Anyone else glad the weapon triangle is falling out of favor with intelligent systems?

[AnonymousSpeed]

I don't think the weapon triangle is going away, but I wouldn't be too terribly upset if it did.

As much as I love axes, they really aren't all that distinct from lances, and I didn't really miss them in Shadows of Valentia. So there really doesn't need to be three "main" weapon types, and without that you can't have the weapon triangle. I've heard people say that the weapon triangle helps distinguish swords, lances and axes from each other. However, if you need a shallow mechanic to make your weapon types noticeably different, then perhaps they aren't meaningfully distinct in the first place.

That's one thing I actually really liked about Fates. The increased prevalence of the weapon triangle and the shakier hit rates some characters had did make it feel significant and engaging, even if the basic three weapon types were more homogeneous than ever. They were better or worse not only because they did slightly more damage or had slightly more hit, but because they were advantageous against very distinct types of enemies.

I still feel like the Fates weapon triangle went underutilized though, especially since they didn't really get creative with the combinations of weapon types that promoted units could use. Mechanist is the only class to exclusively use weapons newly added to the weapon triangle, and there were plenty of potentially interesting combinations of weapon types that weren't used at all.

I wouldn't mind seeing the weapon triangle return with axes cut and replaced by gauntlets or something. As for the traditional implementation, I could take it or leave it, so long as the design is adjusted for its absence. My main problem with it is that it's built for an arrangement of weapon types that I question the merits of.

[Emperor Hardin]

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

For warriors I'd say the system is less the problem and more that the playable cast is out of whack. They definitely should have given one of the twins a lance at least (or just made them Eirika and Ephraim, or Alphonse and Shareena).

They wanted to make the banana twins as generic and unlikable as possible I suppose.

If the roster was going to be like that, then they should've just done elements or just removed the weakness mechanic altogether else instead of adding weapon triangle solely for the sake of having it. Same for stuff like having armored category and no armored units.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Emperor Hardin said:

They wanted to make the banana twins as generic and unlikable as possible I suppose.

If the roster was going to be like that, then they should've just done elements or just removed the weakness mechanic altogether else instead of adding weapon triangle solely for the sake of having it. Same for stuff like having armored category and no armored units.

Well if given the reins to make Fire Emblem Warriors, personally I would have overhauled the cast entirely and have made it class based instead of character based. Ie instead of Marth and Corrin and co, the playable cast would be something like Myrmidon, Halberder, Fighter, Armoured Knight, Paladin, Wyvern/Falcon Knight and Lord. With each class having a wide selection of characters from the series that all fight using the same attacks, but are distinguished from each other by the skills they have (so Camilla comes with Trample and Minerva comes with Iote's Shield to give an example they already use in the  game already. They already made a third of the cast clones, but they did it in such a way that they add basically no new flavor to the gameplay. This would also mean unlocking new abilities on units wouldn't be the core aspect of grinding, but actually unlocking new characters for the playable classes would. Not only would this bring more weapon balance to the cast (we're still on topic!), but it would allow for a massive range of characters to be included from across the entire series.

[joevar]

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

Well if given the reins to make Fire Emblem Warriors, personally I would have overhauled the cast entirely and have made it class based instead of character based. Ie instead of Marth and Corrin and co, the playable cast would be something like Myrmidon, Halberder, Fighter, Armoured Knight, Paladin, Wyvern/Falcon Knight and Lord. With each class having a wide selection of characters from the series that all fight using the same attacks, but are distinguished from each other by the skills they have (so Camilla comes with Trample and Minerva comes with Iote's Shield to give an example they already use in the  game already. They already made a third of the cast clones, but they did it in such a way that they add basically no new flavor to the gameplay. This would also mean unlocking new abilities on units wouldn't be the core aspect of grinding, but actually unlocking new characters for the playable classes would. Not only would this bring more weapon balance to the cast (we're still on topic!), but it would allow for a massive range of characters to be included from across the entire series.

well, no one knows whats in Koei Tecmo head when they make FE Warrior. maybe its IS fault for choosing that kind of cast, maybe Koei for thinking weapon triangle is something FE fans can relate to. but blaming WT solely for warrior's mess seems not complete. also its genre and playstyle different than mainline FE . whether or not having WT again in another warrior should not affect decision to include it or not in mainline game

[Jotari]

51 minutes ago, joevar said:

well, no one knows whats in Koei Tecmo head when they make FE Warrior. maybe its IS fault for choosing that kind of cast, maybe Koei for thinking weapon triangle is something FE fans can relate to. but blaming WT solely for warrior's mess seems not complete. also its genre and playstyle different than mainline FE . whether or not having WT again in another warrior should not affect decision to include it or not in mainline game

I think from the warriors angle having the weapon triangle was pretty mandatory going into warriors. Warriors games have a pretty major issue IMO of every last game being damn near identical. That's probably why they started resorting to all these crossovers. You've got to feature something from the game your crossovering with to make the Fire Emblem Warriors experience distinct from the typical Warriors experience. To something of a lesser extent Tokyo Mirage Sessions had this too. SMT games aren't quite as samey as warriors games, but without the weapon triangle the gameplay would basically just be a standard Shin Megami Tensei game. Even the Sessions mechanic was used in a previous game I've been told. Granted Tokyo Mirage Sessions does for some baffling reason have a few of the same problems as Warriors in that you don't get an axe user until half way through the game and you're never allowed to switch out your main lore which upsets a lot of weapon distribution balance, but the Weapon Triangle system is actually generally utilized quite good there. Tokyo Mirage Sessions gameplay is pretty great.

[joevar]

23 hours ago, Jotari said:

Tokyo Mirage Sessions had this too

oh, never got to play it, dunno if it has WT too. 

 

23 hours ago, Jotari said:

Tokyo Mirage Sessions gameplay is pretty great.

yeah, i've also heard the gameplay is actually good (or fun? either way in positive light) from many people

[Lightcosmo]

1 hour ago, joevar said:

yeah, i've also heard the gameplay is actually good (or fun? either way in positive light) from many people

The gameplay is pretty good, the only issue it has is that it gets a bit repetitive after a while.