Topic: Fire Emblem: Three Houses

I've played Hard/Classic since Awakening, and I don't intend to stop that now. I even did a Hard/Classic run of Conquest, which got... hairy at times. This is supposedly not a terribly difficult game, though, so it probably won't present too many challenges.

Which is why Casual is the way to go...

I only say this because F*** RNG bulls*** where my character dies to some random critical

Ahh, this brings back Darkest Dungeon memories.

@LzWinky Oh yeah. This particularly sucks with regard to boss encounters, which have never been done well in any of the FE games I've played.

My problem with casual is that I have no incentive not to take huge risks with my units, which conflicts with the way these games are designed. You wouldn't get AW-esque game design with a game that's not built around disposable units, for example. On the other hand, in your favor, Awakening would keep certain characters alive for story purposes even if you couldn't use them, which conflicts with the whole permadeath thing.

I do wish there were some milder penalty for a character being defeated. It'd be cool if, say, a character were hospitalized for a couple of battles after being defeated. It'd still incentivize careful play, but also wouldn't harshy punish the player for a random roll of the dice that turned out poorly, so to speak.

@JaxonH Having played since the GBA titles, casual still feels a bit like sacrilege to me. But then again, I never play higher than normal, and even then sometimes I struggle. lol

@Ralizah I actually really like the idea of the hospitalized thing. I could see a whole series of sub-mechanics of needing to get or maintain sources of supplies, and even special option missions to get medicines. I'd like to see something like Valkaria Chronicles style, where if you get to a defeated unit in time, you can evac them, rather than them just dropping dead on the spot.

Then again, if I cut your head off, there ain't a darn thing anyone can do to fix that! lol

@Heavyarms55 Death in FE games is always very vague unless it's a prominent story beat, though. And if the game is unwilling to kill a character off for story purposes, then I should absolutely be allowed to continue using them in battle.

I also really like how Valkyria Chronicles handles the whole character death thing. Granted, I think it should penalize you more harshly for a unit's HP falling to zero, but I love that I can retrieve my unit before it dies permanently. It's a reasonably elegant system.

Um, it's a game... So, stick it back on with super-glue & they be fine I personally had no problem resetting older games, so I like casual mode

Probably going with Classic - Hard. That's what I did with Birthright and Echoes.

@Tsurii I will. I never understood why people reset as soon as someone dies. Kind of defeats the purpose. Some say it makes the game harder but I fail to see how. I'd say it's much more difficult to actually try to keep everyone alive but prepare for the worst and have a backup plan if someone dies.

I was against the turnwheel in Echoes too at first but then they introduced the witch enemy. In my first battle against them, both teleported from the other side of the map next to one of my units on first turn and killed them. There was absolutely nothing I could have done to prevent that from happening. The whole turnwheel was probably added just because of those enemies...

This reminds why I’m hesitant buying these games. You have these cheap moments where up until that point you’ve been super careful and strategic and all that fun stuff, but then suddenly without warning a couple of enemy units get spawned right behind you and kill a member of your team. It makes me never want to think ahead again because what’s the point?

There is no Phoenix mode. That's gone. Not that it's really needed. Normal casual (with a turn wheel at that) should be plenty easy enough.

And correct me if I'm wrong, but I heard people saying you can lower difficulty, not raise it (only at the mid point?) but I also heard someone confirm that was not the case in Echoes and there's been no mention of confirmation for this game.

Oh dang no Phoenix mode? Hopefully there's easy then...

Also it seems there's spoilers for Three Houses in FEH, so if some of you play FEH and want to play 3 Houses, skip the dialogues in FEH

@Tsurii Oh please. Everyone resets. The challenge is beating levels without losing anyone. Beating the whole game without losing anyone is absurd.

I'm a normal/casual boy. I just like to enjoy games, ya know? Fire Emblem can be so frustrating with perma-death, both for story reasons and gameplay reasons. I want to know what happens to a character, and I want to be able to use a useful character on future maps. The older games are still fun, but I hate having to reset a map due to a lucky crit or a reinforcement spawning behind me.

@Heavyarms55 You don't have to beat the game without losing anyone though?

I lose 5 or so characters each time I play through a Fire Emblem game. Losing a character in the middle of a battle can lead to memorable moments and you have to be on your toes all the time. If you can just reset as soon as one of your units die, what keeps you from just throwing your units to dangerous situations until it finally works out? Losing a unit leads to interesting decisions, especially when it's someone like the early game class changed unit who kills everyone in one or two hits for the first half of the game.

I understand why people want to play Casual Mode. It's a fun way to experience the game without needing to worry about losing units. I like games like Shining Force and Advance Wars, that don't have perma-death, just as much if not more. Resetting in Classic is just playing in Casual Mode but redoing the same chapter for no good reason. It's not tied to Classic either. If someone wants to reset after a death, they could just as well do it in Casual. Resetting, in my opinion, is just waste of time.

Which is harder, playing through the original Super Mario Bros. like it was intended (once you're out of lives, you start from the beginning) or using a save state at the beginning of each level? Resetting in Fire Emblem is the same thing but instead of trying to save time by not doing the earlier Mario levels again, you are using more time by doing the same stuff you already did but this time luck was on your side or you could do better because you knew the layout beforehand.

I always get carried away when I find a topic I like. Sorry. Just used one of my vouchers to buy Three Houses. Currently leaning towards Golden Deer but I'll make my final decision once I have the game and I get to know the characters.

@Tsurii It's not about elitism. It's about changing the way the game plays. If units are disposable, I'm going to play much more loosely than I am if I'm in danger of losing my units. I don't see how resetting conflicts with that. Choosing not to reset makes no sense to me in any game where RNG in a factor, to be perfectly honest.

I reset because I like to figure out the flaw in my strategy. FE is likely the only game that isn't a fighting game that I don't play as a game. I wish that they had an in game function to allow for a level reset. Like you beat the map and then see the story parts and then it asks you if you want to repeat (if you lost someone in battle). It's like when I play chess or shogi. If the CPU kicks my panties or if it is a battle won by attrition then I usually replay to work on playing more intelligently. I get that casual mode is similar but you don't have the game holding you accountable anymore. Just how I feel about it of course.

Even on casual mode I attempt not to lose units, since that means the unit won't gain experience for the rest of the fight, and I won't be able to utilize it against other enemy units. So I don't think playing on casual creates a mindset of unit disposability. Suicide attacks or sacrificial defenses wouldn't be all that beneficial in Fire Emblem where victory usually hinges on your units defeating much larger cohorts of enemy units. You need your units to survive and keep taking useful actions.

@Ralizah
Exactly this!
If I know my units will be back on the next chapter, I won't hesitate on leaving one (usually the Jeigan) to be bait for the mooks ,for example, in a map I need to rescue someone. Or in a defend map, I'll just put someone in a chokepoint but won't be as worried as I am in classic (where I'm checking and making calculations if the unit can last through the enemy phase).
Classic mode simply restrics some of your strategies, and that is what I like about it. It does force you to be far more conservative, and when you do decide to gamble, it's because you're praying to the RNG Goddess that she won't screw you, because if she does, you lose the character for good.

The only game I regret using classic is Echoes because of Thabes' Labyrinth but really that dungeon should've had save points.

Ya, despite always playing casual post-Awakening, I have played previous games and totally get the appeal of permadeath.

And I mean, the real appeal. Of making tough choices like “do I restart the entire map or make due losing my best Pegasus knight knowing I’m close to the end?”. Which actually happened to me in Fire Emblem 7 on GBA. And I made the decision not to replay the map, because I had already spent more than an hour on it and didn’t want to replay it all over again, especially after having to replay a map not long before hand for missing the recruitment of Jaffar.

And I really want that in Three Houses. I’m not sure if I’d have the nerve if it wasn’t for the timewheel. The timewheel takes the edge off, knowing it’s ok to make one blunder, even two, and still be alright. And a lot of times you get in a bad situation it’s not because of one bad move, it’s because of a whole series of bad moves due to lack of foresight. So while you could just rewind one or two moves back, I kind of feel like rewinding is going to account for much more than that in some cases. Sure, one move may save your unit but if your unit was in a bad spot due to poor strategy and foresight it’s going to take more than one move to get yourself out of that. They very well might die three turns later because you’re still in a bad spot.

I’m just ready for a classic playthrough. I do think 4 timewheel moves is excessive though. I hear it starts with 2 but can upgrade to 4 later. Should’ve started with 1, with an upgrade to 2 later. That would have been fair.