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Tabby

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Posts posted by Tabby

  1. 1 hour ago, Reality said:

    If you were comfortable with Conquest Lunatic - then the I'd just go with Shadow Dragon and New Mystery, with Thracia and Binding Blade being runners up.

     

    I tend to consider the first 9 games in the series poorly designed, and it's kind of hard to recommend them to someone who enjoys game play. They do make up for it with story and characterization if that can sustain you. (not FE1-2 of course) Despite the fans teasing each other about Sacred Stones being the easiest one of them FE1,FE3,  FE4, and FE9 are actually easier than SS and additionally of the "hard" classic games you only have FE5, FE6 Hard mode,  and FE7 Hard mode, all of which fai to live up to modern "Hard games"  in noticeable ways.

    FE5 - Considered difficult because of traps. Lack of resistance stat. No free money. Fatigue mechanic.

    FE5 is a very interesting game. Personally I played it before FE4 (although only by a week). Gameplaywise, it's not as hard as it's reputation claims it is. Actually some things go unsaid about it - it's willing to throw promoted non-boss enemies at you really early for instance. The famous traps include bizarre enemy reinforcement positions, enemy status staves, enemies stationed in fog, warp tiles (just once), clumps of promoted enemies behind doors,  and finally overlapping ballista (with high Attack and a crit rate). FE5 can be really hard at times, but it's bite doesn't last that long. This is because while it DOES intelligently attempt some hard stuff, other parts of it's design are very stupid. The main thing being that the bulk o the generic non-promoted non-boss enemies in the game have absolute garbage for their stats. This enables you to train units almost freely (it's hard to run out of experience no matter how many units you show favoritism toward) even units that look bad in a vacuum (such as Leaf) can become quite usable due how many levels you can get in a single chapter. Even chapter 2, 3, and 3x literally copy/paste reinforcements of enemies with stats that shouldn't threaten even your weakest teamate (while still giving the same experience as the strong enemies). The fact that the game has too much experience in it actually undermines it's famous fatique mechanic - It's very easy to have a well trained EVEN team and ODD team, allowing you to simply reset your units without having the mechanic come into play at all. This is the only game I ever played where I had MORE fully trained units for endgame than the deployment limit allowed to give you an idea of the sheer volume of practically-free experience this game tosses at you. Finally, some tools were seemingly meant to be enemy only and were accidently given to the player as well. Mostly status staves - It's pretty easy to figure out that at long as you use 1/3 of your sleep staff charges on an ENEMY sleep staff mage, you can endlessly replensih your supply of them for the entire game!. Unlike Fates, Thracia is not prepared for player access to ranged crippling (hence the much higher number of staves you can build up in this game).Lastly, the capture and steal mechanics in this game heavily favor the player - for one, if you have a unit at low health, having an enemy capture them despite being in Kill range is kind more forgiving than what he would do without the mechanic. Additionally, you can manipulate AI with it - no fancy tricks - a completely unarmed player unit will always cause the enemies to capture it (ignoring anything else in range) This allows any miniboss in the game to have it's stats crippled  without spending any resources at all (especailly since it won't attack on enemy phase anymore due to trying to leave the map).  I think it's easier than FE6 HM and FE10 in many ways, but it's a lot more engaging to play through than the former. It is still considerably harder than the other 7 of the first 9 games. 

    FE6 - Considered difficult because of inflating enemy stats on Hard Mode, and player units being of very uneven quality. 

    It's let down by - The game is too afraid to make the generic enemies promoted - up till chapter 20, you will usually fight enemies in formations of either ALL unpromoted enemies or 4ish unprompted enemies led by 1 promoted enemy. Needless to say, this means that the middle of the game enemies are actually limited by their stat caps, and ONLY some of them are actually cabable of retaining their early game menace. Additionally, once you get through the initial crunch to Chapter 9, the game starts showering you with pre-promotes. You don't have to use them, but the game is clearly designed to encourage it and once you do the rest of the game (except for gimmicky gaiden maps) is noticably less intense.  Finally, although the game is hard at times, it is never intelligent. Every chapter is siege. No advanced manevuers or fighting on two fronts is ever required, and really ramming your charather's stats into the enemy charather's stats (with some body blocking I guess) is all you ever get to do. Once over the hump the game just wastes your time.

    FE7 - Considered difficult on Hector Hard mode ONLY. Mostly specific chapters.

    This game has multiple objectives, but enemy stats (especially speed) are much lower than in FE6. In fact, while FE8 is infamous for its mantra of "any unit with 14 speed ccan double 90% of the game) FE7 is basically the same, except the number is raised2 points to 16. To it's credit, it does have a couple of very interesting maps (the multiple seize point map comes to mind) and it does like to annoy you by making NPCs and some units pre-recruitment separated and vulnerable to enemies. However,  should NOT be played on cartridge or virtual console - The game railroads you into a tutorial and then you have to complete the entire normal mode to access hard mode at all. This is bad because normal mode can be beaten in your sleep  if it's not your first game (even if it was) it's essentially no better than sacred stones. It runs into FE6's problem of falling apart completely if you do what the developmers tell you to do (use pre-promotes), although even if you intentionally use bad units/favorites, it isn't really remarkable except for the NPC/gimmick maps, as mentioned.

    My positive recommendation only goes to FE10 FE11, FE12, and actually Birthright. 

    My feelings about gameplay design in Fire Emblem are that the Kaga era games (1-5) intentionally simplified mechanics - which is not a bad thing by itself, but at the time, the development team did not know how to use that to their advantage and ended up also simpliying map design (except for FE5). This is fairly damning considering that far more interesting combat engines (Pool of Radiance and Rebelstar came out before FE1, and later Frost Mission came out for SFAC the same year as FE3  and in advance of the 2 Judgral games) .  The Gameboy Advance games  and Path of Radiance for some reason stuck with the conservative design of the Famicom/SFAC games which led to their problems - even if you play romhacks that fix the stat curve and generous level up system - actual game design is pretty lacking. Meanwhile in the West "grids" were not even required anymore due to better AP systems. I think that Radiant Dawn was the first consistency intelligently designed FE game, although not quite the first hard FE game, as mentioned above. Radiant Dawn succeeds in a similar fashion  to conquest - it complicates the game with mechanics such as Skills. However FE11 and FE12 are notable for being solid without complications (on their higher difficulty modes, they are barbaric on NM, especially FE11).  I think that the two arachnea games are the first and ONLY times in the series (other than individual one-off maps) that the potential of a simplified SRPG system was actually used well, which is why the games are able to focus on enemy placement, available player resources and intentionally getting the player to move the mass of their units.

    Birthright is well known for being contrasted to Conquest, but BR Lunatic is actually harder than FE7 Hector Hard mode, mostly due to maintained the low HP Bases and growths for player units seen elsewhere in Fates. 

    I actually bought the Birthright cartridge, so it has been beaten. :) Same with Revelation as well. Echoes, Awakening, and Warriors fall into that category with Fates. 

    Like I said above, I already own a legit working copy of FE11, and I liked what I saw of it when I tested it. I just wanted to try a more "non-Archenea" type game for the first dip into the older titles. I also just bought a copy of Blazing Sword and Sacred Stones used on amazon, so assuming they both work and are legit, I would probably want to prioritize those. No worries, since I'd like to give every title a fair chance. I'm pretty sure I already am kinda falling in love with Judgral and Tellius. My boy Ike seems to be running much faster on my "Wii" as well, haha.

    Thanks for some good info though!

  2. 11 hours ago, Slumber said:

    FE7. I played it as a wee-lad(Well, I was like, 11-12 when it came out), and I've loved the series ever since.

    Well, as luck would have it I just went on amazon and bought the cartridges for Sacred Stones and FE7. So it looks like we have a winner. Seems that FE7 is the most consistently not-hated on here, too. Hopefully everything is in working order and the real thing when they get here, but since I bought them via prime I won't face too much resistance if there is an issue. ^-^

    I'm still in utter disbelief that all my GBA games, and systems, and even my charger all work so well after all of this time. Maybe that's why I'm so biased to that time of gaming. :P

  3. 35 minutes ago, Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi said:

    It didn't get mentioned because he already found that solution early on. Also, Lissa wants Miriel over any of the cavs (+4 Mag). If she can just get +1 Mag from any of her levels, that puts her Rescue range at 5, allowing her to pull them down from the base of the cliff on turn 1. If she has the great misfortune to not have gained any, she can still Rescue from relative safety at the choke-point, then Fred can body block.

    Well maybe it'll help someone out regardless... >~<

    The good thing about Awakening is there is always more than one way to go about a chapter, even on Lunatic. I'd personally use Miriel with my Robin at that point since my party would be very weak, and my Robin would have been power leveled quite nicely in chapters 1-4 and the prologue. It's what'cha make of it~

  4. Pretty sure no one else has answered this yet, but if you're still struggling with saving Maribelle and Ricken in chapter five, and have gotten Donnel (and the chest with the Rescue stave, which is important for this). You can pair up Maribelle and Ricken, with Maribelle in the front, have them walk down to the edge of the closest cliff and end turn. Then have Lissa be paired up with Sully, Stahl, Fredrick or maybe Sumia. Get Lissa over to where she's in range of the two, which may require having the mount unit on top at first. Rescue, and voila! Safe! Then proceed to faceroll with Chrom and Robin.

    Also, if you haven't gotten Chrom too ranked up with any particular woman (Sumia is easy to do that with), then you can still get him to marry another by getting them at least one rank higher I believe. Just not Olivia, but that's not the end of the world. Though on your first playthough I would argue that Sumia is the best choice for a spouse, unless you're a female avatar and would rather yourself be his bride. There are no real bad choices in the grand scheme of things there.

    Also, I support the notion of getting the suggested DLC 100%. It makes the game that much more immersive. 

  5. 1 hour ago, Slumber said:

    Genealogy of the Holy War sounds like a metal album, so that.

     

    1 hour ago, Ciarre said:

    Genealogy sounds cool as fuck tbh. I think someone said Ashes of Jugdral as a suggestion for a possible remake, and that sounds metal as fuck too

    I also like SoV a lot

     

    8 minutes ago, Chconroy said:

    Probably Genealogy of the Holy War. Sounds cool and important without being too long and makes clear sense in the context of the game.

    If Geneaology of the Holy War is metal af, then Thracia 776 is its weird alt metal cousin who "you haven't heard of" pushes up thick fake hipster glasses and sips starbucks cup

    To me, Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn seem like the perfect game titles to use as a fake summary of the series for overbearing religious parents. I can just see how that would go, since I've told mine all about "One Peace".

    Personally, my favorite title is Awakening. It was the only one that made me wonder why it was called that. When I finally got it, I felt so darn proud of myself. Two years after I bought it. Ha. Ha. Ha...

  6. 3 minutes ago, Zasplach said:

    You are pretty much equipped to play any of the games, leastwise it seems to me, just jump into them basically.  If we're talking about me and the Tellius games aren't available, I would play the Judgral games, Fe4 then Fe5.  But basically I would group them, either play Fe4 then Fe5 or play Fe7 then Fe6 then FE8 or play FE11 then FE12, all the games have their different merits.  Personally I like to group things in terms of eras, ie SNES, GBA, GC/Wii, then back to handheld, but if you don't want to play FE 3, don't, but I find it enjoyable, but it's pretty old.  Judgral games have a different story and different gameplay, but begin to incorporate the weapon triangle and skills, I find them fun, but they aren't for everyone.  The GBA games are basic, but fun and varying in difficulty and story and then the Archanea DS games are basic, especially FE11, I've personally never played FE12,  but they have have new features like reclassing and skipping the AI's turn.

    Yep, pretty much how I view it too. I do have FE3 (and FE 1 and 2 because why not?), but from what I've been shown, that SNES version of FE1 actually left a couple of chapters and characters out. I'm not entirely sure if that's true or not, since no firsthand experience and whatnot. Since FE12 actually doesn't have a FE11 remake on it, is it safe to assume that playing both would mean I get all the content, or did it get those weird choices for cut content like Echoes got in small amounts?

    The GBA games, as you said, are vastly simplified from their predecessors. They were pretty easy to get a grip on. I still take a look at some things from the Judgral duo and feel like the dumbest human alive, particularly when it comes to the second gens' inheritance in FE4. I did see a bit of gameplay of Thracia though, and thankfully it didn't seem too foreign from what I've been doing once I really started playing on higher difficulties on the 3DS titles. I'm my own worst critic though, it's on me if I kick myself for not knowing something and not doing it perfectly. Too used to being "the one who sucks at XYZ" I guess haha. 

  7. 40 minutes ago, Slumber said:

    My replies are bolded.

    As much as you'd prefer saving Tellius for later, they're still the most "modern" Fire Emblems.

    If you can't play Tellius, you're kind of at an impasse.

    The real issue with the Tellius games is that I have no perfect way to play them, both due to cost and a meh computer that give them an FPS rate of "decent, but deserves better". I might be overly concerned with this, but it felt wrong to have everything else never drop below 59 FPS and have Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn never rise above 23 during a high quality cutscene. It fares significantly better outside of those, however, usually averaging 30-60 FPS on a map and perfect on a menu. I also don't have the absurd amount of money to buy either a better PC or a system that could play both, plus the games. Needless to say, still working on it and have seen good progress, so here's hoping!

    You COULD play the Jugdral games, since they're probably closer to having the features that you'd be familiar with from the 3DS games. But they're kind of difficult to play. Genealogy is paced much differently than any other FE, being much more of a game you play for long periods at a time rather than in small chunks, and things move pretty slowly. Thracia is much, much closer to resembling the later games, and is basically a prototype Tellius in a lot of ways, but it's brutal to newcomers, and it has a lot of mechanics that are unique to it that can be tough to get used to on top of the game slapping you in the face constantly. But if you're comfortable with CQ Lunatic/Classic, you might have a decent tolerance to the poison at that stage, since FE5 probably is the closest to what you get out of CQ Lunatic/Classic in a lot of ways. Unfortunately, FE5 ties into FE4's plot, so it's difficult to just start with FE5.

    Since Mother 1, a game known for being dated and long, is one of my personal favorite games to this day, that sort of thing doesn't bother me as much as something wrong on my end (see above).

    Or you COULD play the GBA games(Probably starting with Blazing Blade), which are paced a lot more like later FEs, but simplified things from FE4/5 like crazy, to the point where it might be difficult to get used to.

    GBA is one of my favorite gaming eras in general, graphics and title wise, so again, this would be a really logical start. Possibly more than others, since I've always known about Roy, Hector, Lyn, and Eliwood since the time FE7 came to the US thanks to a friend who I'd draw with. She did a good Hector IIRC. So definitely a little nostalgia bias there.

    I'd recommend the Archanea games only if you're hardcore fan who wants to experience ALL of Fire Emblem, honestly. The original FE1 is a boring, slow, barebones slog, and its remakes aren't much better. FE3 is like playing any FE5-onward FE, but with a TON of features missing. FE12 is a pretty decent modern FE, but since it's a direct sequel to FE1/11 and doesn't include a remake of it like the original FE3... yeah, it's probably something you'll want to get to at the END of your FE journey, rather than something you jump into after playing the most modern stuff.

    I should have been more clear, sorry! I don't intend to go back and play 1 or 3. I was strictly talking about their respective remakes: 11 and 12. I actually own a copy of Shadow Dragon that I've fiddled with and seems to be official and in working order. My FE12 "copy" is in good shape, as well. 

    Sacred Stones, as much as I hate it, might be a decent place to start. It's going to have the weakness of the GBA games, which is the really simplified mechanics, but it's easy, and it's short. It's probably a good place to start to just get a "feel" for what FE was like before Awakening. Like putting your toe in a hot bath to make sure it's not too hot.

    Aye, that's my most "explored" one. I'll admit, aside from the pretty, rich colors of the GBA era, I can see why people would hate it. Especially coming from two of the best games by general opinion, I can see why there was a sort of "crash" after the "high".

    But aside from my responses, what FE game left the biggest impact on you, yourself? In a positive way, I should add. That might help narrow it down more. ^-^

     

  8. I'll start this off with a message to the mods: If this isn't in the right place, apologies! I couldn't really locate a perfect spot, so I figured since this involved most games the "General" section was a safe bet! ^-^

    I have all the games that would probably be a recommendation, so that is already a start. I seem to be having difficulty really starting and committing to a single game though. At first I wanted to play the games chronologically, but since I've been in Archenea (sp?) overload as of late I wanted to play with some new characters. Not that I'm opposed to playing New Mystery if that is the best choice.

    I'm pretty open to any title, and as the topic name says: not even Thracia, Xavier, and some guy named Cyrus who I'm supposed to fear make me err from it. Games that are challenging make me want to stay and see it through a lot more, and coupled with Fire Emblems' permadeath feature that makes me care about the characters a lot more on top of that.

    That being said, if Sacred Stones - which I know from a second hand experience is the most "watered down" in terms of the older games' difficulty - would be a better choice, that's also fine. I'm not perfect, I may wipe or lose a chapter last minute on an easy setting, but I'm always fine with finding a better strategy. Standalone titles being axed first is also a fine notion. 

    I'd prefer to save the Tellius games for a bit later, as my "Wii" needs to be gotten up to a more passable speed before I can enjoyably play those two.

    Basically, I can't choose! They all seem like fun, interesting titles to me. Like seriously, I'm so glad I picked up Birthright and Awakening, which led to Echoes, then Warriors, and now all of these wonderful gems. It's nice to have that "in love" type of enthusiasm for a whole series again. ^-^

    So yeah, any suggestions or opinions on why "X game is the best" are welcome. I want to hear 'em all.

    Danke!

     

  9. Just now, Levant Mir Celestia said:

    I wouldn't even say Inigo benefits that much... All he gets is Rightful King, which is pretty bleh.

    I always marry Chrom to either Sumia or Maribelle.

    Rightful King is eww and should be swapped for something else immediately. Inigo can proc Luna at a near 100% rate without limit breaker, or at least that's what it felt like when I used him. But his stats are good, though I'd say for the most optimal setup Lucina would want to be a dark flier which then Sumia would be amazing.

    Sumia is a good choice but Brady gets really hurt by Chrom. Though I do like Maribelle. Her and Lon'qu is really adorable, in terms of good conversations. Plus I like the idea of Brady being his son, it sort of fits in a way. 

    I know skills are good but stats are something I try to take into account too. Then again, not everybody is preparing for apotheosis~

  10. Just now, Levant Mir Celestia said:

    The way I see it, with how much of a pain in the butt it is to marry Chrom to Olivia, I'd expect something amazing for the trouble, but the "reward" is anything but worth the hassle.

    Sadly the only real benefit from that marriage is an amazing Inigo stat wise. Everything else leaves things to be desired and I am aware. Chrom, Olivia, and Lucina all get a bit screwed over in the process. Aside from swordfaire, and that's only if you want her to be a great lord.

    Technically speaking, the best mother for Lucina is Cordelia and Severa would be amazing too. Too bad that'll never happen. 

    So what pairing do you like? I've done a lot of them myself but I keep coming back to Olivia due to that super fun challenge. Who would you use personally?

  11. 1 minute ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

    Luck + 4 being a unique skill doesn't mean it'll be useful on Lucina, who tends to have good luck anyway (even with a Luck flaw avatar as her mother, she still has a 65% luck growth). So that means you're gimping Lucina for nothing, as far as I'm concerned.

    I mean, that's just my play style. I don't know what difficulty OP is playing on, nor do I know if he is able to reliably grind (DLC) or if he is doing some form of challenge. 

    Since marrying those two is a bit challenging in chapter 11 it makes it more fun for me that way, though I would really like to know what OP is capable of at this point in his game. Sorry for my dumb advice. 

  12. I know this sounds crazy but hear me out: Olivia. 

    Not because of galeforce as that is unreasonable without dlc. You can grind that on her for Inigo in the later parts of the game. But Lucina can get Luck + 4 from her which is a unique skill to the dancer that may really be nifty to have on Lucy. It's just a suggestion. 

    If not, go for Sumia. Cynthia benefits a lot from Chrom due to Luna and Aether access and Lucina will still get galeforce.

    But if you go the Olivia route, note that Lucina can get galeforce on her own with relative ease. Plus swordfaire. But again this is my suggestion. You may be in too deep with supports with others to marry him to Olivia and I'm sorry if this is irrelevant.

  13. 7 hours ago, joshcja said:

    You're at Ch4 so both games are pretty much curbstomp city now tbh.

    For a FE experience similar to CQ go try out the translation of FE12.

    After beating the first paralogue in Awakening with relative ease, I see what you mean. >~<

    4 hours ago, Bandido Banderas said:

    Until you get Takumi, it's really difficult. After that, it's mostly more tedious than anything, though the difficulty does pick up in the last few chapters.

    Probably doesn't help that I went through all the trouble to get the Fell Brand and all of the Endless Waves DLC items like point blank. >~<; 

    I think my best bet is to see what happens in Awakening for now. Chapter 7 of Revelation didn't look too terrible either.

  14. 5 hours ago, Thor Odinson said:

    Having done both on Lunatic I want to say Rev is a bit harder early, as in your units don't do as much damage, but it never really gets a difficulty spike like BR at least tries to do. It's more gimmicky than anything later on and just tediously long, but nothing actually hard in terms of having to strategize. Nothing really reminiscent of Conquest's maps or even BR 23.

    First: Nice Jotaro siggy~

    And that's a real shame. Do you think it would be worth it to play Lunatic Awakening first if I want to continue with more challenging runs? I have both early Awakening and Revelation (chapters 1-4 for Awakening and 6 for Revelation) completed and could potentially invest in both. I'm mostly interested in playing the one that won't end up a curb stomp.

  15. Gotta go with my son/husband Inigo. I always keep coming back to him regardless of thinking of a different support. 

    And also Morgan Christ is a little tough to deny. 

    I mothered Lucina so she at least gets an honorable mention, but she did try to kill me that one time. I love her character, just not as my child. But she is easily my favorite runner up. Mostly because I have way too much Fire Emblem merch containing her to say that I dislike her, that's silly.

  16. After beating both Hoshido and Nohr on lunatic (classic with dlc grinding) I decided to move on to the third path. I've been playing the first two blind and know nothing of the games outside the very basics of what to expect. I've heard a lot of people say it's easy. I'm not really sure what to think, as I wouldn't even call Hoshido lunatic easy. I mean, only chapter 25 was evil, but it wasn't exactly like Awakening when once you get Morgan you're playing Park Morgan in enemy territory and let him eat people for five minutes emblem.

    Since I'm a Mac user I'm unable to do the gay hack (seriously I can't figure that out) so I can't marry FeMU to Azura as I wanted, I've decided to simply either not get any child units from the two or severely postpone their marrying. If the things I heard about it not being challenging are true, then I don't mind not being S rank for a bit.

    Also, are there any chapters reminiscent of Conquest? That was definitely a challenge but at the very least the last three chapters are easily exploitable. I actually figured out how to beat the endgame in two turns without taking damage and I'd love to strategize like that again. 

    So basically that. I want to know what you guys thought of Revelation.  Also if anyone knows how to actually do the gay hack that'd be much appreciated. I've done the bulk of the work but am stuck at the actual rom part. Thanks!

  17. Alright. So, for my birthday this year my dad got me a ton of fire emblem junk which included the special edition of the Fates soundtrack and the re release of the Awakening one. I know for a fact that the first 4/7 discs will play on my Mac with no problems. However, the data CD for both is a bit new to me as an importer. Is there some reason it wouldn't be compatible with a region one player? If so, is there software available to aid this? And has anyone successfully ripped these discs and had everything intact? I would like to know, seeing as with Fates' data disk in particular it contains most of the awesome music on that one specific disk. I'm being overly cautious, I know, but I don't like breaking and having to replace such a pricy CD.

    Let me know, thanks!

  18. Hi there! I'm new to this forum and Fire Emblem. I picked up Fates around eight months ago and then Awakening, which ended up being my favorite game literally ever! I got introduced by a friend who since doesn't really play them as often anymore, so I felt I needed an outlet to talk about how awesome these games are. I'm also a collector of things, and Fire Emblem is no exception! I also may or may not be totally in love with Inigo. Mostly because he's a dead ringer for Kaworu Nagisa from Evangelion. And I'll never not giggle about it haha.

    I'm usually pretty reserved about joining new groups but I'm hoping this one is welcoming. I'm definitely looking forward to discussing FE with everybody!

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