Come up with a potentially controversial gameplay mechanic

[Jotari]

12 hours ago, Benice said:

The player is given help if enough units die-Such as a powerful item or something else to make their lives easier. This way, if you kill off most of your army, you'll at least accrue some good items for those you have left.

Also, a graveyard where your fallen units have graves with epitaphs.

 

8 hours ago, AnonymousSpeed said:

Those are both very good ideas, actually. If I'm ever a game developer, I'll ask my team to give me their worst ideas and that's where I'll find the good stuff.

Getting help when a lot of units die is something that needs to be balanced carefully to make it not seem like the player is missing out on content. Otherwise you become Shadow Dragon. That's exactly what that game tried to do, but most players didn't view it as "Oh yay I'm getting helped out" and more "Why the fuck do I need to slaughter my army to play the full game?"

To that extent I would say compensating for playable units dying should be one or all of the following

1. Plot relevant. If Makalov dies give Marcia a base convo where she gets a new spear (or a new brother >.>) 

2. Alternate instead of additional, so less Gaidens and more A chapter B chapter. People will see a Gaiden as a missed opportunity, but when you play parallel chapters you're still getting the same amount of game in one playthrough.

3. Unimportant replacements, like Shadow Dragon. No one has an issue with them I believe, in fact I've heard of some people getting quite attached to them.

4. Spit balling myself here, but you could lower the cost of weapons and items the more casualties you've suffered. This would allow forges and silver weapons to be acquired a bit easier to compensate lost man power (hopefully people wouldn't intentionally slaughter their army just for a discount, well maybe some ltc players would, but as we all know those are like the bad guys from Pokemon).

5. Going back to plot 1, prf transferrance would actually be a really cool feature. Like say if Elincia dies then Renning would be allowed to use Amiti.

4 hours ago, DragonFlames said:

You know, if Fire Emblem was made/owned by EA, Activision-Blizzard, Ubisoft, or any of the other greed-filled "Triple-A"-publishers, we would have all of this and more already. XD
Let's just hope Nintendo can keep it to questionable overpriced DLC and manufactured scarcity, shall we?

---

And now for my suggestion: RNG-based recruitment.
When trying to recruit a unit, it's completely left to the RNG whether or not they join you. Of course, I would incorporate a, say, Charisma stat that can influence this chance (let's say it's a base 5% chance plus half your Charisma stat to recruit someone), and OF COURSE every character that can recruit another character has a pathetically low base and growth rate in Charisma.
We're talking Echoes' Res growths kind of low.

Another one: every weapon type uses a different stat to determine damage.
Axes use Strength.
Lances use Defense.
Bows use Skill.
Swords use Speed.
Anima and Dark Magic use Magic.
Light Magic uses Resistance.

That would make strength basically useless on 90% of the cast.

Edited September 13, 2020 by Jotari

[DragonFlames]

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

That would make strength basically useless on 90% of the cast.

Indeed! Isn't it great? XD
Joking aside, Strength could still have its uses in such a setting, such as mitigating weapon weight, Three Houses-style.

[Samz707]

A skill that dramatically increases critical hit-rate...but it only applies for a few turns after one of your other units die.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

On 9/13/2020 at 9:16 AM, Jotari said:

4. Spit balling myself here, but you could lower the cost of weapons and items the more casualties you've suffered. This would allow forges and silver weapons to be acquired a bit easier to compensate lost man power (hopefully people wouldn't intentionally slaughter their army just for a discount, well maybe some ltc players would, but as we all know those are like the bad guys from Pokemon).

Maybe you could get a "windfall" from characters dying? Each character probably has their own (unseen) personal money, that they can use for food and external purchases. If they die, that money can go into the "war chest", and used for army needs. Sorry, Matthis, but I need an extra 500 gold for a few more points of Hit on this Ridersbane!

[Samz707]

Like Metal Gear AC!D (A turn based spin-off of the MGS series.), Character facing is now a thing, you select where a character faces after moving them and this would also change if they get knocked down/attack another unit in melee, this could work for stealth (Since you'd stay behind enemies and watch their movement patterns.), being attacked from the side does a little bit of extra damage. (At least I think it does in AC!D.) but being attacked from behind causes double-damage, Units would also be unable to counter-attack enemies attacking them from behind.

 

[Garfield Faris Claus]

1.) All hits that land do a minimum of 3 damage, unless the defender has the untouchable skill, in which case "No Damage!" becomes possible. Untouchable is a class skill of heavy infantry (Knights, Generals, Barons, etc.) plus the main character. 

2.) Infantry units may elect to sprint, gaining +2 movement at the cost of being afflicted with 2 turns of the "fatigued" condition after movement or combat. (The condition counter globally increments down at the beginning of enemy phase, so the condition actually lasts for the subsequent enemy and player phase). 

 Fatigued halves the unit's STR, DEF, MAG, RES, SPD & SKL. 

 Units may sprint while fatigued, but they reset the 2 Turn fatigue by doing so. This way infantry can indefinitely match their mounted peers MOV but will also be   indefinitely crippled in combat.  

 If capturing/rescuing exists the unit can't spring while having a held unit.           

3.) Many varieties of HP, each with separate growth rates, boosters, etc, some being enemy only. This is their priority, from lowest to highest. A unit dies when their lowest priority health is > 0. 

Green Health is vitality, reduced by DEF/RES depending on whether the damage is physical, magical or hybrid (the average of the two stats).

The boring vanilla Fire Emblem HP that the vast majority of units have.

Yellow Health is fortune, ignoring damage type and instead uses LCK as the damage-reducing stat.

Gray Health is overheal, available aplenty but treated as if having 0 DEF/RES.

If [overheal < Attacker's ATK], defender's overheal = 0 & defender's next health bar is subtracted by [ATK - [DEF/RES/LCK + overheal].

Dark Red, Dark Blue and Purple Health are "barriers".

If [barrier < Attacker's ATK], defender's barrier = 0 & defender is inflicted with the "enfeebled" condition. Excess damage is NOT dealt to lower priority.

Enfeebled negates all defender's skills & authority

Magical damage skips Dark Red for the next health bar, Physical skips Dark Blue for the next health bar, and Purple cannot be bypassed.

Orange Health, like Green Health, is reduced depending on damage type, but it sets itself to 0 if defender is hit by a crit

Might be fun for a gimmicky paralogue: put a bunch of enemies with only Dark Gray Health and plenty of it.

Edited September 23, 2020 by Mongolian Mongrel
indents

[Samz707]

More general "Objective"  focused maps.

For instance, you're in a big forest map that lets you deploy most of your troops, there's a big passage down the middle, after 2-3 turns a bunch of Convoy (so Merlinus basically) units start heading down, each of them are carrying a ton of items you get after killing them but they'll escape if they reach the end, so using mines, light runes and blocking the path if possible, you take down the convoys (maybe it's game over if any/certain amount get away) while dealing with their guards.

FE kinda suffers from somewhat bland objectives for a strategy game in my experience. (And I'm not counting ones that'd require new mechanics, like stealth missions.)

[Shrimpica]

Different level of ''Criticals''
Basically, normal units will have ''Critical lvl1'' which makes Crit only deal 2x damage.

Classes that depend on Crit (Swordmasters, Berserkers, etc), will have ''Critical lvl2'' which makles Crit deal the current 3x damage

Killer weapons also deal 3x. Killer weapons + crit Classes 4x on crit

[Gordin]

Heart Levels. Every character has a heart level. Stable, A little unstable, Unstable, Very Unstable, Catastrophic. At the start of every turn, if that unit was attacked in the previous enemy phase, their heart level will go down by 1. At Catastrophic there's a 70% chance for that unit to get put to 1HP and be unable to move for that turn. Very Unstable is 50%. Unstable is 25% and A little unstable is 1%. If this happens to a unit two turns in a row, they immediately die of heart faillure. This mechanic applies to both the player and the enemy. 

[X-Naut]

Attacking a target who cannot counterattack guarantees a follow-up attack unless the weapon cannot follow-up.

Two weight stats, one that works off Weapon Rank and one that works off a factor of Strength.

[Samz707]

27 minutes ago, X-Naut said:

Attacking a target who cannot counterattack guarantees a follow-up attack unless the weapon cannot follow-up.

Two weight stats, one that works off Weapon Rank and one that works off a factor of Strength.

I feel like the first one would arguably make Archers even more bad than they already are.

[X-Naut]

59 minutes ago, Samz707 said:

I feel like the first one would arguably make Archers even more bad than they already are.

With their advanced range in more recent games they'd benefit a lot from it. Especially the enemy archers.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

1 hour ago, X-Naut said:

With their advanced range in more recent games they'd benefit a lot from it. Especially the enemy archers.

Ultimately, it would help slow Archers (who can now double all melee foes), and hurt fast Archers (who now get doubled by melee foes). In effect, it would make Speed much less important (which may be desirable, given how much speed matters in most games).

2 hours ago, X-Naut said:

Two weight stats, one that works off Weapon Rank and one that works off a factor of Strength.

How would this work? Would a higher weapon rank mitigate the weight? Like, A rank gives 2 more AS with the Steel Sword than C rank.

[X-Naut]

1 hour ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

How would this work? Would a higher weapon rank mitigate the weight? Like, A rank gives 2 more AS with the Steel Sword than C rank.

I had one point of weight mitigation per rank over E in mind but that works too.

[Benice]

Have crit only mitigated by special equipment, (I.E, the lord has a charm that prevents crits) and maybe passive supports, (a la RD bond supports) but crit is only granted by special equipment, (I.E, Killer axe, and it only provides a minor crit rate, such as +12) or having very, very, very high skill.

Also-Skill for different weapon types. It actually adds a lot of variety as to which units excel at what.

[whase]

Something that probably doesn't work, but I'd still like to see:

Instead of a general character level, each stat is a "level". So instead of strength is 1, your strength is level 1, calculations remain the same.
Instead of experience to a general level, you gain experience to leveling up the stat used. Swing your sword? Gain dex experience. Avoid an attack? Gain experience to speed. Get hit by an axe? Gain defense experience. Etc.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, whase said:

Something that probably doesn't work, but I'd still like to see:

Instead of a general character level, each stat is a "level". So instead of strength is 1, your strength is level 1, calculations remain the same.
Instead of experience to a general level, you gain experience to leveling up the stat used. Swing your sword? Gain dex experience. Avoid an attack? Gain experience to speed. Get hit by an axe? Gain defense experience. Etc.

So Final Fantasy II then.

[whase]

50 minutes ago, Jotari said:

So Final Fantasy II then.

It exists? O.O

Does it work? Do you think it'd work for a game like FE?

[Jotari]

4 hours ago, whase said:

It exists? O.O

Does it work? Do you think it'd work for a game like FE?

Yeah. And rather hilariously the most effective method of training was to have your units beat up themselves. As for whether it would work in Fire Emblem. *shrug* Bases are still probably going to be more important. And if bases aren't, then every unit would come out feeling very samey as no combat would be detrimental. Worth a try for an experiment though.

[Alastor15243]

35 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Yeah. And rather hilariously the most effective method of training was to have your units beat up themselves. As for whether it would work in Fire Emblem. *shrug* Bases are still probably going to be more important. And if bases aren't, then every unit would come out feeling very samey as no combat would be detrimental. Worth a try for an experiment though.

I'm certain I'd hate it. Whenever weird shit is involved for optimizing your characters, I tend to feel compelled to do it even when it isn't fun.

[Interdimensional Observer]

It's more than FFII, the entire SaGa franchise, a very niche JRPG line, and the more recent Legend of Legacy and The Alliance Alive use similar "use a stat and you'll randomly get increases it in" systems. I haven't played any of them, but of course, the randomness and repetition result in criticism. You can increase your likelihoods of getting stat-ups and learning new skills I think, and there might be an invisible cap imposed by the enemy's own level.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

On 9/25/2020 at 3:30 AM, whase said:

Something that probably doesn't work, but I'd still like to see:

Instead of a general character level, each stat is a "level". So instead of strength is 1, your strength is level 1, calculations remain the same.
Instead of experience to a general level, you gain experience to leveling up the stat used. Swing your sword? Gain dex experience. Avoid an attack? Gain experience to speed. Get hit by an axe? Gain defense experience. Etc.

What if this worked, instead, by gaining experience based on whom you damge/kill/support? So, fighting a Brigand gives you Strength-exp, while dancing for an allied Myrmidon gives you Speed-exp. Personally, I like the idea of giving the player some control over how their unit grows (such as Path of Radiance's "Bands").

[Alastor15243]

5 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

What if this worked, instead, by gaining experience based on whom you damge/kill/support? So, fighting a Brigand gives you Strength-exp, while dancing for an allied Myrmidon gives you Speed-exp. Personally, I like the idea of giving the player some control over how their unit grows (such as Path of Radiance's "Bands").

PoR'a fixed mode actually did that too, where the points you gained for each stat based on your experience were altered slightly by the enemy you killed to get said experience.

But really, that could only conceivably be fun in a really player-phase-heavy game, where you have more control over what specific enemies each of your units fights.

[Jotari]

50 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

PoR'a fixed mode actually did that too, where the points you gained for each stat based on your experience were altered slightly by the enemy you killed to get said experience.

But really, that could only conceivably be fun in a really player-phase-heavy game, where you have more control over what specific enemies each of your units fights.

Speaking of Path of Radiance fixed mode, what about an actual fixed rate mode? Basically drop all that weird bands and weapons giving growth points stuff and have units gain a predetermined number of stats upon every level that matches their averages in the also available standard mode. Taking the rng out of the system and having a more reliable playthrough is something I think a lot of players would gravitate towards.

[Alastor15243]

35 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Speaking of Path of Radiance fixed mode, what about an actual fixed rate mode? Basically drop all that weird bands and weapons giving growth points stuff and have units gain a predetermined number of stats upon every level that matches their averages in the also available standard mode. Taking the rng out of the system and having a more reliable playthrough is something I think a lot of players would gravitate towards.

Honestly, something else I'd appreciate is just a way to keep units' stats from straying too far away from their averages. Like, if you get too lucky or unlucky in a stat, the next level up is predetermined to correct it. That would prevent RNG abuse and keep people from getting stat screwed, all without getting rid of the random element that keeps playthroughs from feeling too same-y.