Everything Wrong with Fire Emblem Awakening

[Ownagepuffs]

Same reason Micaiah and Diadora are now DMs. Either the programmers were lazy designing the magic system and light got turned into "not anima" or magic works differently in Awakening's world.

Going to assume the former. Light magic is kind of a big deal in Jugdral and Archanea, so for it to be absent altogether is like wtf. No way is the Book of Naga a generic "not anima" tome lol.

[MrSaturn64]

I wish for Emmeryn they had her return in a way like Yen'fay, where he's not in power but willing.

[Buttocksinator]

For the last one,it's pretty obvious, Lonqu may have hurt a few of the shephards really badly in that tournament, and it probably resulted in their death by grima. She obviously had to go easy on whoever she hit to not make tough wounds

I fear I cannot see the obviousness of your point when it is based on speculation.

Marth represents Basilio because she knows one of the gemstones is in Ferox and she wants to stick around to look for it. Basilio offered her a golden excuse to have access to everything (and she likely knew he had the stone, too), she'd have to be a fool not to take it. She likely didn't know she'd be fighting Chrom ahead of time.

This one makes much more sense.

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

For the last one,it's pretty obvious, Lonqu may have hurt a few of the shephards really badly in that tournament, and it probably resulted in their death by grima. She obviously had to go easy on whoever she hit to not make tough wounds

nowhere in the game does it even say this in the script, go ahead, look, i dare you.

get your head canon out of here, its only canon in your head

[Wen Yang]

Whoever did the costume designs for the females should be shot. Repeatedly.

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

Whoever did the costume designs for the females should be shot. Repeatedly.

not all the females have terrible costumes.

though there's quite a few that do

[IceBrand]

not all the females have terrible costumes.

though there's quite a few that do

Like Knights and Generals?

[Zepher-Tensho]

Oh are we talking about stuff we don't like about Awakening? =V

I guess I'll restate a point said before, I'm sure, which is NO LIGHT MAGIC 8U WHY

Oh, and WHY ARE DARK FLIERS AND DARK KNIGHTS CALLED DARK IF THEY CAN'T USE DARK MAGIC.

Why you gotta trick me man?? Not to mention Dark Knight is a possible promote for DARK MAGE. What a mind f**k.

Oh and the Generals look like a joke. Their armor makes them look like they have fat pot bellies. The males at least. Female Generals are ok in my book.

And I want Validar on my team. Seriously. Grima's Truth is a badass tome.

[isetrh]

And I want Validar on my team. Seriously. Grima's Truth is a badass tome.

Plus getting to see his confession scene, right?

I haven't actually played the games with Light magic, but I too wish it was in Awakening. And why did they think that completely removing the magic triangles was a good idea?

Edited October 19, 2014 by isetrh

[Zepher-Tensho]

Plus getting to see his confession scene, right?

I haven't actually played the games with Light magic, but I too wish it was in Awakening. And why did they think that completely removing the magic triangles was a good idea?

PFFT. That'd be incest, cuz he's the avatar's father XD

I dunno. It's like in PoR. They had anima and light, but no dark. They brought dark back for Radiant Dawn tho. Who knows what these developers are thinking when they come up with this stuff.

[Owain_the_swordsman]

Like Knights and Generals?

Just a few.Sumia looks terrible.I kinda like kjelle.

[Ownagepuffs]

I personally wanted Robin to get a Prf weapon or skill at some point. And why is Aversa's Night not Aversa's Prf tome?

[Zepher-Tensho]

I personally wanted Robin to get a Prf weapon or skill at some point. And why is Aversa's Night not Aversa's Prf tome?

^This. Both of these. Chrom and Lucina (and Marth) are the only ones with prf weapons. Suuuucks.

[Book of Ereshkigal]

How can you hate that scene?

That scene is the only moment that Cliff, the best character that is ever created is shown.

I mean who doesn't like Cliff? He's a fucking brilliant character.

Liek in the last best waifu poll, Cliff beats the entire cast by a landslide, to the point that Emmeryn falls for him.

Honestly the biggest wrong in the game is the massive quality drop after that point. They can't top Cliff and they know it.

....?

Perhaps he learned the teachings of Mila, and became one with the earth, forming his namesake.

Edited October 19, 2014 by L95

[PrismaticStar]

Okay so it's been a very long time since I've been here and this may qualify as a necropost, but now that I've finally fixed the driver issue that kept making my computer explode, I really feel like I need to clarify my argument about Lunatic and Lunatic + with a more level head.

What I'm absolutely NOT saying is:

A) There isn't enjoyment to be had in Lunatic, or that it isn't the perfect game mode for certain types of players.

B) Lunatic mode does not offer exactly what it claims to... a very difficult challenge for hardened Fire Emblem masters.

C) There are not ways to minimize the RNG involvement down to a negligible level.

However, Czar you will receive no written apology. I want to mention first that I'm not complaining because I can't do Lunatic. I can do Lunatic. I'm a more than halfway through rounding up all the child characters on my playthrough. If I remember it's just Severa, Noire, and Nah left. Maybe one more. I admit that I used the DLC once I was able to, but that's because I genuinely do not enjoy playing Lunatic "properly" and I decided to make my life less hellish. My beef with Lunatic isn't exactly that it's too hard for me, or even that it's in the game. My issue is that it's the difficulty level after Hard, and for that matter a difficulty level at all. Bear with me here.

The best way I can think of to make my point is to pull up Interceptor's thread that everyone and their dog has linked to me by now: http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=48207#entry3145464

This guy has done incredible work with this chapter. I won't argue against that for a second, but when I scroll down a little bit and see that to even follow the hilariously in-depth guide of one of the one or two possible turn combinations required to survive the beginning of this chapter (Chapter 2 I remind you, the beginning of your game should never be the hardest part) Robin needs to have a certain amount of magic and speed which you can get RNG screwed on, and C Support with Chrom which will probably require you to gimp your chances of surviving the earlier chapters because in the early game Fredrick is the only one capable of surviving anything, I could basically stop reading already. I've read through it several times, and that one point sticks out to me every time.

If your Robin doesn't have those things? You're screwed. Start the game over. You wanted to take basically any other stat increase other than Speed at the start of the game? Too damn bad, you're on Lunatic mode now, you do things Lunatic's way. Even on a "hardest" difficulty mode that's something you as a game dev should always, ALWAYS avoid. Only a very, very small number of extremely hardcore people (who are unfortunately for my argument, all on this forum since this is basically the only place for hardcore FE players to be) would PREFER having to start over if you didn't know everything about a difficulty mode going into it.

To be honest, I just wish Lunatic wasn't a difficulty mode. I wish it was a separate game mode altogether. The people who love Lunatic mode love it because, as has been said before "every battle is a puzzle." Good on those people. They should be able to have their FE puzzle battle mode, where every battle has one, maybe two solutions and you have to use the craptacular, outgunned units they give you in a particular way in order to clear the chapter. That sounds fantastic and even I would enjoy that a lot... as a separate game mode.

The reason why I hate Lunatic/+ so much isn't the fact that it's hard or because it relies on too much RNG (although that one certainly doesn't help), it's because it removes any flexibility or customization that I have in a Fire Emblem game. If I decide to use sub-optimal units with sub-optimal pairings, who don't have the cheapest and most broken skills possible, I either can't win, or I'm going to have to spend an amount of time that I simply do not have either grinding (which is never enjoyable in anything) or slamming my head against the same chapter over and over again, trying to remember what I've already tried and what I haven't. This is of course assuming that I don't just cop-out and follow someone else's guide.

The flexibility to "make it work" with the units and pairings and my own personal strategies and preferences about how to tackle a chapter are vital, critical parts of my enjoyment of Fire Emblem, and Lunatic doesn't let you do that. There is no wiggle room for you to do what you want. If you don't min/max in Lunatic it's going to be a nightmare, and far too frustrating for you to have any fun. If you want to try to work your way through a strategy for the chapter yourself instead of just outsourcing to a guide, go for it, but you'll more than likely come up with the exact same thing as whoever wrote that guide because there are only one or two ways to get through it alive.

Rather than punishing you for mistakes like FE always does, Lunatic punishes you for preferences and not conforming to what Lunatic wants. Lunatic punishes you for not following the exact sequence of turns necessary to "solve the puzzle."

Lunatic forces me to do either do things Lunatic's way, or waste gigantic portions of my life which could be spent playing other games, and I hate that. I cannot stand that.

Lunatic mode (or as I think I'll refer to it from now on, "Puzzle Battle") is great as a feature in the game, but as a difficulty level of the main campaign that is supposed to be a step above Hard? It is a nightmare.

[Czar_Yoshi]

Okay so it's been a very long time since I've been here and this may qualify as a necropost, but now that I've finally fixed the driver issue that kept making my computer explode, I really feel like I need to clarify my argument about Lunatic and Lunatic + with a more level head.

Necro limit is 1 month, you're in the clear.

This guy has done incredible work with this chapter. I won't argue against that for a second, but when I scroll down a little bit and see that to even follow the hilariously in-depth guide of one of the one or two possible turn combinations required to survive the beginning of this chapter (Chapter 2 I remind you, the beginning of your game should never be the hardest part)

Difficult earlygames are actually so common they have their own trope. Should they exist? Maybe. But they do, and Awakening's Lunatic(+) is far from the only example.

Robin needs to have a certain amount of magic and speed which you can get RNG screwed on, and C Support with Chrom which will probably require you to gimp your chances of surviving the earlier chapters because in the early game Fredrick is the only one capable of surviving anything, I could basically stop reading already. I've read through it several times, and that one point sticks out to me every time.

Correction: Fred is the only unit capable of surviving repeated enemy phase abuse. Robin doesn't get OHKOed, even with a Def flaw against Luna+ Barbarians at base level in the prologue, so as long as he/she sticks to fighting one battle at a time, you won't die (barring unfortunate misses/crits). Having Avatar take the normal amount of stuff in the Prologue can get you almost all the way to those thresholds, and you've still got all of Cht.1 to reach them- it's not hard to miss them unless you're not using Avatar. The Chrom C support is a little harder to get, but it's also optional (you need one more Spd and a bit more luck on one battle early in Cht.2, and that's it).

If your Robin doesn't have those things? You're screwed. Start the game over. You wanted to take basically any other stat increase other than Speed at the start of the game? Too damn bad, you're on Lunatic mode now, you do things Lunatic's way. Even on a "hardest" difficulty mode that's something you as a game dev should always, ALWAYS avoid.

While it's very possible to dig yourself into such a huge hole in Lunatic(+) that you're forced to restart, you're acting like Int's guide is the only way to clear it, and it's not. Def is a fully viable asset using "old" strats, and is probably better than Spd for midgame. Mag boosts both your Mag and Spd growth rates, and is very nearly as good as Spd (you've just got a little slack to pick up on the Spd base). Unless you're using a Spd flaw (which would be silly, Spd is one of the worst flaws to have, both ingame and postgame), the worst you can do is have to worry about those thresholds rather than watch them take care of themselves.

And if every game dev tried to intentionally avoid having players play by the rules of the game, the gaming industry would be having a bit of trouble at the moment. Playing by the game's rules is the whole point of games. Don't like the rules? Figure out how to break them. Or just don't play.

To be honest, I just wish Lunatic wasn't a difficulty mode. I wish it was a separate game mode altogether.

What's the difference? The only one I can see is the game telling you that one is harder.

The reason why I hate Lunatic/+ so much isn't the fact that it's hard or because it relies on too much RNG (although that one certainly doesn't help), it's because it removes any flexibility or customization that I have in a Fire Emblem game. If I decide to use sub-optimal units with sub-optimal pairings, who don't have the cheapest and most broken skills possible, I either can't win, or I'm going to have to spend an amount of time that I simply do not have either grinding (which is never enjoyable in anything) or slamming my head against the same chapter over and over again, trying to remember what I've already tried and what I haven't. This is of course assuming that I don't just cop-out and follow someone else's guide.

Again, there is not One Strat to Rule Them All in Lunatic+. There are many different ways to play (especially past earlygame), each with various pros and cons. Just because there happen to be one or two that are better than the others doesn't make the others bad.

If you want to try to work your way through a strategy for the chapter yourself instead of just outsourcing to a guide, go for it, but you'll more than likely come up with the exact same thing as whoever wrote that guide because there are only one or two ways to get through it alive.

No, there aren't.

Lunatic mode (or as I think I'll refer to it from now on, "Puzzle Battle") is great as a feature in the game, but as a difficulty level of the main campaign that is supposed to be a step above Hard? It is a nightmare.

Hold on, you're not talking about Lunatic+? Because I thought we were talking about Lunatic+. Int's guide is for Lunatic+, and if you try to use it for vanilla Lunatic the overkill will be incredible. And Lunatic+, by the way, is a very different thing from vanilla Lunatic: in vanilla Lunatic, once you're past Cht.2, you can start training whoever you want with no repercussions as long as you keep your team from getting too big and spend your money wisely. I can understand feeling constrained by Lunatic+, even though there are several different fully viable ways to keep it in check, but literally the only obstacle to doing whatever you want in Lunatic is getting those units ahead of the curve, which usually takes about one chapter of effort depending on the unit. There are a few units who will stink no matter what you do, but those kinds have been in all FE games.

Edited November 5, 2014 by Czar_Yoshi