Difficulty Tier List

[Ike-Mike]

I'd say it's about time to revive this one now that FE12 is out!

Asylum:

FE12 H3

Very hard:

FE5

FE11 H5

FE12 H2

PoR Maniac

Hard:

RD HM

FE5 Elite

FE6 HM

FE11 H4

Somewhat difficult:

FE7 HHM

FE6 NM

FE11 H3

FE1

Average:

FE12 H1

FE3 Book 2

FE11 H2

FE12 NM

PoR HM

RD NM

FE3 Book 1

FE4 1st Gen

FE7 EHM

FE8 HM Eph

FE7 HNM

FE4 2nd Gen Substitutes

FE11 H1

Gaiden NM

FE8 HM Eir

RD EM

PoR NM

FE11 H5 Cheap

Easy:

FE7 ENM

FE11 H4 Cheap

FE8 NM Eph

Gaiden EM

FE4 2nd Gen

PoR EM

FE8 NM Eir

FE11 H3 Cheap

Kindergarten:

FE11 NM

FE8 NM 1-8

FE8 EM 1-8

FE7 LHM

FE7 LNM

FE11 H2 (and less) Cheap

Edited September 11, 2010 by Ike-Mike

[Anouleth]

FE8 HM needs to go up, as always. At least above PoR NM, which is pathetic joke difficulty.

[NinjaMonkey]

Can somebody tell me why RD Easy Mode is so high?

[Colonel M]

FEDS H5 is rather easy given the Warpskip option, sadly. If you argued no Warpskip, then it can probably still stay very high.

[Thor Odinson]

FEDS H5 also has General!Zag/Wolf option which can trivialize a good portion of the game.

[Darros]

FEDS H5 should be given two options- Cheap way (using WTFRAPE characters and Warpskip)

And honest way - No warpskip, no WTFRAPE.

[Ike-Mike]

There, added FE11 difficulties for playing it the cheap way.

Their difficulties are listed in relation to how difficult the first 3 chapters are in the other FEs since you don't get most of the stuff that cheapen the game there yet.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Ike-Mike

[Narga_Rocks]

FEDS H5 should be given two options- Cheap way (using WTFRAPE characters and Warpskip)

And honest way - No warpskip, no WTFRAPE.

I see no issue with using any characters. By that argument, you should also have an fe6 no-Marcus and an fe9 no-Titania option. Etc etc. It is understandable, however, to have a no warpskip option for fe11 H5.

Granted, if you don't warpskip you can use Wolf and Sedgar and if you do warpskip you can just use Merric and Caeda. Still, even if you do either of those options, don't you still have many annoying maps early on?

Oh, and has Sophius eaten any crow yet now that fe12 is shown to actually have difficulty? Just out of curiosity. I mean, casual mode didn't ruin the difficulty of the other options, did it. None of that "oh they'll focus too much on making the easier modes easier that the harder modes will suck" or whatever it was he was spouting turned out to be true.

[Fayt Zelpher]

FEDS H5 should be given two options- Cheap way (using WTFRAPE characters and Warpskip)

And honest way - No warpskip, no WTFRAPE.

I agree with this.

Also, I think that SD needs to be split: Chapters 1-24x and Final, because the last map is such a huge increase in difficulty over every other map in the game.

On a less ambitious note, RD Normal is harder than SD H3 by far if you use General Wolf and Sedgar. Even without warpskip, H3 is made a lot easier with just General Wolf and Sedgar right up until chapter 24 and final (where they still make the game a lot easier)

EDIT: H3 is easier than FE3 Book 2. By far - I've had trouble with chapter 2 of FE3-2 and H3 is laughable comparably speaking. Even without Wolf/Sedgar.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Cocytus

[Genericname]

If the order matters within the tier, I would say to put FE11 H1 right near the top of it's tier, possibly bottom of the next tier. I personally think it's harder than FE10NM, but that's just me. Maybe my opinion sucks because I'm still trying to learn to not just think about personal experience when it comes to Fire Emblem. But I think that on average FE10NM has more "lol i can kill everything pretty easily" characters right from the start. FE10 has Sothe quite early and him along with Volug are both very strong for when you get them, then once you get Nailah or BK later on in P1, it becomes a joke if you use them. Then in part 2 you get Haar right away for a little bit, then one chapter with no one that is super awesome, and then Geoffery the next chapter. Then you get Haar back, I believe. P3 and forward, you pretty much always have a few units who are uniformly great, such as most of the GM in their chapters. You get the idea from there to the end of the game. In FE11, you get... Jagen? He's not very good. The beginning of the game is pretty brutal. Who do you get that can just go around and kill the majority of enemies on the map right away when you get them in FE11? Maybe I'm just vastly underestimating the units in FE11 or have just had bad luck with the game or something, but I generally find that the units you get are worse and the enemies you face are better in FE11HM1 in comparison in FE10NM.

EDIT : OK, so maybe I forgot about Wolf and Sedgar. I've probably just had bad luck with the game.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Genericname

[Sophius]

Oh, and has Sophius eaten any crow yet now that fe12 is shown to actually have difficulty? Just out of curiosity. I mean, casual mode didn't ruin the difficulty of the other options, did it. None of that "oh they'll focus too much on making the easier modes easier that the harder modes will suck" or whatever it was he was spouting turned out to be true.

I have not, so I will take this opportunity to do so. FE12 does thankfully focus on gameplay for veterans, unlike its FE11 counterpart which was made as magnet for new players. However, the inclusion of casual mode does not fail to disgust me.

As for the tier list, I believe that FE5 can go above FE11 H5, and FE5 elite below FE6HM. FE10 NM could also go above FE11 H3, or at the least, FE1.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Sophius

[Colonel M]

Zag and Wolf don't really split the game in half until much further in the game unless we burn up turns to grind them pretty much.

[Narga_Rocks]

Zag and Wolf don't really split the game in half until much further in the game unless we burn up turns to grind them pretty much.

Didn't Interceptor get Zag going pretty well, though? Not sure if you can cut turns without warping, though. If you can then perhaps his level wouldn't have gotten going.

[Colonel M]

Didn't Interceptor get Zag going pretty well, though? Not sure if you can cut turns without warping, though. If you can then perhaps his level wouldn't have gotten going.

Zagaro can at least keep stable, but like every other unit he starts mediocre. The growth kick in helps and he has Chapter 8 "IMMA WARP ONNA FORT" to help him out, but certainly not an invincible God. Besides, being invincible doesn't really do you much favors after a short period of time since the enemy density is low. His weigh-in was that Barst and Zag were pretty close, at least for a while, up until probably late game, which makes perfect sense since I'll admit Zag is crushing late game with his bare hand thanks to the drop in Atk.

[Paperblade]

I think that the difficulty of non-H3 versions of Book 2 are being highly overrated.

Normal Mode above FE9? Book 2 above HHM?

Edit: I also think you're overrating FEDS without Warpskip. Sedgar and Wolf still exist, and Wing Spear crushes everything even without warping everywhere.

Edited August 13, 2010 by Paperblade

[BEST TRYNDAMERE PLAYER]

Normal Mode above FE9? Book 2 above HHM?

I just noticed that as well. PoR HM is definitely harder.

[Junkhead]

Put FE9 MM above FE5. It isn't that hard when you have Titania and a decent ammount of BEXP. It's easily easier than FE11 H5 & FE12 H2.

[Mousefire]

unless it gets a fairly large difficulty spike, I don't think Fe12 H1 deserves to be higher than Fe3 book 2. I'm on chapter 7 so far, and it's been pretty much book 2 with a broken my unit and in battle save points.

[DomDaDude]

There is Hitomi that completed FE1 and im trying it to.

Hitomi: 1. This is the arguably the easiest of the FE games (the latter on Normal Difficulty) and is much easier than its remakes, due to many differences that were changed in other FE games and that are easy to abuse in this game.

[icey]

I haven't played anything except for FE7-10, but...

I think FE7 EHM needs to go up. For some reason, people always seem to underrate its difficulty. Right now, it is only two spots above FE7 HNM, which does not make sense to me because EHM is way, way harder than HNM. EHM has a very limited number of character slots per chapter, as well as a gigantic experience penalty, which means your tier 1 characters are probably promoting around Chapter 22x (Genesis) or later, assuming no early promotion. In contrast, in HNM you can field like 16 characters per chapter (I'm exaggerating, but still), and because there is no experience penalty, your characters will probably be able to reach 20/20 without much difficulty.

EHM should go at least above FE9 HM, which is pretty easy as well:

1) Again, you can field way more characters in FE9 per chapter, on average, than in EHM.

2) Also, because CEXP gain in FE9 is still quite high, characters in FE9 promote probably around Chapter 17 (Day Breaks) or earlier, andddddd face only unpromoted enemies for a couple of chapters. And you can promote your characters even earlier with BEXP.

3) It is easier to get supports in FE9 than EHM. In FE7, you have to plan how you are going to place your units each turn if you want supports. In FE9, you just need to field the units you want to support.

Not to mention that things like Titania, Canto after attacking for paladins/pegasi/wyverns, Reyson, and being able to shop at base (instead of on the chapter map) make FE9 THAT much easier. And don't forget EHM's rankings - not sure if that applies in this Tier List though.

Edited August 14, 2010 by icey

[eclipse]

I'm fine with the placement of EHM. In my opinion, it's a mode that I had to play somewhat seriously on, without having to worry about the RNG pulling stupid stunts on me on a regular basis. Also, it the mode that you can safely level and promote Priscilla and Serra. The enemies weren't so ridiculous that I felt the need to max out supports. I had to plan my teams ahead, but that's something I'm accustomed to.

I don't understand why RD NM is so high up. It feels like it swapped places with FE11 H2 (I'm playing both right now, and FE11 is giving me more stress than RD).

[Integrity]

I'm hopping on the EHM Up bandwagon, but I don't know how far.

Also, FE7 LHM should be over FE8 1-8 EM and NM. Consider, if you will, that Eirika can *reliably* solo 1-8 on HM, and that's not even counting the variety of Franz you can field, 1-8 should go between LNM and LHM.

yay bottom tier lobbying

[CATS]

I dunno if FE11 H5 should be dismissed just because you can warp through half of it. The first half is still pretty challenging, definitely the more challenging half of the game anyways in my experience, just getting to the point where you can warp skip would still be harder than beating some of the easier games. Most notably, it's under FE8 Eir Route? I would think 12 or 13 hard chapters (or however many it is until you can warp skip) is still more difficult than 20 or so easy ones. Zag/Wolf trivializing things doesn't matter much either compared to FE8, since FE8 has Seth who's even worse (not only is he invincible, but he shows up earlier, he has huge mobility instead of low mobility, and he's awesome right from the start).

[eclipse]

I dunno if FE11 H5 should be dismissed just because you can warp through half of it. The first half is still pretty challenging, definitely the more challenging half of the game anyways in my experience, just getting to the point where you can warp skip would still be harder than beating some of the easier games. Most notably, it's under FE8 Eir Route? I would think 12 or 13 hard chapters (or however many it is until you can warp skip) is still more difficult than 20 or so easy ones. Zag/Wolf trivializing things doesn't matter much either compared to FE8, since FE8 has Seth who's even worse (not only is he invincible, but he shows up earlier, he has huge mobility instead of low mobility, and he's awesome right from the start).

Here's the locations of the four warps staves.

Chapter 3: Lena has it.

Chapter 12: A thief near the beginning holds it.

Chapter 17: One of the thieves will attempt to run off with it.

Chapter 17x: In a chest.

The biggest Warp gap is near the beginning, and those beginning levels don't exactly take well to skipping. Of the levels between 3 and 12, here's the ones that I think might warrant it:

Chapter 7: The reinforcements are really irritating on H2. I don't think I want to deal with them on H5.

Chapter 8: The reinforcements that trigger when near the boss do NOT stop once you defeat him.

Chapter 9: I can see this as necessary if you went out of your way to recruit Jeorge. If you didn't, then I don't know how ridiculous the dude with the Devil Axe is, I'm not sure if the guys with the Hand Axe suddenly got accurate, and I don't know if it's possible to beat up the boss before the reinforcements appear.

Chapter 11: I'd say it's necessary if you want to recruit Jake with minimal headache.

Assuming Warp is used twice on Chapter 11, that should leave two uses left once Chapter 12 starts. That should be more than enough to get the last couple Warps.

I'm not sure where in H5 warpskipping breaks the game. Any help?

[Paperblade]

I dunno if FE11 H5 should be dismissed just because you can warp through half of it. The first half is still pretty challenging, definitely the more challenging half of the game anyways in my experience, just getting to the point where you can warp skip would still be harder than beating some of the easier games. Most notably, it's under FE8 Eir Route? I would think 12 or 13 hard chapters (or however many it is until you can warp skip) is still more difficult than 20 or so easy ones. Zag/Wolf trivializing things doesn't matter much either compared to FE8, since FE8 has Seth who's even worse (not only is he invincible, but he shows up earlier, he has huge mobility instead of low mobility, and he's awesome right from the start).

I agree that the gap between warpskip and non-warpskip FEDS needs to shrink. Non-warpskip is being overrated (harder than FE5? ucrazy) and Warpskip is being underrated.