Topic: Fire Emblem: Three Houses

Post time skip Dimitri is pretty cool so far He’s edgey and aggro but the concept of a man fighting for the dead in such a cruel and twisted way is interesting. It’s not something you see commonly in this manner. I was really disappointed when Byleth stopped him. Would’ve preferred one of his class mates stopping him or seeing him pushed further to see how they clash.

@Heavyarms55
It's a B for the support, but supports lessen the requirements also. So a C support will make the skill and stat requirement easier.

Easiest way is not to level up a skill you dont need, but to just shower them with gifts. Pummel them with everything you have. Shove it all down their throat. You'll have that support in no time.

I gotta be honest.

I’m really starting to get aggravated with how easy this game is. It’s a complete joke.

My playthrough feels ruined, as I’m overleveled by 3-4 levels, on top of the game already being ridiculously easy and half a dozen rewinds thrown in on top of it all.

I should have never done a single paralog or auxiliary map. It ruins the game. And I should have done HARD mode, not NORMAL. I think HARD mode, without doing any paralogs or extra maps, while also recruiting as many people as possible to spread the XP out... would barely make it feel like a normal FE game again. I made a gross error in judgment by picking NORMAL and doing those paralogs.

I based my decision on the difficulty of past games. But this one is different. I would never dream of playing HARD Classic mode in Awakening (I tried, And died in the 4th map). But for this game, I almost feel like I want to play LUNATIC on Classic. It’s THAT easy.

And maybe it’s good they readjusted the difficulty. Because the super easy difficulty is what helped draw in a lot of other people (Phoenix mode, anyone?). But I need to adjust my choices accordingly and I failed to do so before starting this play through, and it’s really starting to tarnish my experience. I am one shotting EVERYTHING. Even the final boss of the first half of the game only took half Raphael’s lifebar, and he LITERALLY has Resistance stat of 1. So basically ZERO resistance, and the part 1 boss could barely muster half his life bar. That’s pathetic.

I’m really contemplating starting over and not even finishing this playthrough. It’s gotten to be that bad. Even if I avoided all other paralogs the rest of the game, I will stay consistently over leveled by 3-4 levels. And in an already easy game it just kills the experience.

Idk what to do. I really love this game but I screwed the pooch here. I’m not even that confident HARD mode will solve the issue, either. One of the big things it does is restrict grinding the unlimited maps, but I haven’t even touched them anyways! Heck I haven’t even done half the ones that actually cost an activity point! Which is why I thought the game would be balanced for you doing a few of those maps, but apparently not.

The only thing I can think might help correct this is take my three new recruits and just let them steamroll the next four or five naps while letting everyone else sit back, have them soak up all the experience and then use my core group of students to finish the game after that. But even then the game is so easy I don’t even know if it’s worth bothering.

I think I’m gonna start over. HARD CLASSIC and I’m not gonna dare touch a single extra non-story map. Heck... I may even just wait for Lunatic, which is crazy to hear myself saying because I’d never DREAM of touching Lunatic in previous entries, but gosh dang, I need some semblance of challenge here. Then again I may as well just plow through and finish the story so I can choose a different house in New Game + (although now I’m afraid to even use New Game + as all that Renown will just make me overleveled again and trivialize the playthrough).

That sounds like the way to go. Finish the story. Do what I can to soak XP to recruits to rebalance, don’t touch any extra maps, then wait for Lunatic and do a Blue Lions run on Lunatic Classic, while avoiding New Game + like the plague. Thank GOODNESS Lunatic is coming. Probably need to turn off the fallen spirits thing too, as that extra XP and money just translates to more power and better weapons. And maybe even skip the saint statues. All that stuff adds up.

I just beat it. Fantastic game. One of the best games of the year. The only game I have over it is the Resident Evil 2 Remake. I joined the Blue Lions. I really enjoyed the characters in this house.

This is my first FE game, and I’m already hooked. I really enjoy all the non-battle gameplay, too. It gives me quite a bit more investment than I thought it would.

The game isn't hard on normal. Huh, who'd have thought? I always thought what they called normal on previous games would have been hard in most other series.

@JaxonH I know the feeling, it sucks when that happens. I heard you can’t change to a higher difficulty but CAN change to a lower which is weird...

@Galenmereth
Ok, so HARD mode is where it’s at then. Good to know. But I’m gonna avoid New Game + as I just learned all your statue upgrades and professor level carries over. Having that many activity points from the start will just break the game and defeat the purpose of Hard Mode. So I’m going in fresh for Blue Lions. Maybe I’ll do NG+ for Lunatic though.

And I’m gonna finish the story. I think I can rebalance it by recruiting as many people as possible and forcing XP on them instead of my main crew. Plus, the game should rebalance more as I move into A skills and cap off. Not to mention the difficulty should naturally ramp up as I get deeper in the game.

But Hard mode definitely sounds like what I need to graduate to. In my mind I’m still a novice FE player, but I think I’ve played enough games by now that I’m probably better than I give myself credit for.

@JaxonH "Normal" difficulty is clearly intended for new and casual players. You've conquered some of the harder games in the series. So, yes, for you, "hard" mode is where it's at. Although it's still not really hard, imo. Even on this harder difficulty, it's still easier than almost every other game in the series I've played thus far.

Although it's worth mentioning that I also play these games on the highest non-Lunatic settings available. Fates: Conquest was a bit much for me on Hard/Classic, although I did eventually finish it.

@Ralizah
Conquest had the PERFECT difficulty for Normal. That game nailed it.

But ya, New Game + should probably be avoided as well since having 6-9 activity points off the bat, on top of statue upgrades will just defeat the purpose.

But it should be noted that the biggest problem I have is being over-leveled. So Hard Mode, without NG+, without doing any extra paralogs or auxiliary battles, while also recruiting half a dozen others to spread the XP over a larger group... that should make it feel, at the very least, on par with Normal of previous games. Or, the level of challenge I remember from Normal of previous games, anyways.

With all the rewinds, I feel more emboldened than ever to just go Lunatic when the update drops. Where is the challenge if you can just undo all your mistakes? It’s almost like the “Lunatic Casual” approach. You play on super hard difficulty but have the safety net of casual mode. Except, in the case of FETH, The safety net of casual is no longer needed because you have the safety net of rewinds.

@JaxonH I don't usually like talking about how I'd change games, as I feel like it's presumptuous and usually doesn't take into account the fact that the developers have spent thousands of hours longer thinking about every aspect of the game and how it fits together and, as a result, have a much deeper level of understanding about how the game should be designed in the first place than some internet rando. With that said, I can't help but think a few small changes would have benefited this title immensely.

First, I'd have opted to remove "casual" mode entirely, as I feel like it's pointless in a game where divine pulses are a thing. Instead, I'd have included a beginner mode with unlimited divine pulses, and a harder mode with much more limited pulse availability. Unlimited pulses mode would obviously allow for new players to play around with strategies as much as possible because they'd have no fear of being locked into certain decisions, but the fear of death would still force them to play strategically. The limited pulses mode would only allow one or two rewinds per battle, which would account for surprise reinforcement ambushes and the occasional moment of RNG unfairness, but wouldn't allow seasoned players tons of leeway to make mistakes.

Then, "normal" and "hard" would be renamed "easy" and "normal," because, difficulty-wise, that's what they are. This game has no hard mode out of the box.

In general, while I think there are perhaps too many pulses available to the player, I feel like it's a great addition to the series, as having to reset every time a scrub enemy gets a random critical on a valuable unit is artificial difficulty and more a waste of time than anything.

@Ralizah
100% agree.

Casual mode is now obsolete. I do like the divine pulse mechanic but there is such a thing as too much, at least for harder difficulty (but as you astutely observed, there seems to be no hard mode in this game at launch).

One divine pulse, two halfways through the game. At least for the harder difficulty. And just do away with casual entirely. It’s pointless now.

I just hope Lunatic isn’t crazy difficult. There needs to be a reasonable difficulty that’s not way too easy or way too hard. If they balance it properly, it could be exactly what seasoned fans are looking for. If they go overboard with it, there could be a huge golf between crazy easy and crazy hard. Let’s hope that’s not what happens.

@Snaplocket
But with the rewind mechanic, you’ll never suffer the repercussions of permadeath, hence why casual mode is no longer needed.

Nobody is saying they should only offer a permadeath as an option. But the fact is, permadeath is no longer ANY option. Every mode is casual mode now. There is no permadeath. When you can rewind your mistakes nearly a dozen times per map, what’s the point? It made sense back when a death had consequences. But death no longer has consequences. Ergo, casual mode is no longer necessary. The rewind time mechanic IS the casual mode.

Ok, the game is starting to feel more balanced.

I have recruited enough people so that I have 16 on my team, and by always rotating the 8-10 people with the least amount of experience, I ensure the people with the most experience are always sitting on the sidelines and it ensures the XP is spread out among a group twice as large.

I’m only 1-2 levels over now instead of 3-5, and I can feel the difficulty starting to return. Not to mention the fact I’m in the second half of the game now, so the difficulty is starting to ramp up on its own as well.

I still feel the middle of the game is super easy to a fault, but the beginning of the game was fine and it feels like it’s kind of going back to normal in the later game as well. So really it’s just those middle chapters from 6 to 11 that I steamrolled through. But, I actually died on this map I’m playing now! Granted, it was the stupid aggro meter that threw me off. It looked like they were going to attack someone else so I moved in, but they attacked me instead, and did 35 damage! Then the other guy, who was also supposed to attack someone else, attacked me and finished me off. I was taken aback. Thankfully the time wheel saved my butt as it was the end of a 40 minute long affair (I wasn’t sure if it would let you use it if a main character died that was a fail condition, but apparently it does).

My interest in the combat is surging now. As long as I have the threat of dying to where I can’t just mindlessly move a blob of people across the map without any regard, I’m entertained. And it feels like I can no longer do that. I’m so happy 😁

I'm not sure if it's technically possible to kill the boss and have a unit die on the same turn before having a chance to rewind time but if that's a possibility, then the Casual Mode could still come in handy. Which ones move first, enemy units or AI allies? I could see a scenario where the boss kills your units and then an AI ally kills the boss before it's your turn. Or if there's a skill that activates when a unit dies that results in the other unit dying. Not sure if there are that kind of skills. It's still something to take into account if they were to completely remove Casual Mode.

I've just started playing it yesterday despite having since Wednesday + a week, I wanted to finish things up on Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 first. The game is fine but I prefer the 3DS ones. It seems like there is less emphasis on battles and more on cut scenes and roaming around the school which I'm not too keen on. I also don't like however everyone wear similar uniforms rather than having an unique look, it made it harder to choose which house to join when they all look the same and not knowing the non-leader characters yet.

If am not online, do I miss any key features??

@scubydo I think the fallen spirits that grant you extra weapons and sometimes XP when you encounter them in the battlefield require internet. Oh, and it also allows you to see what percentage of players selected a certain action each Sunday.

No key features, though.

I started playing this game last night. I don't understand why people were comparing this to P5.

Combat is fun. I wish there was more of it...

You can skip the Monastery stuff if you want. Besides that, the game is full of battles. Each chapter is generally like 2 to 3 hours of battling from my experience. However if you’re more keen on going only for the main plot battles you can also skip Paralogues and skip towards the main battles.