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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - So, Fire Emblem Three Houses turned out exactly as I feared...

Lonely_Dolphin said:
HoangNhatAnh said:

Echoes? The only good FE story wise on 3ds?

I'm all about the gameplay!

Not for me, Nintendo games are mostly about gameplay only, but there is some exceptions like Earthbound, Golden Sun, Fire Emblem and Xenoblade. They need both good gameplay and good story, there is a reason why many people call Awakening generic and Fates is trash for otaku with fanservices only, despite not bad gamelay



Mar1217 said:
Chrkeller said:
Quick question. My students are highly proficient in a variety of skills, but outside sword my main character has terrible skills. Is there a trick to quickly learning something like flying for the main character? Or is she purposely meant to be a ground swordmaster?

Faculty training is your ally, but you won't get any if you don't go explore and if your professor level is low.

Currently I am a C+ professor level and I have done some faculty training, but it still seems limited.  Flying in particular seems difficult.  



Well, I dont know about that, personally I feel its the best Fire Emblem since Awakening... And Fates, Sacred Sword, Radiant Dawn, and perhaps even Path or Radiance and Blazing Blade. I liked it tho.



My critique of modern Fire Emblem:

1. Lower access to characters - assuming you try to play classic mode if you lose a character, chances are close to certain you lose access to getting characters later. In the older games, from a gameplay perspective, you are usually good to lose a lot of characters because you get a sufficient number of new ones to replace the dead ones. This hasn't been the case in Awakening or Fates (not sure about Valentia, Echoes, or Houses as I haven't played those).

2. Games not balanced for classic mode - You may as well call it "no fun mode" - as I pointed out in my last point, if you lose a character, it's fairly devastating. But there are other reasons, there are a lot of "Got you!" type maps where it's not even a case of "I have to sacrifice a unit to win this battle," and more of a "SIX OF US SPAWNED BEHIND YOUR LINES AND WE'RE ATTACKING NOW AND KILLING YOUR HEALERS AND ARCHERS!" - I noticed this particularly in the Birthright game of Fates. This is fine if you are playing casual mode, but it's pretty much game over if playing classical mode. It adds a new dimension of memorizing enemy spawn patterns, which is not fun at all since they are not logical as they were in old games; and this is why I strongly feel they didn't try to balance or playtest much around classic mode.

3. The story focus is long gone. While there was clearly a decline in story quality (with the exception of maybe Path of Radiance which was one of the few games who had a better story than its more immediate predecessors) the games became much more generic feeling, the relationships felt more like placeholder text and less like a real relationship that you see developing. Additionally, the focus on narrative has been lowered significantly. The stories are less epic, less mature, and more "anime" for lack of a better term. But this is a reasonably general thing that has happened in strategy RPGs in general: Look at the stories and epic feeling of games like Fire Emblem Genealogy of the Holy War, Ogre Battle, Final Fantasy Tactics compared to Disgaea 5, Fire Emblem Awakening, and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance games; it's like when an R-rated film has a rated PG sequel. I don't want to sound like I am bashing those games, I LIKE those games, but they are not the same as the strategy RPGs of old.

4. Simplified gameplay - arguably a good thing, but not for me! I enjoyed the older games where you had to more carefully consider your moves, do a lot more calculating, and take a risk, while in newer Fire Emblem there are fewer variables to consider (except random spawning); but ultimately it makes victory taste less sweet. Not once since Awakening has come out do I get that "Holy hell I can't believe that worked!" feeling. And I'm not even talking about the elemental stuff, but rather how the game presents information to you.

5. No deaths = no meaning - in the past games, while from a gameplay perspective losing a character wouldn't screw you... it would be more like losing 12-20 characters that would. However, the sense of loss was immense, and it would change the story of the game. It added to the game's replayability; each experience was different than the last... As well in Blazing Blade, you could go through with the Hector perspective instead of Eliwood for a more rowdy point of view (and also a little more challenging), Sacred Stones allowed similar branching.; anyway! I digress. Fire Emblem Awakening is a game you might play once, or twice again to see what a harder difficulty/mode is like, but generally you wouldn't play through the same game 8-12 times no matter how big of a fan you were because the game focuses more on character developmental chores than it does on a straightforward epic strategy-packed adventure; to me, that's all the fun stuff and none of the chores/filler. Anyway, because Awakening and later games are balanced for casual mode, the other mode (with deaths) is not very fun at all, and so it's in your best interest not to use it; but it's a catch 22 because playing casual essentially turns off the tension/drama/sense of loss that the older games provided.

So, for me, going back and playing on those really out of date graphics and interface is still more fun than the much more advanced and more beautiful looking recent games (I am unsure how I feel about the look of the new game just yet).

That's just me, and I definitely fall more into the fan of the classic Fire Emblem games fanbase, the first one I ever played was Fire Emblem 4 on emulator; although I would say roughly 50% of all Fire Emblem I have ever played has been specifically FE; Blazing Blade (Fire Emblem Advance, the first one officially released in European markets).



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

Mar1217 said:
Chrkeller said:

Currently I am a C+ professor level and I have done some faculty training, but it still seems limited.  Flying in particular seems difficult.  

Once you get to B/B+ you'll get generally more opportunity to do stuff to up the motivations of your students and activity points to invest in faculty training.

You don't have much choice otherwise you'll just have to stick to the Swordmaster class. Personally I want him to use the Hero class so I'm concentrating my efforts toward Axe skill.

It is a mild complaint, but I wish the main character was easier to customize.  But, not a big deal.



RolStoppable said:
Comparing Three Houses to Shadows of Valentia makes me question your sanity. It's most similar to Awakening, because that's the only other game where everyone can basically be everything and the massive amount of skills really hurt the balance. A return to the classic predetermined class path for every unit and skills being rare would be necessary to amplify the strategy element.

The Golden Deers cast strikes the best balance between frontliners and backliners. Its initial setup of two archers and one gauntlet makes it much easier to pull off your cheap tactics early on. Lysithea may also be the most capable magician in the game, so Golden Deers is the easiest path to play. With the Blue Lions you get heavy tanks against physical attacks, but magic grills them quickly which makes the latter half of the game with its more varied enemy formations more challenging. The Black Eagles don't have any competent tank and the mage-heavy cast only makes that worse; you'll have to change the characters' preset paths to develop a capable party.

I agree that the monastery (the free-running, not the lessons) are the worst part of the game. It takes a lot of time to check everything and you don't gain all that much from it. Recruiting other characters should have been done in a better way, because the way it is, people will hardly recruit anyone on their first playthrough without reading up on how to make it happen more often.

I rank Three Houses higher than all of the 3DS games, Shadow Dragon on the DS and The Sacred Stones on the GBA. But to reach the heights of Fire Emblem (GBA), Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn, it would have had to be without the freedom to turn everyone into everything and without the huge load of powerful skills. Still, the core of the game plays well and the EXP gains prevent it from becoming a drag while the story, characters and world building can compete with the best of the series.

1. Radiant Dawn
2. Path of Radiance
3. Fire Emblem (GBA)
4. Three Houses
5. Fates
6. The Sacred Stones
7. Shadow Dragon
8. Awakening
9. Leaving a gap to make a point
10. Shadows of Valentia

You're being willfully ignorant if you think that one similarity (not really, that requires excessive grinding) outweighs the plethora of mechanics ripped straight from Echoes. Skills are massively toned down in this game and the enemys rarely have any aside from their default class skills so not sure what you're talking about there. Skills can add to the strategy if done right like in Conquest, Lunge will probably forever be the coolest and most hilarious skill ever.

As any unit can be anything, it doesn't matter what their initial preferences are. Raphael doesn't like Bows but I still made him use anyway. It wont be any different when I play the other houses, everyone will still either have Bows Magic or both. Perhaps when you get access to longer ranged magic could be different, but otherwise should be same deal. I certainly wont ever make anyone armored since there's no point when everyone is already tanky enough.

Seeing your list certainly explains your willful ignorance, you can't accept that you like 3 Houses despite it blatantly being heavily influenced by your least favorite FE. :P

MTZehvor said:

I'm curious what level your units are at if they're simply killing everything without retaliation. I'm nearing the end of the GD route on hard (or so my friends tell me), and while it's nowhere near the hardest strategy game I've played, there's definitely a degree to which I need to be careful in order to not get assblasted immediately (i.e. can't just charge in recklessly, can't place Lysithea in cavalry range, etc.). I've given some units both magic/physical skills but one or the other just ends up not being that great and not worth using. Bows also wind up being really bad on later maps without proper investment in my experience (unless it's just hoards of flying enemies).

As for the monastery, I'd honestly recommend skipping it if it bores you. It kinda got a bit samey to me late game, and unless you really need to improve your professor level or level up a weapon skill level for whatever reason, you can pretty much just rest/battle through everything with no consequences.

Overall I've liked it a lot so far. Certainly better than the Tellius games/Fates imo, potentially better than Awakening depending on whether it sticks the ending/whether there are any truly obnoxious maps in the endgame.

My units are around Lv.35, the enemys on the current map are Lv.34 so it's not just because I'm overleveled rather than the reasons given already. I never do auxiallry battles, I only do paralogues, quest, and rare monster if it has a unique weapon. It's to the point where I'm doing even better than the devs expected, this one mission had Claude set up a fire attack, but it was pointless because the enemies were already dead. xD

Eh I like progressing my units weapon skills so I wont be skipping the monastery. It's not great but I can deal with it.



Granted I am playing on normal, with perma death off, but strategy wise I feel FE is behind Mario vs Rabbids. I kind of just attach whomever I want too. Still a really fun game, but just not a 10/10 or 9/10 for me. I'm still in the 7/10 to 8/10 range.



Lonely_Dolphin said:
HoangNhatAnh said:

Echoes? The only good FE story wise on 3ds?

I'm all about the gameplay!

JWeinCom said:
Might be my favorite in the series. I really like the Monastery way more than I expected. It gives you a more interesting way to interact with your units. More importantly for me, it allows you to interact with units that you may not want to use in battle. In previous games, unless you actually use them in your party you would never get to know them. And since some units are redundant that wound up not happening.

As for walking up to enemies and killing them without retaliation, either Gold Deer path is much easier than Black Eagles, or I'm doing something wrong. Even my tankier characters are pretty vulnerable and are likely to get killed if I leave them in the range of more than one enemy. If anything my units feel a lot weaker than Awakening or Fates where my bulkier units could just draw enemy fire without concern.

Random story. I wanted to see more about how item weight effects your characters. I typed in "Fire Emblem Three Houses Weight" and one of google's suggestions was "Fire Emblem Weight gain fanfic". What the fuck kind of shit are people into?

How far are you in the game? I liked the monastery at first too but time I've started to see it short comings. I still like that the characters say new stuff with the story. but I just end up doing the same 2-3 interactions and hearing the same dialogue over n over. I'm not saying they should cut the monastery, I just wish it evolved more.

I don't think game mechanics would change drastically between paths so it's surely the same for Black Eagles. Between overall higher base HP compared to offensive stats, HP+5 skill every unit has easy access to, Shields and Battalions, every unit can tank hits. The Range Meta I.E. Bows and Magic that can eventually reach up to 5 range means you can reach enemies from outside their attack range and avoid taking a counterattack. Finally you have immediate access to innate double attacking via gauntlets, which can nuke everything except armor and potentially kill the enemy before they can counter.

I'm at Chapter 15.  Which I think is fairly close to the end for my route.  

HP + 5 isn't really that big of a deal with the amount of damage enemies do.  It's nice in the early game, but  All units definitely cannot tank hits.  Unless I'm just drastically underleveled or something.  My magic units are going to die around 100% of the time if left within range of a physical attacker.  My bulkier units can usually survive one enemy attack, two if I'm lucky.  Shields can help, but the better ones have a really high weight, which leaves you less likely to double attack and more likely to get double attacked.  And that means sacrificing another item. By contrast in Fates, I would literally send Ryoma out into the battlefield completely unequipped (so he didn't get the kills) and let enemies wail on him.  

By bows and magic that reach five range, the only such stuff I've encountered is the meteor spell (which is limited to one use) and the deadeye ability (with sniper class).  Deadeye uses up a lot of durability and weakens your attack significantly.  Also has a pretty low hit rate so you'll need to have an ability increasing hit percentage to use it effectively.  (hit rate in general goes down the farther away you are).  Good for softening up or finishing off units, but it's pretty much never going to one shot anything, so unless you send someone else in, you're going to wind up getting hit on the next turn.  I still haven't gotten anyone to bow knight, so we'll see if that maybe makes bows too powerful.

As for gauntlets, they double attack, but their mt is really low.  For example, silver gauntlets have an mt of 4 vs a silver lance having an mt of 13.  Plus while the other weapons get a mt bonus for their + states, but the gauntlets don't.   They also have imo the worst combat arts.  In the early game they felt overpowered, but less and less as the game goes on.  

You're also ignoring many features that the other games had that this one doesn't.  You can't pair units which was absolutely broken in Awakening, and still a huge bonus in fates.  There are less luck based abilities.  Your crests kind of serve the same function, but they're not as overpowered as things like Ignis, Aether, or Dragon Fang.  You can also only use rally on one ally at a time instead of boosting them all. 

Aside from the fact that you can use divine pulse (which is a feature I like a lot), I'm finding the game to be overall more difficult than the 3DS entries.  In Awakening and Fates, I found the early missions to be really tough, but once I settled in and figured out which abilities to exploit, the later missions became very easy.  I'm finding the opposite here where I  breezed through the early missions, but started having a lot of trouble (minor spoilers) after the time skip.  



Chrkeller said:
Granted I am playing on normal, with perma death off, but strategy wise I feel FE is behind Mario vs Rabbids. I kind of just attach whomever I want too. Still a really fun game, but just not a 10/10 or 9/10 for me. I'm still in the 7/10 to 8/10 range.

Is the game actually balanced for perma-death like Blazing Sword, or does it make for a horrible experience like in Awakening and Fates because it's balanced for casual play?



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

Jumpin said:
Chrkeller said:
Granted I am playing on normal, with perma death off, but strategy wise I feel FE is behind Mario vs Rabbids. I kind of just attach whomever I want too. Still a really fun game, but just not a 10/10 or 9/10 for me. I'm still in the 7/10 to 8/10 range.

Is the game actually balanced for perma-death like Blazing Sword, or does it make for a horrible experience like in Awakening and Fates because it's balanced for casual play?

Not sure exactly what you mean by that.  The game takes the rewind feature from Echoes (divine pulse) so you don't have to worry about having to start a whole mission over because of some stupid rng.  

Chrkeller said:
Granted I am playing on normal, with perma death off, but strategy wise I feel FE is behind Mario vs Rabbids. I kind of just attach whomever I want too. Still a really fun game, but just not a 10/10 or 9/10 for me. I'm still in the 7/10 to 8/10 range.

Eh... you're basically playing on easy mode.  And that's fine if you enjoy it more, but if your complaint is that the game is too easy... that's kind of not valid.