Genocide Mode: A new challenge run idea

[Zalor]

I have a new (at least I think it's a new) idea for a challenge run. As the title implies it is a Genocide Run. It's inspired by that Invader Zim Episode called Hobo 13 where Zim is forced into a team competition and manages to win, but only because with every obstacle he came across he sacrificed a team member until finally he was the only one left standing. Likewise for this challenge run, you would be required to kill off a character each chapter.

These are the tentative rules I came up with:

1) A playable character must be sacrificed in each chapter. By the term 'playable character' what I mean specifically is that only units you directly control count as a sacrifice. So for instance if you refuse to recruit an enemy/npc character that could join your party and kill them instead, they do not count as a sacrifice. But if you recruit them first, and then sacrifice them, then they do count.

2) In the case that the first chapter only has 1 playable unit, it is not required to sacrifice that unit in that chapter. In the case where the first chapter has 2 playable units (such as FE8 or FE7 Hector mode), it is optional to sacrifice a unit in that chapter.

3) [OPTIONAL RULE] The final boss can only be fought with and defeated by the main lord. Main lord is defined as the lord who can seize thrones. 

4) Permadeath is required (in games where casual mode is an option), but aside from that any game mode is allowed. In the case of FE7 that also means you can start your run with either Eliwood or Hector mode (it is not required to do Lyn mode).

These are the rules I have come up with for now, but I imagine some additional caveats and exceptions may be necessary. It's been a while since I played some FE games, and with the exception of Conquests, I've only played Fire Emblems 1 - 8 (with the additional exception of 5 which I have yet to play). So my knowledge of the later FE games, and especially Three Houses (which seems to have a lot of new mechanics) is lacking. So if any one has any suggestions on how this challenge run could work better in the later Fire Emblem games which I am unfamiliar with, please share them. And just in general, if you have any suggestions please voice them.

Edited October 16, 2020 by Zalor

[Shrow]

Oh I really like this challenge.

Shadow Dragon would prove to be the easiest on this challenge since the player is given so many units in that game anyways.

However GBA Fire emblems would prove to be a decent challenge. In Sacred Stones the player would be forced the sacrifice Seth since the chapter starts the player off with only two units. Already making the game harder.

Unfortunately this challenge wouldn't work so well with the DS Fire emblems Awakening and Fates due to the unit count relying on S+ supports which wouldn't be able to be made if all the parents die early. That being said due to broken pair up mechanics, Awakening wouldn't play all that much different ironically since the player would be left with Chrom and Robin who will solo the game just fine. The Fates player would be left with just Corrin unfortunately.

In SoV the units are split between Alm and Celica and if the player sacrificed a unit on every map spot, they would likely be left with just Alm and Celica by the end of the game. (Which is still beatable even with only two units)

[Zalor]

39 minutes ago, Shrow said:

Shadow Dragon would prove to be the easiest on this challenge since the player is given so many units in that game anyways.

However GBA Fire emblems would prove to be a decent challenge. In Sacred Stones the player would be forced the sacrifice Seth since the chapter starts the player off with only two units. Already making the game harder.

Admittedly I did mostly have the GBA Fire Emblem's in mind when I came up with this. But I think it could work with most if not all FE games. Maybe we would have to tweak the rules a bit for more idiosyncratic titles, but I think it should still be doable. I'm concerned that it might still be too easy for some games. On the one hand the player is frequently given new character in many Fire Emblem games, but there is also the added challenge that a player might have to sacrifice characters that prevent them from recruiting others. Resulting in them not necessarily having as much of a surplus as they normally would. As you mentioned in Awakening this will happen if you sacrifice a parent, and likewise it will have a similar result in FE4.  

 

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

7 hours ago, Zalor said:

3) The final boss can only be fought with and defeated by the main lord. Main lord is defined as the lord who can seize thrones. 

Why is this rule here? It doesn't seem to fit with the rest, and it makes some difficulty modes (Shadow Dragon H5) practically unwinnable.

I like the idea otherwise. It seems more doable in games with lots of characters (Binding Blade, Shadow Dragon, New Mystery) or relatively few chapters (Genealogy, arguably Gaiden), and harder in games where neither is the case (Sacred Stones, Three Houses). It's actually reminiscent of the "turnwheel of death" playthrough of FE12 that Mekkah and Mangs did last year.

[Brave Lance]

Believe it or not, I've actually run something like this before called FE7 7 mode. I was only allowed to have 7 units alive at one time, and I would spin a wheel whenever a new unit joined to see who among the living would be replaced (the new unit would be added to the rng pool so there was a chance of a new unit being forced to die immediately). It was hell during the earlygame, namely the merlinus gaiden, but it got really interesting later on when I had to train up weaker units just so I'd have enough bodies to go around. Bartre was the only unit that joined early that made it through the whole game. Overall a fun ruleset, and be sure to dread the Rath/Isadora/Heath chapter. 3 devastating wheel spins in one chapter.

Edit: Whether it was obvious or not, these 7 units do not include any game over conditions.

Edited October 15, 2020 by Brave Lance

[Zalor]

19 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Why is this rule here? It doesn't seem to fit with the rest, and it makes some difficulty modes (Shadow Dragon H5) practically unwinnable.

The concept of the challenge is that the main lord is a complete sociopath who only sees their troops as canon fodder and a means to win. Leaving them alone (or completely alienated from any surviving allies) when the time comes to face the last major challenge. If you've played Yggdra Union it's kind of like Gulcasa's special where he sacrifices all of his own units. But again, that's just the concept that motivated this idea. In practice I do agree it's unnecessary and I think I'll get rid of it or make it optional. 

 

16 hours ago, Brave Lance said:

Believe it or not, I've actually run something like this before called FE7 7 mode. I was only allowed to have 7 units alive at one time, and I would spin a wheel whenever a new unit joined to see who among the living would be replaced (the new unit would be added to the rng pool so there was a chance of a new unit being forced to die immediately). 

I really like the idea of of having every unit on a list and their death getting determined randomly. One of my concerns is that a lot of Fire Emblem games offer an abundance of units, and you could easily store a reserve of useless unit that you use as sacrifices. Of course after a while this reserve might run dry, but it does make it easy to avoid killing good units. By determining who to sacrifice randomly it adds a higher level of challenge and risk/reward.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

5 hours ago, Zalor said:

The concept of the challenge is that the main lord is a complete sociopath who only sees their troops as canon fodder and a means to win. Leaving them alone (or completely alienated from any surviving allies) when the time comes to face the last major challenge. If you've played Yggdra Union it's kind of like Gulcasa's special where he sacrifices all of his own units. But again, that's just the concept that motivated this idea. In practice I do agree it's unnecessary and I think I'll get rid of it or make it optional. 

Interestingly, the first game where I thought of a "Genocide Mode" was Three Houses. But in that one, the idea would be, you don't recruit anyone whom you can fight/kill in the post-skip. So in CF Genocide, I could recruit Raphael, Marianne, Lorenz, Hanneman, Manuela, and... no one else. The other Golden Deer, and all the Blue Lions, show up as enemies. And I hear Alois and Shamir can appear as enemies in the "Garreg Mach defense" map. I'm considering something like this when I return to Three Houses.