Soul's Maniac Mode playthrough.

[Anouleth]

I'm told they are only 2 levels higher in MM, but there are more enemies. Is this true throughout the game or only near the beginning? Many magic users are pulling high 20s in HM in the late 20s chapters. They might crack 30 in MM. Have you played MM, Anouleth?

Oh, I wish. Only HM, although I want to try MM when I get back onto my own computer. But enemy stats shouldn't that much higher in MM when you're talking units of the same class. I suppose that since many Mages have been turned into Sages, it's more than just a few levels, though, and there are probably more of them.

It's a shame, though, that they aren't sending you against the things you see in fe6. 29 magic druids and 26 strength wyvern lords. They were annoying, but they were a nice threat.

Even with 30 magic, Sages wouldn't break 40 attack because tomes are weaker. In addition, resistance is higher as well. I think I had around 40HP and 12RES on most of my units at the end of my last playthrough. With a Pure Water, that turns 38ATK into a 3HKO.

However, hit is generally higher. Fenrir only had 65 hit, to Bolganone/Thoron's 85 hit. Eclipse was a joke weapon. In addition, you don't have loads of Forests and Mountains to hide in. Only Chapter 28 is thicket-heavy.

Anyway, even if you are 3HKOd, it would be somewhat annoying to face multiple mages in MM. However, you have half the bexp and Mist is more reliant on bexp than most units. Units like Boyd and Titania can get by with the increased cexp from the extra enemies.

I had more experience than I knew what to do with in HM. Consider that I was playing stupidly aggressive and skipping a vast number of enemies and I still managed to get Ike/Tormod/Tanith/Kieran/Astrid/Marcia to high levels (15+ being high), and this was even doing stupid stuff like fast-promoting Mist and putting EXP on Boyd and Rolf who ended up sucking.

[Narga_Rocks]

I had more experience than I knew what to do with in HM. Consider that I was playing stupidly aggressive and skipping a vast number of enemies and I still managed to get Ike/Tormod/Tanith/Kieran/Astrid/Marcia to high levels (15+ being high), and this was even doing stupid stuff like fast-promoting Mist and putting EXP on Boyd and Rolf who ended up sucking.

But now you have less bexp. It gets cut in half and some chapters may take long enough you'd lose even more. You'll still have a fair amount, but you could probably no longer bexp Mist without hurting Tormod or Astrid. The units that fight the whole time, though, like Kieran and Oscar and Titania will probably have no trouble leveling. May even end up at higher levels. But the characters that rely on a 5 level spike when they first appear may have more trouble since you can't give as many of those.