I don't feel entirely satisfied with the current direction of FE

[Locke087]

I think forging is a positive mechanic as it lets you customize your arsenal to fit your playstyle or to boost a character that needs the help. For the issue of buying cheap weapons for forging, I could see a system where lower ranked weapons produce less crafting materials than higher ranked ones

That's why I originally I fell in love with forging when it was first introduced, it came of all these cool combinations that you could do and drove weapon variety through the roof. Sadly now with no weapon durability forging is actually having the opposite affect, forging now drives what I like to call weapon investment as it is far better idea to pick a weapon and continue to invest in that one weapon. It drives the question well I could buy a silver weapon or I could continue my investment with my steel weapon and have zero negatives. IS's stated goal with this weapon system was to create niches for weapons, beyond the usual price to power ratio that the old games worked on. Forging was originally built to expand on this price to power ratio which allows you to really expand your arsenal with weapons playing within the games existing systems by using the price and use ratios of the weapons.

Fates is using Forging while pretending to carry the same system as the old games, Fate system is not built off a price to power ratio as much as it is built on a foundation of positives and negatives. Fates forge was likely sparked from the question why would you ever buy another weapon of the same type? This is not a bad question to ask and they were on to the right kind of idea, the problem is that they thought basing forge entirely off a price to power ratio would be okay for this. It fundamentally is not because at the end of the day each swing is not a loss in gold, whatever weapon you forge will pay you back tenfold. Therefore forge must play with the balance system that fates has in place and negatives must come with positives, if Forge does stay, Forge must be adapted to Fates systems properly therefore Forging cannot be an entirely positive ordeal, for example what you forward your iron sword enough that starts getting close to the power of a steel one it should start getting minus speed, as steel nears the power of silver it starts receiving negatives. This would actual up weapon variety instead of driving it down and discouraging purchases of other weapons as you could really get creative with the minuses that different weapons receive.

Sorry for the long rant... just venting a little. Forging is entirely possible to be balanced in the system IS just has to be willing to bring Fates system to there logical extreme and let Forge inhabit the same system their weapons do it cannot exist outside of it.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Locke087

[Locke087]

Stupid Wifi...

Edited November 8, 2016 by Locke087

[Topaz Light]

On the topic of forging having downsides, what strikes me as a kind of interesting idea is the notion of all the weapon's stat points (to a, well, point) being pooled together, and forging the weapon basically lets you redistribute those points, but not increase the total. Or, at the very least, start charging extra if you want to increase the total number of points, and put a cap on it, like you can only go up to +5 stat increments from however many the weapon normally has or something. Of course, this doesn't cover things like debuffs, special properties, etc., but I think it's a sorta neat idea, at least.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Topaz Light

[DoctorSpectrum]

4.Pair up IS a blessing. Sure its got some flaws here and there especially with the guard meter but its nonetheless very helpful.

Oh yeah, I don't want to sound like I'm dissing it, because it's damn useful in both games and it's a cool mechanic. I just don't see it as being essential to the gameplay, hence why I put it as neutral.

5.Kids are honestly pointless unlike in Holy War. I wish for the next game, IS will do something about this mechanic to make it interesting like Holy War.

Honestly, I'm pretty fine with this. It'd be nice if the kids in Fates were relevant to the story in some way (I guess IS kinda, uh, designed themselves into a corner by including them in Awakening; if they hadn't used kids in Fates there would have been some backlash so they had to include them even though there was no reason to) but I see the kids as more being a reward for getting to S-Rank. I barely use any of them myself, but it's cool to go, "Ooh, I wonder what X's kid will be like?"

6. Except the problem is that some units for the way they are designed are better off being in a different class like Odin.....

That's something I'm not a big fan of with it; if you have a character who can easily be better simply by changing class and they don't start off in that class, why the hell not? It sort of punishes players who don't use the mechanic or are unaware of the benefits of one class for a character over another. I guess they want people to experiment and go with what they find fun, but since I'm pretty much having fun with the default classes, it doesn't really do much for me. (Funny that you mentioned Odin though; he is one of the few characters I did reclass and was happy with the change).

9.Unlimited weapons actually came from FE: Gaiden except the difference here is that weapons alter stats and I agree that it can be frustrating. Wonder if Gaiden did this too?

The stats stuff was also kinda annoying; it made it harder to calculate whether someone could survive something if you moved them somewhere to attack a group (although I do love debuffing enemies with shurikens). Either way, from the looks of what people have said there's a big difference between the unbreakable weapons in Gaiden and the ones in Fates.

Thanks for your inputs guys! Another thing I'd like to talk about is the realism factor. In other words, how much should fire emblem be about fighting generic monsters and dragons as opposed to intelligent, fleshed out human enemies? Of course, it's possible to have non-generic monsters but with the way IS has been handling fantasy elements as of late, they feel more like excuses to bolster the game play as opposed to actually being interesting. Does Anankos ever become interesting or is he just another grima (sorry but I thought he was somewhat generic)? Do the monsters you fight ever become intelligent overall or are they just boring "minions" of the big bad?

For example, are the enemies you fight (apart from hoshido/nohr) ever an actual faction with fleshed out, intelligent characters...or are they just exp soda cans you can kill to get stronger...and their only purpose is to make you stronger and not interest you in any way in terms of character or tactics.

I think monsters every now and then are fine to mix it up, plus you can give them cool abilities and attacks that would be hard to justify on human enemies, although I prefer to fight human enemies. Sacred Stones had a good balance of monsters to humans, I think.

With regards to final bosses, I liked the way Sacred Stones and Blazing Sword did it - fight the human final boss, who manages to summon something big and powerful before going down which is even stronger than them. It made for an excellent climax.

[Topaz Light]

Thanks for your inputs guys! Another thing I'd like to talk about is the realism factor. In other words, how much should fire emblem be about fighting generic monsters and dragons as opposed to intelligent, fleshed out human enemies? Of course, it's possible to have non-generic monsters but with the way IS has been handling fantasy elements as of late, they feel more like excuses to bolster the game play as opposed to actually being interesting. Does Anankos ever become interesting or is he just another grima (sorry but I thought he was somewhat generic)? Do the monsters you fight ever become intelligent overall or are they just boring "minions" of the big bad?

For example, are the enemies you fight (apart from hoshido/nohr) ever an actual faction with fleshed out, intelligent characters...or are they just exp soda cans you can kill to get stronger...and their only purpose is to make you stronger and not interest you in any way in terms of character or tactics.

What I personally was talking about when I mentioned "monsters" were the Monster enemies in Gaiden and Sacred Stones, the Risen in Awakening, and the Faceless and illusory Vallite soldiers in Fates. These enemies are implicitly essentially unintelligent beings with no more motivation than a particularly hostile wild animal or something. Personally, I'd actually categorize the kinds of Dragons that appear in the series as Manaketes, Dragon Laguz, etc. alongside humans, since they're an intelligent race with just as much potential for depth to their characters and motivations.

I'm perfectly fine with Fire Emblem games having nonhuman intelligent races in them, and I'm even alright with unintelligent monsters being used sparingly, but I'd strongly prefer that the major conflicts in the game be between members of the continent's various intelligent races, rather than just "oh a bunch of monsters are invading we gotta kill them".

Edited November 8, 2016 by Topaz Light

[henrymidfields]

You're pretty much describing leadership stars and bond supports, which exist to various degrees in FE3, 4, 5, 9 and 10. It was 6 that started the trend of needing to unlock bonuses rather than being implict.

...Isn't this basically an expansion on Leadership Stars? From the Jugdral games.

Like, in FE4, some units give accuracy and avoid boosts to nearby allies and themself from their Leadership stars. In FE5 I don't think it matters how close you are so long as there's someone with Leadership deployed.

Okay, so there were actual leadership effects in previous games. I haven't played any of the above mentioned, so that's why I don't know. What do you think about having the Jugdral-style leadership bonus together with the current interpersonal support bonuses? (Did the enemy had leadership bonuses too?)

Edited November 8, 2016 by henrymidfields

[Magical Glace]

Okay, so there were actual leadership effects in previous games. I haven't played any of the above mentioned, so that's why I don't know. What do you think about bring that together with the interpersonal Support bonuses seen in FE6 and onwards?

10 had both Leadership Bonus and a buddy support bonus (though besides affinities it works quite differently in 10 than GBA/FE9), and it works pretty well overall.

Again, granted, FE10's support system works by letting one unit support any other one unit, up to A, which is different from the five-convo system of GBA and 9.

[henrymidfields]

10 had both Leadership Bonus and a buddy support bonus (though besides affinities it works quite differently in 10 than GBA/FE9), and it works pretty well overall.

Again, granted, FE10's support system works by letting one unit support any other one unit, up to A, which is different from the five-convo system of GBA and 9.

Would you say that this offered reasons to deploy otherwise below-average stat units (that would otherwise be ignored in other FE entries)? This is assuming that said units bolster the Leadership bonus. Again, I am asking this because I have no idea.

[Magical Glace]

Would you say that this offered reasons to deploy otherwise below-average stat units (that would otherwise be ignored in other FE entries)? This is assuming that said units bolster the Leadership bonus. Again, I am asking this because I have no idea.

Not really, most Leadership units in 10 are good units to begin with.

10 was royals: the game before Fates. Pretty much any royalty you got was an amazing unit.

[Gradivus.]

FE10's leadership stars are pretty irrelevant, it's mostly just a flat hit/avo boost to everyone depending on how many stars the enemy boss has since only the stars on the "leading" unit of the army grant any bonuses. No real nuance.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Gradivus.

[Augestein]

FE10's leadership stars are pretty irrelevant, it's mostly just a flat hit/avo boost to everyone depending on how many stars the enemy boss has since only the stars on the "leading" unit of the army grant any bonuses. No real nuance.

Really all they do is hurt you when you're the Dawn Brigade. I'd have actually liked Leadership stars if you as the player could appoint certain units you liked as leaders and each one would give different bonuses based on the unit. As it stands, they are just a nuisance or practically nonexistent.

[Quintessence]

I think Leadership stars should also raise proc skills chance by 5% per star or something. After all, it's basically a morale boost.

Edit: also, it should be applicable to sub groups and hierarchy. For instance, Dawn Brigaders should benefit from Micaiah's leadership, but Holy Guards should benefit from Sanaki's. And so on.

Edited November 8, 2016 by Quintessence

[Augestein]

I think Leadership stars should also raise proc skills chance by 5% per star or something. After all, it's basically a morale boost.

Edit: also, it should be applicable to sub groups and hierarchy. For instance, Dawn Brigaders should benefit from Micaiah's leadership, but Holy Guards should benefit from Sanaki's. And so on.

That would be a nice little benefit for them, and yeah, I like the subgroups idea as well. With all of the custom supports you could do in RD, that would have been really cool.

[Dinar87]

Going back on the topic of not feeling 100% satisfied with fates and awakening, while fates was a massive step up in terms of making the dlc characters feel like actual characters (with voice acting, specially made portraits, etc...) it's a shame they didn't go all out and let you support with them, or give them personal skills, etc... Hopefully for the next game, I'll finally be able to support these dlc characters (if they return hopefully) and will be as fleshed out as any other non-dlc character.

Would more fleshing out of the dlc characters be something that interests you? Because for me, not going to lie, the fact that you can play as Ike (and have it actually feel like Ike unlike awakening's version) makes me 100 times more excited about playing fates. I'm wondering if I'm the only one who likes them that much and wants to see more of them.

[Jotari]

I'd rather they use DLC development time to flesh out maps or the game's plot. I don't feel any real benefit to having a DLC only character fleshed out if they're not involved in the game's story. Course writing dialogue for a character isn't particularly resource heavy though so i suppose it's mostly harmless. Just not something that I feel is necessary.

Edited November 9, 2016 by Jotari

[Jave]

The DLC/amiibo characters are nothing but fanservice so I'd rather not have them waste too much time and resources on them.

I wish they would have given some Support Conversations to the Bosses you can capture. Now THAT would have been interesting.

[eclipse]

Absolutely not.

The DLC characters aren't a part of the main story - rather, they're callbacks to previous games. Let Awakening be its own story, weak as it is.

[Quintessence]

I've always been a fervent enemy of DLC, specially if they're taken as an excuse to 'complete' story or sidequests. Personally, I think FE doesn't need DLC but the money, exp and regalia combo seem ok to me. If anything they should expand on characterization and character development by using Genei Ibun Roku's Intermission figure. They can implement a sort of 'break' after a set number of chapters and make available a sidequest where a group or characters participate in order to make them a bit more fresh and lively.

[Jotari]

The DLC/amiibo characters are nothing but fanservice so I'd rather not have them waste too much time and resources on them.

I wish they would have given some Support Conversations to the Bosses you can capture. Now THAT would have been interesting.

This; I went out of my way to make sure I could capture both bosses is Kana's chapter really hoping they could support at least each other but nope. Given the fact that most bosses are either playable characters from the other campaign, plot important, or monsters, the game barely let's you capture many bosses at all. It's almost exclusively the bosses from the children chapters. It'd be great if capturing, when it comes to bosses was just treated as a standard way to recruit new characters in the story.

Edited November 10, 2016 by Jotari

[Troykv]

This; I went out of my way to make sure I could capture both bosses is Kana's chapter really hoping they could support at least each other but nope. Given the fact that most bosses are either playable characters from the other campaign, plot important, or monsters, the game barely let's you capture many bosses at all. It's almost exclusively the bosses from the children chapters. It'd be great if capturing, when it comes to bosses was just treated as a standard way to recruit new characters in the story.

Yeah, with the few available bosses... I think they would give them some support (at least to Nichol and Candace... They were supposed to be actual characters!)

[Augestein]

Yeah, with the few available bosses... I think they would give them some support (at least to Nichol and Candace... They were supposed to be actual characters!)

Honestly having all of the boss characters have supports with each other could have been a riot.

[Harvey]

I would personally like having more chapters to expand the story further rather than the usual 25 chapters. It'll help in making short maps for the most part kinda like Final Fantasy Tactics....as much as I don't like that game.

[RJWalker]

I too am heavily disappointed with the direction of the series. Most of my disatisfaction has to do with the story. They're just... terrible. Irredeemably awful in Conquest and Revelation's case and just plain awful in Awakening and Birthright's case. It's like IS is just writing the story as they go along. Things just happen. We seem to visit locations just for the sake of visiting exotic locations, not because it suits the story.

[Dinar87]

I too am heavily disappointed with the direction of the series. Most of my disatisfaction has to do with the story. They're just... terrible. Irredeemably awful in Conquest and Revelation's case and just plain awful in Awakening and Birthright's case. It's like IS is just writing the story as they go along. Things just happen. We seem to visit locations just for the sake of visiting exotic locations, not because it suits the story.

Finally some one who agrees with me!!! I mean, I haven't even played fates yet but awakening, oh man, has a VERY weak story imho. It's characters also often try and fail to be funny when they should've focused more on character development and being interesting. Mustafa was ok but should've been expanded upon heavily if the writers even wanted to match the brilliance of Shiharam.

I feel that,even in the main story, awakening was too light hearted for its own good. Things like sumia slapping chrom or lissa swallowing a bug are just pointless because there's no need to balance out any "edginess" (anything taking itself seriously) because that "edginess" is what made the previous games great. If IS doesn't take the story seriously then why should we? Sure the majority of events aren't trying to be comedic but the fact that there was three mini stories all tied into one by the gem mcguffins killed any chance of it being good in the first place as none of the chapters were given enough build up to be anything special in my opinion.

I don't think awakening is a bad game but I can't stand the stories and characters in it. It's fine if anyone else likes them though or thinks that they're good.

Edited November 10, 2016 by Dinar87

[Jotari]

Finally some one who agrees with me!!! I mean, I haven't even played fates yet but awakening, oh man, has a VERY weak story imho. It's characters also often try and fail to be funny when they should've focused more on character development and being interesting. Mustafa was ok but should've been expanded upon heavily if the writers even wanted to match the brilliance of Shiharam.

I feel that,even in the main story, awakening was too light hearted for its own good. Things like sumia slapping chrom or lissa swallowing a bug are just pointless because there's no need to balance out any "edginess" (anything taking itself seriously) because that "edginess" is what made the previous games great. If IS doesn't take the story seriously then why should we? Sure the majority of events aren't trying to be comedic but the fact that there was three mini stories all tied into one by the gem mcguffins killed any chance of it being good in the first place as none of the chapters were given enough build up to be anything special in my opinion.

I don't think awakening is a bad game but I can't stand the stories and characters in it.

There's a pretty massive number of people who think the writing in Awakening and Fates is weak....