Alef Zero

I think it is OP, bacause other brave arts are tied to a class, that is inferior to it's master class. Swift strikes can be used in any class, so in the base game you use it as a wyvern lord to make one-rounding, fast, extremely mobile and dodgy unit. Besides, once you unlock swift strikes, you are never using any other art - even ruined sky for Sylvain is weaker than this one. It was a joke. I just feel that Emperor with 6 in defense and resistance, access to magic with dark tomefaire is plenty strong already. Don't know about armored lord, but these are stepping stones anyway. Honestly? My main reason is to make use of "Rhea Sword" animation set (the one she uses in crimson flower I presume? I've never seen them), which is cool, but only fits women. What if I changed it's name to Mystic Knight? Nobody would realize. 🙂 I don't understand this question - and what's a unit who trains brawling and bow supposed to do? Nothing, there is no way to fit all possible weapon combinations. Bow/sword is at least consistent than bow knight randomly switching from swords to lances. It being so good is precisely why I don't want to remove it. Lowering it is not possible since... it's icon has +20, it would be silly if it was actually less. Bow range sounds cool, but on maddening, bow knight's attacks at range 4 reach around 50% hit WITH hit+20. You're not hitting with a bow from that much away. And since uncanny blow is exclusive for women, how are you fixing hit rate of some units?

Yes. Do you think they are mutually exclusive? I don't. Of course it's born from my ideas how it should be, but not uploading it for community is just such a waste. Even if a single person used and enjoy it, it would be worth uploading, don't you think? Feedback may have been a poor choice of word, think of it like an invitation to discussion. I changed her prof from lances to sword, since bow knight's req are also changed from lance to sword. It would also let her easily access assassin, which fits her character. Same goes for Bernadetta. How about the reverse - them working when above 50% HP? Although I suppose it would make them too strong. I feel like her amount of boons is balanced by her weak stats, but I really think that 5 boons is too much. Need to think about it a little. It cannot be done, "hit 5 times for 30% dmg" is hardcoded as one effect. It must be balanced via adjusting dmg. crit and accuracy. Amyr is one of the the few relics that did not get a boost, as raging storm is already game-breaking. In fact, I increased it's cost to 5, so that she can can only get 4 additional moves. Giving her emperor could break some things, as these classes are acquired automatically. And given I dislike Edelgard, I don't feel like buffing her too much. Undoable, unfortunately - weapon arts can only have one special effect. Half magic usage seems to be hardcoded for specific classes. If I figure out how to do it, it's a good idea, otherwise it will have to stay as it is. Does it really fit her? She's fanatic to Rhea, I don't think she mentions church itself a single time.

Side note - what do you think about splitting mortal savant into two classes: samurai (male ex) with swordfaire, bowfaire, darting blow (keen intuition on mastery) kunoichi (female ex) swordfaire, stealth, pass, [access to magic] (some mastery, possibly the same?) Their outfits really don't match the same class. Hero could be repurposed into 'mystic knight', instead.

But lance is the only weapon type to not have a brave art right now. Note that with my changes wyvern lord, great knight and dark/holy knight (who also have 8 mov) would have higher. I don't like ST being character-specific as it makes those 3 characters vastly superior to other. According to what I've learned, frozen status reduces mov to 0. I'm still yet to test it. The point is further elasticity - you can get a weaponfaire and keep it while in another class (ex. Felix gets swordfaire and takes it into war master class). Now that I think about it, reducing exp required for S+ rank would be a good idea. Yup, sucky commoners are now in the dust where they belong! Seriously though, it may not be good for balance per se, but like I said, crest absolutely do not show the power story makes them out to be. Aside from Felix's crest, which is very powerful because it's a major crest, most others never stood out to me. Their effects are too rare to matter. Your idea of secondary effects is interesting, but it's not possible with what I have, crests can only have one effect. Dimitri's one is actually hardcoded to do both things (dmg and durability usage up) at once. Then it's not a viable path for Paladins. This isn't a rebalance, it's a flavor change. No, but it now follows the trend of archer/sniper having sword exp, not lance, and lets you easily switch between bow classes and assassin. IMO Lance Crit +10 would be way better. It would synthesize with his Battalion Wrath/Vantage setup, and his innate Lance specialty. If Dimitri wants Swordfaire, he has plenty of other options. What are those options? I can only think of swordmaster/assassin, whose ascetics don't fit Dimitri. Great lords traditionally used swords, lord class in this game uses swords, great lord gives sword exp. It seems obvious to me. Battalion W/V is already busted, and with his current talents (no bane in axes, hidden talent in brawling) you could easily go for war master to maximaze this strategy. I want Dimitri to run around in his glorious armor and I want him to use swords! Please don't ruin my dreams T_T. Oh, it's definitely worth using now: It doesn't need Swordfaire. Dancer is already a really good class, and its combat doesn't matter. The Charm skill would be a cool benefit, if not strictly necessary. If you really want to improve Dancer... maybe Stealth? Just become less likely to get hit. I guess I wanted dancer to be useful for something more than just giving it's turn away. Right now, I don't want any character to be a dancer, since that unit would do nothing anymore. Still, maybe I'm just trying to fix something that's not broken. Stealth would make no sense - dancer are meant to be flashy. I dunno, I think the rates are... fine. Especially when you get the statues and Knowledge Gem online. Maybe reduce the requirements a smidge: say, from 20/60/100/150/200 (vanilla), to 20/50/80/120/150 (proposed). On this, I strongly disagree. I remember that, on my first, virgin run of three houses I didn't manage to master a single class, aside from noble/commoner and I guess Ingrid who stayed in pegasus knight until level 30. Not mastering classes means very little skill selection to customize units. Note that you don't have access to statue bonuses until intermediate classes, and knowledge gem appears even later. Going back to lower classes and griding to get good skills is horrible for me. Especially since I remember how nice it was to play awakening and get skills naturally, just be playing in a class. Unfortunately, impossible to do. It can either be mastered or at zero. Out of those two, I prefer mastered. Also, how would, say Gilbert, who was a knight his entire life not master his classes? Hmm. Actually, this is a pretty good idea, easy to implement as well. It will be done! (Also, he starts with B authority now). ...So it's not a viable option for Hubert or Hapi anymore. Lovely... Hmm, why not? Lack of dark tomefaire? My idea is that no class gets dark tomefaire - these spells are superior to black magic, but they don't get a faire. Also Hubert is an asshole I want dark and holy knight to be hybrid classes. This is what I thought they were when I first played and I really liked that three hopes made them as such. Dark Knight is already better at magic since black magic is better offensively and it has one more mag. But the dark merchant is available very late in the game, you'd have to backtrack and grind dark mage if you want vicious blow. I imagine these classes were supposed to be a reward for beating death knight, but they aren't that good even with my changes, especially since you really aren't beating DK in that first fight without Lysithea (or prior game knowledge). Ah, I forgot it only requires C rank. Let's put it to B rank 🙂 Seeing how she effortlessly broke throgh Bernie's or, I don't think punching things is unfit to Ingrid 🙂. I don't know what bane to give her, but with authority hidden talent (which I definitely want her to have) she now have 5 boons and no banes. It's too much. It actually is possible, but it has to be a solid number (unlike 'halve enemies movement'). Let's leave it at -3 for now (I'm not rising Dimitri's brawling no current run, not tested it yet). She's not, I wasn't paying much attention to the existance of this trend. She's just neutral in it. I changed her boon to sword to ease her access into bow classes (bow knight now requires swords), since I think assassin really fits her. And Cyril keeps his art, everyone hates on him enough. In fact swift strikes removed is the only nerf (as I wrote I dislike them). Side note, Dimitri gets Vengeance now. Deus Vult! As they should, they are very rare. I like Dorothea, but not that much. If anything, it's a deliberate effort to make mages ridiculously good 🙂 Welllll... I use dark flier animations for falcon knight casting, so without dlc, it would probably crash. No workaround for that, unfortunately. Maybe I should create and give dark flyer galeforce. Wouldn't it be fun? 🙂 That's true, maybe darting blow is too much, but it must have a third skill. Any suggestions? Like I said, I have trouble what to make out of Hero. Axefaire would be nice, but no advanced class has two faire, so it'd have to be moved to master class. I intended hero to be an offtank, not as tanky as fortress knight, but faster, defensive tactics would play into it, as it allows to take more hits before losing battalion and I always imagine hero as a champion leading allies on a battlefield. I'll give it some more thought/ But holy knight would get white tomefaire, not black, so mortal savant goes into another niche. Lancefaire makes it worth to take Sylvain into it, otherwise his reason talent is hard to utilize.

Try checking if the save files are still present - they should be somewhere in the dolphin folder in appdata (you should check where exactly either on dolphin home page or maybe on reddit). When you backup the files, try to reinstall dolphin. Check reddit or any other forum to see if it happened before. Unfortunately if the files really are corrupted, there is nothing you can do.

Hello. I'm currently working on a rebalancing patch for the game, thanks to discovery of a easy to use triabolical editor and are looking for feedback. My main goals were: making all classes viable (which generally mean buffing many weak classes as I dislike nerfing. There is an exception to it and you know which. As all buffs apply to enemies as well, this is not a problem) making class system more flexible and modular. I wish for more elastic class paths, like great knight being a possible final class for both paladin and great knight, while also making advanced classes worth using adding a little more lore accuracy to some elements (mostly by strengthening hero relics, their exclusive arts and crests) reducing tedious and grinding Changes to far: Unit talents: Ingrid gets a hidden talent in authority (which fits her and her personal) but weakness in axes (could be something else, not feeling strong on this) Ferdinand von Aegir gets a boon in authority (fits him perfectly) but weakness in brawling (a true noble would not punch things) Dimitri's bane in axes changed to neutral (this never made sense, as axes handle more similar to lances than any other weapon, this bane was, in my opinion, purely gameplay-wise), riding to normal boon, added hidden talent in brawling - mastery: seal movement (really fits his hidden beast tendencies), bane in flying (I really don't see him being a flier) Catherine gets a boon in armor (no reason really, just wanted her to have it) Shamir's boon in lances changed to swords Bernadetta's boon in lances changed to swords Claude gets a bane in axes (this guy is not smashing things, lets be serious) and hidden talent in lances (monster piercer) F!Byleth's boon in brawling switched to bows Unit skills: -changed byleth's white magic learnt - Aura learnt on faith B. On faith A M!Byleth gets abraxas, F!Byleth gets seraphim -removed swift strkes from relevant units (changed to different skills: Sylvain - frozen lance, Seteth - shatter lance, Ferdinand von Aegir - lance jab) -changed Ingrid's magic attack arts rank from A to C+ -changed flayn's frozen lance from A to C+ -Felix learns bolting on reason A+ Weapon Arts and magic: increased accuracy and crit rate of astra to +20, reduced cost to 5 repurposed subdue into sol (hero exclusive master art) swift strikes repurposed into paladin exclusive master art war master strike moved onto warrior fimbuveltr now applies frozen meteor has power of 20 thunder magic is switched to high accuracy no crit. thunder range increased to 3 ragnarok is effective (double) against armors cutting gale is effective (double) against fliers nosferatu weight reduced to 4 abraxas is now range 2-4 power 18, cannot double aura's crit reduced to 0, hit increased to 100 agnea's arrow is now effective against everything defiant skills activate below 50% HP, stat boosts increased from 8 to 9, defiant avo reduced from 30 to 25, crit reduced from 50 to 25 Lore Accuracy changes: -doubled activation rate of all crest effects (save for those that cancel counter attacks, those increased by 50%) -buffed all hero relics and sacred weapons -vastly upgraded all hero relics' exclusive weapon arts [Reliance on crest is a vital point of many characters' backstories, it's detrimental to have them so weak in the game] Class data Vast changes to majority of classes: Stats: HP STR MAG DEX SPD LCK DEF RES MOV CHR Hero: Stats:+3 +2 0 0 +! +2 +4 0 +1 0 Skills: swordfaire, defensive tactics, weight -3 Mastery: defiant str, sol Req: swords B+, authority C Mortal Savant: Stats: +1 +3 +3 +1 +4 0 +2 +2 +2 0 Skills: swordfaire, black tomefaire, darting blow Mastery: keen intuition Req: sword A, reason A Great Knight: Stats: +5 +3 0 +2 -4 0 +10 0 +3 +1 Skills: canto, lancefaire, axefaire, Mastery: defiant def Req: axe C+ lance C+ armor B riding B Dark Knight: Stats +3 +2 +3 +2 0 0 +3 0 +4 -1 Skills: canto, lancefaire, black tomefaire Mastery: seal res Req: lance B reason B riding A Holy Knight: Stats: +3 +3 +2 +2 +1 0 +3 +4 +4 +1 Skills: canto, swordfaire, white tomefaire Mastery: defiant res Req: sword B faith B riding A Dark Mage (it, alongside dark bishop require normal seals. I guess you can sell your dark seals): Stats: +3 0 +3 +1 0 0 0 +2 0 -1 Skills: miasma, heartseeker Mastery: vicious blow (crit+20 on initiation) Req: reason C Dark Bishop (now a master class): Stats: +5 0 +5 +3 0 0 0 +4 +1 -1 Skills: lifetaker, fiendish blow, heartseeker Mastery: arcane mastery (mag/res +4) Req: reason S Wyvern lord - removed bonus and growths of speed, lowered mov to 7 changed avo+10 to lancefaire, changed req. to axe B, lance B, flying A Enlightened one - added white tomefaire Dancer skills: dance, charm, swordfaire Bow knight skill bonus and req changed from lance to sword great lord - added swordfaire, +2 dex +1 def emperor - can use magic All lord master classes now learn offensive tactics on mastery falcon knight - changed req sword C to faith C, can now use magic, lowered mov to 7 priest - mastery changed from miracle to warding blow Skill progression: reason C - fire faith C - miracle armor B - staunch shield (def +4 on wait) authority S+ - general/commander (not decided yet) faire skills earned from S+ rank no longer stack On tedium and grinding: class mastery exp required is halved (save for commoner but not noble) all faculty members join with all their acquired classes already mastered On difficulty: I don't like maddening. I've played and beaten it on ng+ but find bloated enemy stats not fun at all. What I do like, however, are bonus skills. As such I've made changes to generic enemies on hard mode: all prowess skills upgraded (ex. generic brigand enemy used to have axe prowess lv 2, now it's level 3) all enemies have their classes' mastery skills equiped (that includes higher tier classes - death blow will be equipped on both brigand and warrior) many enemies also get breaker skills On modularity: Advance classes that focus on a single weapon get unique special attack: swordmaster - astra grappler - fierce iron first sniper - hunter's volley hero - sol paladin - swift strikes warrior - war strike Meanwhile, master classes are all hybrid classes with dual faire skills and higher stats, but also higher requrements. This is meant to give a choice - a low-effort class with a unique skills after mastery, or a premium class with higher requirements. There are more synergies between classes now - sword and bow can orbitate around assasin, hero, sniper, bow knight. Great knight could be a master class for both paladin and fortress knight. Lance users can go for paladin and stay for swift strikes, or move towards dark knight or great knight. I also wanted to make sure all faire skills get at least two end-game classes excluding lords Undecided yet: Cannot decide if dark knight should get lance or swordfaire (holy knight gets the other). Holy knight looks like it should be a straight upgrade to paladin, so lancefaire, but most units who want to be a dark knight (Sylvain, Lorenz, Hubert) prefer lances. Dark knights in the past used to prefer swords and it would synergize with mortal savant more. Holy knight using lances would synergize with falcon knight for women and I feel it would fit more. On the other hand, my holy knight Ingrid with a silver sword looks majestic. A tough one. I'm not sure what to do with hero. It's fine right now, but I've been thinking about changing it to master class with axefaire. I'm thinking about using one of the spare class slots to divide mortal savant into two gender-exclusive classes. It's because those two models don't look like the same class - male one is definitely a samurai while female looks more like an onmyo mage. Male variant looks especially silly doing anime casting animations while wearing full armor. A random thought - do you think game would gain if all faire skills were removed from classes and replaced with other skills? There is no limit on how many requirements and proficiency bonuses classes can give (even though in the base game these are capped at 3 and 4 respectively). What do you think? Your feedback is appreciated.

Right, I should have been more specific. I wanted to know why are there so few actual clones (or if there are, and I just didn't know). Unicorn Overlord is not such a game, because combat is different, map design is different, units move in real time etc. Persona 5 Tactica is not a clone, despite it having rpg elements, named characters and a grid, because it also focuses on small maps and deploys only 3 characters. FF Tactics also does not cut it, different camera perspective, emphasis on verticality etc (although this one is close). Aside from the last 2 and tactics, I've never heard of these games before. Also, they look like games made in rpg maker, my query is bigger games (this may be wrong in current age, but I consider a game big, if it got a physical release). Yes, and no. My idea was to ask, since this question has been with me for some time now.

FE clones, if you will (not pejoratively in the slightest), are they as rare as I think they are? Fire Emblem may not be a mainstream franchise, but one would think that with this many games, there would be at least a decent clone every now and then. By a clone, I mean turn based combat on a grid with many characters available, with focus on tactics specifically. I think it's easy to intuitively know the elements, especially for members of such a forum. Maybe I'm just unaware, but the only titles I can think of are: -Tears to tiara 2 - probably the closest game, even story follows a familiar pattern. It's a also a ps3 exclusive, that nobody cared about then, and that's completely forgotten now -Hyperdevotion noire - gameplay is very close, but narrative is closer to a traditional jrpg, it's also a low-budget spin-off to an already niche series. -Fairy fencer F refrain chord - a spin off of a niche jrpg from the same developer as above. If I didn't actively search for it, I wouldn't know it exists -Natural Doctrine - this one is a stretch, as the gameplay differs quite a bit, but I still recognize many similarities, especially during the last 3 missions, where characters can die, and consequences are very similar to fe. I'm aware original creator of fe went to make his own games, can they be considered fe clones as well? Anyway, am I missing something? And if not, why is this a case?

That is, not necessarily a sequel (I wouldn't mind in the slightest though), but just any new game in Fodlan specifically. Direct follow ups seem rare (to my knowledge that is), but there were many games set in Archanea (the first game, shadows of valentia, awakening, although distant, was fates in the same universe? I didn't play it but I think so). Obviously we got three hopes, and while it fixed many problems from the original and gave many a character more chances to shine, it was ultimately a different gameplay and game had it's own share of problems, including terrible endings. Given that three houses is one of the most popular games in the franchise, do you think we will see more of fodlan? Or is it a closed chapter?

I remember a game very similar to FE called tears to tiara 2 - one of the characters could ride an elephant, and it worked similar to mount/dismount of three houses. Unlike mounting, the elephant was a separate unit, that took a slot.

Is there any way to download this mod without gay endings? Version 1.3 appears to miss some features.

This may be harsh, but my experience with fate go and feh points to one conclusion - gacha stories are absolute trash and that cannot be remedied due to business model. Every new chapter/book/etc. is introducing new status que smashing enemies that are always more dangerous then the previous ones. Every chapter have heroes deal with world, or straight up universe altering events, that grow so large, it's impossible (for me) to take it seriously. We had invasion from another kingdom, then invasion from another kingdom led by unkillable king, then invasion by the queen of death AND THEN an assault by a time-controlling reality warping goddess. How the hell am I supposed to take seriously a story about a bunch of kids fighting reality-shaping goddess AND WINNING? The scale gets so out of hand. Unbelievable clusterfucks like these happen (too) often in jrpgs, but since these games have to introduce new OP units to sell, they also have to introduce them to the story, which destroys it.

Its mostly girls that are imprisoned, because, well, men tend to get killed when defeated. When you capture a woman, aside from ransom, you can have one as a trophy or a slave (sexual or regular). Women are physically weaker than men, and most of those we save are fragile (that is, all aside from Mathilda) and are less aggressive than men, so they're easier to subdue. If Mathilda was not to be used against Clive, she ought to be killed as well, since she would be a problem to keep. It's all biology, really. The fact that Jesse is not immediately killed makes no sense - he's a mercenary, so nobody's going to pay for him, and he can try to escape or fight his captors - he's too dangerous to keep as a slave, not worth any money to pay, and cannot be swayed to work for them. The only logical step is to kill him to get rid of dead weight.. The only reson none of this happen is because this is a PEGI 12 game. By the way, I didn't notice the fact that you mostly save girls at all. I also am not sure if a girl being saved by a handsome knight is an outdated trope? And if anything, Mathilda/Clive support was meant to be a commentary against sexism? At least that's how I understood it. I also don't think they meant to make Celica another damnsel in distress, that's just a result of subpart writing. In fact I have an idea - have Alm's route end with killing Rudolf, therefore uniting Valentia militarily, while Celica's route ends with killing Jedah, thus eliminating dark magic from the country - forget about fighting evil unded dragon, about magically unsealing falchion (btw. can someone explain why is this sword in valentia and not archanea? SoV is supposed to take place in the same continuity right?). You have Alm, who focuses on dealing with physical dangers, while Celica deals with the spiritual, unnatural aspects. This makes their union more balanced - Alm brings physical strength and charisma, while Celica brings enlightenment and spirituality. This is clearly how developers wanted them to be, but with how the story is currently, Celica should absolutely not be allowed to rule. Also, you seem to heavily dislike traditional gender roles, but you'd be fine with a woman being a symbol of purity to offset a ruthlessness of a man? How exactly a trope gets "outdated" and who decides that?

Sure, if you knew that the only other healer save for Silque is available for the last 2 chapters. Or that reclassing does not really exist in this game (reclassing naturally happens so late it's pointless and I've never found the villager fork thats been mentioned a few times.) Yup I have 480 hours in that game, played every route except crimson flower, because I will not support Edel, especially since it means going against Dimitri. I've played azure moon 3 times, currently thinking about SS to romance Rhea Hanneman though, I'm not sure about. I've already tried a full faculty memebers run, but I had more fun using students. Oh well. Got the joke from "this is basically fire emblem". Still, you find this old dude, that you last met half the valentia apart, in the most random place and he asks to join us. I was completely sure that he was going to turn on us at some point and reveal he's a villain, there was no way he swam all that way alone on a tiny boat. Already used Hanneman, a good mage, but I really dislike his supports. No idea why does Seteth even talks with him. Thank you, I appreciate you taking the time to write all this. I'll keep it in mind. My take? Just have her try to combat Jedah and fail. Have her overpowered then whisper something like "I tried Alm. I'm sorry, but now it's in your hands". Communities I frequent says otherwise - it's hard to find a thread about pairing that does not involve shipping all of them save those with Alois and Rodrigue. Same goes the for girls, apparently, likes of Ingrid, Annette and Marianne are all closet lesbian. And it keeps getting worse - in engage everyone is bi, in baldurs gate 3 everyone is bi. But I'd like to not continue this topic - the longer it goes on, the higher the chance I'll write something that certain people will consider homo/transphobic and a certain person would love to rise the pitchfork, I'm certain. I've heard complaints about misogyny before, but I'm not sure If I see any. Like, the only one I can find is in Mathilda/Clive supports, but thees are quickly destroyed by Clive himself. Unless girls acting like girls is already considered misogyny, in which case I disagree. Some people dislike traditional gender roles, but I see no merit in going against them just because. Men and women are different.

I mean, I get the memes, but when I got there, I was invested in the plot. I expected it to be serious. Magic golems and stones shooting lightning still fit medieval fantasy. A futuristic base that looks like a space station, does not. It may be a preference, but I DESPISE when these get mixed, it's impossible to be taken seriously. Is it? Last evening, Halsin told me he believes I care about him like I care about a lover and wants to cross the sticks, because I asked if he feels good in our camp. Once. I'm kinda traumatized. You know, I miss the times when a man could admire another man AND not be accused of being gay. Like Sam and Frodo who I consider a great example of loyalty and friendship we should all aspire to. Yet today, netflix would make them gay, no doubt about it. You are a hero of light, who will traverse many places helping locals with their local troubles, giving valuable life lessons, like not punishing villains (no Vince, I will never let it go, you should be hanged), never getting angry and helping idiots obviously using you, because they asked. At the end of your journey, you will find the sword of light and kill the demon lord. Hmm. Wait a minute... Well, it does not fit azure moon. I feel like I should just replay three houses (again). I, uhh... You know what, how about you just tell which titles are different, so that I may skip the other. I understand wanting to keep the tradition, but I'm simply not interested in hearing the same story every time, just told by someone else. No matter how good the gameplay is, if I don't give a damn about the world and characters, my enjoyment will be shallow.

Hmm, when exactly does he show "savage desire for battle"? The entire reason he leaves the village is to help his country and possibly find Celica. In fact, I don't remember one moment when he was bloodthirsty or even angry. He sounded pissed a little when first fighting Berkut, but... what else? Yes, I understand that this is PG12 game, so I may expect too much, but I guess I'm just reaaally tired of child protagonists. When you say battle thirst, first thing I see in my mind is Dimitri riding into battle with a sadistic smirk in three hopes, and remember his awesome battle lines from boar phase. THAT is PG12 bloodthirst. Well, she's a beautiful woman with long hair and a sexy outfit. Yes yes, very shallow, but when the other choice is a guy with black armor, I'll still go with sexy. Deen is not even "edgy cool" guy, he's so boring. You want to play almost entire route with ONE healer who doesn't even learn physic? No thanks, healers who don't have physic have no place in my party. In fact, only after I finished the game did I learn Silque can learn Invoke. She was basically relegated to being a warp bot, and casting seraphim when needed. The fact that you may be right terrifies me. Sorry, that was never my desire. Awakening WAS a fun game. I simply prefer three houses with it's (mostly, whoever shoved those who rave n the dark into the game should be fired) grey morality, and more flawed heroes. TH also had more supports, so even if some were boring/stale, you still have more good ones, due to sheer quantity. I'm still mad they had to shove a map that looks like a space station into a surprisingly grounded fantasy, but japanease gotta japanease. Alas. I also happen to align very closely with Dimitri who is my favourite lord, one of my favourite characters in jrpgs in genreal, and my one and only lord I'd follow (just no homo, please). So, I'm biased. I consider it good by the standard of jrpgs. Comparing it to disco elysium or planescape torment is an unfunny joke, but hey, it's better than dragon quest. 🙂 I wouldn't dream of not seeing full story, obviously I'll play RD. -_- This is... problematic. I despise them. It's the easiest thing possible, to just make a despicable antagonist. No effort, no gain. That's why Edelgard I consider a good villain, while slithers are terrible.

I've only played Azure Moon (twice, won't play other routes), so aside from Byleth and Jeralt (these are obvious, like you saide). The only character that was done better was Rodrigue, and only by virtue of not dying. I don't feel like anyone is particularly different, save for Sylvain, who's more boring here, he really lacks anything to do in this story, he no longer changes as the story progresses. There is the case with his brother, but despite being alive and even part of an army for a long while, I feel his presence has less impact on Sylvain than in three houses, where he dies the moment he's introduced. Crazy. Dimitri's path is somewhat different, but that's not for better or worse, he's story is just different. It's nice he puts greater emphasis on finding the truth, instead of just giving up like in houses, but I miss his edgy phase. In general, I miss most designs from houses - only some girls like Mercedes and Marianne look better (love girl's long, loose hair. Marianne looks stunning as holy knight). Sylvain looks silly, Ingrid straight up ugly, Felix's outfit looks more regal, but fits terribly on him during combat. I also preferred his previous hair. Dimitri looks more charming, but much less mature, and I really liked that in houses.

After a long pause, and loosing save files, I started the game anew, this time finished it. I know this topic has been discussed to death, but Celica's portrayal and decisions in chapter 5 made me rage. After she decided to give up her life for a dubious offer of an even more dubious man (Jedah is literally purple, and serves a god you know is evil), I just stopped caring about the story completely. The scene when she realized she's been tricked made me utter phrases, many of which could be considered sexist, and since Integrity is probably onto me, I'll refrain from recalling them. Add to that the fact, that, in hindsight, Celica's entire journey was largely pointless (aside from saving many lifes and killing bandits of course) and I ended the game largely disliking Celica. Also, I still have no idea why did the falchion un-stoned. If Milla could still communicate, why didn't she speak to Celica? That would spare a lot of troubles. Alm will not be one of my liked protagonist - guy is way too soft and apologetic. I have no idea why did killling Rudolf affect him in any way - at that point, he was a stranger to him, AND a man who invaded his country. I get why would he be shocked, but sad? Same goes for Fernand and Berkut - first was a traitor who would let his friend be executed, while the other was a pathetic looser who would sacrifice his lover's soul just out of spite. Neither of them deserve more than a cold stare at best or a swift dagger to the chest at worse (Hell, if you don't save Mathilda, Clive still calls him a friend, despite the fact that he spoke to her and left her to death. This is just ridiculous). Maybe I'm too biased having started with more modern games, but aside from a couple of characters, most of the cast was incredible bland. Lack of supports AND any story relevance really hurts them. And also: Deen. This guy is bland, he may as well not exists. He acts like he's in the game as a punishment. Sonya is more interesting visually, mechanically AND has a relevance to the story. Recruting this guy is a trap, like many things in the game. Also Nomah, is he supposed to be a joke character? The "Eleventh hour old (gay) man character"? He's so useless I don't know why he's even in the game. Mechanically, game does not hold well - too few classes, that feel largely the same, too little mechanics to work with. Many decisions made me rage: All archers having close counter and absurd range, meant that there was no strategic way to deal with them - normally you'd try to close the distance to prevent them from attacking, now it's impossible. Witches having unlimited teleportation range is straight terrible design. They can teleport anywhere they like and you can never protect every single unit, you are always at risk of random instakill. Why are enemies so tanky? Even dumb mages can easily take doubling from physical unit to the face, and survive Class progression is terrible. Mages take so long to promote, I ended up benching Boey, Mae and even Delthea. In fact, pristesses ended up being superior mages, since they always learn seraphim, powerful spell effective against half of the game's enemies. Also physic, warp, invoke. What's even the point of mages? Dread fighters and gold knights are absolutely superior to everything. Barons are ok, but with most maps, they'll not see much actions. Same for mages There are so many traps for newbies - making Faye anything other than cleric is going to make your run needlessly hard. Saving Mathilda is so much more stressful and luck-based without physic, it's insane. Making any of the villagers a cavalier is also such a trap, because you get so many other, better cavaliers. Not recruiting Sonya rips you from an interesting, story-related unit (getting Deen made me regret ever wanting to not prioritize women over men). I also most of chapter 3 without Palla and Catria, because nothing in the game suggests they would return to the harbor - I expected to run into them some time after saving Est. When they joined, they were vastly under-leveled. Ugh. Music was very good. I knew to expect that, but it still surprised me how good many of the tracks were. Track when fighting Rudolf was even better than final fight theme. In general, the final fight was a little underwhelming, but oh well. Honestly, every part of the story regarding dragons was weaker than liberation of the country. One thing that bothers me more and more - does every FE game ends up being about killing an evil dragon? I first played three houses. After engage, I assumed they wanted to copy the story of awakening (which wasn't good anyway), since it was an anniversary title, but shadows ends up with very similar premise. I don't have to tell, that I find TH vastly superior that any of these stories. I though "This is basically a fire emblem" was supposed to be parody, yet it described these games mostly unironically. Next one on my list is Path of Radiance. Should I be worried?

I'm planning to play these games for the first time. Given that these would be my first FE games without casual mode and without some form of time reverse mechanic, I'd like some opinions on what difficulty would be best. I've read that they're easy, but so I've heard about Echoes hard mode, which was a disaster for me. Note that any death means game over for me, and I'd like to minimize the amount of restarts I'll have to make. Especially to 1% crits, these tend to make me shut the game down.

Maybe I didn't catch something, but bld seems to me, like a strictly inferior speed stat. It has the exact effect, increasing AS, but only matter if unit's current weapon is too heavy, while speed matters always. What I mean is, imagine unit has 10 speed and 10 build and uses 15 weight weapon, so 5 AS. Increasing bld gives the same result as increasing spd, up to fifth point, by which, further increasing bld gives no benefit, while increasing spd, does. So why would anyone choose to build bld+ passives instead of spd+ passives, aside from availability of course. I'm aware, that in some older games constitution existed, but it also had other functions. Build does not seem to have them.

Continuing my fetish need to try make that one character regarded as useless, as strong as possible, I kept using Vander from the start to the very end with varying successs. At the beginning of the game, he's decent, but mostly for setting up kills. Unfortunately, paladin class is not well suited for him - he would be much better if he started as great knight, like Frederick. Paladin offers above average growths and bonuses in most stats, but that's completely countered by Vander's terrible innate growths. Him gaining more than two stats was a rare sign. As a great knight, he was decent (but that's more on great knight being actually great in this game, which is awesome after terrible three houses incarnation), that +7 to defence is no laughing matter. Still not as good as say, Jade, but he was able to take some punishment, and deal some dmg. with axes, even with his average strength. By the endgame I got bored of having half my team great knights, and tried halberdier for pincer attack. Unfortunately, I could rarely position him in such a way to activate it, my army was focusing on mobility (mostly mounted classes with canto). Imagine my disappointment, when I learned that pincer attack activates only if both units are adjacent to enemy, I though just having an ally on the other side of that enemy be enough. Unfortunately, even with heavy favourism with stat boosters, his stats were low, very low. I gave him two energy drops, and his str. was only 30 by the endgame. With terrible personal skill, low growths and very high internal level, he seems unsalvageable. A real pity. You could probably try making him royal knight or griffin knight and have him focus on healing and chip dmg. but I hate his outfits in these classes. Thank you Vander, for defending us. Always Rating: 3/10 (decent, not good, decent in the beginning, weak to worthless lategame. )

This section saddens me. Jade was one of my strongest units, for a time, she kind of slowed down in the late game, but never to the point of uselessness, far from it. She just could no longer tank mages, but almost no normal enemies were able to scratch her, the only really dangerous things were chain attacks, but her high HP usually allowed her to survive even enemies attacking en masse. Great Knight all the way, I realize Bunet joins soon after, and Louis, but I have weakness for blond, ponytail girl knights, don't judge me. Too much konosuba and monster musume. Next time I play, I'll probably try mage knight and make her mine :} Rating: 8/10

Will photos be enough? She's cool (heh). Great stats, great design, decent personality (as far as engage goes). I made her bow knight, and she was destroying enemies left and right. Thanks to her high magic, she had great success with radiant bow. Fast enough to double most enemies without Lyn or passive speed bonus. Rating: 8/10

Hard mode, casual (does this matter?): Long story short, she spend the entire game as Griffin Knight, focusing on dodging. I gave her represailles (whoever that lance is spelled) with 40% avoid engraving. For the first half of the game, she was drifting about 80-90% avoid chance. After I regained Marth's ring, she learned avoid+20, which pushed her into 100% avoid for the reminder of the game. She was not hit once, since then, and ended up with rating of 241, the highest in my entire army (for reference, Alrear ended with 202). No stat boosters at all. Thanks to Eirika emblem, her dmg. was fine, although she couldn't ORKO even with doubling, save for mages and archers. She was absolutely MVP of my team. If only I predicted we lost the first rings, I'd have grinded her SP to get avoidance earlier, That would make her unhittable. Rating: 9/10 (being able to consistently keep 100% avoid cannot be overstated. Why does it matter if she needs two rounds of combat to kill most enemies, if she can just stay there and dodge forever?)

I am prepared to be judged for that, but I'm not feeling bad. This is how I feel, and no amount of critique will change it. Still, I regret his death, he never wanted to take part in the war in the first place. I could've planned it better (maybe going left? But I didn't want to fight the monster there), but I hate that map and just wanted it to finish. If I ever play again, I'll try recruiting him to avoid this problem, at least Lysithea can have an ending other than with Hanneman. I don't think he's that much of a jerk, and I'm lazy as well. MAYBE on hard, maybe. On maddening, great knight Seteth with duscur battalion (10 def) was still taking around 20 dmg from warriors. And being doubled by literally everything, but that's a given. Poison strike also ignores all that defence, mages one shots them etc. It's much more trouble than it's worth, especially with ridiculous requirements. Hell, on my hard mode run, GK Ferdinand Von Aegir still couldn't 0-dmg. enemy swordmasters. And let's not forget, with only +1 str, without stuff like swift strikes, GK is not ORKO anyone. So a slow tank, that cannot tank OR kill enemies. Ugh. Actually, is this some kind of twisted joke? what was reasoning behind it? Felix is literally coded for this class (always talking about swords, hidden talent in reason, he even has a sword,reason training request) and it's terrible for him even on hard mode. I'd prefer vantage, wrath and retribution. I want to be like Dimitri, dammnit!