The most balanced FE game hard mode

[Køkø]

1 minute ago, Intercopter said:

No, I don't typically use reclassing. I've disliked the system since FE11. 

I never denied that Conquest Hard wasn't difficult, I just said I thought it fairly challenged the player. Sure, I got my ass handed to me on occasion, but it was always my fault. The game never threw any sucker punches at me that I wasn't capable of avoiding.

I guess you and I just have different standards for difficulty.

Me too. If you used Arthur from Chapter 7 to Endgame without all that, that's really impressive. 

I feel like Conquest started to slip during late game. Things started feeling more contrived, with the game relying on swarms of enemies and ridiculous skill sets instead of clever map design. There are definitely instances in which RNG matters, so I disagree on the "sucker punch" part. Evasion is not good in this game.  

 

[Dunal]

For the difficulty to balance ratio (basically how hard a FE has ever been while being fairly balanced) then it's Conquest. Some other games are more "balanced", but only by virtue of enemies being so weak that anyone can be used as a result. 

Everyone is usable in Conquest. Even Gunter for a few maps after his jointime where he can see some use -- and that's the worst unit you have. Otherwise, Nyx/Charlotte/Arthur are more than usable with a +2 bronze (which are rather cheap) especially the latter. Same thing with Odin regarding a thunder tome (albeit more expensive in comparison) or like Mozu; Heart Seal + Forge. Everyone else is at least average without too much support. And the best two units at least have a specific weakness (Camilla = Bows, Xander = Magic). Again, you need to throw a bit of money (usually in the range of 2 to 4k gold) for the group of weaker units -- but that's an immediate investment that doesn't set you back too much.

Comparatively in a lot of other games, the lesser units don't have this 'fix' available to them. Mostly because the weaker units here are held back by a very specific weakness -- that either being accuracy or crit avoid. Only Odin or Mozu are notably 'underleveled' as a whole, which is pretty impressive (for example, Nyx's only prominent issue is doubling at base and accuracy; in which a forge fixes the latter and a couple early speed tonics fixes the former. It's not actually all that difficult to have her 1RKOing at base, or very close to it).

Edited August 25, 2017 by DLuna

[Shadow Mir]

2 hours ago, DLuna said:

For the difficulty to balance ratio (basically how hard a FE has ever been while being fairly balanced) then it's Conquest. Some other games are more "balanced", but only by virtue of enemies being so weak that anyone can be used as a result. 

Everyone is usable in Conquest. Even Gunter for a few maps after his jointime where he can see some use -- and that's the worst unit you have. Otherwise, Nyx/Charlotte/Arthur are more than usable with a +2 bronze (which are rather cheap) especially the latter. Same thing with Odin regarding a thunder tome (albeit more expensive in comparison) or like Mozu; Heart Seal + Forge. Everyone else is at least average without too much support. And the best two units at least have a specific weakness (Camilla = Bows, Xander = Magic). Again, you need to throw a bit of money (usually in the range of 2 to 4k gold) for the group of weaker units -- but that's an immediate investment that doesn't set you back too much.

Comparatively in a lot of other games, the lesser units don't have this 'fix' available to them. Mostly because the weaker units here are held back by a very specific weakness -- that either being accuracy or crit avoid. Only Odin or Mozu are notably 'underleveled' as a whole, which is pretty impressive (for example, Nyx's only prominent issue is doubling at base and accuracy; in which a forge fixes the latter and a couple early speed tonics fixes the former. It's not actually all that difficult to have her 1RKOing at base, or very close to it).

Erm, if Nyx/Charlotte/Arthur is having accuracy issues without a forge, I fail to see how a +2 forge fixes this when it's a measly 2 hit over a vanilla weapon. Hell, I dare say you'd have to go as far as +4 before you'd see any notable improvement in accuracy (and that's for bronze and other weapons that can't crit). Oh, and this is ignoring the fact that you get all of one ore type regularly - if you don't have the ore type you need, you're sorry outta luck.

Edited August 25, 2017 by Levant Mir Celestia

[Dunal]

28 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

Erm, if Nyx/Charlotte/Arthur is having accuracy issues without a forge, I fail to see how a +2 forge fixes this when it's a measly 2 hit over a vanilla weapon. Hell, I dare say you'd have to go as far as +4 before you'd see any notable improvement in accuracy (and that's for bronze and other weapons that can't crit).

Because the whole point is so they can use an accurate weapon without sacrificing damage (base bronze is weak of course). +2 Bronze is a Steel with -1 MT, but +17 HIT, no AS penalty and mostly crit immunity (it's the equivalent of +20 LCK in crit avoid).  This is the same price as a steel weapon.

Arthur can also class change and do this for Sword/Lances as well. Same goes for any unit. Odin included... although Iron probably has more incentive because of his personal (for whatever that's worth).

It does mean though that A) you need to farm 10 of whatever mineral you have at base and B) Using one (or two maximum) of these 'lesser' units is viable between that and the gold you have. It does make these units go from a 4 or 5/10 to 7/10 though. And in terms of gold or resources, the other good units don't really benefit from a forge much (they can either use weapons with drawbacks like lower acc or AS penalties... or just have powerful prfs). 

Some can be multi use as well. An early bronze axe forge can be passed from Arthur to Charlotte or a promoted Selena/Laslow/Effie etc... who starts E axe. So they get a much better weapon to work with.

Forging is mostly bad or too expensive for anything other than a Bronze / Iron but since they are the cheap-no-drawbacks-weaponry they really benefit some units. Units like Charlotte want to use a bronze due to the accuracy, but loses 8 damage on a round of combat without a forge. So either she has bad accuracy or bad damage at base. A forge + maybe a couple early STR tonics should fix that (at least makes her very usable before her growth kicks in).  

Edited August 25, 2017 by DLuna

[Shadow Mir]

55 minutes ago, DLuna said:

Because the whole point is so they can use an accurate weapon without sacrificing damage (base bronze is weak of course). +2 Bronze is a Steel with -1 MT, but +17 HIT, no AS penalty and mostly crit immunity (it's the equivalent of +20 LCK in crit avoid).  This is the same price as a steel weapon.

Arthur can also class change and do this for Sword/Lances as well. Same goes for any unit. Odin included... although Iron probably has more incentive because of his personal (for whatever that's worth).

It does mean though that A) you need to farm 10 of whatever mineral you have at base and B) Using one (or two maximum) of these 'lesser' units is viable between that and the gold you have. It does make these units go from a 4 or 5/10 to 7/10 though. And in terms of gold or resources, the other good units don't really benefit from a forge much (they can either use weapons with drawbacks like lower acc or AS penalties... or just have powerful prfs). 

Some can be multi use as well. An early bronze axe forge can be passed from Arthur to Charlotte or a promoted Selena/Laslow/Effie etc... who starts E axe. So they get a much better weapon to work with.

Forging is mostly bad or too expensive for anything other than a Bronze / Iron but since they are the cheap-no-drawbacks-weaponry they really benefit some units. Units like Charlotte want to use a bronze due to the accuracy, but loses 8 damage on a round of combat without a forge. So either she has bad accuracy or bad damage at base. A forge + maybe a couple early STR tonics should fix that (at least makes her very usable before her growth kicks in).  

Did you forget already? If you don't have the ores for axes or tomes (given the units you mentioned), you're practically out of luck. And need I mention we're talking about a game with a forging system that's just bad?

Edited August 25, 2017 by Levant Mir Celestia

[Nobody]

5 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

Did you forget already? If you don't have the ores for axes or tomes (given the units you mentioned), you're practically out of luck. And need I mention we're talking about a game with a forging system that's just bad?

You can swap ores in the forge. Using that and the arena, you will be easily able to forge whatever you want until a reasonable level (+2 is definitely reasonable)

Edited August 25, 2017 by Nobody

[Dunal]

32 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

Did you forget already? If you don't have the ores for axes or tomes (given the units you mentioned), you're practically out of luck.

Like I said, you need 10 of any mineral to forge a +2 weapon. This is because you can convert 5 to an ore of any type.

If you just so happen to get the right ore then all the better. I suppose it's a big difference since you can forge earlier for specific units (immediately at CH7). Last run I had Ruby so forged a lance for Arthur w/ heart seal. Or Mozu could have ran with it (Or given to Peri/Benny later if Arthur wasn't growing well -- after all, it's almost a strictly better Steel weapon for the same gold cost). There's only a 1/6 chance in getting the weapon type you want -- but chances are the type you get can have some good use.

Otherwise it'll take ~3 chapters to forge a +2. In time for CH10 (for Fire!Nyx) for instance. But you'd likely only be able to create 2 forges tops per run in this manner (assuming efficiency has merit here -- spending more than 4K on forges total is a tad much). 

Quote

And need I mention we're talking about a game with a forging system that's just bad?

I don't really see how that's relevant for Bronze / Irons, especially the former. That statement is only specific for weapons either expensive or hard to get (Well... that's pretty much any weapon that isn't Bronze / Iron).

I mean, the forging system is bad no doubt, but that's not relevant in optimising units in some cases. 

Edited August 25, 2017 by DLuna

[Reality]

At the end of the day Conquest and Radiant Dawn are the only ones I can seriously consider.

 

I'm thinking. Shadow Dragon if you count H2 or H3. (H1 is too close to normal, H4-5 are more lunatic than hard) The "units don't have chance of growing" is more community spread myth than fact. That said, yeah, the game does encourage locking in your party early on, even on the lower hard modes.

New Mystery- if you count Maniac as the hard mode. (Hard is too close to normal, and lunatic and reverse are lunatic and reverse) 

FE4- most Hard mode changes are just AI and the same things that work on normal mode will work there, gen 1 has a group of units in gen1 with godlike growths (and usually horses) due to major holy blood (including the main lord), gen 2 is only ever annoying -not difficult- in chapter 7. Beyond this once again you have godlike growths, and oh yeah 3 of your units are unthouchable dodgetanks because not all holy weapons are equal. Honestly pobabbly the most pointless hard mode difficulty "increase" other than path of radiance and awakening.

FE6- you technically can use anyone (see the all axe or all girls run). That said they drop the ball with enemy stat's halfway through, so while the start is nasty regardless of strategy (although not too nasty if you trust in Marcus), the later maps (excpet the obvious notorious one) aren't that much of a limiting factor.

FE7 hard - FE6 but the sudden switch to "easy hard mode" happens considerably earlier. That said while it's not too hard to prevent you from using who you want, there isn't really incentive to bother putting the effort needed to do so because the natural advantages are there (as with FE11, FE6, and 12)

FE8- Better than PoR HM for what that's worth. Being able to casually double with  everyone including the game's thwomps (gilliam and Lute) should raise red flags.

FE10- The C4 is laguz only? so what, the GBA game's endgame (really 7+ last maps) are also inferior to the hard mode experience in much of the rest much of  those games. Honestly I find shafting this game's hard mode because of the balance of C4 to be disingenuous. 

Conquest Hard - unit diversity has more of a point than other hard modes while simultaneously requiring less elbow grease to accomplish than before

Shadows of Valentia - I'd like to point out that some units (the alm route warp user) will probbably never learn the unique  things that made  you excited to put them in your party. That said they manage to hold their own without getting there just by being mold able into  a solid unit at general combat... People who like this game can talk about it. I won't. 

I'd make a case for Birthright and Rev being more functionally diverse than the GBA games, but not conquest and SOV, but whatever.

 

 

 

Edited August 26, 2017 by Reality

[Shadow Mir]

15 hours ago, Nobody said:

You can swap ores in the forge. Using that and the arena, you will be easily able to forge whatever you want until a reasonable level (+2 is definitely reasonable)

The arena? As in the same arena that has no qualms whatsoever about bullshitting you? Anyways, it ain't like money rains down on you like a downpour such that there's nothing better to spend it on...

Edited August 26, 2017 by Levant Mir Celestia

[Nobody]

3 hours ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

The arena? As in the same arena that has no qualms whatsoever about bullshitting you? Anyways, it ain't like money rains down on you like a downpour such that there's nothing better to spend it on...

The first two rounds of the arena are easily beatable. Also wtf are you talking about, the arena and all its resources are free and unrelated to money. Also, a +2 bronze forge costs the same as a steel weapon.

anyway, i'm done discussing with you, you're as stubborn as a mule.

[Shadow Mir]

1 hour ago, Nobody said:

The first two rounds of the arena are easily beatable. Also wtf are you talking about, the arena and all its resources are free and unrelated to money. Also, a +2 bronze forge costs the same as a steel weapon.

anyway, i'm done discussing with you, you're as stubborn as a mule.

The first two rounds? You speak as though you have access to the level 3 arena immediately... And it ain't like I've never had my characters either lose in the first round or come out of it in such bad shape that I'd have to stop then and there. As for my other comment, it was more saying that I have better things to spend my cash on than duplicates of a certain weapon just so I could forge it. Like healing items and staves.

Edited August 26, 2017 by Levant Mir Celestia

[Dunal]

28 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

The first two rounds? You speak as though you have access to the level 3 arena immediately... And it ain't like I've never had my characters either lose in the first round or come out of it in such bad shape that I'd have to stop then and there. As for my other comment, it was more saying that I have better things to spend my cash on than duplicates of a certain weapon just so I could forge it. Like healing items and staves.

And? All units need resources to some degree. Your argument is that units like Arthur are "unusable" as a counter argument for Conquest being balanced. Yet... a 2k gold investment is all it takes to make him decent/good (the dude has solid bases/growth, near perfect availability and a really powerful personal skill later into the game -- also a good class change option where the base weapon rank doesn't matter that much due to a forged bronze being optimal for him anyway. Not to mention that Percy negates Arthur's main weakness even more should you decide to use him).

Meanwhile there are other FE games where there are no quick fixes like this. Games plagued with units with genuinely bad stat spreads (or stats in general) and/or are underleveled. The only two units in conquest without these "quick fixes" are Odin and Mozu. But they aren't exactly awful long-term, especially the latter. All other units are decent from base with some kind of resource. That isn't typical for a FE game. Especially for a FE with higher difficulty.

Edited August 26, 2017 by DLuna

[Shadow Mir]

4 minutes ago, DLuna said:

And? All units need resources to some degree. Your argument is that units like Arthur are "unusable" as a counter argument for Conquest being balanced. Yet... a 2k gold investment is all it takes to make him decent/good (the dude has solid bases/growth, near perfect availability and a really powerful personal skill later into the game -- also a good class change option where the base weapon rank doesn't matter that much due to a forged bronze being optimal for him anyway. Not to mention that Percy negates Arthur's main weakness even more should you decide to use him).

Meanwhile there are other FE games where there are no quick fixes like this. Games plagued with units with genuinely bad stat spreads (or stats in general) and/or are underleveled. The only two units in conquest without these "quick fixes" are Odin and Mozu. But they aren't exactly awful long-term, especially the latter. All other units are decent from base with some kind of resource. That isn't typical for a FE game. Especially for a FE with higher difficulty.

I didn't say he was outright unusable. I DID, however, say he's easily far more trouble than he's worth - a sentiment I have zero intent of going back on, and one I know full damn well you can't convince me otherwise on!

bold: Tell me you're kidding. I have one word for that, and that is "laughable", with a capital L, a capital A, a capital U, a capital G, a capital H, another capital A, a capital B, another capital L, and a capital E.

[Dunal]

38 minutes ago, Levant Mir Celestia said:

I didn't say he was outright unusable. I DID, however, say he's easily far more trouble than he's worth - a sentiment I have zero intent of going back on, and one I know full damn well you can't convince me otherwise on!

bold: Tell me you're kidding. I have one word for that, and that is "laughable", with a capital L, a capital A, a capital U, a capital G, a capital H, another capital A, a capital B, another capital L, and a capital E.

Far more trouble than he's worth? 2K gold to have a solid unit for the entire game? Fair to disagree but that's hardly a huge factor for a FE game (with the Geeses and Martys and Bartres out there). But if you insist. You have to consider that units need to be rated on their own merits. Assuming certain resources are going to certain units is not a fair way to judge other units. You can only use a certain amount of units, so any resources going to the other unit you'd be otherwise using are going to Arthur or any particular unit we'd be discussing.

Arthur's personal skill reduces nearby enemy luck by 30 in regards to critical avoid (so up to 15% extra crit towards nearby enemies). Over the course over an entire late game map you're likely to outright 1HKO a few enemies because of it (over the course of attacking 6 times in the proximity to Arthur, on average you'll land on extra crit). That's a lot more powerful than other personals at that stage of the game. And due to Arthur's high SKL at that point in the game, he ends up having high crit even as a hero (granted, he needs to not be using a bronze at that point, but either way, it benefits your other units that are attacking).

It doesn't mean much early on since the base crit of your own units isn't that high and enemy luck isn't high either. But either way, setting enemy crit avoid to literally zero is good later on. It might as well read as "Passively grant all allies within 2 spaces up to 15% crit" in most cases.

 

Edited August 26, 2017 by DLuna

[Rapier]

On 24/08/2017 at 11:03 AM, Køkø said:

On Hard? Lol, tell me your secret. Who were your main units other than Corrin, Azura, the Nohrian royals, Niles/Shura,Effie/Benny, and maybe Haitaka/Rallyman? It passes the latter 3 requisites, but all units are not usable without DLC in Conquest hard and up. Unless you know something I don't. Harvey didn't mention anything about DLC, so if that counts, then ignore this post. 

 

 

As for my vote, either Sacred Stones and Path of Radiance. They're both incredibly easy.

Nobody said it was easy. (sorry, I couldn't help myself but notice the reference) But it is doable.

I can't vouch for the children characters and Charlotte (Gunther sucks, forget him), but Mozu, Kaze, Laslow, Peri, Nosferatu!Odin and probably Arthur if you invest a bit more money on him are perfectly usable. You also just cited 80% of Conquest's character pool as efficient units in Hard mode, so where is the issue?

 

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I'm not sure between FE10 (I'm counting US Normal Mode as Hard Mode because that is what it is) and FE14/FE15. Since I never played the later games in Normal, I'll go with FE10.

Edited August 26, 2017 by Rapier

[Shadow Mir]

1 hour ago, DLuna said:

Far more trouble than he's worth? 2K gold to have a solid unit for the entire game? Fair to disagree but that's hardly a huge factor for a FE game (with the Geeses and Martys and Bartres out there). But if you insist. You have to consider that units need to be rated on their own merits. Assuming certain resources are going to certain units is not a fair way to judge other units. You can only use a certain amount of units, so any resources going to the other unit you'd be otherwise using are going to Arthur or any particular unit we'd be discussing.

Arthur's personal skill reduces nearby enemy luck by 30 in regards to critical avoid (so up to 15% extra crit towards nearby enemies). Over the course over an entire late game map you're likely to outright 1HKO a few enemies because of it (over the course of attacking 6 times in the proximity to Arthur, on average you'll land on extra crit). That's a lot more powerful than other personals at that stage of the game. And due to Arthur's high SKL at that point in the game, he ends up having high crit even as a hero (granted, he needs to not be using a bronze at that point, but either way, it benefits your other units that are attacking).

It doesn't mean much early on since the base crit of your own units isn't that high and enemy luck isn't high either. But either way, setting enemy crit avoid to literally zero is good later on. It might as well read as "Passively grant all allies within 2 spaces up to 15% crit" in most cases.

That's still 2 grand that other units don't need blown on them just to prevent them from being liabilities (and in Arthur's case, a walking, breathing failure condition).

Except - read this and weep - most enemies don't have anywhere near that amount of luck, even in lategame, where they use silvers that nuke their crit evade. And the only two enemies I can think of that'd suffer the full effect of Arthur's personal (Garon and Takumi) are both enemies I'd be well within my rights to question your intelligence for putting Arthur anywhere near them.

Breaking news: It's pretty much useless even in lategame for reasons already mentioned.

[eclipse]

The fuck is going on in this topic?  It's AN OPINION about A VIDEO GAME at the end of the day.

I'm voting FE12.  Units may not be optimal, but it's possible for most of them to be usable (even the Wolfguard).  However, it will NOT be efficient.  Given the size of the cast, that's pretty impressive.

Edited August 26, 2017 by eclipse

[Køkø]

3 hours ago, Rapier said:

Nobody said it was easy. (sorry, I couldn't help myself but notice the reference) But it is doable.

I can't vouch for the children characters and Charlotte (Gunther sucks, forget him), but Mozu, Kaze, Laslow, Peri, Nosferatu!Odin and probably Arthur if you invest a bit more money on him are perfectly usable. You also just cited 80% of Conquest's character pool as efficient units in Hard mode, so where is the issue?

 

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I'm not sure between FE10 (I'm counting US Normal Mode as Hard Mode because that is what it is) and FE14/FE15. Since I never played the later games in Normal, I'll go with FE10.

It's fine to post what you have to say, but please address me with a question I haven't answered already. This topic is mostly me going back and forth, and frankly I'm tired of it.