Where would you rank Fates (Difficulty wise) against the rest of the series?

[Avalanche]

Now that we've all had some time to play with each route, I was just curious where you all would rank each of Birthright, Conquest and Revelation (on Normal, Hard and Lunatic) In comparison to other games in the series? Bare in mind this is purely focused on gameplay, character and story be damned in this thread.

Edited April 10, 2016 by Avalanche

[Sentacotus]

I think Conquest is definitely one of the harder Fire Emblem games in the series some chapters are pretty brutal especially if you are doing a classic no grind run like its marketed to be. Birthright is a step above Awakening in difficulty due to nerfed pair up but not too hard. Don't know about Revelations haven't played it yet.

[BANRYU]

Def pretty tough. I went into Conquest planning to play it like FE7 (my first game / barometer of general quality and difficulty), and found it to be significantly harder. Not quite RD hard, I think, (or maybe I'm a poor indicator of that, having never finished RD), but definitely up there.

[Thor Odinson]

Only did Lunatic on each so I have no clue what normal and hard are like--not that I think I can even rank normal mode anymore since I'll probably lump them all into "this is easy"

but I'd say FE12 L/rev feel the hardest still, Conquest L is solidly harder than Awakening L, debatable about L+ since chapter 2 is the one glaringly bullshit chapter in the otherwise fine L+ design, and I actually didn't find most of Conquest L that hard either--midgame is still midgame and every midgame of every FE ever is easy there's no way around it--but I think CQ 25/26/28 is a bit harder than Awakening L+'s lategame.

Birthright is on average easier than Awakening L since nothing quite matches up to Awakening L earlygame difficulty, though I think its lategame is also stronger if you "moderately use" Ryoma instead of press him to win. Definitely harder than Awakening hard, though--I did both as my first runs of each respective games and I still reset more on BR--though most of it is just forgetting attack stance worked for the enemy too. I'd put it around FE6 Hard? I can't say higher or lower since I played FE6 way more times than BR Lunatic so I can trivialize the shit out of FE6 at this point, but it's somewhere around that region. Dream of Five's harder than Birthright Lunatic though

Revelation is imo the easiest route. Early on the enemies are buffer than BR's but there's not even an attempt at a lategame difficulty spike (instead, chapter 26 is the "ryoma is already invincible? Cool, let's make him more invincible" the chapter, hello 40 avo field). Even earlier on the buffer enemies just made everything take longer to kill instead of actually putting pressure on me. Kinda like FE11 H5 earlygame, now that I think about it.

so I guess for me personally, out of the ones I played enough to remember, it's

FE12 Lreverse > FE12 L > FE13 L+ > CQ L ??? FE5 Blind > FE13 L > FE6 H ~ BR L > Rev L > FE4 > FE5 not blind > HHM > PoR H > FE8 H > Awakening H > Things that aren't hard mode after hard modes start existing probably also I've played RD like, once 5 years ago so I can't really place it period

Edited April 10, 2016 by Thor Odinson

[MCProductions]

For me, FE difficulty hardest to easiest is

FE5>FE6>FE3>FE14C>FE10>FE7>FE14R>FE4>FE13>FE9>FE2>FE8>FE14B

I didn't rank the remakes or vanilla FE1, as it's been a while since I've played them due to me considering FE3 superior in every way

[joshcja]

Fe12

Conquest

Thracia 776

Everything else

Awakening

Birthright

Revelations

@Thor: Just roll +def avatar on lunatic/+hp on lunatic+ awakening and snowball off prolouge into quadforce inheritance + sol/sorc spam. The game becomes a joke even with high deployment, no grind, no reset, iron man.

Edited April 10, 2016 by joshcja

[Lady Sansa]

Conquest is up there with New Mystery/Binding Blade. Birthright/Rev are toward the bottom, though still harder than Path of Sacred Radiant Stones.

[-Cynthia-]

I would say Conquest is one of the harder FEs, easier than FE12 Lunatic though. Maybe somewhere around FE6, FE6 weighs its difficulty higher in the early chapters and Conquest is more difficult later, though neither of them ever really drop sharply.

I would say Birthright Lunatic is like FE7 HHM. Easy most of the time, but a few chapters here and there might trip you up (Ch23 is like Cog of Destiny or something).

I'd say Revelation Lunatic is most like Awakening Lunatic, where the difficulty comes from inflated enemy stats early and then the enemy stats level off and it's pretty easy. There are a few challenges later in the game though- rooms full of ninjas are always gonna be a bitch.

Edited April 10, 2016 by -Cynthia-

[Thor Odinson]

@Thor: Just roll +def avatar on lunatic/+hp on lunatic+ awakening and snowball off prolouge into quadforce inheritance + sol/sorc spam. The game becomes a joke even with high deployment, no grind, no reset, iron man.

I rated Awakening high not because it's hard

but because I think the rest of the series is easy

I think basically everything is easy bar like 4 chapters of CQ, Awakening earlygame, and FE12

And Awakening's up there because it at least has earlygame to trip me up with vs everything else that doesn't

Edited April 10, 2016 by Thor Odinson

[Avalanche]

Anybody know if the Difficulty Tier List is still floating around? I figured I could update it for anyone curious where they should start in Fates.

[joshcja]

I rated Awakening high not because it's hard

but because I think the rest of the series is easy

I think basically everything is easy bar like 4 chapters of CQ, Awakening earlygame, and FE12, basically

Go play rev-luna 12 no DLC :P (Bonus points if you rock fem archer MU)

Past that uuuh, Thracia is an enourmous nub trap with fun exp spreads?

Everything else is pretty easy though.

Edited April 10, 2016 by joshcja

[Thor Odinson]

man if i didn't hate DS emulation I actually might haha (i don't hate myself that much though wrt archer mu)

I mean Thracia's literally listed as my favorite FE and my favorite past time is breaking the shit out of Thracia

no kill like hilarious overkill

Edited April 10, 2016 by Thor Odinson

[joshcja]

man if i didn't hate DS emulation I actually might haha (i don't hate myself that much though wrt archer mu)

I mean Thracia's literally listed as my favorite FE and my favorite past time is breaking the shit out of Thracia

no kill like hilarious overkill

Yeah, Thracia just has a steeper learning curve for news. It caps out pretty low overall.

Man, you are missing out. Desmume has gotten a lot less shit recently if you kill the big frameaters in options, I get it to run around 50-60 fps on my garbo laptop. The second wave DS games Fe12, AWDoR (and ofc Conquest) are probably the best things IS ever made in terms of raw gameplay.

Bows are 10x better in fe12 than they are in conquest, archer MU is actually legit on luna/luna-rev you just have to know how the games AI manip works to actually get out of the games lyn mode lol (12 has a 100% manipulable AI, it would be broken if it wasn't set to murder the unholy shit out of you as hard as it possibly can). So suggesting it was less pointless sadism and more.. helpful sadism?

Edited April 10, 2016 by joshcja

[Sentinel07]

I've played every localized game on Normal mode.

Comparatively speaking, I think Conquest might be the hardest of all localized games. Not even Radiant Dawn gave me this much trouble.

Birthright is probably slightly harder than Awakening.

[Book Bro]

I've never really tried to list the games in order of difficulty but I think I would say:

Hardest

Conquest

Radiant Dawn

Binding Blade

Fire Emblem

Shadow Dragon

Path of Radiance

Sacred Stones

Birthright

Revelation

Awakening

Easiest

Keeping in mind I'm a non-lunatic scrub.

[Thor Odinson]

Yeah Thracia just has a steeper learning curve for news. It caps out not terribly high.

Desmume has gotten a lot less shit recently if you kill the big frameaters in options, I get it to run around 50-60 fps on my garbo laptop. The second wave DS games (Fe12, AWDoR) and ofc Conquest are probably the best things IS ever made in terms of raw gameplay.

Bows are 10x better in fe12 than they are in conquest, archer MU is actually legit on luna/luna-rev you just have to know how the games AI manip works to actually get out of the games lyn mode lol (12 has a 100% manipulable AI, it would be broken if it wasn't set to murder the unholy shit out of you as hard as it possibly can). So suggesting it was less pointless sadism and more.. helpful sadism?

I'm aware of 12's AI, I've done it way back when--I did 12 when I had a much slower computer years ago and everything would overheat all the time

I just don't like playing female on 12 bc it's half the classes i get access to

no horseman no lyfe

Edited April 10, 2016 by Thor Odinson

[joshcja]

I'm aware of 12's AI, I've done it way back when--I did 12 when I had a much slower computer years ago and everything would overheat all the time

I just don't like playing female on 12 bc it's half the classes i get access to

no horseman no lyfe

Pfft, Ryan is love, Ryan is life.

Shinon a shit. Takawhomi?

Edited April 10, 2016 by joshcja

[Thor Odinson]

Pfft, Ryan is love, Ryan is life.

pls i'd rather stuff all the boosters into navarre again

I don't use characters I don't like regardless of how good they are

[joshcja]

pls i'd rather stuff all the boosters into navarre again

I don't use characters I don't like regardless of how good they are

Blasphemy.

That bowl cut is raw sex.

[Aurabolt]

Hmm...I'd put Conquest-L+ in the top 3 behind HHM and RDVH, just ahead of FE6 and and FE5.

On the other end, Birthright behind Sacred Stones-Erika and just ahead of FE5.

...And yes, I've played 'em all.

[Loki Laufeyson]

Out of the games ive played, id say Conquest is pretty hard. I think the only one that edges it out, is possibly Hard Mode Radiant Dawn.

[eclipse]

Let's do Hard modes, since that's where I screw around the most.

Birthright - The difficulty comes from a blind run of Fates in general - there's a new weapon type that does weird things, units with equally weird weapons (lances and bows on a flying unit), a completely different mentality when it comes to shopping, a plethora of new skills, etc. Once the initial shock is over, it's not that bad.

Conquest - No grinding outside of DLC means that you, the player, need to plan stuff out ahead of time, which is somewhat difficult on a first run. After that, it's a matter of managing all the various nonsense the maps throw at you.

Revelations - Dumb map gimmicks aside, this felt like the easiest of the lot, because you can freely leverage both armories, and the unit distribution is outright weird.

Soooo. . .(using FE12 H1 and FE11 H3 just so I don't have to list a bajillion difficulties, and FE7 EHM is basically "reduced experience mode"):

FE12 H1 -> Conquest -> FE11 H3 -> FE7 HHM -> Awakening -> Birthright -> FE8 -> Revelations

Don't remember enough about FE6/FE9/FE10 to say. . .FE10 is somewhere up there in difficulty because of how badly the game is split, FE6 had a lot of resets due to bullshit throne hit rates, and I can't remember which Tellius game removed enemy attack ranges for no good reason. Haven't played FE5, and I don't have the patience for FE4.

[Loki Laufeyson]

Let's do Hard modes, since that's where I screw around the most.

Birthright - The difficulty comes from a blind run of Fates in general - there's a new weapon type that does weird things, units with equally weird weapons (lances and bows on a flying unit), a completely different mentality when it comes to shopping, a plethora of new skills, etc. Once the initial shock is over, it's not that bad.

Conquest - No grinding outside of DLC means that you, the player, need to plan stuff out ahead of time, which is somewhat difficult on a first run. After that, it's a matter of managing all the various nonsense the maps throw at you.

Revelations - Dumb map gimmicks aside, this felt like the easiest of the lot, because you can freely leverage both armories, and the unit distribution is outright weird.

Soooo. . .(using FE12 H1 and FE11 H3 just so I don't have to list a bajillion difficulties, and FE7 EHM is basically "reduced experience mode"):

FE12 H1 -> Conquest -> FE11 H3 -> FE7 HHM -> Awakening -> Birthright -> FE8 -> Revelations

Don't remember enough about FE6/FE9/FE10 to say. . .FE10 is somewhere up there in difficulty because of how badly the game is split, FE6 had a lot of resets due to bullshit throne hit rates, and I can't remember which Tellius game removed enemy attack ranges for no good reason. Haven't played FE5, and I don't have the patience for FE4.

The Tellius game that removed enemy attack ranges in its Hard Mode was Radiant Dawn.

I also agree that Rev is the easiest path on Fates.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Conquest Lunatic isn't hard. This might be a pretty biased opinion for me since there isn't a part in Conquest Lunatic where 1-2 of your units is 4 shot, while everyone else is doubled and one shot like in FE12 L and FE13 L

FE13, yeah kinda difficult early game, but mid and late game is a joke. Haven't finished Lunatic+ though

FE12 is definitely the hardest game ever made. I still remember when i need to take a surgery treatment not long after playing FE12. Game is too hard

[nordopolica]

Based on playing all of them on hard/classic, I'd say Conquest is definitely up there in the series' difficulty, but since I haven't played FE5, 2 or the original 1+3, I can't really comment on its overall ranking.

I'm playing through Binding Blade right now, and it certainly seems comparable to that, albeit I'd say the earlygame difficulty is derived from having a lack of units rather than the abundance you are given in earlygame BB. It's definitely above FE7 and FE8, but not quite as difficult as I found 10.

Birthright is easy, probably comparable to Hard mode Awakening if not a little easier, and Revelation is an absolute cakewalk. I'd say it's the easiest in the series, honestly, and is manageable for even the most casual player on Lunatic in my opinion (though Chapters 5 and 6 are a bit tricky).