Mechanics that you want

[Othin]

Maybe if his examples weren't bullshit, I wouldn't be "whining" about them.

I also responded to the substance of his argument, but I guess you can't see that since you're blinded by your fanboyism for General Banzai.

Yeah I don't even know why I should bother trying to reason with you anymore if you're only capable of obnoxious shit like this rather than civil debate.

[Dark Sage]

Yeah I don't even know why I should bother trying to reason with you anymore if you're only capable of obnoxious shit like this rather than civil debate.

It's like 99% of the content of my posts never existed.

I am quite capable of civil debate btw. Ask people like Colonel M, Anouleth, Cynthia, and the like. Sure, the last post may have been obnoxious and uncalled for and for that I apologize. I could easily ask why I should bother reasoning with you too since you seem to ignore all the responses to Banzai's main argument in favor of focusing on how I'm correcting him about his examples and calling you a fanboy.

I am quite willing to drop this part of the argument if you're willing btw.

Edited November 15, 2011 by Dark Sage

[Colonel M]

Now see, someone like me refuses to be civil because I find it more hilarious to be a grade A Tyrant. Sometimes, it helps sink the point a little better too (or it should, anyway).

[Othin]

It's like 99% of the content of my posts never existed.

I am quite capable of civil debate btw. Ask people like Colonel M, Anouleth, Cynthia, and the like. Sure, the last post may have been obnoxious and uncalled for and for that I apologize. I could easily ask why I should bother reasoning with you too since you seem to ignore all the responses to Banzai's main argument in favor of focusing on how I'm correcting him about how his examples and calling you a fanboy.

To answer your question: I was more concerned with the insistence on continuing to argue the examples and your attitude in doing so than in the actual content of this particular argument. I understand that I caused some confusion and irritation in bringing that up in that way, and for that, I, too, apologize.

Edit: I also support that idea.

Edited November 15, 2011 by Othin

[Dark Sage]

To answer your question: I was more concerned with the insistence on continuing to argue the examples and your attitude in doing so than in the actual content of this particular argument. I understand that I caused some confusion and irritation in bringing that up in that way, and for that, I, too, apologize.

No problem. Your concerns were legitimate and I could see how it could come off that way.

Edit: I also support that idea.

Excellent. I am glad there are people besides me who don't find their Internet Tough Guy cred important (if they did, they would not let up no matter how stupid and unpleasant it got).

For the record, I can understand Banzai's concerns. I agree that stats should not be completely what makes up a unit and that class and skill advantages should be important. But I find that's one of the major strengths of FE. Even units who are bad at combat such as Thany can contribute something valuable thanks to their class. It's a lot better than many strategy games like Disgaea in this regard.

I don't find that making all the units very similar statistically is a good solution. It weakens individuality between the characters and then it is also unbalanced anyway. As I said early IIRC, fliers will always be better because their combat is always awesome and they can rescue drop and have high move and armors will always be worse thanks their low move and at times, too high Con (prevents them from getting rescued).

Finally, I don't agree with various people like Crash in general that balance is so important. Let me use Super Smash Bros. Melee as an example. SSBM is a very unbalanced game but it is fun to play and thanks to various technical aspects, excellent competitive matches can be played (this is where the balance issues become apparent). Super Smash Bros. Brawl is definitely a more balanced fighting game, yet it is not superior to Melee.

Or perhaps I should use a better example. Disgaea can be extremely unbalanced. Laharl can solo the story section of the game and is pretty much the Disgaea version of Seth. Bows are a terrible weapon in every way. Prinnies and other monsters are rarely worth using over humans. I could go on and on about the balance issues. But it's still an extremely fun game. In fact, the main problem with it is that it requires way too much grinding for the content other than it's story mode. The balancing issues don't detract from the enjoyment that much, if at all. It is balanced enough that Laharl basically can't solo most of the postgame maps and requires the aid of mages, healers, fellow front liners, etc. and I think that type of balance is basically all that's really needed.

[Othin]

No problem. Your concerns were legitimate and I could see how it could come off that way.

Excellent. I am glad there are people besides me who don't find their Internet Tough Guy cred important (if they did, they would not let up no matter how stupid and unpleasant it got).

For the record, I can understand Banzai's concerns. I agree that stats should not be completely what makes up a unit and that class and skill advantages should be important. But I find that's one of the major strengths of FE. Even units who are bad at combat such as Thany can contribute something valuable thanks to their class. It's a lot better than many strategy games like Disgaea in this regard.

I don't find that making all the units very similar statistically is a good solution. It weakens individuality between the characters and then it is also unbalanced anyway. As I said early IIRC, fliers will always be better because their combat is always awesome and they can rescue drop and have high move and armors will always be worse thanks their low move and at times, too high Con (prevents them from getting rescued).

Finally, I don't agree with various people like Crash in general that balance is so important. Let me use Super Smash Bros. Melee as an example. SSBM is a very unbalanced game but it is fun to play and thanks to various technical aspects, excellent competitive matches can be played (this is where the balance issues become apparent). Super Smash Bros. Brawl is definitely a more balanced fighting game, yet it is not superior to Melee.

Or perhaps I should use a better example. Disgaea can be extremely unbalanced. Laharl can solo the story section of the game and is pretty much the Disgaea version of Seth. Bows are a terrible weapon in every way. Prinnies and other monsters are rarely worth using over humans. I could go on and on about the balance issues. But it's still an extremely fun game. In fact, the main problem with it is that it requires way too much grinding for the content other than it's story mode. The balancing issues don't detract from the enjoyment that much, if at all. It is balanced enough that Laharl basically can't solo most of the postgame maps and requires the aid of mages, healers, fellow front liners, etc. and I think that type of balance is basically all that's really needed.

Excellent points; I actually agree with all of them, although I don't know too much about your examples.

[Snowy_One]

Let me ask a better question. If we wanted to design a FE game so that stats mattered less and, instead, unit utility and your specific strategy mattered more, how would we do it?

Here are several ways I can think of that could accomplish this goal: 1) Unique/locked skills. In FE9, Tormod comes with the Celerity skill. It's a pretty basic skill overall and lets him move an extra 2 spaces. If he didn't have it or it could be removed/given to another unit, it is without question in my mind that he would be below Soren/Ilyana (who come earlier and less under-leveled). Obviously this is only a minor example at best (2 move is a basic upgrade and stats can still win out), but it is a indication of one way to fix it. Imagine a unit getting a skill that allowed them to function as a flier while lacking the terrain movement. Or a priest getting a staff that allowed him to poison all enemy units in a three-square radius from the target. Even if those were purely enemy-based skills, just their existence would put a much bigger focus on strategy.

2) Split the team up. I don't want to harp on this, even though it was my suggestion. It's not like splitting teams up will suddenly make the game great or something, but let's stop and think for a moment. When you have one single team, you pick the best units and don't even bother to field the rest. Why bother? You already have units that are as good/better on your team who are leveled and, unless the new unit fills some hole, they're playing second-string unless they are statistically superior (which is what we're trying to avoid here). Dividing up the team, however, creates holes that need filling. So what if this newly recruited priest is inferior to your main priest? He's not here and you NEED a damned healer!

3) Less penalties on special weapons! Let's look at the siege tomes for a second. With great MT and range, they would seem awesome, even if you didn't double with them. Just the ability to lob an assault half-way across the map would be great since it means you can hurt enemies before they crash into you. However, they only have five uses, so even if they were guaranteed 1-hit kills on most normal units, they wouldn't really be worth-while.

4) Objectives that you really CAN'T win. Let's take your standard 'defend the square for X turns' chapter. It's usually pretty straight-forwards. There will be choke points where you station high-defense units and then you sit back and cast slews of heals until you clear the chapter. Now imagine you had to do that when there was a total of 6 open spaces across the checkpoints, but you only have 5 units. And on top of that, enemy fliers/units with pass appear. Just for fun, for whatever reason, you can't just station your lord on the defend square either. No changes in the capabilities of your combat parameters for your units, but suddenly a LOT harder!

5) Turn player advantages against them. Enemy fields army in a mystical field where heavy armor is somehow pulled hard to the ground, making every movement with metal a challenge. Knights, paladins, fliers, and such have their movement reduced to 3-4 for the entire chapter. Suddenly building up a army of paladins doesn't look so hot. Enemy deploys a magic field that reverses magical heals done, but also reverses poison effects. Present players with things that turn previously built-up advantages against them, though not so much to the point that they feel like they are being punished for what they do.

[Anouleth]

2) Split the team up. I don't want to harp on this, even though it was my suggestion. It's not like splitting teams up will suddenly make the game great or something, but let's stop and think for a moment. When you have one single team, you pick the best units and don't even bother to field the rest. Why bother? You already have units that are as good/better on your team who are leveled and, unless the new unit fills some hole, they're playing second-string unless they are statistically superior (which is what we're trying to avoid here). Dividing up the team, however, creates holes that need filling. So what if this newly recruited priest is inferior to your main priest? He's not here and you NEED a damned healer!

So basically, the player shouldn't be allowed to choose the units they want to use, they should be forced to use everyone. That sounds terrible. Part of what makes Fire Emblem great is being able to form and train a team of your own choosing, and it's a staple of many popular RPGs, most notably Pokemon.

3) Less penalties on special weapons! Let's look at the siege tomes for a second. With great MT and range, they would seem awesome, even if you didn't double with them. Just the ability to lob an assault half-way across the map would be great since it means you can hurt enemies before they crash into you. However, they only have five uses, so even if they were guaranteed 1-hit kills on most normal units, they wouldn't really be worth-while.

Of course they'd be worthwhile, and they frequently are worthwhile in the games where you get them. Just because they have five uses doesn't make them "not worthwhile", it just makes them scarce. The limited amounts of uses of Warp staves or Brave weapons or stat boosters doesn't make them "not worthwhile", after all.

4) Objectives that you really CAN'T win. Let's take your standard 'defend the square for X turns' chapter. It's usually pretty straight-forwards. There will be choke points where you station high-defense units and then you sit back and cast slews of heals until you clear the chapter.

It's not really a "standard" chapter though. Off the top of my head, there are two such chapters in the history of Fire Emblem, both of them in FE9 and both of them pretty boring.

5) Turn player advantages against them. Enemy fields army in a mystical field where heavy armor is somehow pulled hard to the ground, making every movement with metal a challenge. Knights, paladins, fliers, and such have their movement reduced to 3-4 for the entire chapter. Suddenly building up a army of paladins doesn't look so hot. Enemy deploys a magic field that reverses magical heals done, but also reverses poison effects.

That sounds horrible, again. Why does the game have to have all this wacky bullshit in it?

Present players with things that turn previously built-up advantages against them, though not so much to the point that they feel like they are being punished for what they do.

But they *are* being punished. The player that decides to make a mainly Paladin army will suddenly find himself completely screwed over. How is that not punishing him?

[Othin]

Skills and special weapons work brilliantly to differentiate characters and are certainly the most practical of those to bring up - and Berwick Saga makes too perfect an example of that to not bring up.

But maybe now it's worth bringing up the interesting stat system that goes along with it. In terms of core stats, characters in Berwick Saga essentially configure themselves to one of three builds: Knight, Fighter, and Mage. Fighters have much more speed than Knights in exchange for a smaller amount of Defense, while Knights have shields to emphasize the Def increase, at the cost of more Spd due to the weight. Knights are also typically mounted, but have serious problems with terrain compared to Fighters both mounted and unmounted. Mages have even lower Spd, as well as lower HP, Str, and Def, in exchange for actually having a Mind stat, and using magic which doesn't reduce AS at all and tends to be crazy powerful. Within the three builds, differences generally aren't too notable, even if they don't even out, and the three builds overall aren't really any better than one another, but each fill important and different roles on a team. This seems like it's a much more viable way of implementing the suggestion Banzai was making.

Edited November 16, 2011 by Othin

[Dark Sage]

3) Less penalties on special weapons! Let's look at the siege tomes for a second. With great MT and range, they would seem awesome, even if you didn't double with them. Just the ability to lob an assault half-way across the map would be great since it means you can hurt enemies before they crash into you. However, they only have five uses, so even if they were guaranteed 1-hit kills on most normal units, they wouldn't really be worth-while.

Just make more available. Make them stealable and have more of them be found in chests. They are certainly worthwhile weapons because attacking somebody from half the map away is bitching.

4) Objectives that you really CAN'T win. Let's take your standard 'defend the square for X turns' chapter. It's usually pretty straight-forwards. There will be choke points where you station high-defense units and then you sit back and cast slews of heals until you clear the chapter. Now imagine you had to do that when there was a total of 6 open spaces across the checkpoints, but you only have 5 units. And on top of that, enemy fliers/units with pass appear. Just for fun, for whatever reason, you can't just station your lord on the defend square either. No changes in the capabilities of your combat parameters for your units, but suddenly a LOT harder!

This has to be one of the worst ideas for a map I have ever heard in my life. I think I speak for nearly all FE players here when I say none of them want a map that is unwinnable. There is the game being difficult and then there is the game just being an asshole and your idea fits into the latter category.

5) Turn player advantages against them. Enemy fields army in a mystical field where heavy armor is somehow pulled hard to the ground, making every movement with metal a challenge. Knights, paladins, fliers, and such have their movement reduced to 3-4 for the entire chapter. Suddenly building up a army of paladins doesn't look so hot. Enemy deploys a magic field that reverses magical heals done, but also reverses poison effects.

This sounds like yet another of your thinly veiled attempts to say screw LTC play, caused by your butthurtness. Paladins, knights, fliers, etc. all make up a large part of the deployment force and making a map that reduces move of such units to 3-4 is just ridiculous. Snipers and Warriors btw are also portrayed with armor on. Do you reduce their move too? Also the move of armor knights is usually roughly the amount you're proposing they be reduced to, so armors would suffer nearly no penalty which makes no sense, but then if they suffer a bigger one, they're pretty much unusable for the map.

I'm all for interesting challenges on the map, but this is a poor way to do it.

Present players with things that turn previously built-up advantages against them, though not so much to the point that they feel like they are being punished for what they do.

But this is exactly what you're doing. What if you raise an army composed mainly of paladins and fliers with a few mages and healers mixed in (a capable and powerful army to be sure)? Your team choice will be punished because of a dumb obstacle like what you're proposing.

@Othin: It's a more reasonable version of what he's proposing, but I don't think I like that system. Mages do sound kind of horrible in that game because of their poor speed and durability. Additionally, I don't think most people like to have units fit into three molds without too much variation.

Your idea is certainly not without merit. It has provoked the thought that perhaps there could be some more terrain heavy maps where mounted units face some challenges in maneuvering. They can still be useful that way, but can have enough disadvantages that they don't trivialize the map.

Edited November 16, 2011 by Dark Sage

[Rothene]

How do you get punished for an entire paladin army? Short of every enemy unit sporting Horseslayers/Halberd/Zanbato/Rapiers/Wingspears and the sort. Lack of healing can be sustituted with Vulneraries/Elixers, and paladin duarbility means it's usually sufficient. You have the awesome balance of decent durability, enough Spd to not be doubled, decent Mt, Hit and access to 2 weapons types early on, leading to overall higher weapon ranks. Let's not forget about the awesome move they have.

Of course the other punishment is in desert maps...which are rare and maybe a map choke full of forests.

[dondon151]

This sounds like yet another of your thinly veiled attempts to say screw LTC play, caused by your butthurtness. Paladins, knights, fliers, etc. all make up a large part of the deployment force and making a map that reduces move of such units to 3-4 is just ridiculous. Snipers and Warriors btw are also portrayed with armor on. Do you reduce their move too? Also the move of armor knights is usually roughly the amount you're proposing they be reduced to, so armors would suffer nearly no penalty which makes no sense, but then if they suffer a bigger one, they're pretty much unusable for the map.

He's basically suggesting a desert map. And everyone hates desert maps. What a terrible idea.

[Dark Sage]

He's basically suggesting a desert map. And everyone hates desert maps. What a terrible idea.

I am aware, but it seems somewhat arbitrary. Plus desert maps already exist and have their place. They also have the benefit of having a lot of awesome hidden treasure. Why do we need an anti-metallic field again?

[Paperblade]

Knights, paladins, fliers, and such have their movement reduced to 3-4 for the entire chapter.

So it wouldn't actually reduce knight's move.

[General Banzai]

Othin and I had an idea for an FE where literally every unit has the capability of mounting, and that mounting was a "rank" sort of like a weapon rank. At an E rank, you can ride a horse and mount/dismount once a turn (and unlike Thracia, mounting or dismounting is the only action you can do on that turn--so no flying a peg into range of two ballista, dismounting, killing one ballista, and then end your turn without much fear of the other ballista). Every unit has at least an E rank and this can mount. However, with only an E rank a unit cannot fight while mounted. So they can ride and take advantage of the movement speed but while riding they are completely vulnerable to enemy attacks. At a D rank, one can fight while riding, and so generally the units who would be considered "cavaliers" would have at least this rank. Higher ranks would allow for further actions to be taken while mounting, such as rescuing etc, and the highest levels of mounting rank would allow a unit to ride flying mounts like Pegs and Wyverns.

The idea was that there would only be a handful (I believe we decided on six) tier one classes. They would be general categories: Soldier, Fighter, Thief, Archer, Mage, Healer. However these would encompass several different class TYPES. For instance, a member of the Soldier class could specialize in riding rank and become a Cavalier; or he could specialize in using Shields and become more of a tank. Depending on what choices they specialize in determines in what way they would promote. There would be around thirty second tier classes.

So in effect, it's similar to the class change aspect of FE11 and 12 in that you get to choose what class your unit becomes, but it's done in a way which is more based on working towards a goal (you cannot simply click a button and become a knight, you have to actually use certain weapons more than others, etc). It allows for unit customization but feeling cheap or "easy".

On a second level, unit stats would be fairly similar to start out with but after they specialize and promote into a specialized class it would influence growth rates etc.

Then there's the whole ordeal where individual stats were less important than the several support and leadership bonuses that units could acquire but that's a whole other can of worms.

[Snowy_One]

So basically, the player shouldn't be allowed to choose the units they want to use, they should be forced to use everyone. That sounds terrible. Part of what makes Fire Emblem great is being able to form and train a team of your own choosing, and it's a staple of many popular RPGs, most notably Pokemon.

No. Remember, I'm offering suggestions as to how to make the game more strategy-focused and less stat-focused here. You split the team up and then, even if you have some amazing units on one team, they can't carry you through the entire game.

Of course they'd be worthwhile, and they frequently are worthwhile in the games where you get them. Just because they have five uses doesn't make them "not worthwhile", it just makes them scarce. The limited amounts of uses of Warp staves or Brave weapons or stat boosters doesn't make them "not worthwhile", after all.

However both also can be used far more than the standard 5 uses of the siege tome. You only get one tome and it only has 5 uses and it doesn't even have enough MT to do be a guaranteed kill on normal guys at times. Sides, siege tomes were only the example I provided. Let's look at a actual statistical comparison between the FE9 Knightkiller and the Steel Lance, both D-ranked weapons. The Steel lance has 10 MT while the Killer only 7, both have the same hit, the Killer has a weight of 16 compared to the Lance's 13, and it has only 18 uses compared to the steel lances 35. What's more, you can forge the lance up to a MT of 15 (more than double the Killer weapons), reduce its weight, boost it's hit, AND you can do this once a chapter. Why on earth would I want the killer when the steel lance is more durable, easier to replace, more usable, and doesn't have to be up against a specific unit type to be useful? This is my problem with 'special' weapons. Now granted, it did improve by FE10, but still, that's the problem I have with them. They're often overshadowed entirely by their non-unique weapons since those don't need to be up against a specific unit type to be well and are solid all-around.

It's not really a "standard" chapter though. Off the top of my head, there are two such chapters in the history of Fire Emblem, both of them in FE9 and both of them pretty boring.

I found these to be far more interesting than the 'progress to the end and kill everything' chapters, especially since it actually gave me a challenge greater than 'don't let the leader die'. However, here is the point. They were tough chapters that couldn't be won by a single overpowered unit. You were put in positions in which you occasionally had to give ground and couldn't be very effective (especially if you avoided using Titania). That is a GOOD thing. Remember, just because something has been presented badly in one game does not mean it is a bad idea, just that it needs work/retooling.

That sounds horrible, again. Why does the game have to have all this wacky bullshit in it?

Because it puts the player in situations where they have to sit down and think instead of using their mega-statted units to win battles. FF has done both well, so it's not like I'm making this suggestion on a wild tangent. Reverse and Zombie are two status effects I'm pretty sure you are aware of, and I can testify how one of the harder bosses in the game was hard because she knew how to use them well (Yunalesca). As for the other, I can only think of one instance where it was done (FFXII had at least two bosses who would give a auto-slow to anyone wearing heavy armor, meaning you either had to take the penalty or change out for weaker armor) as well as at least one nagging memory of having seen it before in another game, so it's not like it can't/hasn't been done.

But they *are* being punished. The player that decides to make a mainly Paladin army will suddenly find himself completely screwed over. How is that not punishing him?

Being challenged =/= being punished. Oblivion punishes the player if they level up too fast/poorly by making them fight with a horrible stat-spread and making it harder to get good stats if you picked the skills you would actually be using as your major skills. Part of being challenged means being put in situations where someone knows your weaknesses and can exploit them. Overspecializing in one unit type just makes it hurt more when being properly presented as that weakness gets magnified across more units than a well-balanced team. That can feel like punishment, but you can still get your advantages and easy wins on other chapters, just have to also have to deal with their weaknesses as well.

And honestly, you're really blowing things out of scope. I'm not saying 'hey! Let's change everything we know about the FE games'. Just 'Hey! Let's make it so the FE games revolve more around strategy and having a well-balanced team than on stacking paladins/fliers'. I mean, let's face it. I haven't suggested anything actually NEW in that post as everything in there has been done before (Unique skills in FE9, Split team in FE10, weapon powers change constantly, difficult objectives/being forced back in every game, deserts turning mounted advantages into disadvantages).

Hmmm... Is it just me, or are you more interested in seeing that your playstyle of paladin/flier stacking gets preserved and remains useful than anything else?

Just make more available. Make them stealable and have more of them be found in chests. They are certainly worthwhile weapons because attacking somebody from half the map away is bitching.

A fair enough suggestion, but remember, not all special weapons are siege tomes. The siege tomes might be fixed by a item-increase, but that doesn't apply to every non-basic weapon out there.

This has to be one of the worst ideas for a map I have ever heard in my life. I think I speak for nearly all FE players here when I say none of them want a map that is unwinnable. There is the game being difficult and then there is the game just being an asshole and your idea fits into the latter category.

Whoa whoa. Stop there for a moment and think about it for a second before you condemn the idea. Normally you're being presented with a situation that can easily be won. Rush to the end and kill the boss, wipe out every unit, survive for X turns, Etc. You're usually presented with a clear method to achieve this goal and are not usually put in positions where you simply cannot achieve every goal. Ergo, you don't have to choose between defense and killing 80-90% of the units on the map. If things go bad, there is usually some sort of fallback for you to go to. Imagine it a bit more like this. It's a huge battle map between two armies of which your squad is one. For every soldier on your side that survives, you get 20 Bexp. You want to save the soldiers, you put effort into saving them, yet no matter how many you save, for everyone you do save another dies. To make it worse, your units get wounded and can't withstand the onslaught on their own. You need to fall back and defend yourself at least until you're healed, even though it means giving up more soldiers and Bexp. Every move is a calculated risk. Can you afford to keep a unit out there for just one more turn and maybe save 2-3 more soldiers by doing so? Or do you need to fall back now? That is a 'good' choice to have in the game, where you simply cannot win no matter what, but still need to keep trying.

Sort of like in Missile Command. No matter what, you can't win. Eventually places start taking damage and you need to decide between saving bases, sparing many towns, or just one or two. It's a choice you have to make, with each outcome having variables that can cost you the game.

This sounds like yet another of your thinly veiled attempts to say screw LTC play, caused by your butthurtness. Paladins, knights, fliers, etc. all make up a large part of the deployment force and making a map that reduces move of such units to 3-4 is just ridiculous. Snipers and Warriors btw are also portrayed with armor on. Do you reduce their move too? Also the move of armor knights is usually roughly the amount you're proposing they be reduced to, so armors would suffer nearly no penalty which makes no sense, but then if they suffer a bigger one, they're pretty much unusable for the map.

I'm all for interesting challenges on the map, but this is a poor way to do it.

Sage. I am NOT against LTC play. I am against LTC tier lists for two primary reasons (unfair rewarding not based on unit usefulness but speed completion and requiring specific strategies to make the list applicable). Neither of those are related to my suggestion. I'm suggesting that we make it so that players can't rely on stacking one unit type or units with one specific set of attributes to win maps, but rather need to stop and think about their units and choices. You want to play for a LTC, that's fine. You can still do that here. It just requires more thought than stacking high-move units.

If you have a suggestion as to how to make it more challenging, then let's hear it. I'm all for discussing such things.

He's basically suggesting a desert map. And everyone hates desert maps. What a terrible idea.

I don't hate them at all. They don't affect me all that much. Then again, I rely a lot more on foot soldiers and mages than you guys, which is probably why they don't hurt me as much. Plus, I love it when goals and required playstyles change from time to time. It keeps things interesting.

[Othin]

@Othin: It's a more reasonable version of what he's proposing, but I don't think I like that system. Mages do sound kind of horrible in that game because of their poor speed and durability. Additionally, I don't think most people like to have units fit into three molds without too much variation.

Your idea is certainly not without merit. It has provoked the thought that perhaps there could be some more terrain heavy maps where mounted units face some challenges in maneuvering. They can still be useful that way, but can have enough disadvantages that they don't trivialize the map.

These are not ideas, but the facts of a game that has been around for six years. The stat changes merely allow for more change based on skills and equipment; indeed, with those, characters have the most variation of any FE game. Most characters have unique personal weapons, unique tactical skills, special events, or some combination of the three. Those changes are also what allow mages to become effective; most have obscenely powerful personal weapons, and the lack of AS loss from spells means they actually wind up faster than any knights in combat. That said, you're correct that in spite of what I was suggesting earlier, they would not even out on their own.

As for terrain, it actually doesn't take maps that are overly terrain heavy to work. Crossing rivers makes a great example; most mounted units will take most of their movement to cross first the sand terrain on one side of the river, then the shallow water over the fordable part of the river, then the same terrain on the other side, over three separate turns - even if they dismount. Fighters, meanwhile, can cross the whole thing on one turn, because of a lack of any terrain penalties from that terrain that completely destroys mounted units' movement. So it's not necessarily the amount of terrain, but how dramatic of an impact it has. This is also used to balance some otherwise weaker mounted classes, such as Sherlock's Horseman class, which has notably less penalties in all terrain. Leon and Adel get the same decreased penalties, but only before promotion, when their Spear Knight class is otherwise entirely at a disadvantage compared to multiple Cavalier-like classes, having both swords and spears.

[BwdYeti]

However both also can be used far more than the standard 5 uses of the siege tome. You only get one tome and it only has 5 uses and it doesn't even have enough MT to do be a guaranteed kill on normal guys at times. Sides, siege tomes were only the example I provided. Let's look at a actual statistical comparison between the FE9 Knightkiller and the Steel Lance, both D-ranked weapons. The Steel lance has 10 MT while the Killer only 7, both have the same hit, the Killer has a weight of 16 compared to the Lance's 13, and it has only 18 uses compared to the steel lances 35. What's more, you can forge the lance up to a MT of 15 (more than double the Killer weapons), reduce its weight, boost it's hit, AND you can do this once a chapter. Why on earth would I want the killer when the steel lance is more durable, easier to replace, more usable, and doesn't have to be up against a specific unit type to be useful? This is my problem with 'special' weapons. Now granted, it did improve by FE10, but still, that's the problem I have with them. They're often overshadowed entirely by their non-unique weapons since those don't need to be up against a specific unit type to be well and are solid all-around.

This is why the effective bonus is 3x is the majority of games, while the one you chose is one of the few exceptions. 14 against cavalry is pretty terrible compared to the Steel's 10, but 21 is great; and the AS loss doesn't hurt much if one slayer attack does more than two steel attacks.

And the forging bit is just FE9's mechanics being terrible? (well I don't really like forging at all but whatever) Even with that forged Steel, if the effective bonus was 3x as normal then 15 mgt Steel would still hit cavalry for less. And then if you could forge the Knightkiller and get 3 dmg for each mgt, they'd suddenly be one of the best weapons to have around (DS FE does this right?). Sure it would still be a worse weapon against non-cavalry, but that's kind of the entire points isn't it

I would like to see a few more uses on siege tomes though, that's fine

[dondon151]

I don't hate them at all. They don't affect me all that much. Then again, I rely a lot more on foot soldiers and mages than you guys, which is probably why they don't hurt me as much. Plus, I love it when goals and required playstyles change from time to time. It keeps things interesting.

Think about who you're talking to for a second. I love fliers and I use them for everything, but I still hate desert maps. The reason is because my non-flier combatants (whether they are mounted or not) are completely shafted in terms of movement and it absolutely requires fliers to get anywhere fast. So you're reasoning is entirely off the mark.

[Paperblade]

also since I talked about this a bit on IRC

4) Objectives that you really CAN'T win. Let's take your standard 'defend the square for X turns' chapter. It's usually pretty straight-forwards. There will be choke points where you station high-defense units and then you sit back and cast slews of heals until you clear the chapter. Now imagine you had to do that when there was a total of 6 open spaces across the checkpoints, but you only have 5 units. And on top of that, enemy fliers/units with pass appear. Just for fun, for whatever reason, you can't just station your lord on the defend square either. No changes in the capabilities of your combat parameters for your units, but suddenly a LOT harder!

This would be terrible for a storyline map because I have no idea how it would actually work if it were literally unwinnable, but it WOULD be a cool idea for a trial map sort of thing where the goal is to survive for as long as you can. There are lots of custom maps like that for WC3 (hero sieges/gladiator games) and I'm a big fan of that particular sub-genre.

[arvilino]

4) Objectives that you really CAN'T win. Let's take your standard 'defend the square for X turns' chapter. It's usually pretty straight-forwards. There will be choke points where you station high-defense units and then you sit back and cast slews of heals until you clear the chapter. Now imagine you had to do that when there was a total of 6 open spaces across the checkpoints, but you only have 5 units. And on top of that, enemy fliers/units with pass appear. Just for fun, for whatever reason, you can't just station your lord on the defend square either. No changes in the capabilities of your combat parameters for your units, but suddenly a LOT harder!

Then you just move your units all to the corner of the map and let the AI sieze on turn 1 or 2. Else you'll just have a chapter that you can't win and even trying to play the way it's intended would result in you losing characters trying to stop the loss that you're going to get anyway.

This makes me think of chapter 3-13 on RD if it had a longer turn count. It'd be a pretty unfair chapter towards any player in a game where character death is permament.

Edited November 16, 2011 by arvilino

[dondon151]

I know that in FE5, there are maps that you win, but storyline wise, you lose either way. For example, if you successfully defend chapter 14 for 10 turns, you still "lose" the battle and are forced to retreat from the city, and in chapter 19, even if you successfully escape from the invading enemy army, you still "lose" and are besieged in Lenster's castle.

[Anouleth]

No. Remember, I'm offering suggestions as to how to make the game more strategy-focused and less stat-focused here. You split the team up and then, even if you have some amazing units on one team, they can't carry you through the entire game.

What you want is to remove the choice from the player (specifically, the choice of what units to use). I don't think that there's anything inherently wrong with trying to emphasise the strategy over the RPG side of Fire Emblem, as FE10 did, but I think the majority of players are interesting in being able to pick what units they use.

However both also can be used far more than the standard 5 uses of the siege tome. You only get one tome and it only has 5 uses and it doesn't even have enough MT to do be a guaranteed kill on normal guys at times.

Even if you only had one use, it would still be worthwhile. The actual attack is no less or more valuable whether you can do it 1 or 100 times. The only thing that goes down in value is the actual tome: but long-range tomes are already of respectable value with their 5 uses.

I found these to be far more interesting than the 'progress to the end and kill everything' chapters, especially since it actually gave me a challenge greater than 'don't let the leader die'.

Chapters 5 and 13 of FE9 were /not/ challenging.

However, here is the point. They were tough chapters that couldn't be won by a single overpowered unit.

No, pretty sure you could win them with a single overpowered unit. Hell, you could win them with a single above-average unit. Just leave Ike on the defend square with a stack of vulneraries. Hardly very interesting at all.

Defend chapters were the worst thing to ever happen to Fire Emblem. Give me FE6 and its endless Seizes any day.

You were put in positions in which you occasionally had to give ground and couldn't be very effective (especially if you avoided using Titania). That is a GOOD thing. Remember, just because something has been presented badly in one game does not mean it is a bad idea, just that it needs work/retooling.

From what I gather, what you want is something like FE10's 3-13, where you have to protect a large area and the opponent brings flying units.

Because it puts the player in situations where they have to sit down and think instead of using their mega-statted units to win battles.

I encounter situations where I have to think all the time in Fire Emblem. The implication is that currently, Fire Emblem does not require thought when that is completely not true. It's already an extremely cerebral game.

As for the other, I can only think of one instance where it was done (FFXII had at least two bosses who would give a auto-slow to anyone wearing heavy armor, meaning you either had to take the penalty or change out for weaker armor) as well as at least one nagging memory of having seen it before in another game, so it's not like it can't/hasn't been done.

The difference is that in FFXII, changing to weaker armour is just a matter of pausing the game. In FE, if the team you're using has heavy armour, well, you get to eat shit if the game decides it doesn't like that.

Being challenged =/= being punished. Oblivion punishes the player if they level up too fast/poorly by making them fight with a horrible stat-spread and making it harder to get good stats if you picked the skills you would actually be using as your major skills. Part of being challenged means being put in situations where someone knows your weaknesses and can exploit them. Overspecializing in one unit type just makes it hurt more when being properly presented as that weakness gets magnified across more units than a well-balanced team. That can feel like punishment, but you can still get your advantages and easy wins on other chapters, just have to also have to deal with their weaknesses as well.

No, it's being punished. There's a difference between a chapter that's difficult, and a chapter that's annoying and frustrating, and typically giving the player massive movement penalties comes under the latter category. Especially when the player has already gone out of their way to design a team around having high move stats. Obviously, they want to play with high movement units. Why should the game take that away?

And honestly, you're really blowing things out of scope. I'm not saying 'hey! Let's change everything we know about the FE games'. Just 'Hey! Let's make it so the FE games revolve more around strategy and having a well-balanced team than on stacking paladins/fliers'.

Fire Emblem games do revolve around strategy. FE10 is extremely strategic, at the expense of it's RPG side (there is a lot less choice in what characters you use, so the strategy you use with them is more important). FE12 is similar because such a huge proportion of the cast is unusable. Not only do you have to make the right choices in your characters but you also need to be extremely sharp on the strategy side.

I just question whether that's the best direction to go in. I love the strategic side of Fire Emblem and don't really have much patience for the team building, but it seems that the majority of FE players don't feel the same way (see FE4 where team building is utterly paramount).

Besides, your suggestions are wacko-jacko. You want the games to be less about what characters you use and more about what strategy you use, and your suggestion to do so is to penalise certain classes in certain chapters? Surely, that would make it even more about picking the "right" team and less about using them well? The solution is merely to make the characters more balanced.

I mean, let's face it. I haven't suggested anything actually NEW in that post as everything in there has been done before (Unique skills in FE9, Split team in FE10, weapon powers change constantly, difficult objectives/being forced back in every game, deserts turning mounted advantages into disadvantages).

Hmmm... Is it just me, or are you more interested in seeing that your playstyle of paladin/flier stacking gets preserved and remains useful than anything else?

I don't know what you're talking about. FE10 is my favourite Fire Emblem, I have no problem with unique FE9 style skills and think they're actually a good addition. I don't understand what you mean by "weapon powers constantly changing", but I think that FE6 got it about right with weapons, if a bit on the inaccurate side. I have no problem with the actual game being difficult, I just think that chapters shouldn't be unwinnable like you make out. Even FE12 is never unwinnable. Deserts don't turn mounted advantages into disadvantages... rather, they make mounted units more powerful because rescuing and dropping become that much more important. If anything, for a good player like me, deserts aren't such a big deal since I have the skill to make use of flying units to circumvent the terrain. It's regular players who are going to have to tediously shuffle forward at a horrible 2 spaces per turn. What's fun about that?

[Zohda]

I'd like to see a reactionary system in place for the enemy where they deploy units and weapons that counter your army. For example, say that you're deploying a lot of sword users, so more the enemy would deploy more lance users, or if you're deploying fliers, the enemy fields archers, Armors would result in Hammers, etc. This would be determined by the MVPs of your team, going by FE9 and FE10's method of determining MVPs.

Now I can hear the criticism already. "You're just trying to make it so that LTCs can't use mounted units." Congratulations, you just realized the whole point of this system, but are only looking at it through your own little viewpoint. The whole point of this system is that the game makes an attempt to counter your strategy no matter what strategy you're using.

[Anouleth]

I'd like to see a reactionary system in place for the enemy where they deploy units and weapons that counter your army. For example, say that you're deploying a lot of sword users, so more the enemy would deploy more lance users, or if you're deploying fliers, the enemy fields archers, Armors would result in Hammers, etc. This would be determined by the MVPs of your team, going by FE9 and FE10's method of determining MVPs.

Now I can hear the criticism already. "You're just trying to make it so that LTCs can't use mounted units." Congratulations, you just realized the whole point of this system, but are only looking at it through your own little viewpoint.

That sounds like a terrible idea. So if you use a lot of a particular type of unit, the game suddenly becomes really difficult? What if you use lots of a particular type of unit because I don't know... you /want/ to?

This seems to me to be exactly the same as Snowy's suggestion. You want to make it more important to "pick the right team" rather than actually play well, by penalising players who pick a team you perceive as "bad".

Edited November 17, 2011 by Anouleth