vanguard333

How is it a terrible gameplay design? The Black Knight doesn't move at all unless someone's in attack range, and it's fairly straightforward (the first time at least) to deduce where he'll show up. The commander has a conversation with the Black Knight where they talk about the plan being for the Black Knight to wait to emerge until the tide turns against the Daein forces. It's straightforward to deduce from both this and the boss' movement before and after the conversation that the Black Knight will emerge from the only house in the right side of the town that's closed; the house that's just sitting there by itself. That's not bad game design; the game basically told you, "He will jump out of one of these houses after you beat the boss, and we couldn't be less subtle about which house it is without a big neon sign saying he will emerge from that specific house." The second time he shows up, sure, you have no prior indication that he's going to turn up at all, which is a bit bad I'll admit, but this is a mission where the goal is, "arrive at a specific tile near the top-left of the map in 15 turns when your units start near the bottom right with a bridge to their left and a bridge ahead of them, and you want to get there quickly because one of the green units guarding that spot is recruitable if he survives this chapter", so him showing up at the bottom-right corner is not a terrible gameplay decision, as the game has been telling you since before the mission begins to get your units out of the bottom-right part of the map as quickly as possible, and the time limit to get them all out of that part of the map before he shows up is rather generous: turn 5 on easy and hard mode and turn 6 on normal mode. Okay; what is all this about Path of Radiance being slow? Are you guys talking about the text speed or something? I've played the game many, many times and, while I wish it had a save system instead of a suspend system, I cannot think a way it was "slow".

Funny enough, I just realized; I had already sort-of considered the idea of the unit being incentivized to be alone when I was making it, and changed it from my original idea of, "Hit and avoid +5 for every enemy unit targeting this unit" to, "hit and avoid +5 for every enemy unit for which this unit is within attacking range" in an attempt to fix it. Maybe that could work, but I feel like that might go too far away; dis-incentivizing the unit doing anything alone. Besides, there's already incentive for them to work in a group in the form of linked attacks and attack bonuses from the enemy unit being within the attacking range of allies. Thinking back on the ability as it is right now, I don't think it would encourage the vanguard acting alone; if anything, I think it instead would encourage that they go in first, and then their allies cover them, sort-of like how Ike often behaves in the Tellius games.

1. I see. Makes sense. 2. Same as (1). 3. That could work. It would incentivize summoning. 4. Thanks for the input. I did say I was taking inspiration from a blend of the two, and even then, all I really took from the lord outfit was the long coat. I took more from the vanguard outfit. Regarding the mastered ability, I was trying to make a unique ability that would make the vanguard unit benefit from being in the thick of the fight; make them specialize in being the first one out there, surrounded by enemy units and all that stuff since, well, it is in the name Vanguard. I didn't realize that it would promote the unit being alone rather than in a group; perhaps there's a way to rework it so the unit gets stronger from being in the thick of the fight without it mattering if they're alone or have allies nearby. Perhaps instead they're stronger for every enemy unit for which they're within attacking range?

I suppose, although as a history enthusiast, I kind-of wince at the sight of a knight fully clad in thick plate armour and carrying a shield, since full plate armour meant that knights didn't need to carry shields, and a lot of them (in fact, most of them really) started using two-handed weaponry as a result. Perhaps armoured units could be the ones who get that "two-handed" class skill I mentioned earlier, and a "double defense boost from shields" could go to something like halberdier/sentinel if it ever returns. I could see anti-shield weapons: One theory for the Roman pilum's function was that it would get stuck in shields as well as penetrate far enough to likely hurt the person holding the shield. Of course, this weapon wasn't seen on the medieval battlefield (but neither were sharpened gauntlets). Though rarely seen on the medieval battlefield, one advantage of a flail is that the head can swing around and hit behind the shield. The Dacian Falx was a two-handed forward-curved sword that gave the Romans a lot of trouble because its forward curve meant it could go around the Roman scutum and hit the person behind it. Though again, this was an ancient weapon.

Wait; what?! There are probably a dozen different builds I could think of for Petra, and Fortress Knight honestly was not one of them. Fine; 99% of the time, that class skill is a bit useless. My point was that I think one way to expand upon shields in the future would be to have different skills and abilities that factor in whether or not a second item is equipped and stuff like that, rather than just general weight reduction.

I suppose, although that weight -5 is rather made useless on a Fortress Knight, who has -10% speed growth, That's one reason I suggested personal skills and abilities that specifically involve the weight of secondary items like shields rather than just overall weight.

Path of Radiance: 9.5/10 Basically what I was going to say, only swap out, "one of my favourites" with "my favourite" and I was probably going to say something far less concise. Regarding the gameplay, I will say that one thing that keeps me coming back is the variety and level design: the maps are almost all very well made and each provide an interesting challenge (not difficult challenges, but interesting ones) and there's variety in the objectives: one chapter, we're rescuing prisoners, and in another, we're stuck on a ship while it's attacked by ravens. It's also the FE game that most makes me feel like the characters are actually involved in a war. Radiant Dawn: 7.5/10 It does build upon Path of Radiance in both story and gameplay, but there's also a fair bit that brings it down. It's less focused than Path of Radiance and the story, while bringing a good conclusion to the Tellius saga, is not without issues. Plus, non-royal laguz in this game are almost useless. Shadow Dragon: 7/10 I appreciate this game as something of a throwback; everything's kept very retro while still having some features that make it easier to get into. The plot is barebones, but that's how it was in the original, and while in hindsight I personally would've preferred a remake that brought everything up to date, I'm glad that they had one consistent idea on what they wanted this remake to do and stuck with it; there's almost nothing worse for a remake than a team that doesn't know what they want to do with it... Awakening: 5.5/10 It's competently made (characters' lack of feet aside), and it's good as a sort-of, "Fire Emblem Greatest Hits", which is exactly what they were setting out to do since it could've easily been the last FE game. But, on its own, everything's just so... generic. It really does feel like it was made with a checklist. Not only that, but the map design takes a serious hit compared to the FE games I started with. Fates: 4/10 I purchased all three versions at once via the special edition so I'm going to review all three at once. I criticized Radiant Dawn for being less focused compared to Path of Radiance, but this game may be the epitome of unfocused in an FE game. Every gameplay element and plot device is just thrown in haphazardly, there's no consideration for worldbuilding, almost every chapter is either boring or tedious with only a few good exceptions (and no; the exceptions are not mainly in Conquest as that game confuses tedious difficulty with engaging challenge, though not to the same extent as Revelation), the characters aren't well thought-through. Nothing connects cohesively; any good aspect of the game is only good on its own in a vacuum. It feels like a game made to test the waters and see what fans wanted, and that's because it probably was. Well, given how quite a few things in Three Houses seem like a response to criticism of Fates, looks like IS heard the feedback for Fates loud and clear. Echoes: Shadows of Valentia: 3/10 Really? Worse than Fates? He must be mad! Hear me out: remember what I said about how at least it was clear what Shadow Dragon wanted to be? Shadows of Valentia was all over the place. Every gameplay feature or story element feels compromised and ill-considered, as if they couldn't figure out if they wanted this game to update and overhaul Gaiden or keep things similar and be a throwback like Shadow Dragon. As a result, the game has the worst of both: the story is all over the place with it being easy to tell what's new and what's old, but with all of it being bad, the characters are just as all over the place, as is the gameplay. Again, anything good about the game is only good in a vacuum; the whole is far worse than the sum of its parts. @JAZ_2002 I would've preferred something that was just Gaiden with better art, as at least that would've been a consistent experience. Three Houses: 7/10 This is potentially subject to change, as I've only played through Crimson Flower and Verdant Wind so far. One thing I will just say right away is that it is not unfocused; the stuff that the game does well, it does very well. The student characters have plenty of depth to them, experiencing teaching them is engaging, making it a real gut-punch to see them caught up in war. There is a lot more worldbuilding and history in Three Houses and most of it is relevant to the plot or the gameplay. However, there's then a lot that isn't well-done. I'm reminded of Radiant Dawn in that there was a lot it was trying to do and that it got a few core things right and well-explored. Three Houses has greater ambition, greater amount of things to like, and greater amount of things to dislike. Map design still isn't back to Tellius levels, though it is at least an improvement over Awakening and Echoes even if a lot of it gets recycled. For a game that's about three sides at war for ideological reasons, everyone is really stupid when it comes to actually confronting each other on their ideologies. TWSITD are an improvement over Garon and Anankos but not by much. I could go on, and on, and on. Overall Verdict: Fire Emblem games have an unfortunately tendency to bite off more than they can chew; trying to do a ton of different things without really exploring them instead of focusing on just a couple of things and focusing heavily on and building on those things. It says something that my favourite game in the series, Path of Radiance, does the latter, and it does the latter very well. I'm not saying FE games shouldn't be ambitious, but to use Three Houses for an example, it tries to be a game of war between three superpowers over ideology when their leaders once went to school together and one of them was taught by you, and a game of empire vs church as both are caught up in an ancient feud with the protagonist being an important piece of this to both sides so-to-speak, when just one of those two things would've easily been enough for a fantastic and ambitious FE game. It's this disconnect between the things that build from Edelgard vs Dimitri vs Claude and the things that build from Edelgard vs TWSITD vs Church of Seiros that bring the game down.

Thanks for the answer. I either never noticed or forgot that Grappler could move normally through forests or sand even though I made Raphael one in my Verdant Wind playthrough. I knew there were other reasons for Caspar's low ratings; I just thought that his authority bane was the main one.

Um, Grappler and War Master, according to this website at least, both have 6 movement. Neither one is more mobile than the other. I'm pretty sure Caspar's low ratings are mainly from him having a bane in authority.

Interesting, though I'm not sure if that description fits what most people think of when they hear "inquisitor". What does it mean by "White Magic Range -1/+1"? Is that a typo? I'm skipping Whisper because I have nothing to say about it other than it sounds good. Interesting. Does the summoner gain exp if a summoned or controlled beast fights an opponent, or do they only gain exp from direct combat? If the latter, that might dis-incentivize summoning for the player. By the way, what did you think of my idea (vanguard)?

Unlikely, since a lot of them were built with the context of, "the protagonist is a teacher at a military academy" in mind; I could see some mechanics like the arena returning, but everything else would have to be either reworked or cut to fit whatever the new context is going to be. I rather doubt that stuff like fishing, advice box, choir practice, etc., will return, and stuff like skill levels and proficiencies, explorable bases, etc., will be reworked. One small thing that I hope for is a subtle reworking of shields. I don't know if this is an unpopular opinion or not, but I think that shields were a good idea that could afford to be expanded on a bit. I think one way to improve shields would be to have either specific characters or specific classes that benefit from either using or not using shields: perhaps certain classes ignore the weight of shields (like maybe if halberdier returns in some form) or maybe certain classes learn a passive skill like: "Two-handed: halves weapon weight as long as nothing else is equipped."

Yeah, the anime's pacing was definitely an issue. I think they simply weren't given enough episodes; had the show been given even so much as 28 episodes instead of 24, I think it would've been a big improvement. But I never read the light novels; I only stumbled upon the anime a year ago (on Netflix, funny enough) and I enjoyed it overall. Yeah; that's more what I meant, that they have experience depicting and animating factions, allegiances, sieges, wide-scale battles and army formations, etc. I'm assuming, since the topic is about adapting a show as a Netflix series (which seem to be able to have as many episodes as they need rather than a fixed number), that the pacing issue that RoGW suffered would be a non-issue since there'd be a far greater degree of control over the number of episodes and stuff like that. Of course, there'd be new challenges in adapting a video game rather than light novel volumes, but I wouldn't have A-1 Pictures do everything. What do you think of the idea of choosing Path of Radiance as the game to adapt, as well as my reasons for choosing it?

I see. Thanks for the input. What do you think was the problem?

I realize now that I phrased my question poorly. I meant the answer I gave to this topic's main question: my idea that I would adapt Path of Radiance as a two-season animates series, that I'd hire A-1 Pictures since they have experience with making a fantasy war anime in the form of Record of Grancrest War, etc. See the first reply I made in this thread for more details (it's the fourth reply overall). I suppose that could work.

I thought they just meant that in terms of the planning stage rather than the programming stage? Anyway, what did you think of my overall point?

I wouldn't say it's unfinished; I mean, I would, but I don't think that encompasses everything about the game. There's a lot that really shows they weren't able to give everything 100% and cut corners for time, but then there are things that seem almost over-focused, if that makes sense. I think the real word to define Three Houses is not "unfinished", but "Overambitious". Think about it: Story-wise, the game tries to present both a complex narrative of war between three superpowers whose leaders once went to the same school but are now bitter enemies due to ideological differences, as well as a narrative of empire vs church, and when you look at the game's overall narrative, I think it's obvious which one the game started off as (the second one) rather than both being considered as intertwined from the get-go. But, when they got down to making it, the route they built first got the most attention (Blue Lions). Regarding Byleth, all the aspects of the game where you're the teacher who trains these students only to witness them get torn by war are done very well, though perhaps some mechanics could've been tuned more for better replayability; the problem is that, on top of that, the game also has Byleth be the center of a plot about the Nabateans and the church by being the artificial vessel of Sothis on top of the teacher stuff. I think one reason why Jeralt's death is done so poorly is that it's built to tie into that latter plot: Byleth finds the journal, finds out about things regarding his birth, Seteth also finds the journal and angrily demands answers from Rhea (though this subplot goes nowhere), etc., and I also suspect that it was also considered rather late into the game being planned out. I could go on, but I don't want this to be too long. I'll just say that this can also be seen the gameplay, with certain things really thoroughly planned out (the unit customization and such) while others aren't so much (the class balancing). My point is that Three Houses is trying to juggle so many different complex ideas both in its gameplay and in its story when just a few of each would've been enough for an ambitious and great FE game. They bit off more than they could chew. This wouldn't even be the first time that this happened with FE: Path of Radiance had a very refined story and gameplay experience, and then Radiant Dawn is more ambitious and a bit less successful in those areas. Fates was just a mess; trying to make three games in the time they'd normally use to make just one, and treating the games less as games and more as testing the waters to see what fans want: "Throw it all in! If you can think of it, throw it in! Let's see what they want!" And, funny enough, you can see where they tried to avoid repeating the mistakes of Fates: there's a ton of worldbuilding and history, things mainly diverge after the timeskip rather than just five chapters in, they had Koei Tecmo do all the programming so they could focus on the story, world and characters, and the game got delayed twice. But they missed perhaps the biggest thing they could've learned from Fates: don't cram your game with too many ideas if they don't thoroughly or seamlessly intertwine! Take a few good ideas and build your game around those! I honestly don't think Three Houses is bad or even, "not that good"; I would still say it's good, as the things it does well, it does extremely well. The problem is of course that there's also a lot of things it does not-so-well thanks to that overambition. Yeah; the Flame Emperor is pretty pathetic. The worst part is that the Flame Emperor also ends up being redundant: on every non-Crimson Flower route, you fight the Flame Emperor again, with the only differences being a silver axe and an added Crest.

You can definitely find an emulator for it given that there's enough demand for the game; I know this because at least two acquaintances of mine have played the game via an emulated version. However, even if I could tell you where or how to find one, I wouldn't know where or how to find one since I don't know the first thing about emulators. As for whether there'll be a remake anytime soon... maybe, but IS will probably cycle through the games that were Japan-exclusive first, so it probably won't be until quite a fair number of years from now.

The Pyrathi stuff would probably be seen as filler and cut, since all it does is explain where Marth's army temporarily goes after fleeing that harbour, and then then Marth is contacted by the Whitewings at the end, immediately heads back to the mainland now that he has potential allies on the mainland, and Pyrathi is never so much as spoken of again. He could easily be contacted while still on the ship and nothing would be lost from the original tale. Personally, I wouldn't cut it since Ogma was born in Pyrathi and it would be interesting to see him react to the idea of trying to refuge in Pyrathi. He could be the biggest voice against the idea, he could be seen keeping his head down until someone inevitably recognizes him, etc. But again, it would be hard to make an episode about Pyrathi not seem like filler. Perhaps having Marth be morally conflicted about decisions made on the island and having it affect him and how he approaches the war going forward could perhaps work, but one would really have to be careful. By the way, what do you think of my idea for how to adapt an FE game as a Netflix series?

I see. Any suggestions for improving what is completed, such as the special moves for the three characters?

You're welcome. That makes sense. By the way, what did you think of the (admittedly incomplete) moveset I created for Edelgard at the beginning of the thread; the one that uses Edelgard, Dimitri and Claude as something of an FE version of Pokémon Trainer?

Since we're talking about a series, I would have to go with Path of Radiance for several reasons: First and foremost, its story would easily be the most straightforward to adapt; the Archanea games are so barebones that I'd have to add a lot to the script and the later games like Fates and Three Houses are so variable that I'd have to decide what plot and subplots to even go with. With Path of Radiance, it would be a lot easier to adapt: the script is pretty much already there, the characters are fully fleshed-out, the worldbuilding is there without having to read in-game library books, and the plot doesn't have any divergent paths or anything. It also has easily the most refined plot of any of the FE games as well as one of the easiest plots for newcomers to the series to ease into, so its not only the easiest to adapt, but, in my opinion, it's the one that's the most worthwhile to adapt. Finally, Ike is one of the most well-received of all the FE lords, so he's an excellent choice for a 1st FE Netflix Series. As for how I would adapt it, hm... live-action and animation have different pros and cons, and I think the pros of animation outweigh those of live-action in this particular case, so I think I would adapt it in animation. The animation would be 2D and anime-esque like Castlevania if not completely anime. If completely anime, one studio I would definitely want to hire for the project (or at least talk to one of their animation teams) would be A-1 Pictures, since they have experience with adapting something like an FE plot when they made Record of Grancrest War (see spoiler tag below for the show's openings to get a sense of what I'm talking about): I would want to have a good number of episodes. At first, the show would cover two chapters per episode, but after the chapters start to get longer, I would want to slow down and cover a chapter an episode at most. Season 1 would start with an episode adapting the prologue and chapter 1, and it would end on a 2-part episode adapting Chapter 17: Day Breaks. Then season 2 would start with Chapter 18: Crimea Marches, and naturally end with the epilogue. Each season would have its own opening and ending, with the episode where Ike confronts the Black Knight having a special version of season 2's opening that puts more focus on Ike vs the Black Knight. Oh, and to be clear, I'd be adapting the North American localization of the game's script (though I'd add in some scenes that were cut like drunk Shinon) as the NA localization is easily the best version in terms of story and character.

Now that we have the next two Monster Hunter games coming to the switch and Rathalos is already in ultimate as an assist trophy and a boss, I guess having the hunter as one of the remaining DLC fighters would make sense. I mean, the wirebug that's part of Monster Hunter Rise seems almost like it was made for giving the hunter an up special (and a grab, now that I think about it). The question would then be how to incorporate the different weapon types available to the hunter. 15 weapon types, each with a large amount of moveset potential, is a lot.

As far as I'm aware (I practice Historical European Martial Arts, but I'm still a novice and I mainly focus on longsword combat), the unarmed martial arts that existed in Medieval Europe focused on grappling, not throws or kicks. Bladed weapons couldn't pierce plate armour, so one of the ways to defeat someone in full plate armour was to grapple them to the ground, then either capture them alive or open their helmet's visor and plunge a dagger into their face. There were other unarmed European Martial Arts that existed: the Ancient Greeks had Pankration, and a lot of its techniques can be seen in wrestling and boxing today (though quite a few pankration techniques would be illegal in the ring today for safety reasons). There's also a Norse/Scandinavian martial art that dates back as far as the Viking Age and I think it involves throws, but I can't remember its name. I honestly don't think so; there was a lot of backlash to how far overboard Fates went with the avatar and s-supports, and I think how Three Houses handled it was very much a reaction to that negative feedback. I don't see why restricting characters that are already established as a couple would alienate s-support fans.

I could see this one happening. I don't think avatars should be able to romance everyone, and we did get some married characters in Three Houses even if we never saw their spouses.

I really like this one. I like how you incorporated rising star; having it that the move keeps going every time it lands a blow is a very clever way to incorporate the art's gimmick into action combat. Having her grab use Amyr's scythe-mode is also clever (I went with Banshee O as the grab because of the reduced movement; since Edelgard doesn't learn banshee O, your idea makes a lot more sense). Funny; we both had the same idea for her up-special but used different names for it. I like the idea behind how you incorporated crests; I'm just not sure about introducing the element of chance. I suppose she wouldn't be the first character to have it (Mr. Game & Watch's side-special). I like how you made it that there's both the pre-timeskip (student) version of her and the post-timeskip (emperor) version of her. Having the kirby hat be her emperor hairstyle is also a nice touch. I'm not sure about her final smash being the exploding barrel attack. I mean; I like the idea of one of the battalion gambits being the final smash; I'm just not sure if an animation of a barrel in a cart slowing moving towards the opponent before exploding is the one to go for.