The statement that FE5 has "Fake dificulty" is very similar to what came out of my butt yesterday

[Luminothe]

I constantly here the statement that FE5 has "fake dificulty". This annoys me a great deal. Most people are calling "true" difficulty in Fire emblem beefed up enemies that make the game harde(and things along those lines). In my opionion, this is "Fake" difficulty. "Real" difficulty is putting the player in uique tactical situations where multiple backup plans and intricate strategies are required for progress. Thracia 776 happens to have alot of these situations. Seriously, anyone can hack the game and make enemies stronger, however the essence of true challenge lies in said situations.

[cheetah7071]

FE5 isn't really a game of tactics like you're claiming, it's a game of strategy. Any chapter can be trivialized when you throw enough resources at it, whether those resources be a warpskip, breaking out the brave weapons, liberal application of status staves, whatever. The trick is to figure out what chapters warrant what method of trivialization, and what chapters are easy enough you can afford to milk them a bit for more resources.

Not to say there aren't at least a few chapters with a tactical challenge (chapter 14 comes to mind among others), but FE5 is by and large the FE is most tilted towards strategy in the strategy vs tactics axis.

[Dat Nick]

Fake difficulty is luck-based difficulty.

The only time FE5 is ever hard is because of luck. ANd most of those scenarios can be worked around.

[Kriemhild]

There's Aida's father on the castle gate with 5 leadership stars. There's Rinehart with his h4x skill combination and he's got 5 leadership stars. There's a cool priest named Cyas that is rigged to be invincible and he has TEN leadership stars. What does that amount to? 20 leadership stars. i.e. +60 Hit and Evade for all the enemies. Oh yeah, they have quite a lot of Ballistae too, which no longer suffer from the low Hit that they should have had. I think they even have Iron Ballistae, to make matters worse.

That sounds a whole lot like fake difficulty.

[Junkhead]

That's right, seeing on how FE5's RNG can be paiful.

[CT075]

That's right, seeing on how FE5's RNG can be paiful.

FUCK YOU, RNG!!!!

Yes, it's FFtF, but it's true.

*cough*

At any rate, FE5 is difficult because of actual enemy AI.

Among other things.

[Parrhesia]

Fake difficulty is difficulty nonetheless.

[Bryan]

Fake difficulty is difficulty nonetheless.

But you could capture, without that, the game would have been a ton harder. >>

[Kriemhild]

That's right, seeing on how FE5's RNG can be paiful.

FUCK YOU, RNG!!!!

Yes, it's FFtF, but it's true.

*cough*

At any rate, FE5 is difficult because of actual enemy AI.

Among other things.

Enemy AI is certainly not the MAIN reason. It's among other things. The RNG is biased and some situations are just plain unfair (look at Ch 22 and Ch 24x). It's not the AI that makes it hard at all.

[CT075]

That's right, seeing on how FE5's RNG can be paiful.

FUCK YOU, RNG!!!!

Yes, it's FFtF, but it's true.

*cough*

At any rate, FE5 is difficult because of actual enemy AI.

Among other things.

Enemy AI is certainly not the MAIN reason. It's among other things. The RNG is biased and some situations are just plain unfair (look at Ch 22 and Ch 24x). It's not the AI that makes it hard at all.

24x is just mean. FoW, Evayle statue, warp points that pretty much force you to let a character get captured, and Berserkers everywhere. WTF.

[The Envoy of the Beginning]

That's right, seeing on how FE5's RNG can be paiful.

FUCK YOU, RNG!!!!

Yes, it's FFtF, but it's true.

*cough*

At any rate, FE5 is difficult because of actual enemy AI.

Among other things.

Enemy AI is certainly not the MAIN reason. It's among other things. The RNG is biased and some situations are just plain unfair (look at Ch 22 and Ch 24x). It's not the AI that makes it hard at all.

Biased? I thought so at first, but not at all anymore. The RNG in FE1-FE5 is actually proper and should have been used in all the other FE games >_>

The 2-RN system in FE6-FE11 is a step down because of how it is and the fact that enemies usually have low hit and your playable characters have high hit in those games.

I don't think I even came across an unfair situation in my FE5 playthrough. Ch22....warp skip it. Ch24x? That's hard, but still not unfair (if you know what you're doing).

[Luftwaffe]

This seems pretty minor but i hate it how you can't get a 100% chance to hit. I missed at around 99% when playing Gaiden the other day.

[_____]

Biased? I thought so at first, but not at all anymore. The RNG in FE1-FE5 is actually proper and should have been used in all the other FE games >_>

The 2-RN system in FE6-FE11 is a step down because of how it is and the fact that enemies usually have low hit and your playable characters have high hit in those games.

Raise enemy hit and evade or lower allied hit and evade. There, now we can use the superior 2-RN system. It's already like this in Shadow Dragon.

[Icon of Sin]

Raise enemy hit and evade or lower allied hit and evade. There, now we can use the superior 2-RN system. It's already like this in Shadow Dragon.

Why do you consider it superior? When my enemy has 20% chance of hitting me, I find it normal that he has 20% chance to hit me, not 8,20%.

[Hero]

Why do you consider it superior? When my enemy has 20% chance of hitting me, I find it normal that he has 20% chance to hit me, not 8,20%.

Because it's less random.

Also, there's a reason that hit ratings in latter Fire Emblem games aren't followed by a percentage sign.

[Icon of Sin]

Because it's less random.

Also, there's a reason that hit ratings in latter Fire Emblem games aren't followed by a percentage sign.

It still doesn't make sense.

They actually never used percentages, though FE 1-2 had those bars to represent your hit rate and accuracy in your status in FE 3 wouldn't go over 100 even if it should have.

Edited January 2, 2010 by Dr. Rockzo

[Dr. Tarrasque]

2RN is biased. Penalizing the <50s which are usually enemy hit rate and blessing the >50s which is often the player.

Examples...

Steel Lance Wyverns in C21. With all the terrain provided, you make these look like complete jokes by having say... Lugh/Lilina/Hugh fighting them with Aircalibur or Gonzales on a Peak basically being a god against them. Then there`s Lyn mode where she usually sees enemies attacking her at 40 hit. Newb pampering basically. (funny how some can still fail at Lyn mode)

In FESD, Hand Axes in the earlygame. You`ll probably see 60-75 hit displayed but the 2RN gives you a more reliable chance.

I prefer FE5`s way of adding difficulty myself, fake or real.

[Kriemhild]

I prefer FE5`s way of adding difficulty myself, fake or real.

So do I but that doesn't change the fact that the difficulty is still fake.

[General Spoon]

I prefer FE5`s way of adding difficulty myself, fake or real.

So do I but that doesn't change the fact that the difficulty is still fake.

I think that someone is just butthurt over FE5.

[Hero]

They actually never used percentages, though FE 1-2 had those bars to represent your hit rate and accuracy in your status in FE 3 wouldn't go over 100 even if it should have.

That's true, but you used percentages. When my enemy has 20% chance of hitting me, I find it normal that he has 20% chance to hit me, not 8,20%. As you confirm, in the example you make it never said anywhere that your enemy had 20% chance of hitting you.

It still doesn't make sense.

The argument is that too much randomization abstracts the actual strategy too much, since the player and the enemy can both have a good chance at victory if they go forward and ceaselessly attack each other. According to this argument, the two-RN system by making the game more deterministic forces tactical thinking in much the same way as terrain bonuses/penalties and the weapon triangle do.

2RN is biased. Penalizing the <50s which are usually enemy hit rate and blessing the >50s which is often the player.

The fact that the two-RN system tends to favor the player has everything to do with the enemy's and player's respective stats and nothing to do with the system. In fact, there are places where it could just as legitimately be said to penalize the player--not as many, but there are places. The whole picture could be reversed if the games using the system had been balanced in a different way.

I don't have any strong opinion on the real debate here, randomness against determinism, but I don't want things to be unclear.

[General Spoon]

How about future Fire Emblem games use a new kind of RN system? Something like "predestination" sounds good to me.

Edited January 7, 2010 by General Spoon