how are the 5 difficulties compared to the other game's difficulties?

[Redeyesblackdragon]

ex.
i feel h3 is like binding blade hard mode
h4 is like conquest lunatic
blah blah blah... 

[Shaky Jones]

H2 is like Eliwood hard or maybe PoR hard

H3 is like Radiant Dawn Normal (not spamming battle saves) or maybe Awakening hard without grinding. It's slightly above the standard hard mode to me, while H2 is either exactly that or a bit lower.

H4 is like Binding Blade Hard

H5 is like New Mystery Maniac or Conquest Hard

Normal and Hard 1 is...ahh I dunno.

Sacred Stones Erika Normal?

[JimmyBeans]

Shadow Dragon H5 was the hardest game in the series when it arrived, not so much anymore with the existence of fe12, Awakenings Lunatic mode, and CQ.

The quality of the enemies are very, very high, but there is a lot less than them on the map, take ch3 for example when you have more units than their are enemies on the map. With this in mind, this game isn't really comparable to even fe6 and it makes for a pretty unique entry in the difficulty department.

[MuteMousou]

I think I've only played H1? I would compare it to a relatively less difficult RD Hard? Otherwise Idk, has anyone ever even played all of the difficulties to compare all of them? lol

[Shaky Jones]

34 minutes ago, MuteMousou said:

has anyone ever even played all of the difficulties to compare all of them? lol

I've played them all except hard 1, which I hear is just normal, but without the prologue. I would do it just say I did them all, but I doubt I'd get much out of it, unless I do something completely ridiculous.

15 hours ago, JimmyBeans said:

Shadow Dragon H5 was the hardest game in the series when it arrived

That's interesting. Honestly, I find RD hard to be more difficult than H5, mostly because of how ridiculous forging is in DSFE, and you get save circles. Then again, I guess H5 was the first FE game to feature enemies that dealt so much damage per hit. It probably is objectively more difficult. You just get quite a lot of resources to get by in SD. 

15 hours ago, JimmyBeans said:

The quality of the enemies are very, very high, but there is a lot less than them on the map, take ch3 for example when you have more units than their are enemies on the map. With this in mind, this game isn't really comparable to even fe6 and it makes for a pretty unique entry in the difficulty department.

I agree. Hard 5 is very unique. There's no other game that takes quite the same approach. It's difficulty also curves quite drastically. It's known for it's brutal early game, but that doesn't make it the hardest game overall. I can only compare them to how much I struggle with other FE's at. And then H5 has the infinite range warp staffs, or General Sedgar/Wolf that can destroy the challenge of the game if trained enough. It stands out. I think its difficulty is rather flexible, and your ability to properly utilize the gold, units, effective weaponry, and general player phase strats massively affect how hard the game is, whereas something like conquest lunatic or New Mystery lunatic is just consistently difficult for the most part.

[MuteMousou]

12 minutes ago, Shaky Jones said:

I agree. Hard 5 is very unique. There's no other game that takes quite the same approach. It's difficulty also curves quite drastically. It's known for it's brutal early game, but that doesn't make it the hardest game overall. I can only compare them to how much I struggle with other FE's at. And then H5 has the infinite range warp staffs, or General Sedgar/Wolf that can destroy the challenge of the game if trained enough. It stands out. I think its difficulty is rather flexible, and your ability to properly utilize the gold, units, effective weaponry, and general player phase strats massively affect how hard the game is, whereas something like conquest lunatic or New Mystery lunatic is just consistently difficult for the most part.

Part of that I feel like is just wonky design because I think they just left things a certain way because that's how fe3/fe1 did it. I do think fe12 and conquest do difficulty better, though.

[Shaky Jones]

3 minutes ago, MuteMousou said:

Part of that I feel like is just wonky design because I think they just left things a certain way because that's how fe3/fe1 did it. I do think fe12 and conquest do difficulty better, though.

For the most part, they chose to be very faithful to the original. Possibly to a fault. A lot of people aren't big fans of Shadow Dragon for that reason. The biggest sign of it not being play tested is SD's H5 early game. Enemies are questionably strong, especially in bulk. Yhe fighters in chapter 3 have nearly 40 HP, and the bosses are infamous for being unfair. Since there isn't clear differences between each individual hard mode, its safe to assume they probably added some multiplier of something per level increase. The main differences will be when enemies get stronger weapons earlier. At no point does FE11 add more enemies or change their positioning in different difficulties, like in New Mystery or Conquest. The intention was likely that you just played the Shadow Dragon experience with the difficulty scaling of your choosing. With 5 increments, surely one of them will be just right. I don't think I'd call the design wonky, aside from chapter 3 and some of 2, but it's definitely not as well crafted as some other ones. I mainly appreciate that the base design of the game overall allows you to do so much even at really high difficulties. You get ridiculous gold in FE1, so you add forges to give you something to use it all on, which in turn creates a mechanic that greatly affects strategic forge choices to get out of really hard maps. You can even use it to give low tier units a solid fighting chance in H5, in case you want to ironman the game, which was the original intention. You dont need to rely on lucky growth rates to not have a bad time. I like the weapon rank system bonuses that are very important to try canceling with the triangle advantage in h5, such as sword units getting +3 might to make up fir their lack of strength. I also just think fe1/fe3 does a suprisingly good job with eneny/map design. I wouldn't want it changed much, unless they do it very well, like New Mystery in my opinion. Again, H5 is unique. Similar to FE1, but also not, given how much your choices change when throwing in reclassing, strong enemies, forges, Matthis, etc.

[MuteMousou]

12 hours ago, Shaky Jones said:

I don't think I'd call the design wonky, aside from chapter 3 and some of 2, but it's definitely not as well crafted as some other ones. I mainly appreciate that the base design of the game overall allows you to do so much even at really high difficulties.

What I mean is that I think leaving warp the same as in FE3 creates sort of a weird balance, especially considering that this mechanic was nerfed pretty heavily in both fe3 book 2 and the 2 other Kaga games after it. The fact that they changed a lot of other things, such as weapon rank, forge, and so on, to match how they are in Radiant Dawn, but left warp as something you get for free in chapter 3, with infinite range and no mechanical limitations, is kind of weird, especially considering warp was also nerfed in the Gaiden remake even though that is generally a more faithful remake than either of the Archanea ones. But yeah, I don't really disagree with what you said or anything, just kind of clarifying what I meant. 

[Shaky Jones]

11 hours ago, MuteMousou said:

The fact that they changed a lot of other things, such as weapon rank, forge, and so on, to match how they are in Radiant Dawn, but left warp as something you get for free in chapter 3, with infinite range and no mechanical limitations, is kind of weird, especially considering warp was also nerfed in the Gaiden remake even though that is generally a more faithful remake than either of the Archanea ones.

It's certainly abnormal. But then again, who could have the heart to remove the best part of FE1? Infinite range staves. Apparently, the SoV devs. I sure would've liked the game more if they just left that part unbalanced. It's this balance of making balance. Some things do need to be balanced or tweaked to become more like what FE is currently at and create more challenging gameplay. I've never been one to believe that remakes should be 100% faithful. It's just a remaster at that point, and every game has things it can improve on. But some changes can take away the fun of the original. I think FE12 did balancing right for things like warp. It's still infinite range, but heavily limited, and outright gone on Lunatic to prevent you basically escaping a map for free. FE11 is wacky, but it's a fun wacky. I'm guessing that's what you meant by wonky design. Because yeah, it's very odd.