BRAINSTORMING: Balancing Skill/Luck/Resistance

[SullyMcGully]

Stats are a very important part of Fire Emblem, in many ways more so than in other RPGs. And while the relative values of different stats have changed over the years, there are three particular stats that have almost always been considered less valuable than the others. I'm talking about Skill, Luck, and Resistance.

Skill generally contributes about 2% to your hit rate, 1% to your critical rate, and 1/4-2% to the activation rates of certain skills. Overall, these amount to a very abstract value for each point of Skill, whereas a stat like Strength immediately contributes to a notable change on the battlefield.

Luck affects a lot of things, but the most notable is your enemy's critical rate. It also grants about 1% to avoid and 1/2% crit, along with playing into certain skills. However, since enemies with a crit rate that is even slightly worrisome are few and far between, Luck is usually overlooked. Awakening even acknowledged this fact making skills like Luck +4 compared to Strength +2. 

Resistance is slightly more useful, affecting how much damage you take from magical attacks. However, magic attacks aren't nearly as frequent as physical attacks, which makes it worth less than Defense. While you certainly miss it when you need it and it can come in handy in a pinch, Resistance still doesn't match up to some of the other stats.

I've heard lots of different ideas on how to buff these stats and debuff the others in order to achieve a more balanced stat system. This is a thread for discussing those ideas and proposing others. I've got a few ideas of my own, but I would love to hear your opinions too.

[Dunal]

Make enemy magic users more frequent by making certain magic types 1 range -- therefore less annoying to fight in bulk. This buffs RES. Also, make healing from staves scale off RES, rather than MAG. 

Make LCK grant 3 AVO per point. While SPD only offers 1 AVO per point. LCK also provides 1 HIT per point. SKL provides 3 HIT per point. 

Therefore you have:

HIT: 3xSKL + 1xLCK

AVO: 3xLCK + 1xSPD

Balanced by buffing the previous 'lesser' stats and nerfing SPD. 

 

For the extra mile, you then increase HP values across the board and buff MT on weapons. Suddenly STR and DEF are also less important. Increase doubling requirement by 6 more AS rather than 4 AS (fates increased it to 5 AS). Also a further nerf to speed.

At this stage, you've made each individual stat fairly comparable.

Edited January 23, 2017 by DLuna

[Seracz]

I've actually been thinking about this recently as well.

DLuna above me mentioned that buffing MT on weapons are a pseudo-nerf to STR. I agree and I think that the opposite is also true, where the lower the Hit on weapons, and the higher the WT (in the games where it applies, but unfortunately this also buffs Speed), the more value that Skill and Luck have. I think in games like FE6 where weapons are significantly worse makes Skill and Luck already more valuable in those games than they are in later games.

I think to make them good, they just need to contribute more to your hit and avoid in comparison to your weapons, since the amount they contribute comparatively is so small. So while people generally hate the weapon balancing in FE6 for example, I think that it maybe is too far in the other direction in games since then for Skill and Luck to have any meaningful value. Maybe it would feel more meaningful if your high Skill units were significantly more reliable at hitting than low Skill units, but that isn't really the case since they are carried by high weapon hit rates anyway.

Also as you pointed out, crit dodge has almost no value in practice, since not only are enemies with significant crit rates pretty rare, most (or all) of the time, your strategy will revolve around trying to kill them without giving them a chance to attack. So Luck just doesn't do enough per point.

I honestly don't have much to add about resistance right now.

Edited January 23, 2017 by Seracz

[Augestein]

1 hour ago, DLuna said:

Make enemy magic users more frequent by making certain magic types 1 range -- therefore less annoying to fight in bulk. This buffs RES. Also, make healing from staves scale off RES, rather than MAG. 

Make LCK grant 3 AVO per point. While SPD only offers 1 AVO per point. LCK also provides 1 HIT per point. SKL provides 3 HIT per point. 

Therefore you have:

HIT: 3xSKL + 1xLCK

AVO: 3xLCK + 1xSPD

Balanced by buffing the previous 'lesser' stats and nerfing SPD. 

 

For the extra mile, you then increase HP values across the board and buff MT on weapons. Suddenly STR and DEF are also less important. Increase doubling requirement by 6 more AS rather than 4 AS (fates increased it to 5 AS). Also a further nerf to speed.

At this stage, you've made each individual stat fairly comparable.

This essentially. Lck needs to do more for avoid, and skill needs to do more for hit. Having lck do most of the evasion might make it too good though. Instead, I'd leave it 2 x 2. Because if not, then lck becomes a powerful defensive stat with the way DLuna has it  as it's the only way to lower critical evasion outside of supports. and it's the bulk of evasion, which would mean that any evasive unit has darn near 0 critical against them while having decent critical in general. 

Mages do need to be more frequent though, and there should probably be more differences between them. Honestly, for mine, I think that nerfing speed would be enough if you made it to where player phase could only double with speed, and on defensive strikes, you can only double with skills on enemy phase. However, sticking straight to standard Fire Emblem, this is probably the best compromise. 

[SullyMcGully]

2 hours ago, DLuna said:

Make enemy magic users more frequent by making certain magic types 1 range -- therefore less annoying to fight in bulk. This buffs RES. Also, make healing from staves scale off RES, rather than MAG. 

Make LCK grant 3 AVO per point. While SPD only offers 1 AVO per point. LCK also provides 1 HIT per point. SKL provides 3 HIT per point. 

Therefore you have:

HIT: 3xSKL + 1xLCK

AVO: 3xLCK + 1xSPD

Balanced by buffing the previous 'lesser' stats and nerfing SPD. 

 

For the extra mile, you then increase HP values across the board and buff MT on weapons. Suddenly STR and DEF are also less important. Increase doubling requirement by 6 more AS rather than 4 AS (fates increased it to 5 AS). Also a further nerf to speed.

At this stage, you've made each individual stat fairly comparable.

I've heard this before and I like most of it. However, there are a few things I don't feel right about. From a logical point of view, I think SPD should play a larger role in dodging than LCK, just because of the way things are in reality. I also think MAG should still play a role in healing (something like staff user MAG +  unit being healed RES + staff healing power [which has been nerfed considerably] = HP gain).

Two ideas in particular that I came up with. These are both a little strange and aren't the best thought out, but I figured I'd share them anyway. First off, what if SKL affected damage done by long-range attacks? Of course, in melee combat, keep STR + weapon MT, but what if we used STR/2 + SKL/2 + weapon MT for ranged battles? I can see one possible strategic effect this would have: characters who have both melee and ranged attacks would deal different amounts of damage at different distances. For instance, a mage with high SKL would be well served to attack at a distance, while one with high MAG would be a better close-range fighter. 

Just a crazy idea. Here's another one: what if we threw in a hidden skill for every member of the players party called "Blitz"? This skill would basically grant every one of your units the "Adept" skill from the Tellius series, allowing them to have a free bonus attack whenever it triggers. Its trigger rate would be LCK. So, suppose we have a character who maxes LCK at 30. That character has a 30% chance of attacking again, which in my opinion makes maxing LCK a much worthier cause.

Of course, there are probably holes in all of these ideas, but I'm just trying to think outside of the box. I welcome your input.

[Augestein]

34 minutes ago, SullyMcGully said:

I've heard this before and I like most of it. However, there are a few things I don't feel right about. From a logical point of view, I think SPD should play a larger role in dodging than LCK, just because of the way things are in reality. I also think MAG should still play a role in healing (something like staff user MAG +  unit being healed RES + staff healing power [which has been nerfed considerably] = HP gain).

Two ideas in particular that I came up with. These are both a little strange and aren't the best thought out, but I figured I'd share them anyway. First off, what if SKL affected damage done by long-range attacks? Of course, in melee combat, keep STR + weapon MT, but what if we used STR/2 + SKL/2 + weapon MT for ranged battles? I can see one possible strategic effect this would have: characters who have both melee and ranged attacks would deal different amounts of damage at different distances. For instance, a mage with high SKL would be well served to attack at a distance, while one with high MAG would be a better close-range fighter. 

Just a crazy idea. Here's another one: what if we threw in a hidden skill for every member of the players party called "Blitz"? This skill would basically grant every one of your units the "Adept" skill from the Tellius series, allowing them to have a free bonus attack whenever it triggers. Its trigger rate would be LCK. So, suppose we have a character who maxes LCK at 30. That character has a 30% chance of attacking again, which in my opinion makes maxing LCK a much worthier cause.

Of course, there are probably holes in all of these ideas, but I'm just trying to think outside of the box. I welcome your input.

Sounds decent. That's honestly an idea I had, where a person has a range attack stat and a melee attack stat. This makes it to where things like archers are hurt less by the strength thing for classes. Even if another class gets bows, they'd have  a lower weapon rank, and less of the ranged attack stat (I honestly made a new stat for it rather than tying it to skill, as that seems kinda ridiculous for archers to get damage boost, more accuracy, and critical chance off of their attack stat). For bows, I'd use something like strength/2 + (new stat) / 2 with archers getting a skill that completely eliminates the need to have strength for ranged attacks and is instead the new stat based. Or give them crossbows to use as well so they can eliminate the need for strength and simply use the new stat given. This has the added effect of what you said before, while not making archers have a dump stat (strength). As for the range magic attack versus melee, it's an interesting idea, but I think that there should be more formula for that sort of system, but I like how this is going. 

I don't like the idea of a character having a hidden skill honestly. Even worse, is that doubling is something that I'd consequently want to be a constant rather than a random variable. Proc skills can be fine at moments, but not one like this. It's too low to be reliable, and wouldn't have enough of an effect to necessarily help when needed. If anything, I'd make doubling skills things that were based off of conditions like: 

1) Target can't counter attack. If you have a skill like cancel, this could be an interesting combo. 

2) Target is not in terrain cover. Meaning that you can double attack it. 

3) You are in terrain that provides cover. 

Stuff like that could make doubling less of a stat thing and more of a condition thing instead which could make units more or less useful based on situations rather than having to even worry about stats. Some might say it'd make for a skill fest, but I'd rather have a skill fest than a stat fest. 

[Dunal]

Another method to buff LCK would be to increase crit rates across the board (SKL now grants 2 CRT per point). Then reduce crit damage to x2 instead of x3.

Since crits are now a more consistent threat (albeit without being an auto-kill) LCK's value goes up.

This would be a far better way to include randomness. Why have an adept skill proc when critical hits are pretty much the father of them all? If you reduce the damage to x2, then it's also exactly the same concept of the adept thing -- except using a mechanic that already exists.

[SullyMcGully]

9 hours ago, Augestein said:

Sounds decent. That's honestly an idea I had, where a person has a range attack stat and a melee attack stat. This makes it to where things like archers are hurt less by the strength thing for classes. Even if another class gets bows, they'd have  a lower weapon rank, and less of the ranged attack stat (I honestly made a new stat for it rather than tying it to skill, as that seems kinda ridiculous for archers to get damage boost, more accuracy, and critical chance off of their attack stat). For bows, I'd use something like strength/2 + (new stat) / 2 with archers getting a skill that completely eliminates the need to have strength for ranged attacks and is instead the new stat based. Or give them crossbows to use as well so they can eliminate the need for strength and simply use the new stat given. This has the added effect of what you said before, while not making archers have a dump stat (strength). As for the range magic attack versus melee, it's an interesting idea, but I think that there should be more formula for that sort of system, but I like how this is going. 

Do you have a name in mind for this new stat? I guess I'm just trying to be realistic with a fantasy game, which is kinda impossible, but it just seems like SKL is the kind of stat that would affect something like that. However, I understand that that isn't very balanced. What if we decreased the value of SKL at a distance? I'm thinking about making it so that the accuracy bonus granted by SKL halves with every space. This would add another strategic element, where units with 2-3 range weapons like Longbows or DLuna's proposed wind magic would get different hit rates depending on how close they are to their targets. It's also more realistic that way.

Just an idea. I like what I've heard so far!

[Dunal]

6 hours ago, SullyMcGully said:

 This would add another strategic element, where units with 2-3 range weapons like Longbows or DLuna's proposed wind magic would get different hit rates depending on how close they are to their targets. It's also more realistic that way.

At least In FE10 RDX, longbows lose a flat 30 HIT per extra range (they are 3-5) and wind magic loses damage (based on tome). So they work differently (magic would lose potency as the caster is further away; while bows would be harder to hit with logically).

As for SKL, you could split it into DEX (dexterity, which is melee accuracy) and TEC (technique, which is long range accuracy and magic).

TEC would also affect skill procs primarily.

DEX would also affect things like stealing, finding items, and movement penalties.

Javelins and Handaxes would use DEX for 1 range and TEC for long range. This is a cool way to nerf them since the units needs to have high amounts of both stats rather than just one.

EDIT: Also, another good way to buff SKL is included in FEXNA -- overloaded hit. When you have 100% HIT on an enemy, any additional HIT is then converted to crit. 

Edited January 23, 2017 by DLuna

[SullyMcGully]

5 hours ago, DLuna said:

EDIT: Also, another good way to buff SKL is included in FEXNA -- overloaded hit. When you have 100% HIT on an enemy, any additional HIT is then converted to crit. 

I don't really like making crit higher than it already is. I would prefer that it remain the extremely unpredictable godsend that it is. However, the idea of granting some kind of bonus for 100% HIT is something I've been interested in before. Maybe a damage bonus instead?

[Dunal]

1 hour ago, SullyMcGully said:

I don't really like making crit higher than it already is. I would prefer that it remain the extremely unpredictable godsend that it is. However, the idea of granting some kind of bonus for 100% HIT is something I've been interested in before. Maybe a damage bonus instead?

Mean to clarify? Killer weapons are acceptable but being rewarded for having high SKL (or using weaker weapons) is not?

You can nerf crit to x2 damage or even x1.5 damage. And having them proc more makes LCK better as well. (And also makes skills like FE5!Wrath really interesting/cool as opposed to just broken -- albeit it would make more sense to flip it for player phase rather than enemy phase).

Besides, we already have passive/activated skills for the "extremely unpredictable godsend" element. So crits have all the more reason to be made different. 

I actually think crits being lower % (and more devastating) is actually worse for the game. Because the times they happen will either be completely superficial (because you wouldn't plan for it to happen) or completely screw you over (enemies randomly one-shotting you). In both scenarios they don't really accomplish anything meaningful. Unless you happen to have a killer weapon or its FE5 (or FE6 with some classes).

Edited January 24, 2017 by DLuna

[Augestein]

10 hours ago, SullyMcGully said:

Do you have a name in mind for this new stat? I guess I'm just trying to be realistic with a fantasy game, which is kinda impossible, but it just seems like SKL is the kind of stat that would affect something like that. However, I understand that that isn't very balanced. What if we decreased the value of SKL at a distance? I'm thinking about making it so that the accuracy bonus granted by SKL halves with every space. This would add another strategic element, where units with 2-3 range weapons like Longbows or DLuna's proposed wind magic would get different hit rates depending on how close they are to their targets. It's also more realistic that way.

Just an idea. I like what I've heard so far!

Dex or Technique could actually work. The point was to have some stat that works for archers to make them not have a dump stat. Because honestly, I'm not a huge fan of dump stats. It's sort of how in the Tellius games, it bothered me that mages needed all 8 stats while physical attackers only needed 7. That's... Not good. 

 

Quote

You can nerf crit to x2 damage or even x1.5 damage. And having them proc more makes LCK better as well. (And also makes skills like FE5!Wrath really interesting/cool as opposed to just broken -- albeit it would make more sense to flip it for player phase rather than enemy phase).

Besides, we already have passive/activated skills for the "extremely unpredictable godsend" element. So crits have all the more reason to be made different. 

I actually think crits being lower % (and more devastating) is actually worse for the game. Because the times they happen will either be completely superficial (because you wouldn't plan for it to happen) or completely screw you over (enemies randomly one-shotting you). In both scenarios they don't really accomplish anything meaningful. Unless you happen to have a killer weapon or its FE5 (or FE6 with some classes).

Funny thing, is that if I had it my way, the damage would be lower. Then you could do stuff for swordmasters like give them extra critical without each critical being a one shot fest, and then make Beserkers do more damage for criticals. I feel that criticals should be something that's embraced , and having something like that would go a long way for luck. Seriously, playing your FE6 Redux is when I realized that luck really isn't a bad stat. Rutger, a unit with bad luck, starts to have some scary issues against some of the enemies with his lowest luck against units like Bishops because they have so much luck that they can realistically have you having 70ish hit against them without supports. And that's all because of luck. 

 

Edited January 24, 2017 by Augestein

[Dunal]

31 minutes ago, Augestein said:

Funny thing, is that if I had it my way, the damage would be lower. Then you could do stuff for swordmasters like give them extra critical without each critical being a one shot fest, and then make Beserkers do more damage for criticals. I feel that criticals should be something that's embraced , and having something like that would go a long way for luck. Seriously, playing your FE6 Redux is when I realized that luck really isn't a bad stat. Rutger, a unit with bad luck, starts to have some scary issues against some of the enemies with his lowest luck against units like Bishops because they have so much luck that they can realistically have you having 70ish hit against them without supports. And that's all because of luck. 

 

When it comes to LCK, it tends to be extremely noticeable/detrimental when you have a severe lack of it. But having an extremely high amount of LCK is not really noteworthy, because crit rates tend to be low enough that those with just average LCK can get by. As such, you don't need anything more than average LCK, so those with high LCK are w/e.

Increasing the rate of crits solves this issue as well -- units with stat spreads favouring LCK would now have something notably good about them. While those with avg LCK can still run the risk of being crit. And then, if you nerf the effectiveness of crits, this doesn't become frustrating; just something you need to consistently play around outside of high LCK units.

SKL can then contribute to providing more CRT, therefore being better as well.

So as a result, you don't even need to tinker with HIT/AVO rates.

Then when it comes to RES, just add more enemy magi; with some reworking to magic itself to give them more counterplay. RES can also affect staff healing, but MAG still affects staff range. Or alternatively, the higher RES you have, the more healing you could receive, including from items. To that effect, you'd rename RES to SPI (Spirit).

Edited January 24, 2017 by DLuna

[SullyMcGully]

I have another question. In Fates and Awakening, a character's class has no affect on their LCK growth. I think this was different in the GBA games, though, because it always seemed like the monks and myrmidons had higher LCK than other units. Do you guys think LCK should be affected by different classes? 

[Seracz]

Actually I think as far as player controlled units go, their class in the GBA games also had nothing to do with their Luck. Luck as a base stat is not related to the class, but entirely by the individual unit. Luck is actually I think the only stat where a base stat is not assigned based on class in the GBA games. If you ROM hack edited a characters class, I think I am right in saying that their Luck would be the one stat that definitely would not change.

But anyway I personally prefer characters having unique individual stats that can make them interesting to use over other characters of the same class. Lords seem to generally have pretty good Luck stat but I would rather see it tied to characters than class.

Although with some of the changes people have talked about so far, if crits were far more common it could be cool to see units with high Luck sort of act as crit tanks, where you could safely throw them up against units with killer weapons and swordmasters and such, the same way people often put knights or generals up against high physical damage. Though I don't know which class I think would play the role of high Luck crit tank archetype the best.

[Deltre]

I took a crack at rebalancing FE8 at one point and what I decided to do was [STR+SKL]/2 for Bows and if I were to do it again I'd probably work standard 1-2 Range weapons into that same formula as well. That makes Skill a very important stat for any ranged attacker. It also nerfs Javelins/Hand Axes at the same time, while still allowing Archers/Snipers to be the best Bow users bar none thanks to weapon rank and generally higher Skill than say, a Warrior. 

The thing with making SKL add more crit is that it will also increase the amount of BS deaths at the hands of low percentage crits. The thing is, if SKL suddenly gave 2 points of Crit per point of SKL all the enemies who normally had 0% Crit now suddenly have 5-10% Crit right off the bat. Even if you reduce Crit damage to 2X I don't see how it promotes more tactical play since you've just increased the element of randomness significantly. True, Fire Emblem at heart is a game about taking weighted risks with the best chance of success, but something about every enemy having low percent Crit chance doesn't sit right with me. Nerfing the Crit multiplier would also hurt Generals, as one of the very few things they have going for them is their ability to soak crits for days thanks to their naturally high defense. If everyone can reasonably be expected to tank a crit that kind of goes out the window however. Ultimately I guess it depends on how you would handle luck though, since these two things are so closely related.

For RES I wanted Healing to be based off the RES stat rather than MAG, and Magic Swords would be changed to work from RES for damage (keep in mind this is GBA, MAG is fine in modern titles). Also, like someone else said, increasing the frequency of Magic users automatically makes this stat better. It's not really bad on paper, it just gets so few chances to actually come into play compared to say, Defense. I also agree completely with more Magic variety instead of every spell being some flavor of 1-2 Range with varying MT. 

For LCK IDK man you got me. I never really thought about this one too much, maybe a 50% boost to its effect on current formulas or something like that (I.E 2 LCK = 3 AVO and so on). The thing with Luck is that it's not a stat with any real focus, so increasing its attributes too much can quickly swing things in the opposite direction, making it OP. 

2 hours ago, Seracz said:

Actually I think as far as player controlled units go, their class in the GBA games also had nothing to do with their Luck. Luck as a base stat is not related to the class, but entirely by the individual unit. Luck is actually I think the only stat where a base stat is not assigned based on class in the GBA games. If you ROM hack edited a characters class, I think I am right in saying that their Luck would be the one stat that definitely would not change.

Correct, there is no Luck Base for classes in GBA, however there is a Growth Rate tied to the class which is why

3 hours ago, SullyMcGully said:

 it always seemed like the monks and myrmidons had higher LCK than other units

 

 

Edited January 24, 2017 by Deltre

[SullyMcGully]

Here's another idea for balancing SKL/LCK.

Suppose we increase the number and frequency of skills w/ trigger rates. Then, we make it so that LCK works as a buffer against enemy skill activation, the same way it does for crits. Then, to account for the decreased skill activation rate, we double the role of SKL in skill activation. This would make high-LCK characters your go-to units for dealing with enemies with scary skills.

Another idea is to make killer weapons double your current crit chance instead of adding 30% to it, making high SKL/LCK more important to proccing crits than the weapon you are using.

[X-Naut]

The Killer weapon idea is certainly interesting, and it might make some early Killers a bit less intimidating. However, Skill + Luck/2 for crit chance sounds scary on its own and is going to cause more ragequits than any other game unless Luck gives more crit avoid.

I agree with the general consensus that Skill should give more Hit than Speed gives Avoid and that Luck can fill the gap. My preference would be (5*Skill + Luck)/2 for Hit and (Speed + Luck)*3/2 for Avoid. There's also the idea to scrap Luck and manage the stats like this:

Hit = (5*Skill + AS)/2
Avoid = (Speed + Skill)*3/2
Crit = Skill/2 below 20 Skill, (Skill-10) above
Dodge = (Skill + 2*Resistance)/3

Resistance could be retooled into a Faith stat, seeing as Luck and Res are usually proportional to one another. Luck would at most be an internal stat like in the Thracia 776 concept that does a few trivial things.

I don't like the idea of Skill% or Luck% proc chances at all, we already have critical hits as a luck-based kill switch and we don't need more.