feplus

We have sixteen pages of discussion exploring why Casual Mode's inclusion hurt the experience for some. I don't see the benefit of rehashing those arguments.

Yes, I can see why cutting Casual would upset some people. I can also see why Casual returning would upset some people.

Those posts don't strike me as being "fine" with losing new players. I think a large majority of anti-Casual people would be content with the inclusion of easier difficulty modes that do not cut a core mechanic. EDIT: I also have to question the relevance of your EC video. Both sides want accessible depth.

You're posing a different question: is grinding in Awakening viable? That relies on data. Whether grinding should be factored into difficulty evaluation is a conceptual question and does not involve data. I never recommended grinding against Luna+ Risen. That would be foolish.

Has anyone said this?

Grinding is significantly easier, less time-consuming, and less risky via the Tower than arena abuse. Stories abound of new players pouring hours into arena abuse only to have an unlucky critical end their run. Tower grinding doesn't have that disincentive. Sure, FE7 has some stellar units. Seth is better than Marcus and Duessel is a boss on casual runs, but Pent outclasses Saleh, Hawkeye outclasses Dozla, Vaida outclasses Syrene, and Harken is an animal. FE7's got sweet prepromotes. On the flip side, Sacred Stones gives you a dragon, Gerik, Seth, Franz, Cormag, a couple of great lords, and nine weapons / tomes that cut through monsters like butter. If most of EHM's final maps were comprised of enemies that took triple might from your best weapons, I'd be inclined to agree with your assessment. On reflection I believe the enemy stats glitch (which cuts prepromote stats far below what they should be) is exclusive to Normal Mode so it wouldn't apply. Someone with better knowledge of FE8's mechanics can clarify. And yes female Druids are HHM exclusive.

Yes.

Rules: -prepromotes cannot be deployed -prepromotes who are auto-deployed cannot fight with weapons, visit villages, participate in item / weapon swapping or rescue units, but they can meat-shield -no Myrrh -no arena / random battles / Tower -all characters recruited and kept alive I'm planning to level up Ewan as a Shaman and have Eclipse cut into the Demon King's health to make him manageable. Going Eirika route. Any nastiness I should prepare for?

I don't agree with this at all. As you said, there are a number of exceptionally good characters the game throws at you, and endgame maps- which logic dictates should be the most difficult- are filled with monsters. Ten weapons that eat monsters for breakfast are handed out for free. Plus there's the promoted enemy stats glitch. Plus you can spend ten minutes at the Tower to trivialize things further.

It's easier but it's also slower and probably makes for a worse watch for most people. Just something to think about.

Makes sense. I think an invaluable Phantom Ship contribution + easy Garm use + virtually invincible is significant, but I guess it depends on playstyle and how fast you're going.

@Horace I'm curious why you aren't big on Duessel.

I'm of the opinion that any% FE7 should exclude Lyn Mode, for two reasons: 1. any% is typically defined as getting to the credits from a fresh file. Since you can start a fresh file from Eliwood / Hector Mode after completing the game once, that would be quicker. For comparison, look at how Diddy Kong Racing runners use TT despite him being an unlockable character. Same logic: once he's obtained on one file, he's available on all fresh files. 2. Lyn Mode is a snooze cruise. Learning about RN manipulation is essential. moltov's route is improvable but also really clever (love how he manipulates enemy spawns in CoD by avoiding spawn boxes), so I'd use his run as a blueprint.

Lunatic+ Casual is also unlocked by beating Lunatic Casual. Red's point is that playing Classic to unlock more Classic isn't much incentive.

The simplest way to incentivize a Classic Mode playthrough is additional content. Maybe the "good ending" path is locked a la Binding Blade; maybe Classic rewards the player with exclusive postgame characters. But what I'd really like to see is a Fire Emblem that takes unit death seriously. Most titles in the series have scenes and bits of dialogue you only get when characters are alive, but I'd also like to see scenes and bits of dialogue you only get when characters are deceased. Let's say two characters get up to an A support, and one of them dies in battle -- wouldn't it be touching to have a brief scene where the surviving character muses on how this loss affects him or her? Or let's say a plot-important character dies off; rather than having them become "wounded," wouldn't it be neat if their death carried plot significance? Intelligent Systems could also take a quasi-Shadow Dragon approach and leave certain gaidens locked unless a particular character or characters have passed on. FEif is all about player choice, right? And tragic choices are interesting. This would encourage even the newest of players to give Classic a whirl.

Rude? A little snark never hurt anybody. I feel I've been quite cordial! But yes, the lines have been drawn the argument's played out. Doubt any minds are going to change.

I don't know what you're arguing, eclipse. Questions like "should we consider grinding when evaluating difficulty?" aren't answerable with numbers; they're conceptual problems. I did provide hard numbers about the utility of Renown rewards. Or are you saying you doubt 1-2 hours of grinding makes much difference? If that's the case, I can dust off my copy and see how many levels 1-2 hours of grinding would net you.

Curious about this luck = illusion point. What do you mean by that? There's plenty of real luck involved, particularly with one-RN titles.

Sure. I thought it was odd how some were calling for moderators and bemoaning how uncivil this thread was, so there's some semi-hard numbers. This is a contentious issue and I think people have behaved themselves.

Good post. I'll sleep on what you said and get back to you tomorrow.

Went back through the thread and counted up all the posts that were either hostile or insulting. I found just ten. Nine came from people arguing on behalf of Casual Mode (like half of which were Sunwoo), and the other one was me sarcastically copy-pasting another hostile quote. There really isn't much popcorn / drama here.

I copy-pasted what someone said to me and changed like three words. It's snarky but it wasn't mean-spirited.

Asvel's primary function is boss-killer; in FE5 that's a value commodity. I suppose I'm just confused as to where balance fits into this picture. Let's grant your assumption (which I think is reasonable on reflection) and say Luna+ was balanced around no SpotPass grinding. Why does it matter? The game does include SpotPass units to hire and grind, so why not take advantage? Imagine the Asvel gaiden was free DLC a la SpotPass. Should we pretend he doesn't exist when evaluating FE5's difficulty?

I don't get the cue. This is an interesting topic. Reasonable disagreement is expected. Most of this thread has been civil. Some people are being uncivil. It's not the end of the world.

So how about we assume Luna+ grinding gets all of your core units up exactly ten levels? That reduces the difficulty a set amount. As for balance, neither of us know what Luna+ was "balanced around" because, to my knowledge, no designer nor programmer has spoken on the subject.