How to make 'useless units' desirable

[Espinosa]

I had this idea when thinking about the viability of some units. Units are useless if they fail to contribute to a certain, be it efficiency (however we understand that notion), or patient accumulation of stats until 20/20 before which prior performance can be disregarded.

Imagine Wolt from FE6. He's agreed to be one of the poorest units in the game, but players do give him credit for one thing. That thing is his existence in the early maps of the game where you haven't got anyone who you'd replace Wolt with, he's forced, his hits are pretty accurate, he doubles most soldiers, etc. Even in chapter 4 where enemies suddenly get really bulky, Wolt can do something like block the enemies' path to a really weak unit so that they (the unit) don't die.

However, competition for deployment slots pushes Wolt out of the list of remotely viable units as soon as you start recruiting all the countless characters the game throws at you. Eventually you have a list of outclassed units, some of whom are just downright terrible.

Now here comes my proposal. If it's failure to compete with other units that make characters inferior as options presented before the player, one either has to balance the cast in a way that makes them all useful in some way (which game achieves this best by the way, would it be Awakening?) or remove the necessity to compete against the better units out there.

So instead, how about the player gets ONE (or maybe TWO) extra deployment slots that are entirely free. The player can opt not to make use of any of them, but what makes this/these deployment slots special is that they're limited to those really inferior units, like Sophia, Wendy, etc. You could either not make use of any of them at all, but since the character could appear and fill in this slot anytime, it wouldn't hurt if you put some effort into raising such a unit.

Good idea? Bad idea? Curious what everyone thinks about the matter.

Edited April 9, 2015 by Espinosa

[General Horace]

There's simply no game that makes every unit useful in some way, unless you really twist things like saying Virion has a use in like, uh Chapter 2 or 5 in awakening or some weaker kid like Inigo is useful if you pair Olivia with Robin and he just has veteran (while denying it to better characters). Even your Wolt example is stretching it. By chapter 4 he's doing like 2-4 damage to enemies and not doubling. He can't really protect weaker units when he's one of them himself.

Theoretically FE4 has no competition for deployment slots, and people totally blow the whole "unmounted units are useless in fe4" thing totally out of proportion, even a mediocre foot unit like Holyn is generally better than any foot unit that isn't a staff user that the GBA games can provide. It might have been the best if not for horrid units like Ardan and Hannibal.

That being said, I think the only totally useless unit that I can think of off the top of my head is Wendy. Sophia at least gets a guiding ring, and Hannibal can actually kill things if he gets close enough. Most bad units like Ewan and Nino and the like don't actually take that much effort to use, they just suck.

I prefer Fire Emblem that way though, can you imagine how boring games would be if units were all equally as useful as one another? It makes sense storywise too, it makes sense that a seasoned veteran like Jeigan starts off stronger that your other, younger guys and they eventually surpass him, but for someone like Seth, it makes sense that he's super strong the entire game since there's no real reason for his performance to drop or him not to be able to improve.

Edited April 9, 2015 by General Horace

[Yojinbo]

Wolt doesn't magically stop being bad just because the game offers a deployment slot specifically reserved for bad units like him. Your suggestion wouldn't really solve the issue at hand.

I think FE5 is the game with the least amount of useless units. There's Tanya, Ronan and Shanan that won't reward you for investing resources into them, everybody else can become decent at worst. FE9 also doesn't have any units that are completely worthless just because of how easy the game is. Not sure if that should count.

[KP 2010]

I still don't think they would be able to contribute much besides very minor chipping (and rescue/dropping for the mounted units but they're not really low on the tier list anyway).

I doubt in FE6 they will really be given much EXP because at the end of the day, it's a zero-sum game (unless you're a dancer/healer) and they don't provide enough benefit to warrant being fed EXP.

I think the difference is that in the early-game, Wolt has the ability to provide some decent damage output (and relative to the rest of the team, he isn't too bad). However, later on, the enemies become too strong and your team is also a lot stronger so his contribution is quite minimal even with free deployment.

Sophia and Wendy's accuracy and survivability are simply too poor. But I guess the free deployment slots would be useful for sleep/berserk distraction (although that's not the point of it).

I think your idea would only help characters that are already good (like additional healers/mid-tier and above attackers) but obviously, that's not the point.

Edited April 9, 2015 by KP 2010

[General Horace]

Wolt doesn't magically stop being bad just because the game offers a deployment slot specifically reserved for bad units like him. Your suggestion wouldn't really solve the issue at hand.

I think FE5 is the game with the least amount of useless units. There's Tanya, Ronan and Shanan that won't reward you for investing resources into them, everybody else can become decent at worst. FE9 also doesn't have any units that are completely worthless just because of how easy the game is. Not sure if that should count.

Even Tanya and Ronan aren't really that bad, they come early, and have their perks (Ronan has high movement and move stars, and Tanya's growths are honestly pretty good) and at least Shanam has BARGAIN and makes Mareeta better. FE5 enemies other than bosses are pretty bad too.

FE5 might be the best example I guess, although the gap between your best units and worst units is among the highest in the series.

Edited April 9, 2015 by General Horace

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

this wouldn't change anything, the units themselves would have to be rebalanced to fit a specialty.

[Magical Glace]

Wouldn't it be simpler to just raise their stats.

I'm all for Wolt being usable, he's my favorite character and all... but this seems needlessly complicated and having the game specifically define the line between sucks and doesn't suck is kinda silly.

[Thor Odinson]

I think not every unit needs to be equally good -- since there's no way of doing that reasonably anyway and realistically some people simply outperform others, but every unit (joke units aside) should be at least viable and also should fill at least some kind of niche within their class.

Hell, Shanam still had bargain.

Edited April 9, 2015 by Thor Odinson

[Espinosa]

There's simply no game that makes every unit useful in some way, unless you really twist things like saying Virion has a use in like, uh Chapter 2 or 5 in awakening or some weaker kid like Inigo is useful if you pair Olivia with Robin and he just has veteran (while denying it to better characters). Even your Wolt example is stretching it. By chapter 4 he's doing like 2-4 damage to enemies and not doubling. He can't really protect weaker units when he's one of them himself.

Virion is still a useful pair-up partner giving people +2 str, +2 def, being able to contribute in damage while his partner takes the punishment, and then reclass to wyvern rider upon reaching 10/0. I'd say that's a lot better than other 'useless units' we know by now.

And Wolt is just specifically bad in that one chapter; characters don't just always shine (cavs in the desert for example). He's not piercing cavs if he hasn't been gaining any strength, but if you've been levelling him up and he got Dorothy's Steel Bow, his chip damage becomes substantial (in a tough game like this), he can nail the wyverns really well (making chapter 7 easier for example) and he'll ORKO a soldier if you need somebody to do it without distracting the stronger characters in your army. It's not much, but it's better than not being there.

I thought how a useless unit is still better than a "no-unit" most of the time, so this could be one solution - allow the player to choose between fielding a weak guy and not fielding anyone in that spot at all.

Theoretically FE4 has no competition for deployment slots, and people totally blow the whole "unmounted units are useless in fe4" thing totally out of proportion, even a mediocre foot unit like Holyn is generally better than any foot unit that isn't a staff user that the GBA games can provide. It might have been the best if not for horrid units like Ardan and Hannibal.

Well, if unmounted units were really that useless, Lachesis would never reach that promotion of hers on time, would she?

I prefer Fire Emblem that way though, can you imagine how boring games would be if units were all equally as useful as one another? It makes sense storywise too, it makes sense that a seasoned veteran like Jeigan starts off stronger that your other, younger guys and they eventually surpass him, but for someone like Seth, it makes sense that he's super strong the entire game since there's no real reason for his performance to drop or him not to be able to improve.

Yeah, I doubt everything can be completely balanced out. For example, Thany in FE6 has the utility of a flier but in a context with growths and room for RNG manipulation, players can turn her into somebody who facerolls the game for them given some initial training. I bet any attempt of "balancing" wouldn't be that particular when players really scrutinise and apply everything they know about what works and what doesn't and how they can exploit it - to a game.

Wolt doesn't magically stop being bad just because the game offers a deployment slot specifically reserved for bad units like him. Your suggestion wouldn't really solve the issue at hand.

I think FE5 is the game with the least amount of useless units. There's Tanya, Ronan and Shanan that won't reward you for investing resources into them, everybody else can become decent at worst. FE9 also doesn't have any units that are completely worthless just because of how easy the game is. Not sure if that should count.

He wouldn't stop being bad, but he's start being present. He'd compete against other useless units like him for that free deployment slot, and the player would have a reason to invest into him because it helps to have Wolt around instead of an empty space in the army.

Everyone is sorta good in FE5 because of the scrolls, no? I like how the scrolls were handled in TearRingSaga. They weren't nearly as gamechanging there.

Wouldn't it be simpler to just raise their stats.

I'm all for Wolt being usable, he's my favorite character and all... but this seems needlessly complicated and having the game specifically define the line between sucks and doesn't suck is kinda silly.

Every archer unit should be like Shinon or Holmes in TRS and less like... nearly every other archer out there.

Yeah, I can definitely agree with the silliness part, but from a theoryFE perspective I thought it worth addressing regardless.

Characters have different degrees of usefulness, and when some lose to everyone else it means they don't show up at all. If they can be featured in your strategies at no opportunity cost, that would fix their 'lack of presence' problem, not necessarily making them better units.

[Jedi]

Every archer unit should be like Shinon or Holmes in TRS and less like... nearly every other archer out there.

Yeah, I can definitely agree with the silliness part, but from a theoryFE perspective I thought it worth addressing regardless.

Characters have different degrees of usefulness, and when some lose to everyone else it means they don't show up at all. If they can be featured in your strategies at no opportunity cost, that would fix their 'lack of presence' problem, not necessarily making them better units.

The main issue is that IS doesn't give good bases to their archers (save Ryan) unless they are snipers. This is as clear as day even in FE6, Igrene and Klein are really solid while.. Wolt and Dorothy suffer.

[NinjaMonkey]

If you could somehow infinite grinding and reclassing, then the problem is essentially solved, right?

Edited April 9, 2015 by NinjaMonkey

[Jedi]

Allowing infinite grinding and reclassing = problem solved.

This still doesn't solve the issue for those who want solid units without having to baby weaklings from the ground. While appealing to some (including myself in my more casual runs), it doesn't appeal to everyone.

Seth is still considered (rightly) the best in such a game regardless for instance.

Edited April 9, 2015 by Jedi

[Yojinbo]

Everyone is sorta good in FE5 because of the scrolls, no?

Scrolls and the fact that stats universally cap at 20.

[Jedi]

Scrolls and the fact that stats universally cap at 20.

I always found it odd how the universe 20 stat cap is in the same game with the 80 Hp cap.

[Irysa]

I thought how a useless unit is still better than a "no-unit" most of the time, so this could be one solution - allow the player to choose between fielding a weak guy and not fielding anyone in that spot at all.

Honestly, units like Wolt become greater liabilities than they are helpful in FE6 on many maps. He can't keep up without being rescuedropped, a luxury that we can only afford to units like Roy and Rutger, and he is vulnerable to dying horribly due to his very slow exp gain and weak bases. Wolt's biggest contributions aren't even actually chipping enemies, they're participating in rescue drops or trade chains before we get a preparation screen since his con allows him to rescue a few other units (including Roy). Keep in mind that FE6 also has very generous deployment slot limits, there usually is room for a crap unit or two in there, but they simply don't really help regardless.

However, you do raise a fair point that enemies such as Soldiers make it easier for units like Wolt to contribute. This is because high HP/low Def and high Mt enemies create more opportunities for multiple units to help out securing a KO on a target, and being able to weaken them first from range safely also becomes very good. This design shift is something you see in the DS games and to an extent, Awakening, enemies are generally defensively weak but have very high HP totals and hit hard.

Edited April 9, 2015 by Irysa

[General Horace]

Honestly, units like Wolt become greater liabilities than they are helpful in FE6 on many maps. He can't keep up without being rescuedropped, a luxury that we can only afford to units like Roy and Rutger, and he is vulnerable to dying horribly due to his very slow exp gain and weak bases. Wolt's biggest contributions aren't even actually chipping enemies, they're participating in rescue drops or trade chains before we get a preparation screen since his con allows him to rescue a few other units (including Roy). Keep in mind that FE6 also has very generous deployment slot limits, there usually is room for a crap unit or two in there, but they simply don't really help regardless.

This is another big thing with bad units. Even if you never use the rescue function and/or play slowly, oftentimes i'd rather have nothing than have Wolt.

The best units in most games (early pegasus knights) really aren't that fantastic when they're not getting strength every level, or dodging all lethal attacks. Under that context, the units that can move the farthest will always be the best. Lyn Mode!Florina aside, the average Vanessa and especially the average Thany are pretty mediocre, yet still flexible units. When they're turning out according to their growths, someone like Dieck is argueablely more valuable than Thany, and uh, Vanessa's actually still pretty good compared to the other early units in FE8, they're pretty bad. A really awesome flying unit is pretty rare. Miledy and to a lesser extent Heath are theoretically stronger than Thany and Florina, but it doesn't always work out that way either.

What i'm trying to say in short is when you force the gap between your best units and your worst units to be bigger, the bad units become totally unusable, and you get a scenerio like Irysa mentioned above, you don't wanna deploy level 3 Wolt in Chapter 9.

[Czar_Yoshi]

There's simply no game that makes every unit useful in some way, unless you really twist things like saying Virion has a use in like, uh Chapter 2 or 5 in awakening or some weaker kid like Inigo is useful if you pair Olivia with Robin and he just has veteran (while denying it to better characters).

Virion has major issues with soaking up enemy phase exp that cause him to have a lot more trouble training up than other units in a low deployment context. On Hard/full deployment, your units are consistently either weak enough that his chip is greatly appreciated (he's got a complete monopoly on Bows for a large part of the game, and if you reclass Robin and don't train Miriel could realistically be your only ranged unit for a few chapters), or strong enough that you can keep your team safe through player phase offense, in which case his ability to get kills from range is very useful. Bows and decent bulk also make him one of the better units for holding chokes midgame.

Regardless of whether or not you find him useful (I do), he also makes up for any ingame shortcomings by being one of the best fathers in the game.

Inigo has a hard paralogue and typically low bases, but in return has a good base class, and is one of only two non-Morgan male children in the game who doesn't have a problem with initial weapon ranks (a big deal when both Avatar-M and Chrom have daughters, and most of Avatar's best wives do too- there's a shortage of good 2nd gen males). Since he still has the standard fast 2nd gen growths, he can wear off his low stats in fairly good time (definitely better time than it takes the likes of Brady and Yarne to make up for having no weapon ranks and no decent base skills). No Second Seal required, either (though his Paralogue does sell those, which is actually another point in his favor).

Postgame he's a galeboy who can go either magical or physical. What more do you want?

[General Horace]

Virion has major issues with soaking up enemy phase exp that cause him to have a lot more trouble training up than other units in a low deployment context. On Hard/full deployment, your units are consistently either weak enough that his chip is greatly appreciated (he's got a complete monopoly on Bows for a large part of the game, and if you reclass Robin and don't train Miriel could realistically be your only ranged unit for a few chapters), or strong enough that you can keep your team safe through player phase offense, in which case his ability to get kills from range is very useful. Bows and decent bulk also make him one of the better units for holding chokes midgame.

Regardless of whether or not you find him useful (I do), he also makes up for any ingame shortcomings by being one of the best fathers in the game.

Inigo has a hard paralogue and typically low bases, but in return has a good base class, and is one of only two non-Morgan male children in the game who doesn't have a problem with initial weapon ranks (a big deal when both Avatar-M and Chrom have daughters, and most of Avatar's best wives do too- there's a shortage of good 2nd gen males). Since he still has the standard fast 2nd gen growths, he can wear off his low stats in fairly good time (definitely better time than it takes the likes of Brady and Yarne to make up for having no weapon ranks and no decent base skills). No Second Seal required, either (though his Paralogue does sell those, which is actually another point in his favor).

Postgame he's a galeboy who can go either magical or physical. What more do you want?

None of these things appeal to me since I don't play postgame (with the exception of the earlygame virion chip, which he's worse than Robin and Miriel at), and pairing Olivia if she's dancing takes a while, so by the time Inigo exists, he's likely totally useless in my experience (on hard, not even on lunatic). He's decent early on in lunatic for avoiding counters but it's not something you need on any other mode, Frederick or any physical unit he pairs with are very strong on the enemy phase for a long time, which obseletes Virion's value.

I can understand why you think they're good though. I just don't care for the game past beating grima, or use DLC or anything ingame to get a few extra levels on weaker units. Just different playstyles I suppose.

Although I am curious, what makes Virion a good father? I wouldn't think any of his classes give particular good skills for postgame stuff, although I could be missing something.

Edited April 9, 2015 by General Horace

[Psych]

I agree with Horace that, in theory, FE4 and FE5 are the games with the best cast balance. FE4, you want to use all the females because of children, and you want to use all their husbands. Then you have things like Dew for money, horse units are just good, and most of gen 1 foot units are just good. The only one left out is Ardan, but the game tries to get you to use him, what with the Pursuit Ring and even forcing a game over if you lose the home castle, making you want to use someone to defend it. In practice, the player never really has a moment where the castle is really in danger, since Chapter 1 probably being the prime example, Eltoshan just comes in and saves your ass.

FE5 tries to use things like capturing being required for items and money and fatigue to make you use pretty much everyone, and it works, except you can basically just juggle your max units plus like 3 or 4 more to wipe fatigue of important people for events or thieves for chests and stuff. And Warp breaks everything, but that's another boat and not super required.

[NinjaMonkey]

Inigo has a hard paralogue and typically low bases, but in return has a good base class, and is one of only two non-Morgan male children in the game who doesn't have a problem with initial weapon ranks

I thought that all of the child units (apart from Nah, obviously) started with C ranks for all their weapons...

Edited April 10, 2015 by NinjaMonkey

[Irysa]

@Horace and Czar

I think even ignoring a playstyle difference, Virion can be useful. VirionxFred is a useful support earlygame on Lunatic if you are marrying Sumia to Chrom or are trying to train multiple units. Kellam and Vaike have comparable boosts but don't actually support Fred, and the extra Hit, Avo, and Ddg are definitely welcome, especially given the prominence of early crit enemies and Frederick's terrible luck stat. Virion also builds support levels with Fred extremely quickly since it is a same sex support combo, meaning he is not losing as hard in pairup bonuses as one may initially think. Admittedly his usefulness here is more in augmenting Frederick rather than anything else, and Sumia makes Fred contribute more, but some people wanna marry Chrom and Sumia yo.

I thought that all of the child units started with C ranks for all their weapons...

Brady has D in Staves and Yarne and Nah have nothing because they use stones.

Edited April 10, 2015 by Irysa

[Ownagepuffs]

Awakening does a pretty good job. You could train someone just for their pair up bonuses if you wanted to.

None of these things appeal to me since I don't play postgame (with the exception of the earlygame virion chip, which he's worse than Robin and Miriel at), and pairing Olivia if she's dancing takes a while, so by the time Inigo exists, he's likely totally useless in my experience (on hard, not even on lunatic). He's decent early on in lunatic for avoiding counters but it's not something you need on any other mode, Frederick or any physical unit he pairs with are very strong on the enemy phase for a long time, which obseletes Virion's value.

I can understand why you think they're good though. I just don't care for the game past beating grima, or use DLC or anything ingame to get a few extra levels on weaker units. Just different playstyles I suppose.

Although I am curious, what makes Virion a good father? I wouldn't think any of his classes give particular good skills for postgame stuff, although I could be missing something.

Good modifiers and good classes (Sages and Snipers are all the rage and Wyverns rock). That's the jist.

@Horace and Czar

I think even ignoring a playstyle difference, Virion can be useful. VirionxFred is a useful support earlygame on Lunatic if you are marrying Sumia to Chrom or are trying to train multiple units. Kellam and Vaike have comparable boosts but don't actually support Fred, and the extra Hit, Avo, and Ddg are definitely welcome, especially given the prominence of early crit enemies and Frederick's terrible luck stat. Virion also builds support levels with Fred extremely quickly since it is a same sex support combo, meaning he is not losing as hard in pairup bonuses as one may initially think. Admittedly his usefulness here is more in augmenting Frederick rather than anything else, and Sumia makes Fred contribute more, but some people wanna marry Chrom and Sumia yo.

Chromia does have a significantly better long term. Stronger Sumia, stronger Cynthia, t3h geylfurse Lucina. It's a lead that extends all the way into the post game. Frederick's flame will always burn out by Fort Steiger/C17. Unlike SD Jagen you can't just forge an effective weapon to keep him going, either. If you're doing Robin x Chrom then Fred x Sumia is definitely the best option, though.

I have really never noticed Fred's luck stat. Is it actually bad?

[Irysa]

6 Base and 40% growth when you are lucky to get a level a map is pretty bad yes.