rank the FE games by difficulty

[Junk]

So to be more specific I guess you would rank them by mode because FE has different difficulty modes. I'm bad at FE so this probably isn't going to be a good ranking but interested to see what you guys think. This is from what i've played.

FE13-lunatic plus

FE12-h3 (have not gotten to play H4)

FE 13-lunatic (it's hard but the fact that the avatar can pretty much make the game an easy mode brings it down, irsya told me that avatar can do the same on lunatic plus but have not tried it yet so keeping lunatic plus up there)

FE 13-hard mode (I feel it's quite easy early and midgame but towards lategame it gets hard)

FE 12- normal mode (i'm so bad at FE that I actually find this hard at times)

FE 11- normal (not much to say but pretty easy)

FE 13- normal mode (I personally find this extremely easy)

please note that i'm not trying to make a tier list or whatever and it's just opinions to see.

[Irysa]

There is a problem with ranking difficulties like this because we don't have a clear metric for what exactly constitutes as difficult, or under what constraints the player operates.

Lunatic+ can be bruteforced by Avatar, but in the same way I can bruteforce the hardest sections of FE12 H3/H4 via Knight!MU with rigged prologue levels and Lunatic Booster Dracoshields/Rainbow Pot. FE11 H5 can be cheesed by Warp and General Wolf/Sedgar.

I think the only reasonable way to ascertain a ranking will have to operate from a position of the player simply not knowing anything. In this case, I think there are probably more unintuitive realisations that lead to simplification in FE11 H5 than in any of the other difficulties, so I would rank it above the others in this sense only. However, I haven't played FE5 yet, so likely that will be in the lead if other's statements are to be believed.

Another alternative is to examine the difficulties from the LTC/efficiency perspective, in which case Lunatic+ is miles ahead of anything else, and the rest are broadly comparable.

Edited April 8, 2015 by Irysa

[Ownagepuffs]

Some games become harder without foresight so it's hard to rank them. FE12 and 13's various Lunatic modes sit at top regardless, with H5 following behind. Everything else is highly debatable.

[Irysa]

I'd have to strongly contest FE13 Lunatic being harder than H5 from a completely uninformed perspective. The enemies in FE13 Lunatic are nearly incapable of killing most moderately well trained units past a certain point in the game, wheras just about everyone on H5 is perpetually 2HKO'd the entire game except for General Wolf/Sedgar. Those two are dead meat to numerous enemy types as well. Obviously warpskipping is a thing, but a player requires a non miniscule amount of foresight and planning in order to pull this off repeatedly without eventually hitting a brick wall later on.

Edited April 8, 2015 by Irysa

[momogeek2141]

IDK much about FE13 L or L+ because I haven't played that game, but I would assume it's easier than H5. H5 can easily be cheesed with forged ridersbanes, wing spears, and hammers, and maybe rapiers. There is also the option of warpskipping certain maps.

FE5's difficulty is overrated, it's only really difficult to one going into it completely blind. After one playthrough it becomes absurdly easy because it is just a war of staves.

[-Cynthia-]

I would say FE6 HM is the second hardest (not counting Lunatic+ or Reverse) mode in the series behind FE12 Lunatic. The game hands you some powerful units, but the variety of situations the game throws at you makes it diffiicult to 'cheese' the game really.

[Ownagepuffs]

More I think about it, FE6 HM and H5 are probably more difficult than FE13 Lunatic. FE12 Lunatic is still above them.

[sthbdis]

It's kind of like Irysa said in that it's hard to quantify what someone means by difficult. I've never played FE12 so this is ignoring that. (And this is assuming we're talking about each game's most difficult...difficulty Awakening is just cheap difficulty for me. Just a ton of enemies who are way stronger than you, especially at the beginning. I think FE5 is really difficult. As well as FE6. RD's not a walk in the park by any means either, well not until after Part 1 anyway. SS is a joke. PoR isn't very hard either. BS is harder than those two, but not as hard as the others.

[feplus]

There is a problem with ranking difficulties like this because we don't have a clear metric for what exactly constitutes as difficult, or under what constraints the player operates.

Coming up with a metric is tricky, but I don't think it's impossible.

Let us define "difficulty" as "amount of strategy needed to complete." This stops us from overrating games like FE5 and FE11(H5), where much of the initial difficulty stems from lack of familiarity. This also brings Lunatic+ down a notch, since we wouldn't consider necessary resets during earlygame maps as "part of the challenge."

Let us establish that the player is informed, but lacks perfect knowledge. He understands mechanics, how to recruit every character, where items are located, etc., but he is not a savant with all stats memorized in advance, he cannot "look into" the game's RNG, etc.

Let us further define difficulty in terms of modes and challenges offered by the games. This stops us from considering challenge runs, since if we consider those any game can be just as hard as any other game.

Lastly, no glitches.

YMMV, but those restrictions make sense to me. If we start from here, it seems like the hardest three games would be Thracia, Genealogy, and Blazing Sword in that order.

1. Thracia's SSS-rank mode is beyond brutal. There is no room for error. You must recruit all characters. You need to staff abuse to hell and back. You need a combination of perfect strategy and favorable RN rolls (which aren't factored into the difficulty, see above). This mode is king.

2. Genealogy's AAAA-rank mode is really tough. Most of the requirements are actually generous, but the experience requirement is gaudy. You can no longer horse + holy weapon your way through; now, everyone from Sigurd to Arden needs a ton of level ups. Not quite as tricky as SSS-rank.

3. Blazing Sword's HHM S-rank is also really tough, as the player needs to juggle experience and funds with turns taken. You're forced to cycle through pitifully underleveled units to keep your experience totals up, and those "weak" FE7 enemies start feeling quite intimidating. Smart arena use makes this rank run manageable, though, moreso than the two modes above it.

From here, I guess I'd probably go Lunatic+ then Lunatic Reverse then H5. When you don't need to worry about various requirements, as in 4/5/7, Fire Emblem is a pretty easy series.

[Irysa]

Ehhhh.

I don't really like ranking games based on scoring criteria, because you don't need to attempt to obtain a good rank to complete the game. The rank isn't an objective unless the player sets it to be one, it is simply a measurement of the end result of the player's playthrough. In this sense, it's not any different from any other self imposed challenge - the player chooses to aim for a particular objective (S Rank) of their own volition.

For example, the game also measures your turns and time spent playing. But just beacuse these numbers are all logged and shown at the end doesn't mean that somehow it consistutes as a separate "mode" or anything, speedruns and LTCs are just as arbitrary.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Irysa

[feplus]

I'd argue that's a clear qualitative difference between a raw number and a ranking.

If I set out to complete Genealogy as fast as possible, that's a challenge run; the game doesn't reward me and the game doesn't expect it of me. But the game does expect certain players will attempt to AAAA-rank the game (and actually rewards a successful player with a new Opening Demo battle, so there's something tangible in this case). If you LTC Blazing Sword, nothing happens; if you S-rank Blazing Sword, the Battle History screen is filled up with golden stars and flashing green letters. You could not have done any better. No more starts to get. Congratulations.

In other words, a challenge run is player-imposed while a ranked run is game-imposed. In the case of Genealogy, a ranked run even offers a tangible reward.

If you think that ranked runs don't count because "the player chooses to aim for a particular objective of their own volition," what are your thoughts on higher difficulties? Those are optional, too. Should we start comparing Awakening Normal to Shadow Dragon Normal?

[Irysa]

The higher difficulties are optional, but they are separate "modes" that can be individually examined and compared, and to complete each mode you have to overcome the challenges presented. FE4, 5, 6, 7 and 12 do not have a "ranked mode" or anything of the sort, the games simply rank you all the time.

If Fire Emblem had more of a visible and clearly understandable ranking system, or the games were clearly designed around the ranking, then I'd be less opposed to what you're proposing. But really, most of the requirements and goals required to achieve these "maximum scores" or ranks are pretty cryptic (or absurd, in the case of funds), and the core game doesn't suffer terribly if a player doesn't aim for better rankings. There are games that are clearly designed around scoring, and without them become relatively shallow, uninteresting affairs, but the Fire Emblem series is not one of them.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Irysa

[feplus]

Would you consider ranked runs "legitimate" in-game runs if they were selected from the main menu (so in addition to Hector Normal and Hector Hard, you'd have Hector Normal Ranked and Hector Hard Ranked)? Or if rankings tables were presented in-game?

I'm of the opinion that 4, 5, and (especially 7) are designed with rankings in mind. I could go into detail if you're interested. 6 not so much, since the turn requirement is exceedingly generous and the funds requirement is very buggy.

[Gradivus.]

I don't see why it'd make sense to give the player the same mode twice since it hardly makes a difference gameplay-wise, and not just mentioning the ranks in-game on regular HHM runs. they may be designed with ranks in mind, but it's still self-imposed to care about those, actually only the fact that you do get ranks (no matter if good ones) is a given.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Gradivus.

[Irysa]

Would you consider ranked runs "legitimate" in-game runs if they were selected from the main menu (so in addition to Hector Normal and Hector Hard, you'd have Hector Normal Ranked and Hector Hard Ranked)? Or if rankings tables were presented in-game?

I'm of the opinion that 4, 5, and (especially 7) are designed with rankings in mind. I could go into detail if you're interested. 6 not so much, since the turn requirement is exceedingly generous and the funds requirement is very buggy.

I suppose I should probably be clear that I don't have a problem with the concept of making a list of "most difficult FE games to complete with the best ranking" or whatnot, I simply don't think you can compare a selectable difficulty like Lunatic to S ranking a game.

A selectable mode for ranking is unfortunately not enough to make it comparable though, since all it means is that you get a score presented to you/put onto a leaderboard. Unless the game actually ends if you fail to meet the ranking requirements for a particular map, the objective of "completing the game" would still be the primary consideration in regards to difficulty. If the game did have such failstates, to me that would leave no question to the actual challenge of the mode, regardless of whether or not these ranking requirements were clearly presented or not. That being said, if they aren't presented in a clear, or at least fairly discernable manner then I'd argue it as pretty bad design.

I don't really agree that they are designed "solely" with ranking in mind. FE7 clearly has some thought put into it, but the game does not rely on it in order for it to be a fufilling game.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Irysa

[feplus]

@Gradivus: I worry about using "self-imposed care" as a difficulty metric, since, as I mentioned earlier, one could argue that higher difficulties are also self-imposed. Why not just play on the easiest settings?

@Irysa: Needing a fail state is an intriguing requirement. I don't quite buy it (and stick by my standard of "game-imposed vs. player-imposed"), but I do understand where you're coming from. Not having a fail state certainly makes a mode "feel" more optional, since the game itself progresses regardless of how your rankings fare. To me, though, this is just a feeling, and player-monitored (compared to player-imposed) runs still qualify as a legitimate, in-game difficulty option. Agree to disagree.

My earlier wording was imprecise. When I say "designed with rankings in mind," what I should have said was: rankings in 4, 5, and 7 complement design choices in their respective games, iron out balancing issues, and enhance the experience. That requires a pretty thorough explanation, I hope that later today I'll have time to detail my thoughts in this thread.

[Irysa]

@Gradivus: I worry about using "self-imposed care" as a difficulty metric, since, as I mentioned earlier, one could argue that higher difficulties are also self-imposed. Why not just play on the easiest settings?

This is a relevant criticism if we are simply judging each game as a package. However we are not, we're ranking individual modes.

@Irysa: Needing a fail state is an intriguing requirement. I don't quite buy it (and stick by my standard of "game-imposed vs. player-imposed"), but I do understand where you're coming from. Not having a fail state certainly makes a mode "feel" more optional, since the game itself progresses regardless of how your rankings fare. To me, though, this is just a feeling, and player-monitored (compared to player-imposed) runs still qualify as a legitimate, in-game difficulty option. Agree to disagree.

Sure, but just to add on - I don't really believe games can "impose" behaviour on a player without being restrictive or using negative reinforcement. Positive reinforcement encourages particular styles of play, wheras failure and penalities force particular styles of play. To impose, the game must impede you in some manner, and the Ranking metrics clearly don't. By extension, if the game is tedious or dull unless a player plays in a particular way, I'd say that would broadly fit under negative reinforcement too. (getting bogged down in super powerful reinforcements, getting status staffed all over the place, etc)

My earlier wording was imprecise. When I say "designed with rankings in mind," what I should have said was: rankings in 4, 5, and 7 complement design choices in their respective games, iron out balancing issues, and enhance the experience. That requires a pretty thorough explanation, I hope that later today I'll have time to detail my thoughts in this thread.

Oh absoloutely. They most definitely do have legitimate considerations in their design towards ranking, and I wouldn't need you to outline them as such to agree (but feel free to do so anyway). However, I'm trying to say that the games are not wanting for ways to keep people engaged. There's a strong driving narrative for one! The basic tenants of strategy aren't especially demanding for FE7 but they're enough to keep the player stimulated in a moment to moment process as well.

Comparably, a game like say, Viewtiful Joe is pretty much trash if the scoring isn't taken into account. The game has absoloutely no depth in any respect unless a player is focused on scoring, beacuse the basic platforming is dry, the puzzles are bland, enemies are all really easy to defeat, bosses rarely have more than 3 easy to avoid attacks and are really just mooks with big HP bars for all intents and purposes. Without aiming to get a high score with stylish gameplay, it's an extremely dull action game.

Fire Emblem is not so dull as to be unengaging without ranking. That's why I don't believe it's a primary concern, because if it was, it would be in more of the games.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Irysa

[kaldson0]

1.luntic plus on fe 13 just dont try.

2.fe6 THE BOSSES JUST WONT STOP DODGING!

3.fe7 stupid WHY CANT WE JUST LET ZEPHIAL DIE!

4.fe4 we have sigurd thats why its not higher.

5.fe8 its the last of what ive played so it has to go here.