Also, Shin's a mounted unit in a game that favours mounted units to an obscene degree (and in the event you go to Sacae, both he and Sue, in addition to Dayan, must be alive to access a side chapter), so mentioning him doesn't help your case. RE: Noah, by that point, Alan and Lance have gotten going, and they probably have supports with each other. Noah's gonna have a hard time competing for a slot. At any rate, sure, some units are gonna be better than others, but even compared to the games with bigger casts than it, Binding Blade has a lot of throwaway units.

[samthedigital]

Quote

And she's not the only example of this, either; Cath and Sophia have the same thing going on. It's pretty telling that some people tend to kill the former when she first shows up. So I ask again; what the hell is the point???

The unit balance in Binding Blade is kind of all over the place, but that was also the intent. Not every unit is supposed to be equal. That being the case does not mean that the game is completely imbalanced. There are a lot of variety between the good units, and this is what makes FE6 interesting to me. There isn't a prepromote that joins at the start of the game and steamrolls everything, it's not just mounted units that wreck the game, and it's not all about slaughtering a bunch of crap on EP.

Quote

Also, I would say that the unit balance pretty much comes close to lunatic Awakening tier - most of the good units either join early or have mounts, or both. Niime is about the only exception to this.

Quote

That being said, it manages to not be the worst unit balance wise only because Genealogy of the Holy War somehow manages to be worse.

You're brushing over the fact that there's a lot of variety in the good units in FE6. Marcus and Zealot are good early pre-promotes that fall off later. Rutger has amazing combat, but he has limited movement. Niime has warp, but it's a little tricky to get her to S rank for +5 magic because she's frail. Shin is great, but he's limited to 2 range. Shanna is an early flier, but she's really frail and takes care to use. She also can't dominate maps without a lot of help. I could go on if you'd like. It helps that 1-2 range options are more limited. The point is that this is a lot more variety than in many other FE games. Here are some examples:

FE4 features units that can solo the game from start to finish easily, and non mounted units can't compete in that game.

FE7's best units are all 1-2 range mounted combat units along with a few magic users.

FE8 has Seth and other 1-2 range mounted combat users and some magic.

PoR is dominated by mounted 1-2 range combat units.

The best way to play Awakening is to Corrin solo.

Quote

That doesn't excuse overdoing it, which this game does. Especially when the game is essentially one giant escort mission. Hell, for how much it gets bashed in the map design department, even Gaiden/SoV has better maps than this.

Part of the fun is in escorting Roy to the throne. I'm not sure where you're coming from as far as map design goes. What do you dislike about the maps besides the fact that they're big? It's not FE4 where we spend a lot of turns just traversing the map and doing nothing. There are always things happening, and there are often several objectives rather than just getting Roy to the throne. Enemies are actually a threat too, so it's never as simple as marching from point A to point B without thinking.

Quote

They're not the only ones; there's the aforementioned Cath, who starts at level 5 about the halfway point of the game, and even with hard mode bonuses, she's still far inferior to Astolfo. And Zeiss, who comes at level 7 right before a route split where both sides suck for him. Not to mention he needs his sister, who's guaranteed to be running rings around him by that point (not to mention being one of the best units in the game and needing to stay alive for a side chapter), to recruit.

Zeiss is a flier, so even if he had nothing else going for him he has some utility just for that. Miledy does not invalidate Zeiss completely; they are both useful, and Zeiss can still see some combat especially on slower playthroughs.

Quote

Noah, by that point, Alan and Lance have gotten going, and they probably have supports with each other. Noah's gonna have a hard time competing for a slot.

There are several things that are problematic with this. You're suggesting that deployment slots are limited to the point that Noah has a hard time being fielded. You are also suggesting that Noah is worthless just because Alan and Lance exist. He's not Wendy; he is very usable without too much effort. If both Alan and Lance end up doing poorly he's a good replacement. Alan and Lance's supports don't mean a whole lot either. There is only one Knight Crest available for a while, so the character that remains unpromoted is going to be left behind.

[Koops]

I don't understand what's wrong with having a lot of replacement units tho, even if they're bad. You are still being given more option if you want more of some type of unit. For example, Chapter 7 HM is a nightmare especially with those Wyverns, so maybe bringing all the archers you have (3 at this point, Wolt Dorothy and Sue) isn't a bad idea. Both Marcus and Zealots can be deployed in a single earlygame map to make the job easier for all the other unpromoted people you have. More cavaliers, more mounted units=good extra options for rescue-dropping.

This is the beauty of FE6, there's so many scenarios in which a certain type of unexpected unit can see use, even if they're not units that are generally good.

[anikom15]

The idea that units need to be balanced is a fallacy. Part of the fun of permadeath is losing a great unit, having to replace it with a mediocre one, and making it work.

[PyroPlazma]

On 4/15/2020 at 3:42 AM, anikom15 said:

The idea that units need to be balanced is a fallacy. Part of the fun of permadeath is losing a great unit, having to replace it with a mediocre one, and making it work.

Large amount of the playerbase doesn't play the way. It's sound on paper, but isn't reflective of reality.

[Koops]

I wanna add something to the idea of unit balance, tho... when everyone's really good, it just kinda becomes boring. FE9 is my favorite game in the series but that is not because of the unit balance in that game. FE6 on the other hand has godly units like Percival, Rutger, Milady, while also giving you people like Sophia, Wendy, Dorothy... even Lilina, as much as I love using her... and then there's everyone else, who may or may not have some gig to them, and a lot of them are interesting. Fir joins as a level 1 myrmidon in chapter 9 and looks bad but she comes in a place where it's incredibly easy to train her and she can become decent, or even great or amazing depending on your luck (once had a 20 strength Fir). Fae also has bad bases but the DragonStone kinda makes up for it, and she's a great status staff sponge. Even Noah has some things going for him, like having one extra Con, C rank in swords so he can use killing edges right away, stuff like that.

Part of the fun in FE6 is simply experimenting with all these units they give you. Having a lot of options was never a bad thing. If anything, having a large roster, one that consists of good and bad units is a good thing. You can always try to have fun training the scrubs, or if not, at least get this fulfilling feeling when they get somewhere, and it's always still really satisfying seeing the already OP people just do their thing. Each playthrough, a new unit is the star.

This, to me, is the beauty of FE6's unit balance.

[anikom15]

5 hours ago, PyroPlazma said:

Large amount of the playerbase doesn't play the way. It's sound on paper, but isn't reflective of reality.

Their loss. It's how I play. Never had a problem with it. I've never even gotten to a point where I couldn't finish a game due to poor leveling/lack of effective units

[eclipse]

8 hours ago, PyroPlazma said:

Large amount of the playerbase doesn't play the way. It's sound on paper, but isn't reflective of reality.

 

2 hours ago, anikom15 said:

Their loss. It's how I play. Never had a problem with it. I've never even gotten to a point where I couldn't finish a game due to poor leveling/lack of effective units

Hey, two different opinions.

And neither one is wrong.  Some people want a smaller cast, others want options, still others want some reason-or-other to use unit X over unit Y besides favoritism.  I'm all for a larger, not-necessarily-perfectly-balanced cast, since FE6's benchmarks are lower than they appear (Shin is good, but have you seen what happens when Bartre gets his hands on a bow?).

Edited April 18, 2020 by eclipse

[Koops]

Bartre's strength is fantastic, shame that he hasn't the speed to properly make use of that. BUT he will prove useful against those Chapter 13 Wyverns!

And here we have another case of a unit not considered amazing being helpful in some way!

Edited April 18, 2020 by Koops

[Lightcosmo]

In FE6's defence, they did take the series in an entire different direction, so they had to change so much, I can imagine organization not being a thing in this game.

[Shadow Mir]

On 4/14/2020 at 8:45 AM, Koops said:

I don't understand what's wrong with having a lot of replacement units tho, even if they're bad. You are still being given more option if you want more of some type of unit. For example, Chapter 7 HM is a nightmare especially with those Wyverns, so maybe bringing all the archers you have (3 at this point, Wolt Dorothy and Sue) isn't a bad idea. Both Marcus and Zealots can be deployed in a single earlygame map to make the job easier for all the other unpromoted people you have. More cavaliers, more mounted units=good extra options for rescue-dropping.

This is the beauty of FE6, there's so many scenarios in which a certain type of unexpected unit can see use, even if they're not units that are generally good.

I dunno about you, but imho, quantity over quality is a poor creed to submit to regarding FE units, and this game demonstrates the pitfalls of such a creed (AKA, Archanea Syndrome; ergo, I find it hard to find reasons to invest in, say, Ogier when he doesn't stack up well compared to Deke even when trained, much less Rutger, and even Fir is better despite joining later). It's also one of the absolute worst games for ironman runs, but that's neither here nor there. Sorry, but I find your explanation to be flimsy and unacceptable.

On 4/15/2020 at 3:42 AM, anikom15 said:

The idea that units need to be balanced is a fallacy. Part of the fun of permadeath is losing a great unit, having to replace it with a mediocre one, and making it work.

I dunno about you, but when the replacements are too poor to last long themselves and need a truckload of effort to get anywhere, something is obviously wrong. Also, this mentality only worked in Archanea, where the stat scale was lower, and even there, I'd say it was folly. It's even more foolish when certain units must be alive to get the true ending. Also, most of the playerbase doesn't play that way, largely because it's quicker and easier to reset and keep the good unit than to try to train up a replacement.