Like I said, I'm only 3 levels below the max (except for Marth, who is maxed). The enemy, on the other hand, killed me in one attack every time, which shouldn't happen for only being 3 levels under.

It's like the old Pokemon Stadium games. 

If you bring a team of raised pokemon against an opponent using stock pokemon, your opponent is almost guaranteed to lose.  Yours are simply better.

If you both bring teams of raised pokemon or both use teams of stock pokemon then it's more a matter of strategy (switching, move-use, etc) because the teams will both be relatively similar power-wise.

Yes, obviously I knew you were going to say this, but it doesn't change the fact that you will know what to do against certain types of characters (Pokémon) after a certain time.

This is why I hate online games with characters that have different stats on each of them. They add attributes on certain characters and they remove them on some others to compensate with certain types of weapons they can only wield and stuff like that. At a certain limit of the game, the balance isn't somewhat balanced, if you know what I mean.

Wow, I think I know why I hate playing online in general. Some people just know how to screw up the system too much. o_O

It's not a matter of people screwing it up.  It's just a matter of other people being better at playing it than you.

It's like getting mad at someone playing Chess against you for moving her queen in 8 directions while you only move yours in 4 directions.  Just because you didn't take the time to prepare and read all the rules doesn't mean they should lower themselves to playing at your level.

Hopefully they will improve it on the next fire emblem wii.

It would be more fun if players could create their own maps and share them or do co-op with another player.

Being better at grinding to the max level and repeat the same patterns all the time? Good for them, but it's what I call an easy win. Can you really be proud of your win? Do they even realize that when it takes less than 2-3 minutes to complete an online match with no trouble at all, it's just not fun anymore? Unless those people are sadists...  (And that's what they are if you ask me.)

Also, that Chess example is a bit extreme. Sure, they shouldn't take it easy on you since you're a beginner, but beginners will get better at one point and adapt to the different play styles. Then, the pattern I just said above is going to repeat itself. That's exactly it, it takes time to get to the top of your game and realize everything you can exploit in the game, but once you do, isn't it redundant?

It's not fun when you start and lose all the time, it's not more fun when you're "good" because there's no challenge anymore.

It takes time to become good at anything.  Some people have fun spending that time to get everyone ultra-powerful, some don't.  It's rather ignorant of you to assume your standard of "what is fun for me" applies to others.

If you don't want to spend the time maxing your characters then you should just accept that you will lose to people who do.  They put more time and effort into the game and they win more often.  It's exactly how things should work.

I think the happy medium between Words of Wisdom's "if you haven't hacked you lose, only people with max stats and the best stuff need apply" and Smashchu2's dilemma is a simple match making system. Lots of games have them these days to prevent that exact kind of frustration. Hell Chess had a simple one it a very long time ago (Elo ratings), and tons of online games made use of that (starcraft for instance) so you could at least use Elo ratings to match make yourself. But now lots of games do it automatically.

If I player's characters drastically over power yours, then a match making system should be making sure you aren't playing them. That way more people can actually enjoy playing online rather than an incredibly small cadre of individuals who either hacked the game or invested 200 hours into maximizing their characters (only to get creamed by a hacker).

Sure, it's fun to get everyone to the max level (I didn't say anything about this by the way), but do you really have to prove to everyone that you did it? I'm just speculating here, I didn't assume anything. I thought it was obvious that there's a limit of having fun "owning" easy targets, especially when you can't upgrade your characters after getting them to the max level. There's no point anymore, unless, like I said, you're a sadist!

That's why I should add that online for a RPG is pretty silly. It sounds weird in my ears to hear someone say "w00t, I owned your guys with my overpowered guys. Take that, noob!" I mean, yeah, really? Wait until I get there I say!

Tsssk... Human beings and their will to compete against each other! =P