[In which FE game were armor knights at their most useful?]

9 minutes ago, Flere210 said:

Yes, he has significantly less movement compared to an OP semi-hidden unit.

That said, there are quite a few things going for him:

1)higher stats than usual in a way that don't make him overspecialized

2)ability to ignore terrain in a game whit maps that are 100% terrain(this could be replicated whit things like ledges).

3) there is a move increasing ring that can be traded around

4)plains increase defense by 15% and forests by 30%. This both means high defense is more valuable, and that flyers miss an important bonus and are either very frail or are tanky but deal no damage

5) damage is in general higher, because there is no permadeath. In particular, certain bosses oneshot 90% of your party no matter what, wich makes the one guy that can take an hit from everything valuable.

That really reminds me how terrain in Fire Emblem should be an advantage for Armored units, yet instead it is always a disadvantage instead with armored units being unable to cross certain tiles or taking reduced movement, crippling their already low movement down to absurd levels. I can't think of even one time in FE where being an armored unit has provided any terrain advantages and that is bad. The most I can think of is in FE2 all non flying units getting 1 movement in desert chapters meaning all non flying units move at the same pace as armored units. But that still isn't an advantage.

Also the movement ring really should not been removed from Echoes: Shadows of Valentia.

Finally if Berwick Saga still interests you, the only thing Marcel not being an armored unit effects, is his terrain.

[Alastor plays and ranks the whole series! Mission Complete! ...For now.]

Niime is pretty cool, I wish old lady druid could've been a thing.

[In which FE game were armor knights at their most useful?]

I just realized I forgot to cover Hector for some reason. He is another extremely good armored unit, though starting out with normal infantry movement is a major point in his favor.

The movement stat in Fire Emblem is so integral that the series really needs to try to balance armored units to even out this major weakness. Armored units really need a canto of some sort. I've seen provoke, adjacent buffs, defensive skills and such suggested as their canto. And as mentioned before, there needs to be a moment taken from Berwick Saga and Heroes of giving armored units some sort of way to increase their movement even if temporarily.

11 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

FE4 - embarrassingly bad. The only good thing about armors is Arden being needed to get the pursuit ring...

I just remembered that Hannibal is very good at guarding the player's castle in his recruitment chapter. Too bad that is the only moment in all of FE4 where defending the player's castle is at all used..

11 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

FE11 - You can break most of this game with General Wolf/Sedgar, but other than that they are terrible. Being situationally game breakingly good is still probably the high point for armors.

They aren't terrible, its just the default armored units outside of Dolph who comes in late, haven't had their growths updated to suit their class.

11 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

 I seem to remember a few levels of General on Chris (or possibly others) to shore up their Defense being a great idea, but it isn't a long term class as you want to class change out of it for the speed needed to deal with late-game threats, but it still has some short term use.

To be fair, early to mid game is arguably the most difficult part of any Fire Emblem game so being good in that portion is nothing to sneeze at. Outside of that, you are correct that isn't a long term. Still you're never going to get high defense as a Paladin or DracoKnight without RNG Abusing unless you level as an armored class.

11 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

I seem to remember them being alright, but on the higher difficulties you really need to reach game breaking status, so if we grade them on a curve they come out OKish at best.

Naw, they stink there too and they look like crap.

11 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

I seem to remember them being alright, but on the higher difficulties you really need to reach game breaking status, so if we grade them on a curve they come out OKish at best.

They're actually significantly worse then the original NES game.

11 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Much like FE12 they are a good thing to pass for their bases (jumping up to 12 defense at level 10 for only a little effort is nice on a lot of otherwise squishy units) and the weight -3 skill, but it isn't what you want long term.

Unlike FE11 and FE12, they aren't a good class to level in.

On 12/18/2019 at 5:35 AM, Flere210 said:

Guntz in shining force.

I forgot to ask, does Guntz have low movement and what makes him good?

[In which FE game were armor knights at their most useful?]

To answer the question raised in the title, FE11 and FE12 are the best they've been in a mainline title, being the preferred class for an Avatar in the latter. However they are mainly a utility class rather then something you want to be in 24/7. There's also Fates, they're high tier in multiplayer at the very least from what I remember.

On 12/18/2019 at 5:35 AM, Flere210 said:

• Lorenz and Sheena are both rather bad, even if Lorenz when Warped can almost solo Michalis's chapter with Gradvius and the Star and Light -spheres.

Lorenz is actually quite good unlike the other FE1/FE3 armored units, his base stats are strong enough to kill Medeus with the Gradivus, in 0% runs he is the MVP. He is around mid tier.

On 12/18/2019 at 5:35 AM, Flere210 said:

In Thracia armors are almost usefull because if the game did not have 3927927492917538 armorslayers(whose purpose is to be stealed by the player) they would be good at least in indoor maps.

That isn't entirely correct, whilst Dalshin is only useful for the prison escape, Xavier is considered a good unit on tier lists due to the power of his weapon ranks, skills and sheer bulk. For reference, he is the only unit able to use the Hero bow at base and his base stats allow him to ORKO Elf, the most dangerous Dark Warlord/Deadlord.

The hammer isn't that a big of a deal for Xavier as effective damage is lowered in Thracia . 

On 12/18/2019 at 5:35 AM, Flere210 said:

• Billford and Zachariah though are stuck being Generals, which does them little good, although Zachariah has solid bases.

Zachariah has monstrously high HP and good stats, so he has his uses similar to Lorenz without the Gradivus.

Supposedly Billford is very helpful in 0% growth runs thanks to a strategy against the boss, Barabossa. Otherwise he's mainly there for the meme of a 12 movement armor.

On 12/18/2019 at 6:58 AM, Dark Holy Elf said:

FE11-12: I seem to recall some maps might occasionally give some use to class-changing into one since class-changing was so easy, for all that these games had reasonably big open maps so you wouldn't want to stay in one often.

That is correct. Many maps encourage tanking, Generals have massive base stats and incredible class growths which also work with few characters having personal growths with very high speed and low defense.

On 12/18/2019 at 5:35 AM, Flere210 said:

And though I'm waiting on Berwick Saga's translation to be finished, I'm aware Derrick the lone true Armor Knight is considered the game's joke unit. Although Daoud and Marcel, who seem Armor-ish, don't fare so badly I think, more so Daoud.

Marcel is an armor in all but name, even having armored movement and animating one. I've heard Marcel isn't among the top units, but he's workable, especially if you capture enemy armored units to take their large shields. He also gets a powerful personal weapon.  Most interestingly Marcel's movement of 3, the same for armored units, automatically becomes 4 after he reaches a certain level.

This could be a very good idea to implement in FE in my opinion.

I've also heard many good things about the armored units in Vestaria and its Gaiden.

[How did the infamous "McCartney" get his name?]

@Acacia Sgt beat me to it.

5 hours ago, Topaz Light said:

Yeah, I remember seeing that video actually! I suppose I was wondering if any knowledge of where the "McCartney" name came from starting from even further back exists, but I understand it may just not be known.

The impression I get, and this is just conjecture, is that he was made a Bard in that video because Nils' Bard class was known to exist unused in FE8 by that point, and the person felt that combining a mysterious enemy character with an unused class would be extra cool, or something along those lines. I can't be sure what was going on in their head, though, of course.

I believe there were jokes about recruiting a bard named McCartney even before the video, with the creator of that video combining it with the bandit with Thunder Affinity. I could be slightly off though?

A LPer also suggested Clarence for Random Bandit with Thunder Affinity, but it seems Mccartney stuck.

[Finished FE1 for the first time]

Nice team. 

1 hour ago, Gregster101 said:

Yeah that's pretty much what I did with Caeda, and most of my units in general. Stat boosters in this game are just disgustingly good

What star boosters did you use besides the boots and that power ring? I always give Barst or another Devil weapon wielder, the luck boost.

[Describe your "perfect" Fire Emblem game.]

3 hours ago, Erick said:

I can see why some people like the gameplay of Fire Emblem Fates, especially the one seen in Conquest. In fact, even I enjoy it. I actually would not mind the pair-up system of Fire Emblem Fates even though I do not believe it is ideal. I should have mentioned that instead of only rejecting Awakening's. I can totally see your point, but I believe combat arts, supports, and a small number of skills are already enough for the game to work. I believe most skills are not reliable enough to actually use them in strategies, such as skills like Aegis and Pavise. However, I do not mind reliable ones. Therefore, my perfect Fire Emblem game would not have them. I simply do not see myself coming up with strategies that rely on these skills working. Meanwhile, I have complete control over combat arts and supports as long as I execute them correctly.

Generals need all the help they can get and Pavise is definitely better then no Pavise, especially if its the not the Awakening version of Pavise.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

1 minute ago, Flere210 said:

Then the informations i checked where incorrect, i'll control again later.

Edit: another unpopular opinion, Tear ring saga is not a fire emblem game, otherwise the last story is a FF game and many other oddities.

Was the last story originally a Final Fantasy game and done by the creator of the franchise? I'm legitimately curious?

[How would you like form changers to be implemented?]

2 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

Well, as I said, I think context is key: what sort of mechanics already in FE 8 would be most relevant? For example, the Laguz being split into three main tribes (beasts, birds, dragons) reflects the anima magic being similarly divided in three: fire, wind, and thunder, with each Laguz tribe being weak to one of the three. This gives clear weaknesses and trade-offs. 

I haven't actually played the GBA FE games; my first FE game was Path of Radiance. 

You know they should've kept the fire, thunder, weaknesses but expand and refine them.

1. Fire hurts beasts including horses/cavalry units.
2. Thunder hurts dragons including wyverns, but they are still weak to bows.
3. Wind hurts birds and pegasus riding classes.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

13 minutes ago, Flere210 said:

 In the only games where they coexist  RD and Fates, they have the exact same def cap(Ike has inflated cap in general tho). If such a difference exist, it is not supposed to be huge.

That isn't correct.

First of all, RD has no mercenaries, unless you mean Vanguard which has a a minus 3 defense cap and and minus 4 base defense compared to Sentinel.

And if you're counting Vanguard, then Path of Radiance's Hero class should be mentioned as having 4 less defense cap then Halberdier.

In TearRing Soldier, Spear Soldier also has higher defense, HP and attack then mercenary.

In Fates, Spear Fighter has higher defense then mercenary as well.

So if anything, Mercenary is consistently less defensive then Soldier.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

1 minute ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Sorry to get a bit pedantic, but both Xavier and promoted Dalshin are able to use Lances during indoor chapters, it just takes a lot of effort to get those two, and work their weapon ranks up from E.

Exactly and weapon ranks increase at a snail's pace.

I like lances, so its a little annoying for me. There should've been a soldier or at the very least, Lance Knights should've kept lances upon dismount.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

4 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Pirate/Brigand runs into the problem of its water/mountain-walk being junk for the player as well. It's more an enemy-only class regarding these abilities because they're so sluggish, a mere two-three tiles. They need to be stronger for the player, without overloading the map design in yucky terrain that makes using normal units a total chore.

I would disagree on that particular point; water walking is extremely helpful in Shadow Dragon, Blazing Blade, Sacred Stones and Berwick Saga. Mountain walking could be nice too.

I think the only time it wasn't useful was Path of Radiance and only due to Largo coming when all those maps had stopped appearing.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

6 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Fascinating... and I agree about the pirate thing. Honestly, having fighters and pirates is a similar redundancy thing to having myrmidons and mercenaries, if you think about it. We have two axe infantry, two sword infantry, and no lance infantry unless you count knights.

I'm ok with Fighter and Pirates/Brigand, though pirate and Brigand existing separately  necessary. The problem is that Pirate/Brigand is almost always way better then Fighter. The thing is supposed to be that Pirate/Brigand has higher speed in exchange for lower skill then fighter which is fine in theory but Pirate/Brigand always has way more speed then Fighter has skill. Like in the DS games, Pirate has 15% skill growth and 30% speed growth which is higher then Fighter's 10% speed growth and 20% skill growth.

Similarly critical bonus is way better then bows.

I liked the idea in Berwick Saga that pirates can focus on thievery.

And we need lance infantry most the time.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

1 minute ago, Alastor15243 said:

Honestly, I miss the "axe mercenaries" of FE5. They looked really cool, and I don't like the typecasting of axe users as huge and bulky. They nearly always are. More slim/agile or at least balanced axe fighters would be appreciated.

It also helps them stand out more for Brigands/Pirates. 

Interestingly the TearRing Saga series never stopped having that depiction of Fighters. The Fighter of Berwick Saga is even the Navarre archetype.

[Should the next Playable Shapeshifters use Monster Mechanics?]

Dragons could work like that. Their size is always supposed to be huge, regardless of what the graphics portray.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

3 minutes ago, Flere210 said:

Imo soldier.make sense only if mercenary is somehow absent. Otherwise you have two classes whit the same movement type and stat's spread. I am already kinda annoyed that we have both fighter and pirate.

Weapon type imo is not a niche, otherwise we can as well bring back the pointless cavalry classes of Jugdral.

Actually an unpopular opinion of mine is that Mercenary and Myrmidon are redundant to have together. Especially when branching promotions exist! 

Soldiers are significantly more defensive then Mercenaries.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

1 hour ago, Ingen said:

I really like the Soldier/Halberdier/Sentinel class. Having any class be playable is something I've always liked in a Fire Emblem game. Do keep in mind that PoR was my first FE game. Even before I got to the point I could recruit Nephenee in the game, I had been very curious about having a soldier on my side to see how I'd use him/her. Needless to say, I was pretty excited to use Nephenee when I could finally recruit her. 

Mine too.

Soldier makes sense as a playable class in most games and I believe most FE players love the class from my experience. 

I'm fine with it being absent in some games like Shadow Dragon as its a remake with not a lot of classes anyhow, but something like Awakening not having soldier, but having pointless classes like villager, Griffon Rider, Taguel and such was a very foolish decision. And if dismounting exists, you have to have soldiers as well. 

Thracia 776 not having any soldiers hurt a lot as it meant you had no lance users during the indoor chapters, conversely TearRing Saga including Lionel the soldier was so much more awesome.

[What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?]

19 hours ago, Jotari said:

Been a long time since I read Aversa's supports from buy what I remember she calls Robin a big brother in a more trolling insincere fashion to annoy him than a genuine term of endearment. The point is that they're not really siblings and it bothers Robin.

That is definitely true in the english version, Robin doesn't buy it.

The Japanese version put so little thought into Aversa, there wasn't even any kind of explanation of why Validar kidnapped her. Her having dark blessing all along with a localization addition.

19 hours ago, Jotari said:

Honestly they should have just gone the Yen Fey route for all of them and made them be from The Future Past (except Walhart, make him a risen who just maintains his mind through sheer badass like it's somewhat implied already). That doesn't have any contradictions with the main game and actually expands on the lore of the games original timeline. Best of both worlds.

That would've been much more preferable.

[Jespoke's FE11 Randomizer]

1 hour ago, jespoke said:

Transformed Earth Dragon was excluded for crashing my emulator but Earthstone PRF access is given out, and Tiki holds an Earthstone and a Divinestone. 
Soldier i removed along with the transformed dragons, but i guess it is actually a fully functional class right?

Ah got it. Those two are the only enemy classes. 

Earthstone works as an item, though the in battle animations are unfinished. With an action replay and a Japanese version of the game, I've used Medeus in the Earth Dragon class in the various maps after having him transform in the final map.

Soldier works perfectly and even has an ally battle palette unlike the other unplayable classes. However while Soldier levels to 30, all it's non HP stat caps are 20.

[How would you like form changers to be implemented?]

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

It is possible to face Yarne as an enemy in his own paralogue, but you're right about no generics. Even Fates, as flawed as its integration of shapeshifters was, had at least one chapter each (in Birthright and Conquest) where you fought them.

You fought invisible beasts in Revelation and the DLC chapters too.

[Jespoke's FE11 Randomizer]

9 hours ago, jespoke said:

Classes

• – Enemy classes
• Inventory
• Bases
• – Enemy bases
• * Growths
• – Enemy growths
• Reclass system*

So Soldier and Earth Dragon are included?

Come to think of it, maybe Soldier's caps could be increased to 25? Though 20 caps could suffice if you play it safe.

[Alastor plays and ranks the whole series! Mission Complete! ...For now.]

14 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Alright, so, we're done with the map. And now we get some backstory on Zephiel. Apparently it's a shock to Roy that he killed his own father. Honestly, if his father wasn't originally intended to be evil... yeah, I think that was a great idea on FE7's part to make Desmond that massive scumbag. Giving Zephiel a personal, visceral reason to see how rotten “humanity” can be really makes his otherwise shallow motivations in this game pretty understandable.

It is curious, in a plothole sense, that Merlinus isn't aware of the rumors that went flying around the country around the same time, rumors that Zephiel died because he faked-

...No, wait, this whole “faked his down death to assassinate his father by leaping out of his own coffin at the funeral” idea... that happens after the timeline of Fire Emblem 7, so if that existed, it had to have been something FE6 already came up with. So yeah, it sounds like Zephiel's father was always intended to be a scumbag.

 

Without any spoilers, Desmond is surprisingly well defined here.

[How would you like form changers to be implemented?]

4 hours ago, Hawkwing said:

4. Have Them Appear As Uncommon But Not Rare Enemies: I liked how Manakete enemies were handled in Shadow Dragon, where they start off as bosses and slowly become more common without ever giving the impression that they're rank-and-file soldiers. I wished that the Fates shapeshifters appeared every now and again as enemies, instead of being present in only one major chapter (they may have been present in some paralogues. I didn't unlock a ton of them when I played through Conquest), and I always thought that having a Taguel Warren level was a huge missed opportunity in Awakening in both gameplay and lore. I haven't played the Tellius games, so I can't comment on how well they handled this, but shapeshifters should appear as enemies, just not as overly common ones.

Laguz enemies appear throughout both Tellius games.

Actually the only Fire Emblem, including TearRing Saga, to have a shifter class and no enemy variant of any sort is Awakening. Yes, even Sacred Stones has Dracozombies who use the same mechanics and a boss who uses the Manakete class.

[How would you like form changers to be implemented?]

Some other good ideas on Laguz in particular

1. Have them gain regular exp at a regular rate.
2. Level to 40 instead of 30.
3. Don't have individual battles make them lose points on their gauge.
4. Allow them to transform at a lower gauge in exchange for less stats similar to the demi band.

43 minutes ago, NinjaMonkey said:

You mean as a glorified chest key?

I see you didn't read up on Archanea's story at all.

[Berwick Saga Translation (Finished, v2.3) - Updated 23 Jan 2021]

On 2/25/2020 at 8:51 AM, Alph said:

Does anyone know of cheat codes and how to use them?

 

Late, but here's one topic.

If you're using an Emulator, it should be an option on the top menu to use AR.