Deenward

My ideal class change system would be something between GBA and Tellius. I'd keep promotion items that correspond to various classes, but let characters promote if they got over level 20. This provides a fail-safe for players who aren't able to obtain certain items, but punishes them from gimping their units by keeping them in an inferior base class longer. However, since I believe all future original FEs are gonna use the skill system in some capacity, I'll address how I feel about that. I think Fates and 3H's class change systems work so well because skills/abilities are so important to the meta of those experiences. Finding creative ways to get characters to reach certain benchmarks or pairing them up with certain characters in the case of Fates to create unique builds. This works really well in Fates Conquest, since Hard and Lunatic were thoughtfully balanced around the freedom players have to sculpt their units with the limited tools they have available. Having classes that correspond to a character's personality through "heart seals" was also a nice touch that opened up other possibilities for customization. I agree that basing 3H's class promotions purely on level and weapon ranks makes creating said builds a chore. The catharsis of reaching said benchmarks is still satisfying imao, but the journey is just a slog. Fates made creating certain builds an interesting puzzle that got increasingly satisfying once you understood the game more. So, if skills are an inevitability in new titles, I'd go back to the Fates system and expand on the ideas presented there by adding more heart-seal style class change option and expanding the number of classes overall to make the sandbox bigger.

(double posted by mistake, lol)

Quan on horseback, Gae Bolg at the ready, would be dope as fuuuuuck.

I get the frustration, but I feel Sigurd's strength in-game reinforces how terrifyingly competent his army is in the story. He's also one of the big reasons the maps in-game don't go slower than they already do. Yeah, I agree. It kind of breaks immersion and creates an awkward flow through the map, especially in maps like Chapter 2 where the castles are placed in a way that forces you to backtrack a lot. Making the maps non-linear by allowing more pathways to get to different castles would open up more options for the player as well. That would help solve the tedious repetition Benice is feeling, too.

Yeah, that's true. I'll concede that point. One thing that's definitely changed compared to 2016 is how big of a threat people perceive Trump to be. Before, Trump seemed like a joke of a candidate; a billionaire celebrity basket case with no chance of winning a presidential election. Even after he secured the republican nomination, people (myself included) still felt he didn't have a legitimate shot. Now that we've had the displeasure of seeing him get elected, cultivate and spread a toxic cult of personality, and fan the flames of prejudice and discrimination against minorities through abysmal policy decisions and inflammatory rhetoric, a lot more people are clamoring to vote this November, just to get him out of office. He's regressed the U.S.A in so many ways, and it'll take a long time to change the tides of the destructive waves he created.

I agree that the electoral college is the big reason Trump got elected. However, only around 60% of eligible U.S. citizens voted. The numbers for how many people are voting overall have gone up, but that's just because the U.S. population has been growing year after year. https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-voter-turnout-records-history-obama-clinton-2016-11 My erroneous statement about it being the lowest turn count in 20 years came from a CNN article with data they admitted was then incomplete, because they had yet to tabulate outstanding ballots. For reference: https://www.cnn.com/2016/11/11/politics/popular-vote-turnout-2016/index.html

I wouldn't say it's a meaningless metric. The small sample size makes it impossible to produce a definitive conclusion about how the whole country feels, but a lack of voter enthusiasm greatly contributed to Trump's victory in 2016. Voter turnout was historically low, and a significant portion of that can be drawn to the number of people who disliked Clinton as a candidate. If enthusiasm drops too far, apathy that can lead people to not votes in. Overall enthusiasm to vote in November is extremely high right now, particularly among Democratic voters, but I'm not sure that alone will carry Biden to November. I'll grant we'll have to wait to a few months before an even somewhat accurate picture can be painted of how Biden will stack up to Trump, but I do think data like that is relevant to gauging how Biden is resonating with American people. Even though they didn't come out in droves for Sanders, young people could still be a critical demographic come election-time, and many are more privy to vote if it's a candidate they can get hyped about.

Yeah, Trump's voter base's enthusiasm is hovering around 70 percent. His fans will stick by him through thick and thin. It's scary AF that I actually believe what he said before; even if Trump hit up Times Square and shot people, a significant amount of his base would still bend over backwards to defend him and vote for him in November. If Biden isn't able to rally that kind of fervor around him by November, then we're screwed.

Ah, that makes sense. I agree. Mb for misinterpreting you.

I'll grant SMG stole its thunder. The marketing for RD was pretty bad, too. There's this old NA trailer released at E3 that's just two teens playing the game with zero context and exciting music, and that was literally the trailer. FE marketing has come a long way, lol. Tbf, making your first FE title on a brand new, selling like hotcakes console a game that's hard to understand unless you've played its predecessor on the less popular Gamecube wasn't necessarily the best move. I'm really glad RD exists, but all things considered, it was a hard sell. It'd be interesting to see how people who'd never played Fire Emblem before get a Genealogy remake as their first game and see how they react to it. I know FE 4 was Chaz's first FE and he loved it, but I wouldn't say he represents the average consumer. My little bro, an off-and-on FE fan who's played FE 7, 8, 13, Conquest, and 16, is nearing the end of Gen 2, and he's enjoying it overall, but he's echoed some of the points brought up here, like balancing different magic types, precise gold giving, smoother inventory management, and stuff like that. It was also suggested to me that lovers should be allowed to freely trade weapons between each other as a sign of trust in their relationship, which I think is an intriguing idea.

Ngl, I thought the Democratic Party was totally screwed when Biden was chosen to be the nominee. However, polling taken in the aftermath of George Floyd's murder by CNN and the WSJ shows Biden's lead increasing to double digits over Trump. Biden's also consistently crossing the 50% threshold in head-to-head match-ups, something Clinton was never able to do in the 2016 election. I have a lot of reservations about Biden's character and competency as a leader, but I'll take him over Trump any day, so polling swinging this far in Biden's direction is a promising silver lining rn.

I get where you're coming from, but I'd take an awkward romance that at least has some dialogue build up over a romance happening for no reason except it's a core game-play mechanic It always bugged me in Genealogy how quite a few parings had no dialogue at all, even if they ended up a couple. Obviously, I would prefer if said added supports were well-written, tho. It's hard to go down from the lack of romance a lot of the couples had in FE 4, tho I would love to see a retro-style Fire Emblem game made today, ala Sonic Mania or something of the like. With modern software, you could make some ridiculously clean sprites and animations. It'd also be a lot more cost effective than 3D modeling and animating. Presentation-wise, I'd be fine with the 3d models and environments for combat as long as they had the weightier, grittier feel of Echoes animations. Cut-scene-wise, I"m with you on 3H looking bleh, so I'd just go the Echoes route, where the cut-scenes feature well drawn half/full body pics of the characters with a generous amount of CGs to represent key story moments. I'd like pre-rendered cinematic, but I'd prefer the mocap animation of Awakening and Fates over the anime-esque 12 fps cutscenes of Echoes and 3H. I do think for the most that Genealogy has aged pretty well, but if someone wanted the authentic original experience, they could just play the original. A re-make's target audience isn't just fans of the OG, but the plethora of new FE fans worldwide, many of who know barely anything about FE 4. I agree things shouldn't be changed just for the hell of it, but I'm definitely open to changes to make the moment to moment gameplay flow more smoothly and make things less tedious for the player. Like Yexin said, FE 15 was by and large pretty faithful to Gaiden. They even kept the (imao) barren and boring map designs, and weird eccentricities like Jedah's "you can only damage me after hitting me several times for no damage" thing. The story and artwork received the most of a face-lift, but mechanically, they just added a few extra things instead of changing the core experience. While Fe 15 sold pretty poorly in Japan, it sold fairly well overseas, to the point that Nintendo said it met expectations and was a noteworthy title in their quarterly financial report. This isn't a RD or SD situation where the game just sold poorly all around. I think this indicates that people can be totally on-board for a faithful remake as long as QOL adjustments are made. I do think it'd be a bit of a risk to leave the gameplay completely unchanged, tho.

Point taken. I get why making too many mechanical changes from the OG might take away a little from FE 4's unique identity. Great shield's the worst, lol. I think just making it half damage like pavise does would be an easy and sensible fix for it.

You're good! I didn't even notice the hangriness, lol Tbf, it is a special item that lets Arden potentially do that, but I share the sentiment. Locking pursuit as a skill only a specific few can have through much of the game just makes some units too much better than others imo, and having to buy/sell extremely expensive band just to give others the perk in Gen 1 is kind of annoying and arbitrary. Agreed. The magic triangle doesn't mean much when wind is superior 99% of the time. I think the easiest way to give the heavier magic merit is by giving them a bit more might and lowering the weight. Wind is the lightest but does the least damage, thunder is the in between, and fire does a LOT of damage, but it's a bit heavier. Like a more balanced version of what's going on with swords, axes, and lances in the base game. I like that. It'd be another way to incentive classes that can use multiple weapons to actually opt for the versatility an Ax or a lance provides, instead of spamming swords all the time. I'm brainstorming whether continue/accost should be an automatic trigger based on AS/HP like in FE5, or a proc like it is in base FE 4. I think free trading and a convoy would break the game because of the plurality of OP weapons the game gives you and the lack of strong enemies (they don't even have skills for the most part). FE 4 is balanced around having to manage your funds and resources between your characters. My brother came up with a potentially good compromise that would involve allowing you to trade between characters on or off the battlefield, but you still have to buy and sell them to other units. I'd use the higher prices the pawnbroker uses in FE 4. That way, you get rid of the tedium of having to go through a third party, while still making inventory management a core part of the experience that helps immerse you into the blue-blood-dominated land of Jugdral. Interesting... If they went that route, I'd definitely make the enemies have less HP. While FE 4 enemies (especially generics) have pretty bad combat, they tend to have lots of HP, so making pursuit a random chance proc as is would make fighting swarms of enemies more monotonous. If that change was implemented, I'd reduce characters HP a little bit all around to compensate.

I'm a really big fan of the Pursuit idea. Units with it are leagues above their peers, even if both are mounted, so the skill just making the margin smaller balance that out a bit. This one might be controversial, but I'd reduce the weapon weight of lances and axes. I don't like that swords are the worst weapon type of the triangle in games like FE7, FE8, FE 9/10, but FE4/5 go too far in the opposite direction, imao. Combining the reduced weight with the pursuit changes mentioned earlier would give especially axes more merit. I could see the case being made for changing the weight/AS formula to account for constitution as well. I agree the big maps are daunting and time-consuming, but the game is structured around them, so I don't think it'd be worth the extra work to try and split them into smaller maps based around individual castles or something like that. I'm pretty sure said castles are supposed to represent "checkpoints", points where you can cleanly take a break (it helps that they're punctuated by cut scenes), but I think a lot of players don't like leaving a map uncompleted. They'd rather finish at least one chapter in a sitting, especially compared to older Fire Emblems. However, I do think QOL like skipping animations and what not would significantly decrease the time the maps take to complete.

Amen. I think incorporating rescue dropping from other FEs would do a lot to keeping 'em relevant even as the maps get bigger.

Self-explanatory. Imao, I'd want all the modern QOL improvements from the DS/3DS/Switch Emblems (sans Turnwheel/Divine Pulse), like being able to skip enemy phase and animations, aggro lines from 3H, and stuff like that. I'd replace the love points system with C-S support conversations that can be activated once per chapter. That way, each potential relationship can be fleshed out while also remaining relevant to what's going on in the story at the time. It also makes the romance mechanic more recognizable to modern players and less archaic. I'd keep the context-based talk conversations, but just add supports on top of it. I'd keep the other gameplay mechanics (once a turn save states, inventory management, arena, etc) the same, since I think they've aged fairly well, but I'd smooth out the gold giving system so you could specify how much gold your thief or lover wants to give to another person. That always felt like an arbitrary programming restriction in FE 4 anyways. You could also keep the flexible hair color thing from Fates and Awakening to make each potential child a little more unique. Thoughts?

Glad I'm getting representation in a Pokemon game

Yeah, taking all this and the rest of the responses in mind, I'm definitely going to preserve his blindness when it comes to gameplay mechanics tied to the story as much as I can. Realizing how different mechanics work as you play the game and how various features support each other is part of the fun. If he tells me straight up that he'd enjoy it more if he knew how various non-story based game-play mechanics work, I don't think there's any harm in telling him that. The game originally came with an instruction manual that elucidated such details, anyways. Worst case scenario, he restarts, and gets to enjoy making more optimal choices in his second play-through.

I feel like Byleth's emotionless demeanor throughout Part 1 really bites them in the foot as a protagonist. Characters in supports and in the story have to tell us over and over that Byleth is this charismatic figure who can rally people to a greater cause, but they barely say three sentences during most cut scenes and these consist of either Captain Obvious questions or banal words of encouragement anyone could say. Byleth's lack of emotions doesn't contribute to the narrative in a very meaningful way, especially in part 2, and I can't buy into the character arc of them coming more into their role as a Professor when characters constantly have to summarize said arc. I don't understand why IntSys and Koei Tecmo didn't pull an Atlus here and give Byleth's dialogue choices flavor and personality based on the player's preference. That would make selecting their dialogue in cut scenes a lot more fun. Plus, it doesn't have to change plot points like the secret of Byleth's origins and the whole Sothis thing, either. Shouldn't Sothis inhabiting them be the catalyst for Byleth having a wider emotional range? I believe that was a big missed opportunity. Overall, I don't find Byleth as infuriating as Corrin or Kris, but their awkward insertion into pivotal emotional moments takes me out of more scenes then it does immerse me in them. I'm with Hawkwing in that Byleth being stuck in to one of two static designs makes it hard to feel like it is "your" story as the US marketing emphasized over and over. I was relieved to hear the 3H director say in an interview that they're totally up for doing another traditional FE protagonist again, because I believe an avatar transparently meant for the player to project themselves on to erodes the foundation of the game's story.

That's true. He's the kind of guy who might enjoy going through stuff again with the hindsight he'd gained from the first run. He recently restarted a Blue Lions run around Chapter 10 because he didn't like how his students were shaping up, so there's precedent for him doing that.

I'm with X-Naut: Jeigan has high mov and access to several types of forged effective weaponry, so even if you're 100% set on offing one of 'em, I'd keep him as long as possible. Is your army everyone you have available, or do you still have some benchwarmers? If those 12 people are all you have right now, I don't think you should have issues with the deployment limit.

Thanks for the input so far. As far as romance specifically goes, he's a bit of a shipping guru, so he's thankfully kinda pieced together how pairing characters together works and what not. I'm really curious to see what kind of combinations he comes up with, lol. I'm with a lot of people in that I value a totally blind experience with any piece of content. At most, I'll selectively guide him to certain events or scenes in vague, mysterious ways. Thing is, my bro suffer from FOMO a lot and a meaty experience like FE 4 is probably something he'd want to get the most out of. He's the kind of guy who'll reset chapters or runs if he gets too many bad level-ups, or he feels he's not building his units optimally. It might enrich his experience specifically to get to experience some hidden events, especially since characterization for some people is kind of thin in Genealogy. On the flip-side, what he doesn't know on a blind first playthrough can't hurt him, right? Too much back-seat gaming on my part could railroad the experience in a way that sucks out the enjoyment for him.

My brother is starting off FE 4 totally blind. He doesn't even know there's a second generation with kids and the like. While the in-game save states ensure you can always beat FE4 without much trouble, should I clue him in to mechanics like inheritance, hidden events, and optimal pairs? Or would telling him about stuff like that give away stuff that happens later?

I've had a very similar issue recently. I'm using version 1.04 of the Lil Manster patch. When the bug first occurred, I hadn't used any of the optional quality of life patches. On Chapter 9, I dismounted Karin on the gate tile to protect it from the swarms of enemies that come from the south. After she had been there for several turns, I tried to move her off the gate, but the game wouldn't let me move her anywhere else. I tried mounting and dismounting, but the problem stayed the same. Like mklm, her inventory screen displays what her movement speed should be, but on subsequent chapters, she still couldn't move. I tried engaging in combat like mklm did, using the arena in my case, but she still won't move. Edit: After engaging in a normal, non-arena round of combat like mklm did, Karin started moving normally again. I'll probably reach out to the Lil Manster patch creator(s) to see what might be causing the issue.