Do FE games have unwinnable situations

[Harvey]

Ok a quick question here, do the fire emblem games end up becoming unwinnable if you somehow get screwed up in any of the games as of now?

By unwinnable, I mean

• Lost too many units to the point that a total of only one unit is forced to be used in the final boss
• Somehow was not able to make units strong enough to face final chapters due to limited experience gained or too much experience being used on specific units.
• Some how broke a good chunk of weapons that makes it impossible to beat the final boss.

Now a 0% growth run doesn't exactly mean that the game is unwinnable to me because that's only referring to the RNG screw age which I personally think isn't a main game breaker since the RNG is made so that it can be winnable.

So is it possible to beat an FE game if these points are meet? I'm aware that FE7, 8, 13,14 & 15 can't make this happen but others?

 

 

[Nobody]

I'm pretty sure it's impossible to beat Conquest Lunatic's endgame if you only have Corrin remaining. You can always lower the difficulty, though, so I guess it's not truly unwinnable.

Edited September 2, 2017 by Nobody

[X-Naut]

Thracia 776 can become unwinnable if by the final chapter you've exhausted all means of getting past the chamber doors (having no door keys, lockpicks, unlock staffs, and warp/rewarp staffs) since the only door keys on the map are all behind the doors.

[ping]

In FE6, you need two non-Roy units to open Zephiel's throne room, so it's possible to get stuck that way, even disregarding whether or not Roy can beat the last few bosses before he promotes.

Path of Radiance should be unwinnable on hard mode if you get your dragon killed and Ike can't beat Ashnard himself. If Ike doesn't proc Str at all, he'll have 8+18=26 attack strength versus Ashnard's 35 Def, and with his base HP/Def + promotion bonuses (23/8), he'll be easily one-shot by Ashnard's 55 attack. Certainly not a likely scenario, but I'm sure it's possible to get to the final chapter without using Ike at all. (Or am I forgetting some chapter(s) in which Ike can't avoid gaining XP?)

[Jedi]

The only way FE games become unwinnable is by the players own choices. It's self inflicted or not enough foresight.

[Harvey]

16 minutes ago, Jedi said:

The only way FE games become unwinnable is by the players own choices. It's self inflicted or not enough foresight.

Yeah that is the thing that  I don't get at all. the creator of Fire Emblem stated that players should play FE the way they want them to be played and yet if that is done, then the players don't get their way done and thus it has to be done in the way the game forces you to do. 

Besides the games that I've mentioned that are the exception, the other games....pretty much make you want to use the guide inorder to plan ahead instead of playing it naturally.

 

[Magical Glace]

In the main series, unwinnable situations are most likely self inflicted (basically, they're unwinnable by insanity). 

I have run into "unwinnable" situations due to RNG in Heroes though, for whatever that is worth:

Spoiler

Leo was the unit who fared the best of those three, Takumi and Faye both did 0 damage.

On 9/2/2017 at 6:40 AM, ping said:

In FE6, you need two non-Roy units to open Zephiel's throne room, so it's possible to get stuck that way, even disregarding whether or not Roy can beat the last few bosses before he promotes.

Did they need to stay on the switches?  I could have sworn it simply required someone (doesn't matter who) wait on each one for one turn, like the map in Lyn mode where you get Rath.  If that was the case, it wouldn't be unwinnable, though it would take a while.

Edited September 4, 2017 by Glaceon Mage

[ping]

55 minutes ago, Jedi said:

The only way FE games become unwinnable is by the players own choices. It's self inflicted or not enough foresight.

Yeah, don't get me wrong, I don't see either of my examples as design flaws per se (I don't like that only Ike, the dragons and the royals can hurt Ashnard, but not because of the theoretically unwinnable scenario). As far as I can tell, there is no easy (or easiest) mode in the series in which units are either unusable or obligatory to progress, with the odd exception of chapters like the BK+Miccy solo in Radiant Dawn.

But FE6, despite its wonky PC balance, allows you to completely ignore and/or skip top tier units like Rutger, Dieck, Marcus and Milady. On HM, you will get punished for a bad team composition, but A) I can see the link in @X-Naut's sig, and B) Fire Emblem is still both a RPG and a strategy game. And personally, I don't think it's a bad thing if the hardest modes of a strategy game require some optimisation. I'll take the Civ series as an example: if you want to not die horribly on the higher difficulty levels, you will have to play a science-heavy game. You can't just go full military and murder everyone in sight. Or rather, you can, but then you will most likely discover that the most distant opponents have started to build tanks and helicopters while your scientists still brood over the secrets of gunpowder - i.e. the game becomes unwinnable. And I'd say that FE is similar in that regard: On the higher difficulties, it's highly recommended to make use of what the game offers you instead of using the most scrubby team possible or letting all your MVPs die. If you want to do that, well, stick to the lower difficulties.

 

€ @Glaceon Mage: You're probably right and I misremember things. There's still the numerical possibility that Roy can't hurt the bosses right before his promotion - Murdock has 28 Def (+3 because throne), so if you're out of Armorslayer uses, Roy would need 18 Str to even scratch him with a silver blade. But really, if you don't have any units except Roy, it's your own damn fault if you're stuck.

Edited September 2, 2017 by ping

[DarkDestr0yer61]

30 minutes ago, Harvey said:

Yeah that is the thing that  I don't get at all. the creator of Fire Emblem stated that players should play FE the way they want them to be played and yet if that is done, then the players don't get their way done and thus it has to be done in the way the game forces you to do. 

To be fair, it is still strategy game. You would look like a pretty poor tactician if your strategy is to literally kill everyone in your army.

[FiboSai]

There is a way to create an unwinnable situation using the tutorial in Lyn mode. Basically, you have to kill of everyone except Lyn before you get to chapter 4 (the chapter where you recruit Dorcas). The tutorial will force Lyn to move towards Dorcas and then recruit him. Then Dorcas will be forced to attack a nearby brigand. Meanwhile, since you have no other units left to defend Natalie, the enemies will have reached her and killed her in one hit, resulting in a game over.

[Dayni]

Gaiden is apparently impossible to beat if you have too few units on Celica's party in the last chapter, but I can't tell how that works aside from Celica taking all the damage. It also didn't get carried over to SoV so I assume the devs didn't want to take the risk on it making a playthrough impossible. You could also skip the Falchion, but there's a way around that as well that makes the final boss still beatable.

Mystery Book 2 and Binding Blade have their endings cut short based on not having certain items, but not a specific unwinnable situation from what I can tell.

Geneology could end up being impossible if you somehow lost all the units you could use against the final boss like Julia or , as doing one damage all the time to Julius and risking a crit if you somehow got him low enough is certainly fun right? Fair is fair, Seliph can still do damage but if he has too little strength or all your healers are dead it could be unbeatable.

Thracia of course has the situation X-Naut mentioned.

In Blazing Sword, Battle Before Dawn has become impossible for some people because the RNG gets Jaffar killed too soon, making it impossible to save Zephiel. Though this likely coincides with the player not having strong enough units either, which could be RNG related as well. This is likely the most RNG-based one mentioned here, but even still it's on the hardest difficulty and still pretty reliant on the player's options.

More generally, you could have an unwinnable situation if you run out of weapon uses, but that's unlikely and in some games impossible to pull off.

Point is, you can lose the game if you don't have certain things depending on the game itself. But those fail states require a lot of mistakes before that point, so it's on the player.

[bethany81707]

8 minutes ago, Dayni said:

In Blazing Sword, Battle Before Dawn has become impossible for some people because the RNG gets Jaffar killed too soon, making it impossible to save Zephiel. Though this likely coincides with the player not having strong enough units either, which could be RNG related as well. This is likely the most RNG-based one mentioned here, but even still it's on the hardest difficulty and still pretty reliant on the player's options.

On the hardest difficulty, you have to rely on Zephiel dodging hits and you have to arrive at his room before the mercenary. I don't think Jaffar's death is the problem...

[Dayni]

5 minutes ago, phineas81707 said:

On the hardest difficulty, you have to rely on Zephiel dodging hits and you have to arrive at his room before the mercenary. I don't think Jaffar's death is the problem...

Sorry, should have put that in. Forgot about that guy.

Thing is that Jaffar distracts many of the enemies that otherwise would come for Zephiel sooner. You pretty much need to be at the room in 5 turns. No warp or Rescue staves.

BBD is up there in hardest maps in in the series on HHM for a reason.

[Maritisa]

The most common cases are just being stupid and not having door keys or thieves in ares which *require* a door to be opened and you have no other way in, but even those chapters are usually nice enough to give you a key in the chapter, so the only way you can lock yourself in an unwinnable situation is if somebody gets the key and then dies with it, taking it to their grave, or if you're just doing it on purpose and throw it away,

[Armagon]

My friend actually ran into an unwinnable situation in Blazing Blade. In Pale Flower of Darkness, specifically, the Jerne version, my friend didn't take any theives with him. The chapter itself did hand out some keys but only enough to open some doors, not all. The Jerne version of that chapter is a rout mission. At one point, my friend was out of keys, and had no thieves. So he couldn't kill any enemies that were locked behind the doors he didn't open.

He had to restart the chapter so he could deploy Legault but imagine if both thieves died before reaching that chapter. He literally would've been unable to proceed.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

The only unwinnable situations with an intact team are already mentioned:

• final chapter in FE5 because you need something to let some of your allies stand on the switches to open the door where Veld is inside 
• the chapter in FE7 where Zephiel must survive because Zephiel's survival it's totally luckbased
   

I was close to the moment to say 1-9 in Radiant Dawn because the difficulty in this chapter depends on how good your Micaiah is. If she gets doubled a / o oneshotted, it'll become a lottery. However there's a way to keep her out of any battles and BK can solo this map.
Same goes for 2-1 in person of Nephenee. These chapters rely on the RNG way more than any other chapters because you're forced to hit.

Edited September 2, 2017 by Aya Shameimaru

[Nobody]

3 hours ago, phineas81707 said:

On the hardest difficulty, you have to rely on Zephiel dodging hits and you have to arrive at his room before the mercenary. I don't think Jaffar's death is the problem...

If you rush a paladin on the right side, Zephiel will only have to face a single axe brigand, which poses no thread to him.

3 hours ago, Dayni said:

BBD is up there in hardest maps in in the series on HHM for a reason.

How people think this when it's only a couple of chapters before Cog of Destiny is beyond me. Protecting Zephiel is trivial. Just rush a Paladin through the right.

25 minutes ago, Aya Shameimaru said:

the chapter in FE7 where Zephiel must survive because Zephiel's survival it's totally luckbased

lol it's not. Rush a Paladin through the right and Zephiel will die a total of 0% of the times.

Edited September 2, 2017 by Nobody

[Ertrick36]

6 hours ago, Harvey said:

Yeah that is the thing that  I don't get at all. the creator of Fire Emblem stated that players should play FE the way they want them to be played and yet if that is done, then the players don't get their way done and thus it has to be done in the way the game forces you to do. 

Is that not the case for most games?

I mean, you can do whatever you want in a game, but if you want to win, you have to perform certain tasks.  And I think it's especially true for a game that presents challenges like FE.  If they gave you too much leniency, it'd be too easy.  And it isn't like they have arrows and directives floating above your units' heads telling you exactly where to go and what to do.

A good challenge might give you some varied options in how to approach a goal, but a challenge in a video game simply can't be so open-ended that you could do anything and still succeed.  Of course depending on how restrictive the challenges are, it can discourage newer fans.  Which is why it's so great that we've gotten such a wide variety of FE games in the 3DS and iOS era to help ease some like myself in.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

34 minutes ago, Nobody said:

lol it's not. Rush a Paladin through the right and Zephiel will die a total of 0% of the times.

I thought it's impossible to reach him in time before enemies can attack and kill him.
At least it's what I read from many comments in the topics worst designed FE chapter or chapters you hate.
And in my HHM run I couldn't save him either despite having several promoted mounted units.

[Nobody]

1 minute ago, Aya Shameimaru said:

I thought it's impossible to reach him in time before enemies can attack and kill him.
At least it's what I read from many comments in the topics worst designed FE chapter or chapters you hate.
And in my HHM run I couldn't save him either despite having several promoted mounted units.

If you rush a Paladin thorugh the right, only a single enemy will attack him, and it's a brigand, which he can easily kill.

I've played FE7 more than 40 times, almost all of them on HHM, and I've never had Zephiel die on me. 

Uhh, if you couldn't save him, you wouldn't have beaten the chapter. Letting Zephiel die is a game over. Again, Rushing a Paladin through the right path, you will always reach him.

 

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Yeah, I had to replay this chapter because of his death.
And in my second attempt Jaffar killed himself, so I couldn't promote Matthew.

About the map itself I can't really remember except that my freedom for my paladins was restricted thanks to Ursula's bolting, and in Hector Mode she moves.

[Interdimensional Observer]

There are such things as unwinnable or very very tedious/difficult to win scenarios. But this isn't a problem if to get into such hells, one must consciously put oneself there. FE is a Strategy RPG- both demand some inflexibility for the sake of true strategic and RPG elements. If an unwinnable scenario can be stumbled across without the need for conscious effort, then there is a problem.

8 hours ago, Harvey said:

Besides the games that I've mentioned that are the exception, the other games....pretty much make you want to use the guide inorder to plan ahead instead of playing it naturally.

 

Rarely does FE demand it that you use a guide. Some games definitely benefit from it (T776), but any game can be played blind perfectly fine. Sure it'll be harder and you probably won't get everything right, but FE is plenty forgiving, and all games are harder and more difficult to perfect blind- not just FE.

 

Also, fun fact- Ike's base Str + promotion + Ragnell deals exactly 1 damage to RD's final boss. It's impossible to be screwed here unless you have no way of getting the final boss down to 1 HP.

[Jave]

It is possible to put yourself in un unwinnable situation in the last map of FE4 if you let Altenna die and you have no Warp/Return, or if whoever is guarding the home castle is not powerful enough to take on Arion.

[Dark Holy Elf]

If you don't level Ike in RD and don't bring a Hammer into the final dungeon, you'll have an Ike who gets doubled by the E-2 boss and can only deal 4 damage to him (against his 18 regen on Normal/Hard Modes). As already mentioned it's possible to have something similar happen in PoR againt the final boss (though only on Hard Mode), but you have to let Ena die in the second to last map.

Otherwise I'm sure there are situations where you could kill off everyone but a Level 1 lord before some lategame map and have no realistic chance of proceeding.

In Echoes you can easily have an Alm who is too weak to deal with his lategame solo section, but unlike the Ike cases you can at least go level him up to fix this. I guess in theory if he got unbelievably bad levels you could get stuck, though?

In most cases you'll have to try really hard to get into these situations though. As long as you have at least a few living units and level the main lord at least a bit you should be okay.

[eclipse]

You can paint yourself into a corner in FE11's Paralogue 4, if you let the armor knights run past the fort.  But it requires some serious troop mismanagement, since we're talking about armors.