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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 ต.ค. 2024
- Permadeath doesn't work in modern Fire Emblem. This video discusses why a once forward-thinking feature is now a formality.
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“And here we see a wild fire emblem fan, hating fire emblem despite playing it almost every day.”
Haha
“And has a bunch of figurines of a certain character and worships that character to the point it becomes a cult even though that character is highly flawed but they always call out flaws of every single character to make their favourite the best character in the series”
@@baalgodofrain hey! stop badmouthing Elise!
Chaz Aria LLC hey I never said it was Elise, I like Elise. I mean literally any character in this game, they obsess over one character (take your pick) and de-mean the others in the process
Gods he's back
Fire Emblem now needs permabirth. Every unit has a child each turn.
...what game...?
LORD OF MAGNA!
Well, the enemies at least XD
Jezus christ...ok how much money you want
Wait.... is't that fates?
I’d play the hell out of that
yes
"Don't you just love happy endings?"
Tanya's still dead tho
NOOOOOOOOO
but now we have dalsin so that overrides tanya's dead-ness
Well then she certainly isn't given anyone a happy ending. 😉
Some deaths are good for the greater good.
How much is the fine, for necrophilia, in this part, of Jugdral?
Oops, my Least Favourite Character accidentally ran directly towards 16 Enemies on the same chapter you got them in and died, gosh diggity darn it.
I didn’t notice that Machyua died either
@@seafoam6119 Don't you dare insult Macha.
"Ah shit Meg died, she was best girl." - No one, ever.
“Oh fuckity fack! Lute mysteriously got her neck broken by a zombie! Darn!”
Oh no! Not Arthur!
Anyways
TL;DR
Dalsin trivializes death
I think part of the thing that kills perms-death is the shift towards greater characterization. Emotional investment can be a VERY strong incentive for a large number of people.
Agreed. I play Fire Emblem for both the characters and the gameplay, just not at the same time. I play the hardest difficulty whenever I feel like playing a challenging game but I play Phoenix mode or on normal or hard instead of Lunatic whenever I just wanna retread the plot or see new supports.
The characterization has advanced but permadeath hasn't kept up with it. They need to have permadeath change dialogue a lot so that permadeath actually works. Right now 99% of characters don't even die anymore in the newer games, so death has only a gameplay impact and all you get is not being able to use a character and they're still alive for some stupid fucking reason
@Morgan_of_the_Maxilla yeah I let Anette " die" early three houses. It's my first ever FE game. I was gutted she died but wanted to have it feel real. Not only was there no cutscene or anything from any character regarding her death. I see her prancing around the monastery afterwards as if nothing happened lol .
@@SurferKrokyThat's because only in the war arc do people actually die. However even Marcus iirc had an actual cutscene (And Lyndis' legion in Lyn Mode) mentioning that they are injured and can't fight anymore. You dont even really get that in 3H.
I simply can't get over how insanely good the editing is
And the voice... oh my goodness his voice
Yeah Chaz always delivers great editing for sure
Yeah, what a weirdo. Putting genuine effort into a channel under 100k subs? Nearly all his content is just about a game that probably has limited fan reach. Choosing to put on a high-effort personality and write fun joke. Damn, what a fool.
It's almost like he's... ... INSPIRATIONAL
@@kdjets You're acting like Swordmaster Arie wasn't genuinely complimenting Chaz Aria LLC. How did you read the comment as an insult?
I want to throw my perspective on the matter here, as I have a different, though not necessarily opposing opinion, that permadeath in modern Fire Emblem games still serve a purpose, though not in increasing the player's options, but rather decreasing them by changing the way the player thinks on a somewhat fundamental level.
My claim of permadeath reducing the player's options can be seen by comparing Fire Emblem to a significantly older game of tactics, chess. In chess, a good player will have no problem sacrificing any piece, besides the king, to gain an edge over the opponent, from a pawn to the queen. In Fire Emblem, the player on a subconscious level doesn't come up with strategies like that, or if they do come up, they squash them in favor of tactics that might leave them in a disadvantageous position next turn,but keeps the units alive. At the very least, it prevents players from pulling a Soviet Union and just throwing units at the enemy, consequences be damned.
This is the purpose permadeath serves in modern Fire Emblem games, to limit the players options by having the player themselves limit the options available subconsciously, at least as far as I can tell. This opinion originally came about after a discussion I had with my brother relating to the fact him played Fire Emblems games with casual mode on, with his main point being that I attempt to keep my units alive through soft resetting, and thus meaning the mechanic now only exists to waste my time. As far as I can tell, he plays Fire Emblem this way because he uses it to relax rather than to be challenged, which is fair enough. This is obviously just my take, and I'm interested what others might have to say.
(edited because I forgot to proofread this)
Yeah I think I share the same opinion after reading this. Permadeath makes me value a units life, whereas on Casual I could just suicide all my units into a boss and be fine.
I don't see casual mode as to be any relaxing, and hardcore mode any more challenging.
It's a chore. Chores aren't challening, and while many players consider "suicide tactics" be extremely effective, i only see them as problematic - you have limited count of units on the battlefied, having one ko'd greatly increases your risks to not complete the map, plus it does not let you upgrade those unit's levels or relationships. The game is already punishing on casual mode.
Add to that the wonky difficulty setting of the game and the fact that has huge sweeps of RNG, and that makes it worse.
The timewheel greatly compensates that, however, but that's not a thing of older games.
@@TheRayny While it is true that your units lose out on gaining experience, stats, and support rank, those can also be gained through other chapters or completing a random battle. Also, that is ignoring the fact that losing out on improving a unit for part of a chapter isn't going to mean the unit is now useless. What I mean is that, in an average chapter, your going to only get like 4 levels on a unit, which means up to 4 points gained in any individual stat, and that is unlikely, though that depends on the unit and what class they are. As a result, assuming you decide to say, throw a unit at the boss with no regard for their safety at the end of the chapter, they've likely gained 3-4 levels, and is perfectly in line with your other units. If you say, lose the unit about halfway through the chapter, they probably got 1 level, and could've gained upwards of 3 levels, assuming you deliberately try to feed them as many kills as possible. And assuming that the unit didn't gain a single level, you can, as previously mentioned, either try and feed them kills next chapter or do a random battle instead. The only recent modern Fire Emblem game that the random option isn't available to use is in Conquest, and that doesn't mean unit isn't viable anymore. Sure, it may be annoying a unit your using is behind in levels, but that isn't the death of usability or even being as good or better than your other units. In any case, thank you for your thoughts on the matter.
I agree with your opinion. For me, the mechanic of permadeath in fire emblem games like 3H is to give the player a sense of realism or immersion when taking up a role as a tactician or in this case as a teacher. Permadeath in the old games can give a player the sense acting as a commander of an army, which then gives a point to the first argument of permadeath can give different options since you act like as a cold calculated commander especially when doing an Iron Man challenge where you have to leave units dead. In 3h however, the player is in the role of a teacher and teachers are mostly associated as a secondary parental figure who serves to guide students and help them become the best they can be rather than treating them as disposable soldiers. The game is filed with activities and mechanics that are designed to help you build the best unit or student. The role permadeath in a game like 3H is to not give options but to give stakes since losing a highly invested unit will feel like losing a student that you honestly believed and guided in their path. Permadeath still has a purpose, it just changed from being a viable option to being stakes in order to raise tension and immersion.
Talking about something slightly different than the video here.
What you're talking about are the benefits of playing on "Classic VS Casual." What Chaz was talking about in the video are the game design benefits of "losing a character forever VS displaying a Game Over" when that character dies in Classic mode.
Not that there is anything wrong with talking about something different, just that your perspective is different because it's a perspective on a different aspect of the game.
Fe character: *breathes*
Player: WELL SHIT TIME TO RESET
FE character: *stops breathing*
Player: Welp, time to reset
Permadeath is a feature? I only play the MOST DAUNTING DIFFICULTY MODE known to man in my hana phoenix mode solo runs. You people are bad at fe
So daunting, no man has completed it.
lol seen plenty of people play maddening and doing fine these guys just don't wanna waste time of reseting for the mistakes they made lol.
SyLuX636
‘Tis a fucking joke
Once I'm done getting everything out from my last Fates play through, maybe I'll do an actual Hana solo on not Phoenix Mode
don't forget to weapon lock her to the Hana Katana.
What interests me most about permadeath in Fire Emblem is the fact that it's one if the only games with permadeath that isnt run based. Most games with this mechanic are short and meant to be re-attempted. FE is more longform and allows you to see the consequences of your actions.
Xcom says hello and units aren't premade you have to train each unit from a blank slate.
@@SyLuX636 xcom chimera squad says hello.
Vip missions will be the bane of my existence lol.
all y'all in this comment section need to actually read the initial comment, unless you're coming from the perspective of just letting the guy know those games exist. Wonder just said that FE is one of the few cases that permadeath is included in a long game, they didn't say it was the only game that does so.
Fire Emblem is also one of the few games with permadeath that actually focuses on characters with a name and story and that you can get somewhat attached to. Only other games I can think of are banner saga/ash of gods (Mostly this one) and the devil survivor games to a degree.
What if we got a system where the game rewards you for keeping your units alive with extra scenes, conversations, and endings while also rewarding you for leaving units dead with... extra scenes, conversations, and endings. It would reinforce this idea of the main story being the same, but your actions in game affect the people within it. Then again, i’m also the guy who thinks that supports should be replaced with numerous in battle conversations that essentially act as supports but don’t break the flow of battle nor overwhelm you, but still flesh out the characters in more normal ways instead of a fixed C-B-A style. So take what i say with some salt.
Actually I'd like that
Abosikay FE9 and 10 have different info conversations and even altered supports if characters die. And of course keeping characters alive allows you to unlock info conversations long after the character was recruited. So IS has experimented with it in the past, and personally I liked the info conversations a lot. Really fleshed out not just the characters but the world building too
No getting rid of supports is stupid.
Despite everything I still reset when a unit dies cause it bothers me when a unit dies and I like having a full barracks. I don't want anyone on my main squad dying either. I'm a bit of a completionist when it comes to unit's.
Would gladly and proudly restart a map no matter how hard, annoying, or long it is if my waifu dies.
I do that too.
Unless it's someone from Dawn Brigade I didn't train.
Then I don't care :P
I'always reset because I use unit I'like as characters so I'just cannot let them die :c
Now, this is a true man of culture
""Every student, when invested in, is really good."
Meanwhile, in Blue Lions:
"If Ingrid could just level up once in Strength"
God Ingrid is a fucking bitch to level up, she almost never one rounds enemies if she's not using Luin, and even sometimes post timeskip doubling with Luin still doesn't kill them.
Would magic help? Dark Flier might work with Ingrid. Her strength growth is equal to her magic, but enemies will have less Res on average. Those who do not are either bosses or magic users. Magic users are more likely to be squished easily.
Quoting Bismix? I see you’re a man of culture as well.
But yes, we all know Ingrid’s strength is crap. Just like we know that Annette’s speed is crap.
wow really guess i'm lucky then she usely one of my best unite
i just farm a bunch of purple flower seeds in the greenhouse for her to get strength boosters
Let’s all be honest, everyone reset once
oh yeah nobody's denying that
he's saying that there are merits to not resetting (which not everyone naturally thinks), not that you always have to press on when a unit dies
More like 5 or 4
Always felt bad for doing it, i always say i will try to not do it but i always keep doing it almost once, i think the problem is that i play thinking i can save them all when its not true, i think the better way to play is knowing someone will die evenctually
I tried on an emulator to play first time through FE7 without resetting and got hit by a belown 50% hit 2% crit and lost a unit (one of the Cavs forgot which due to it being a few months and my limited knowledge of the game). I didn't reset because I wanted to know how much it would hurt me for not having the unit, sadly the PC I was using stopped working internally so I haven't been able to finish that run and I don't think I ever will be able to.
I also hold the opinion that hit rate and more so crit rate are just a suggestion because how often in FE games I will crit with a less than 10% or my enemy crit me with a less than 10% chance is freaking absurd, and the opposite for 90% hit rates with missing instead.
@@dawnevergarden3275 That last bit is not an opinion. You are just provably false. And your support for that argument is your subjective experience, which supports next to nothing.
And also, your mind tends to remember what sticks out to you, chances are you have so many memories of that happening precisely because they felt out of place to begin with.
When I have zero divine pulse charges left, I see danger.
When Mangs sees zero divine pulse charges left, he sees dollar signs.
"Go ahead, laugh at us"
Me accidentally getting 13 charges: y'all are running out?
Likely at the beginning when you have a few.
One thing Echoes did really well, I think, is how the dialogues could change if you did play without reset and on a blind run. For example the villagers despising you because you killed Zeke, or Clive getting mad at you because you were not able to save Mathilda.
There even were one extra line at the end of a battle from a specific character if his/her close friend died in that battle. I'll always remember how sad it was when I heard Palla mourning over Catria.
Instead of having a game which let you make one BIG choice and all the story changes in consequence, I'd rather have a game containing only one story, but that story and dialogues slightly change for every character you lose and in-game decisions you make on a map. And I really think that'd be possible if time was not spent to create two or three aditionnal stories, like in Fates and Three Houses.
That way, the loss of a character doesn't sound like a failure anymore, and the player who let a unit die is rewarded as much as a player who did a run without losing a single unit.
And also, for that reason, I actually think that Shadow Dragon's idea to give units to players who lost too many of them, was a great gameplay feature.
This is totally the potential im referring to in the video i wish theyd lean into going forward.
Yes! I always felt Fire Emblem did not do that enough. Especially in newer games where a lot of characters just 'retreat' to keep the story functional. I'd love to see character deaths influence the story maybe even yield different endings (like not just in the character endings but in the entire story of the game - different chapters, dialouge or similar)
Path of Radiance also had some supports change based on if particular units die.
Kinda reminds me of the gaiden chapters in Shadow Dragon. Those combined with the small changes in character interaction you talked about would be a very interesting element with a lot of potential.
Speaking on Shadow Dragon, there's a gaiden chapter unlocked if you let a certain someone die. They did do some dialogue changes in Path of Radiance when one of the Greil Mercenaries fell, but from Awakening on it feels like less and less people die and more retreat making the whole death concept less meaningful as well.
A concept I'd really like to see come into fruition is a defense-escape map where you have to make a choice of a small diversion team to let everyone else escape. You wouldn't be able to throw in a bunch of bench warmers since they have to defend a gate but you wouldn't want to sacrifice your best units either.
“Every student if invested in can be really good”
Cyril: *Allow me to introduce myself*
Hahaha
Cyril is not a student tho
point blank volley and vengance thou...
@@BananaLugh people sleep on Cyril and he has a really cool post timeskip outfit
Cyril is hella good tho
i see quarentine is treating you well chaz...
12:33
@@partyharry7585 I DID NOT NEED TO RELIVE THAT
Music Man.
@@partyharry7585....... you came!
@@partyharry7585
I don't blame him, everytime Hilda gets a kill I need to change my underwear.
I think the bigger issue is that Permadeath leads to the games’ roster being bloated. The games where Permadeath matters the most (Shadow Dragon, New Mystery, Thracia, Binding Blade). Because these games have more bloated rosters, I think it would be difficult for the devs to dedicate as much effort per character like they did in 3 houses, especially since all their dialogue needs to be voiced now.
Permadeath definitely has merit gameplay-wise, but I don’t know if incorporating it into gameplay would be worth the sacrifices made in other areas, like characterization. This is especially true as many players just play FE for the social aspect, and not just gameplay.
that's originally the idea why Kaga did that with FE1. there's too many characters for you to lose the game with ... but now 29 years later; the formula needs to change with the current gameplay stratagies and core gameplays.
Good video. The issue is that FE has become incredibly character-oriented versus map-oriented. To elaborate, modern FE has smaller casts and the cost of using a unit is much higher than it was in older entries.
I'd argue up to Awakening (with the exception of a few others, like FE4 and FE10), the game is designed with iron man in mind - replacement units, multiple units that fill the same niche, and larger cast sizes (think FE1, FE6, etc.).
Now the games are focused on making individual characters into monsters versus trying to beat a challenge with a bunch of units of your choice. For example, you used to be able to choose between 3 units that each did something similar (like a pirate, fighter, and a brigand). If I lost one of these 3, it was easy enough to replace them. Now, the games give you one unit that can be all 3 things, with limited to no replacement, so that each loss hurts a lot more to the point that continuing on without them is not a viable option.
TL;DR - IS needs to go back to larger cast sizes and make each individual unit less important if they want iron man to be a more viable mode of play.
As long as IS keeps doing 1) full voice acted games (limiting potential for bigger casts because of required budget) , 2) emphasizing unit customization (do I make lorenz a cav or a mage?) vs. army customization (do I use Treck or Hugh?), and 3) creating maps where it assumes you have your full army (like start of post-timeskip 3H), I don't see a return to the old school design principles any time soon.
I agree on you analysis on many points. However there is to keep in mind that design decisions like larger rosters and limited customization while improving the gameplay on some areas it would also considerably cripple narrative space.
More characters equals to less writing spent on each of them, so less characterization, visual design, ties to the greater world etc.. etc..
Three houses has such a wonderfully written cast because it is limited to the right amount of characters and they acre presented to the player from the very beginning, giving them room to grow throughout all the game.
So while a more classic design would make some aspects of the game more interesting we would have to give up on so much more. Ultimately everyone has their opinions and preferences though :)
Of course - it really depends on which aspects of Fire Emblem that you enjoy most. 3H has one of the best casts in the series, and all of the interactions and writing helps elevate the game in this regard. I think 3H is carried largely by its well-developed cast.
I recall Kaga saying something along the lines of permadeath helping the player creating their own narratives. I like the narrative being determined more by my choices and memories (ie I think of a recent FE11 playthrough where I had to sack Jeigan to protect Caeda from an archer, and how that impacts the narrative of the rest of the game from the player's perspective - the subtle differences in dialogue but also in the meta narrative - Marth losing a key advisor at X stage in the story, etc.) versus the written narrative the game's writers want you to have. Perhaps I am being too critical, but I find the modern games are restrictive when it comes to unit death, limiting me from having an enjoyable experience if I choose to play iron man, while the older games expected you to lose units.
I do think there is a middle ground that can be achieved, but I think that will be more difficult given the direction the series has taken since Kusakihara took over. I'd prefer they try to do more with less than lean too heavily into the narrative aspects of the character, especially if the game's design AND maps suffer for it. All a matter of opinion and personal preference though. I am just an old school fan :)
pandan That’s very true. Completely agree on this. I sure hope that they will spend more time in the future figuring out how to make permadeath a more central part of both gameplay and narrative experience.
@@_traximundar_3165 I'm pretty sure you putting 2 seperate teams in one bag, buddy. There are writers & then there are map designers. Unless you have proof, that one team affects the other, this is pure speculation on your part. Looking at most of 3H (often time reused) maps, it's pretty clear not much thought has been put into its maps(which Chaz kinda already explains why). The primary development focus has changed. Kind of ironically, since imo 3H has way to many supports I could personally bother with. And this is yet again another quantity over quality situation, since 3H has a fair share of filler & bad supports ( Raphael, Bernadetta are some of the worst offenders here). It's introduction is also kinda lazy, since everyone meets up in the Monestary. Echoes cast presents itself in a much more genuine way & through gameplay progression at the same time, which makes it imo the better cast.
Saying good writing (sometimes debatable in 3H) would affect a game's map design, is a very weak argument. Why can't we have both, unless IS isn't interested in creating strategically challenging maps anymore.
@@soulmate5589 You can argue that resources are being prioritized in different areas - it's clear that the character writing and monastery mechanics were their primary focuses and everything else exists to serve those (hence re-used maps and repeated storylines in each route).
I agree it is possible to get both, but I think he is saying that the larger the cast, the less each character has time to develop - which I think is totally fair. From there, we know that smaller casts can lead to maps being weaker overall. At least that's how I am interpreting this.
I honestly never considered the upsides of leaving a unit to die. I play Echoes almost exclusively so I'm extremely used to bringing everyone on my team and benching no one. This is part of the reason why I always reset whenever someone dies since they're irreplaceable. But I guess that applies to more Fire Emblem games where permadeath is more applicable. I think you're pretty much right in every way regarding permadeath. I personally will probably still reset even when someone dies since narratively, I think keeping everyone alive is more canonical than leaving someone dead, and I play Fire Emblem for the narrative pretty much all the time. This video is amazing Chaz! Fantastic video in every possible way, informative and entertaining.
You shoudl go play fe 12, you are exacly the kind of marth game makes fun of
"Blank level ups are impossible in three houses" They are possible, just highly unlikely. I know because I got one
Blank level ups are impossible for student units and Byleth in Three Houses*
They will always get 2 stats per level up minimum.
Faculty members can have blank level ups, that's most likely what happened to you, right?
ZeroSuitSnow I’m more puzzled why they bothered not giving the faculty this simple thing. Sure, they are geared more towards being filler/niche units, but it isn’t that big of an bonus, and it can mess with Flayn at times, who blurs the line between the groups.
I saw Mangs getting a black level up with Seteth. But is interesting to know how the students and Byleth can't.
I got a blank level up with Hannemann.
Its really a logical choice by the team if you think about it guys. You have students with potential and youth on their side. No matter how poorly they would hypothetically perform in a real life situation, they'd still be learning something about themselves or something new about the world to make them a better practitioner of "insert stat here." Faculty is older and while everyone can still have room for growth, diminishing returns do exist and can cancel out any growth you might attain. Rather an immersive feature if you ask me.
Am I the only person who wants a Fire Emblem game to have a necromancer, who can turn your dead characters into assets?
Just think, Fighter Bro and Bow Waifu die, and rather than reset, you look foreward to getting a skeleton warrior and skeleton archer later.
OML yes.
Maybe have the necromancer only be recruitable by choosing an "ironman mode" that when played as a normal iron man (losing units and not resetting or just losing enough units) will give special units only available after a certain amount of dead characters (similar to the DS fe games)
Playing Fire Emblem AKA How I learned to stop worrying and love the tomb.
When I first started playing this series, I brought a lot of my expectations and playing habits from other games and genres with me. I nearly reset an hour-long chapter of my Fire Emblem 1 Let's Play to make sure that Gordin, GORDIN OF ALL PEOPLE, didn't die. I'm playing through this series in release order, and I'm grateful that this kind of overly-protective playstyle died at the Thracia stage; I soon found that refusing any amount of loss would quickly ruin the experience of that game, and I also learned when letting some errors slide I was enjoying myself a lot more. I didn't realize it at the time, but I was learning to leave my preconceptions about how a game like this should be played behind me, and adapt more to this series own allowances and systems. In other words, I was subconsciously learning the basics of which Chaz has so perfectly illustrated on in far more detail here.
Considering that I am covering this topic soon in one of my own videos, I was worried about overlapping points with you. I don't think that really happened, which has me relieved. I think your points here have a different context, and are wonderfully illustrated with the Tanya, Three Houses, and broader game examples, where as mine are more mentality based and mostly tied to my one-game focus. As always your editing, transitions, and voice performance are next level. Phenomenal work man, seeing the kind of dedication you put into each of your projects is inspiring to me as a fellow creator.
Just started playing through Thracia-- that game is brutal for people who reset at every death (and there _will_ be death), and on the long and often difficult maps thrown in? You learn some characters are acceptable losses.
I'm still baffled that you actually played the FE games in their numbers order, despite most games not even being connected to each other (except FE9 and 10 maybe)
I played Thracia with save states and still let a few characters die, because it was annoying figuring out how to cleanly run that mission and they were obviously scrubs anyway
When I played Fire Emblem 7 for the first time, I actually let Priscilla and Rath in the final chapter. Because it's the end of the game, so who care? And redoing two hard chapter back to back with no save didn't seem worth it.
It actually had the opposite mental effect as you. Seeing their ending screen replaced by a generic death quote hit really hard. I had a direct negative reaction to my own fallings.
For me, resetting will always have a lower mental charge than Ironman. Since I care about my units going through hell (and Thracia 776 is definitely Infernal) is worth it to save them.
DID YOU JUST REFERENCE MY FAVORITE MOVIE OF ALL TIME?!
"People die everyday b."
- Shouzo Kaga
"It's ok to like Lysithe-."
Chaz: 1:13
She's 20 post timeskip?
@@Risukuyomi What does Liking a unit have to do with age?
@Wil E Since when were we a Persona fanbase?
@@OfficialJugg we are a different flavor of the Persona fanbase now.
I can SAY THAT because she's 20 post-timeskip.
Dalsin is best girl. Can confirm.
Thracia's movement level ups just might be the best way the series has made letting your units stay dead seem VERY tempting.
Extra move on my lord > replaying the whole chapter and letting Karin live
@@garbageman9999 but Leif is trash though.
i leveled him up 5 times and got blanks.
Ren Shinomiya that’s just bad luck in your part mate
Thank you to Chaz for commissioning me to make sprites of Bridal Lorenz and Tanya, both of which are very Blessed :)
Remember to reset and consume fried pickles(optional) everyone 👍
Fire Emblem: *Has a deliberate design.*
Fire Emblem Players: "But that makes me sad!" :(
Intelligent Systems: "k" *rips out design elements*
This says a lot about our society.
Deliberate design can be bad though, it's not immune from criticism just because it's designed to be a certain way.
For me at least, I enjoy Three Houses the most out of ALL fire emblem games, and I've played nearly every single game in the series including FE9 and 10 (which I'm currently replaying right now actually).
This is because I personally enjoy the characters and writing being prioritized over pure map-based gameplay than the otherway around, but that's just me.
It's a deliberate design that specifically stops people from playing the game. Make of that what you will, but I'm not surprised they toned it down.
I understand why they would do that, even if I don't like it. Despite it's really strong story, I genuinely disliked Three Houses because I didn't find it to be a fun game to play. The fact that all units are good and unique really makes it hard to keep playing without resetting and permadeath means nothing since there is almost nothing to justify not resetting. Tbh I hope IS doesn't trivialise the game as much next time: even if mechanics like divine pulse are nice and useful, it just sucks to not be punished for messing up.
@@peggyesculpavit-dupret2945 It's fine to feel that way, the problem is when in the fire emblem fanbase each side tries to act smarter than the other, and dictate what their interests and priorities should be.
I'm not gonna tell you that you're wrong for wanting fire emblem to be more punishing because that would make it more fun for you. That would be terrible, yet many people in the fanbase do this because it's like we're all competing for IS's attention on what to fix/keep the same.
@@dinar8749Tbh I'm not too harsh on how IS reduces difficulty. My first game was Conquest, and cuz I'm an idiot I played on classic for my first playthrough, so I like it when it's easier for new players to adapt to the game. It's simply that I personally feel it can start to trivialize the game when it becomes too convenient. I think what would be nice is if they gradually took away aspects like divine pulse with increasing difficulty, so it's easier for new players to adapt and gives older players a better challenge.
Though permadeath isn't the only thing that made me dislike Three Houses. I mainly didn't want to play all the pre-timeskip maps 4 times with the only actual difference being who you chose. I find repetivity to be annoying after a while if you want to get the whole story done.
1:21 I guess this stream ain’t that extreme
it be like that sometimes :(
Imagine a FE with specials mode to play :
-One with no options : Permadeath
-One with Divine pulses
Problem solved (?)
Divine pulse was built for a reason.. Without it, 3 houses would be a miserable experience or a reset-fest.
Tim none It’s just a mechanic from echoes that they carried over and designed the game around, much like combat arts. That’s why the gameplay relies so heavily on both of them, they didn’t just slap DP on a broken game, or at least I hope they didn’t
@@teecee1827 honestly I forgot divine pulse was even a thing during most of my first run of the game
Fire Emblem will never be “hardcore” again. (I don’t think it ever was. Kaga said in an interview that he designed fire emblem in such a way that a small child could complete it) I think part of the problem is that IS treats every single unit like they are someone’s favorite character. Therefore every character (save a few) are available from chapter 2 or 3. That’s not a bad thing per say, but it does change the how permadeath effects the user experience.
If I want hardcore, I will play Advance Wars. FE, FE3H especially, I believe the emphasis is on the units being good and interesting so you are attached to them. The greatest fun of FE3H is not beating a chapter, but rather seeing the units you invested your effort and "love" in, kicking enemies ass.
Hardcore isn't the issue, the issue is presenting a game with intentions and telling a story around it that makes sense.
Chaz has a point that it's not really a choice if you are presented a decent option and utter dogshit. That's the problem. If Fire Emblem completely lost permadeath then the game would have to at least be redesigned around the idea, not just mechanics, not just map design, but even storytelling; why are you the good guys if you control an army of zombies? (Again, Fates had the real problem of abusing the Deeprealms in such a contrived manner that Kamui's default name should have just been Adolf for all the eugenics he's encouraged to do.)
Regardless of the overall presented difficulty, game design still has to suit the needs of the vision or intent. Games in the future can be like Three Houses all over again where you spend a ton of time building up units you can't afford to lose... so long as the game is properly designed with that mind.
I think the modern Fire Emblem games don't suffer from coddling, but poor execution. They come up with a good idea or innovation but lack the thoroughness to take into account what it really does. Which is why iterations are important... when they learn from their mistakes.
@@lsrrr3857 the thing that sets AW apart from FE though is that in AW you are constantly killing faceless units with impunity, whereas in FE your units dying actually means something.
Actually making a character's death result in a difficult choice makes you care so much more about the characters.
It doesn't have to be hardcore to reap the benefits of perma death as it adds risk vs. reward, tragic feelings and makes your story unique. Every character CAN be someone's favorite, you can reset for the random thief you took a liking to and let the early game paladin bite the dust. Just because people did reset doesn't mean getting rid of perma death is better, just different. There are pros and cons, but when you balance towards perma death properly, it an give you a unique experience as it changes character interactions with each other and the player.
This isn't necessarily the case in recent games, though. Awakening and Fates had several characters you didn't get until over halfway through the game, and in Three Houses, while you have the chance to recruit almost every character very early on, you likely won't be able to and will in fact have to make choices that eat up valuable time on how to grow your main character if you want to recruit specific characters. It's impossible to recruit every character on a first play through of Three Houses even if you spend all your free time on increasing Byleth's stats. There's also several characters that Don't join you until the start of Part 2, which is over halfway through the game, and which of those characters join you changes depending on which route you're playing. In addition, while you have a chance to recruit some of the characters you failed to recruit earlier, you will more than likely end up having to kill them instead.
Agreed, Fire Emblem is like therapy for over perfectionistic tendencies, I love it. Leave your fomo at the door!
*The word: «Ackchyually» has now been added to my dictionary.* B)
v well made wow
Revelations is a centrist route
Ayy Jerg! Didn't know you were a fire emblem fan. Can't wait for an in depth analysis of each games political agenda.
wait you’re a fire emblem fan??
seeing this made my head spin for a second, but hey how's it going :D
Yes but casual mode lets you pull off certain strategies that actively put you into bad habits and let you ignore any kind of threats because all that matter is if you make it through the chapter
It's like you people forget about the concept of climbing your way up the difficulties.
*_GENOCIDE ROUTE IS THE BEST ROUTE_*
That's why it's epic.
In my case, I play (the first time, at least) on casual mode, but I never sacrifice units willingly and most of the time use divine pulse (or even reset if I f*cked up too hard) if someone dies unexpectedly. For me, casual mode is only the last straw if i really don't want to replay a long level, and it always leaves a bad taste if I finish a map with a death
It does depend on playstyle. The time that I played casual, the only unit I let retreat was Lysithea, and that was only because I ran out of Divine Pulses from doing too much rng manipulation and fixing stupid mistakes.
One of the issues I have with permadeath, specifically in the older games, is that it often was the justification for why the game's endgame difficulty was often low. Why were there still first tiers making up half the enemy's endgame army (FE6 Murdock Ch, FE7 Limstella Ch), and why are there still so many dropped or stealable promotion items in the endgame? I think this has largely to do with the devs expecting players to not reset the game to save characters and use their unused and weaker units and late game prepromotes (who tend to be weaker) to fill in the gaps. However the problem I have with this design can go along with your own logic, there was more to lose by leaving a unit dead then there was to gain. Keeping my overpowered units alive trivializes the endgame because the endgame was design to be beatable with weaker replacements.
Very good point honestly.
I'd honestly much rather have a games endgame be beatable with weaker units then something like FE12 Lunatic which is just "Hope you trained up Marth, lol" or Conquest which is "Hope you have a rescue staff". I don't really see the bad in the devs throwing you a bone if someone valuable like Rutger died
That kind of thing is how Conquest threw me for a bit of a loop. I never beat an FE game before Awakening (and forgot how often it was there), but before I played Fates I watched a looooooooooooooooot of older FE content through LP's and noted there really are a lot of first tier enemies later on.
Come Conquest, the enemies are 100% keeping pace with my MAIN party which gets me nervous enough to want to do a paralogue or two just to make sure I don't somehow fall behind on average. I loved Conquest's challenge that it actually committed to keeping the entire enemy party promoted by the final third of the game.
That SNES needs a thorough cleaning.
Honestly, FE3 has become one of my favourite games in the series BECAUSE of the way it incorporates permadeath. The game is built around having a clear set of "the best" units and then a list of "lesser" characters that can stand by for their replacements. And even with that, the lower stat caps, starsphere shards and the fixed exp system of the game makes virtually any unit in the game viable and resetting over deaths more of a net loss than anything else.
For christ's sake, I managed to make sheema of all units my mvp for the latter portion of the game because I lost Camus to some ice dragons and now she's one of my faves. Never would've got that experience without permadeath.
I can't imagine how long this took to edit. Incredible video, Chaz.
I feel like all these iron man runs people have been doing lately are going to do wonders for people's appreciation for not resetting a lot of the older games. Whether it's Mekkkah showing how thinking strategically means very careful runs with only a few expected losses can be enjoyable for the amount of time saved not resetting whilst still having most of your dream team. Or with Mang's runs showcasing that sometimes you can beat games with literally 80% of your army dead, while also discovering so many underused characters along the way. I'm sure there's many more people doing them too, but I only have time to watch those two at the moment.
On another note, while Thracia is your territory so it makes sense to use it for your pro resetting example, I would point to FE 12 for the ultimate reset game. It has BS grouped AI that forces you to bait many overpowered enemies at once, kept inventory on death, like EIGHTY SEVEN CHARACTERS but only 12 or so deployment slots, reclassing with limited class slots, and so many pre-promotes that you couldn't hardly use half of them in a normal run if you tried. Even the wiki recommends you just reset certain chapters over and over as the only way to save certain units on the first turn of several chapters, so losing a few units here and there is expected.
Great video, I don't mind what fire emblem has become, but I do miss the old style a lot.
Where can I watch Episode 2 of The Secret Life of Simps, I'm really interested in following not only the Elitist species, but all the other ones too!
just wait for Camilla fans, Extreme Fates Fan & "I hate Byleth in smash, I need Goku in Smash" fans
I wish Fire Emblem games did what Gaiden/Echoes with character endings that alter pending on who died and what not more often at least
"The Three Houses DLC is definitely worth $25."
Chaz: 1:13
It is worth pointing out that as recently as Fates, Fire Emblem difficulty was at least balanced around the cost of perma-death. Compare Birthright to Conquest for example. As much of a meme as it is that Birthright is easy - and it is - it still can kill your units very quickly. Chapters 9, 10, 16, 23, 24, 25, and 27 send a lot of units at you immediately that can quickly overwhelm you just from the starting positions. Not to mention many of the maps have thieves that make grabbing chests difficulty if you don't risk your units. But...that hints at exactly how the game *is* easier. Enemies that can swarm you on turn 1 means that it's not very costly to reset. Once you survive the early wave, it's not hard to turtle through reinforcements and fight the usually easy boss and remaining enemies. Its levels are frontended in their challenge, the only incentives to take risks come from optional rewards that those thieves are stealing. Whereas Conquest, if anything, is the opposite. Most levels get harder the longer they go on, and the reinforcements often designed to pincer or split you up. Optional rewards are still around, but even then tend to be more varied and often have even higher risk in terms of time lost if you lose a unit and want to reset. It's an interest contrast in design, and one of the hints that Birthright, unlike Revelations, actually put some thought into its levels.
I do kind of miss that choice of leaving a unit dead or resetting though.. Classic mode is a meaningful choice over casual in Three Houses in the sense that it forces a divine pulse if you make an error, and including divine pulse is smart design decision for this kind of game (it's far better as a grow your army game than Awakening partly for this reason). That said, it's not the same kind of risk calculation that something like Conquest and many classic Fire Emblems have, and that is a feature that I miss.
Fates honestly does a fantastic job with giving tons of merit of leaving dead.
This is a rather interesting perspective that is not relegated to only past games within structuring the argument. I didn't think about modern Fire Emblem trivializing permadeath and how investment takes a massive incentive towards players not using classic mode. 3DS era and Fire Emblem Three Houses gives you less and less units at your disposal with an emphasis on keeping units alive. Awakening had limited units and sometimes a singular unit in a particular class without reclassing in the first generation (Lon'qu, Gaius, Kellam, Nowi, Panne). And not even mentioning the emphasis of parents, losing one unit means you lost two potentially or made another unit useless. Fates gave you a limited roster of units to choose from in which losing a unit early was equivalent of shooting yourself in the foot and the child system again.
Past Fire Emblems had more emphasis on keep playing to create unique strategies or "bonds" with potential play through saving units. True, you might be attached to a particular unit, but if the RNG was so good...is it really worth resetting? Potentially yes, probably no. It all depends. I really liked the video, thank you for the insight on permadeath.
Not to be prude, but you got Say'ri, Tiki and Anna as replacements in the first gen (Though Tiki and Anna are paralogue, they're not hidden so I'm counting 'em) . Funnily enough the you only get 1 Wyvern Rider, Cherche and 1 Troubadour, Maribelle in gen 1 and they're both parents. Even worse for Maribelle since she has a son so she's technically the only available troubadour to you without reclassing.
@@aghadlarhen9397 Yes, however Say'ri, Anna, and Tiki are only able to be married by a male Robin. If Robin dies anyways, the game ends so you are forced to keep Robin alive throughout the game but do not have to use him/her except on a few chapters. That first part is equivalent to saying "hey, you could marry Emmeryn, Aversa, or any of the children!" It is true, however what I was saying is that if you lose a potential parent for let's say Severa.
Cordelia cannot marry Chrom, but can marry Robin if male. Let's say you wanted an awesome Bow Knight Severa and...Virion is dead. Doesn't matter, pick another father! However, there is a limited amount of choices so that you get all the children at the halfway point of the game. Sumia, if she does not marry Chrom, can only marry Frederick, Henry, Gaius, and Male Robin. If any of these potential candidates die, Cynthia could have troubles with existing. But that is going without saying that if you lose a fragile unit like Maribelle (do not know how to spell her name). Not only do you lose the only originally classed Troubadour who is great at healing, you lose Brady too who could be even better. This goes for Miriel, Sumia, Cordelia, Sully, Panne, Tharja, Olivia, and Cherche. Most of these units are not tanks except Tharja (Nosferatu is broken in this generation plus a nice Defense and Resistance Growth) and Cherche (Wyvern Ride, enough said). If you lose any of these units it is effectively a two for one. You're probably thinking, "then I will be careful with them." Well, there is only a limited pool of fathers that potentially increases that two for one issue. That is the problem, because the roster is so small and they have a mechanic to create incentive for supporting units together. They effectively made Permadeath extremely punishing, or technically a choice without merit because you can easily reset and have more incentive to do so.
That is also to go without mentioning that Robin and Chrom can most definitely not die and marry at least two of the capable units that allow for a child unit or two (or each other if Female). But marriage is to one unit, so you have to keep both potential mother and fathers alive to have that child unit or you lose out.
1:14 "My dog... is no longer a good boy" WTF
Lost an hour of my life after Corrin died to counter, you're really rubbing it in lmao
I think Three Houses makes using the Casual setting for non-permadeath the better option for an enjoyably challenging game because you are punished for units losing by missing out on them getting experience, Support boosts, and contributing to winning the map. Casual mode on Maddening without using Divine Pulse is my preferred difficulty at least.
I liked the way casual-mode was handled in Echoes. Your units miss the bonus exp at the end of the battle, if they "die". And I also like that the game is still over if your lord dies, which adds a bit of caution to the player actions. You can't just suicide units, becase then your lord might be outnumbered and is at a larger risk off dying, which means you can play the chapter again.
What is also great about the way Echoes handled casual-mode is that you miss out on recruitments if, for example, an allie unit dies or you ignore a certain path.
@@umb3rus108 I feel like Casual mode in Echoes was redundant since the game had revival fountains.
Bruh mocking FE Fans LMAO you went in hard
14:50 I remember when Mangs did Conquest for the first time and his MVP Arthur got fucked at the end of a really dumb chapter, so he reclassed Percy into a Berserker and he outshone his father really quickly. Without permadeath he may have just kept Percy on the bench, but losing Arthur made him consider using a new unit. That's what's fun, trying to go on after a great unit dies. In my fe4 run Ishtar and the fucking sleep dark mages in endgame wiped half my team, it was a fun experience trying to kill the rest of her squad and the deadlords with like 6 or so units that I had left.
Chaz paying more acknowledgment to Pikmin then Nintendo has in 5 years.
One of the dumbest resets I had to make was when I was doing the paralogue with Catherine and Ashe where I had to protect Rhea. It was the last turn and it was enemy phase, I agroed one to attack flayn so she could get a level up, but I got hit with bullshit and she missed and she got doubled, and then the mission was over, so I couldn't divine pulse to save her.
Chaz back at it again with amazing editing and transitions
Honestly i have always liked permadeath in fire emblem, I mainly did it for extra story reasons to build on the story, and had units act accordingly ( even if they forgot about the death). Like in three houses, if A student like Slyvain died, then Ingrid would become more aggressive if he died near her and regretted not being able to save him. So I think if they added some more story stuff to permadeath it could help show it as a valid option story wise, even with things like dragon pulse, though I think it should be more limited like the Mila's Turnwheel. Add some more story to it (and Sothis in general) and with limited, but extreme cases only, usage of it and the valid option to let a unit die like previous games with some story added to the death and you have a good permadeath with rewind mechanic, at least in theory.
Someone: "FE8 is a good game"
Chaz: 1:13
FE8 is a good game. Some just don't enjoy how it's open map can trivialize the core of fire Emblem, and that's completely fine
GameOfWulf nostalgia aside I really do feel like the story of fe8 was great
@@GameOfWulf
I get the open world argument against world map FE. But I've never understood why it's worse than say, arena format in Genealogy. In FE4, there was literally no downside to grinding for hours in arena and it didn't even punish you for failure; your unit is just at 1 HP and you can't lose any money. I think it's less about open world maps about the complaint should be more focused on availability and access to grinding. Because in and of itself, a world map doesn't need to lead to grinding.
@@l.n.3372 plus FE8 never forces you to grind. The argument would be much more potent, if there was a difficulty spike, you could only reasonably overcome, if you trained up. But there is none.
@@GameOfWulf
Yeah I love Chaz for his great videos but his hate boner for FE8 is kinda strange. He reserves special anger for that game alone despite other games that he's praised also giving grinding opportunities that are equally optional and also break linearity the way he disliked. And this from someone who grinded the hell out of FE4 arena because of the lack of actual drawbacks: grinding isn't restricted to open world FE.
XCOM basically does what 3H does with its permadeath expect that game has manual saves every turn so you can save scum if you really want to. I agree with what you’re saying the purpose of permadeath was in previous titles, but I also don’t think permadeath always has do all that. Sometimes it’s fine for mechanics to just be ancillary to the overarching experience.
In 3 Houses, permadeath still pushes methodical play. It’s just more of a penalty in this game than it is a QoL mechanic as you’ve argued for. That’s one of the cool things about FE as a franchise. It can take the same pool of core mechanics and shift them around enough to put them in a different context. This makes every entry into the series both familiar and unique.
XCOM can also very very very easily get away with all the permadeath nonsense it wants because there's zero characterization in your units beyond what you make of them. Gameplay wise, a dead units only costs you their brief promotions and having to train up a newbie, but it can be even more devastating than Fire Emblem if you put as much personal love into them as an actually written character.
That's how XCOM can get away with it, because permadeath is just as much as customizable aspect as anything else.
Dude you still have some of the best editing on this platform. That punch into the pose was so fucking sick! Hope to jump on your streams a little more often!
"What's dying?"
"It's when you die, and your body parts fall off"
No he makes a great point. I've never seen losing a character as anything other than a game over. It's a game mechanic and should be treated like one, not another game over scenario, I'd like it if maybe non permadeath was set up differntly that tries to push you to full defeat or offer up more loss mechanics beyond making future stages harder.
I only let units die if I dont feel like replaying the map. I lost takumi on the underground camilla map in birthright lunatic mode. I'm not playing that map again no sir
_>
I wouldn't reset for Takumi anyway-
*runs away fast*
This is fudging amazing Chazz.
Also source for those Bridal Tanya/Lorenz sprites?
twitter.com/Quickalas/status/1258075371964153858?s=19
Oh yo, right here! :)
Are we gonna ignore the fleshlight at the start😂😂
1:14 For those wondering the text actually says, "My dog is no longer a good boy".
Great video Chaz
I feel like all these ideas and feeling towards perma-death have been floating around the community for a while now, though have never been put together in a clean manner like this before. Another topic is feel like is in the air but not really being discussed is how FEs gameplay focus is leaving the battlefield almost. IMO it started with the archanea remakes and the introduction of reclassing. While not a problem with this out of battle focus, it leads to the player addressing unit growth in a more, idk the exact term, “administrative” means maybe? While small, it started to introduce this focus of improvinga unit outside of the battle field instead of previous means like immediate performance and growths. It was only really conceptual, and not a problem until awakening. In awakening theres far more of a focus on supports, skills, reclassing, child units, and probably 1-2 other things that cant come to mind. Supports now give insane bonuses between specific people when increased, so now theres a focus on building the proper supports over time. Reclassing and skills can absolutely define gameplay with things like galeforce, so now instead of the being just a focus on our immediate objective, theres another focus on when you will unlock the skills, where will you need them, what maps are effective to get them on. Now we compound these things with child units. With children the player has to have as much attention on their immediate gameplay as their plans for the later chapters. Fates is relatively the same but with the added S/A+ support method of reclassing to add onto this pre-planning. 3H is essentially the purest form of this “pre-planning” gameplay. Everyone having open class paths means the player is now forced to know what they want to do with their unit long before theyll ever reach it. The avatar has to want to know their class path while also building skills and supports to recruit unit they want, further adding to this layer of gameplay that isnt concerned with the immediate problem being presented to the player.
While this sort of “down the road” gameplay style isnt bad, its implementation with fire emblem is odd as its a new a reletively forced mechanic into fire emblem. The only old game thats had a long term sense of gameplay before is genealogy. Fe4 though has safety nets to balance it, and im not talking about the mediocre recruit units. In near any form of play for FE4, casual, elitist, any of them, your best units will very often be seliph, leif, and ares. Whether it be intentional or mere coincidence some of the best units for the second half of the game are units that are can be considered failsafes for players who ignore or simply dont do well with this forced “down the road” gameplay style. Every other FE meanwhile has the players primary focus on their immediate chapter, no split attention where the player is forced to consider how this amounts to later actions while still working the current problem.
Wrapping this long thing up but this implementation if different length focuses in FE has just seemed very jarring with all of its current presentations in the series, usually feeling more like a chore for the player. Fe4 probably has the best failsafe but it can still feel like a chore doing the set up you have to
I will say 3H also as a few units who will almost always be very good to incredible, specifically the main lords on non-SS routes and Byleth. Especially Dimitri
That feeling when I did let people die on my first madness run of 3H. Though to be fair it was the last level and Hubert had it coming with those shit level ups and mandatory deploys.
I just use save states for old games. That's why I'm a casual, Despite liking the old games.
Ah, my favorite emotion: staring at the void between the screen and reset button.
Also what if when a unit dies it gave stat bonuses to the ones that it had a support with? Something like fates' guard pair up. I think that would be a nice incentive to not reset.
The A>B rule also works with reclassing, or sometimes promotion branches
Can we just appreciate the amount of effort and editing that this video has. like always you out did yourself Chaz.
I needed this, I always wanted to try classic mode without resetting like a weenie and this might help
Chaz trying to invalidate the experiences of others using unrelated facts be like:
Please don't
How you feelin now homie?
ruh roh
Is this about the video or twitter?
@@dayalasingh5853 twitter
I feel like needing videos like these kinda prove the point of why IntSys fairly regularly does what it does with trivializing permadeath.
*Nobody actually does permadeath anymore without calling it a challenge run.* Playing the game 100% as intended has stopped being relevant, at least to most feedback you can get from the game without strictly watching a playthrough labeled Ironman. It's a big difference between XCOM having a "mode" for that that simply disables manual saving, because they don't expect sane people to START that way.
It's why we got Casual Mode and more so Mila's Turnwheel/Divine Pulse. It's simply not really a selling point for the series anymore, not when they're pushing character interactions since Awakening. Heck, the fact they added said irrelevancy to *Echoes* should speak volumes of what they really think about permadeath that they went hardcore on making it irrelevant in 3H with the hyper limited but hyper focused roster.
So, yes, permadeath obviously doesn't work that well in modern Fire Emblem as a result. But I think it doesn't work that well because I think IntSys has realized that very little fans seem to care enough to MAKE it work and as such intentionally strayed away from focusing on it. You'd easily notice this since they even stopped advertising permadeath on the back of the game box after Path of Radiance (or maybe Radiant Dawn, I didn't get that one so I couldn't say if it was there).
Not that I think it's a bad idea to encourage people to actually give permadeath a shot if they want a different take on the series, but I'm just saying the fact people even have to do this makes it seem to me that there's barely anyone who really actually cares to play permadeath as intended without resetting anyway.
Another excellent video (and your artist who does the pictures is always great).
I honestly prefer the idea of small casts in FE. Sacred Stones and Echoes did this concept well by having fewer units overall. However, I think the trade off for this is that you value the characters more because you have less. If you add more characters, then you can still get attached, but I think it hurts the story if so many characters simply don't matter. A smaller cast allows for more units to matter plot wise and get better development. I think the Blue Lions route handled this best in 3H because every student connected to the main story in a way that every Black Eagle or Golden Deer did not. But then you definitely want to reset to keep these characters alive.
They could definitely change this formula by making smaller casts, having each character matter more in the story, and thus having their deaths affect the plot somehow. For example, if Blue Lions was the only route of 3H, then losing Felix or Dedue could have dramatically impacted the story and altered Dimitri's entire arc as well. I think that would have given us the best of both worlds: a single story with maybe 25 playable characters at best, and maybe 10 different alternate storyline paths within the main story depending on who lived and who you lost during your run. That way, players have reasons to continue when losing a unit or reset when losing a unit, simply to add nice replayability where each choice slightly changes your experience of the story.
Each has its strengths and weaknesses. I just want them to keep trying new things honestly even if it comes at the cost of "trademark" mechanics.
@@Choops6969
BTW great call out to FED when discussing why 3H has so few iron man attempts. I immediately thought of FED the second you mentioned that. I think you hit the nail on the head for this topic.
I like new things as well. I think it would be an interesting change of pace to have a game where character deaths DID dramatically alter the game path. Where losing Unit A causes a chain reaction and you progress down a slightly different path than if A had lived instead. It could be great. But it might not retain a lot of FE at the cost, since you'd need to focus far more heavily on story and characters and ensure that you can still finish the game somehow after losing potentially half the cast.
1:12
Who gave you authority to make the most badass entrance ever?
For me personally, I love divine pulse, it makes me feel like I can get a second chance when I got hit by a crit that has a 1 percent chance of happening. However, I do think it’s a little too OP, mostly cause it gives you 12 free rewinds (and possibly more, idk if I got them all). I think the best way to implement divine pulse (if they bring it back) is to reduce it to say.... maybe just 3 uses per chapter for the whole game. That way, it’s a rare but still usable resource and it forces me to think about my decisions like in previous games, rather than letting me make some risky and semi-idiotic because I won’t get punished for it
These are some really good thoughts, thanks for the video! I think one of the biggest problems of permadeath for me (granting I have only played three houses) is just the sheer amount of content I would end up missing if I didn't reset. Like you mentioned, the cast is so small that losing even one person means that story wise, i'm missing out on a significant chunk of support conversations and as far as I am aware, the game barely even acknowledges the unit even died in the story!
I think if they are going to keep permadeath in the future they really need to expand the cast of recruitable characters, and ensure that even if a unit dies you get something (in terms of plot, not necesarilly items or mechanics). Like say if Lorenz dies, if the plot had adapted to it and expanded on Lorenz family, with his situation at home changing because he isn't around anymore, that could be interesting! Or if that is too much work, at the very least maybe add "death supports" with some characters that fire after he dies. Maybe Claude could host some sort of wake for him or something?
Anyways thanks for the cool video Chaz, keep it real.
I appreciate the analysis here, and what you said about Three Houses is something I had been thinking about. I usually reset when units die, but I do like having the option to leave them dead if I desire, which I have also done plenty of times. Three Houses just didn't have that option, which I definitely missed but I also agree that it's good they tried something different. I'm excited to see what the next FE game decides to do with Divine Pulse/Mila's Turnwheel, as I'm 90% sure it will be in the new game, but it'll be interesting to see how they balance it. Personally I like the way Echoes balanced it (Bear in mind I am biased towards Echoes, it's my favorite game in the series), if the Lord dies it's still a game over, and when using the turnwheel you can only go back to the start of a turn, unlike Three Houses where you can go to any individual action. Nonetheless Divine Pulse works well with how the game is designed, as does Permadeath in pretty much all the other games.
the main thing you've glossed over is the fact that permadeath means losing a character means you're bad at the game. You can do every chapter in any FE, meet all the bonus objectives, and finish in a low turn count, and not have lost a single character. Fire Emblem does not ask you to make sacrifices mechanically. Sacrifices are punishment for fucking up. Hell, it only narratively made you make a sacrifice once in shadow dragon where you were forced to give up a unit to progress. Honestly, it would be more interesting if you were forced to make sacrifices for certain objectives. Someone has to take the fall to trigger an ambush to reach the green npc, you're being chased through the map, someone has to stay behind to hold them back or you simply won't have the movement to get away. Nowhere in Fire Emblem is this a thing you have to deal with. Permadeath simply reflects poorly on you, and means your strategy was insufficient. Your characters are like your score or grade at the end of the game. The more characters you have alive at the end, the better your score.
I mean, when the only other example modern Fire Emblem seemingly has at killing party characters is *Scarlet* I wouldn't trust IntSys at making unit sacrifices a regular thing.
Yeah, let's let you S Support a character, make a child unit with her and then *lol she dies outside your control and we're not gonna let your child even realize her mom died.*
Yeah...no, I think I'd rather this company just make it a gameplay punishment than try to make it a narrative thing ever again.
Heck, I think the ONLY time this has EVER been effectively done is a certain big scene in Genealogy. For all the crap I give to that game, that is still a very effective punch to the gut considering it's NOT a real punishment.
Thanks dad. Now I know why mom divorced you.
I watch A LOT of different video game content on TH-cam. Your videos are SO MUCH MORE QUALITY than anything else I frequent.
Thank you for the top tier shit.
I loved this video, the editing all of it and it was just such a good watch. Thanks Chaz! :D
I really liked the ending to this video.
Also, with regards to permadeath in games like 3 Houses, where the customization comes from how you build out your units ("Should I make my Annette a wyvern lord or dark knight?") instead of which units to take, I wonder if a more elegant solution in those games would be, if your unit's health reaches 0, they come back at the end of the level, but are permanently locked from using the class they were in when they fell in battle? The effect of not resetting would be similar to games designed around permadeath, bc the difference between, say, War Master and Fortress Knight Dedue is the same as the difference between two entire units in a larger-cast game, and letting your war master dedue "die" to preserve your progress means you now have to use a different dedue build. It would be a harsher consequence in Part 1 bc losing a key intermediate class like brigand or archer could cripple your unit, and if they die before unlocking anything past commoner/noble they die for real, but thats when you're able to recruit new students to replace them anyway, so it kind of works out. Thoughts?
3 houses is a game that experiments a lot with the progression formula in fire emblem and imo largely succeeds, so i dont really hold the fact that permadeath is pointless too harshly against it. look at the end of the day, we can come up with less punishing methods of punishing poor play but i dont think any of them are as elegantly simple or as narratively consistent as "people die when they are killed."
What always bothered me about the implementation of permadeath, is how the games never took their time to TELL the player that it's sometimes far better to leave the player to die.
While it is the player's fault for not considering the option and trying too hard to keep everyone alive, the fact remains that a lot of players never even thought about it.
And coupled with the fact that most players are absolute dogshit at evaluating chances, you get a lot of people complaining about permadeath, and the need to make videos like these to explain why it's necesarry.
I mean, houses have time to tell you to not hoard, talk shit about jagens, but not to avoid constant resets?
That's part of why they've strayed further from it with modern mechanic additions like Causal Mode and Turnwheel/Pulse. It's way easier to convince someone that occasional rewinds are okay through actual in-game mechanics than it is to play the psychological long-game with permadeath, because you need people like Chaz to make you realize there was always another option.
The best thing about divine pulse though is i dont misclick the square i want my archer in anymore lmao.
1:18 okay thats all i need.
video's over.
Someone else who likes Lorenz?! Instant sub - we have to stick together!
Proof that Choopi has big brain, he's come a long way from forgetting Hubert has Rally Magic
Never change Choopi, Never change
You're a freaking inspiration for me to learn editing. I can never get over how good you are....and permadeath is epic.
Legends say that if you leave a comment, Chaz will like it.
I’ve done both casual and classic runs in 3H and what I like about having permadeath on, with divine pulse is it allows me to be a little pushy and take chances, while also forcing me to scale back after so many attempts and be more strategic. I don’t want to reset or lose units, and so I give myself a few chances to be cocky and the rest I really have to zone in and focus on my strategy. It’s definitely not quite what it used to be, but with the strong cast and story and that mix of old and new styles of FE gameplay this quickly became my favourite game ever! Great video, really insightful!
The Fire Emblem community is lucky to have you, Chaz. It's amazing how much work you put into these videos. The production values are so much higher than what anyone else is doing, and you make actual thoughtful videos. It's been about a year and a half since people either ignored or missed your point because of Moulder not healing Colm, and if I knew that there was a sizable chunk of my audience was that stupid, I would have resorted to just making top ten fart videos.
Most arguments over permadeath are short and not well thought out. They go something like:
"Permadeath encourages a different play style and casual mode, as well as Divine Pulse, take that away from us."
"Permadeath doesn't respect my time, and Divine Pulse is optional anyway, and more options is L I T E R A L L Y always a good thing."
Then you come along with a 17 minute video that not only has a thoughtful argument in favor of permadeath, but addresses the concerns over permadeath. I know that you're always suppose to tackle the other side of the argument, but a lot of videos don't. They put out their opinion and then ask the comments to debate it, which is an easy way to increase interaction on their videos for that sweet sweet TH-cam algorithm. No one else is making Fire Emblem videos like this at your level of quality. Thank you, Chaz.
Hey thank u for the very nice comment. Always a joy to see you and your humor in the stream.
Holy shit I fucking LOVE the Mischief Makers sound effects you're using dude. HARDCORE nostalgia.
I'm going to sound like a broken record with this, but I don't care.
THIS EDITING AAAAAAAAAAAAA
That Petra bride at 9:31 tho, quality waifu.
Edit: Oh nooo, it's not Petra! :C Petra still best waifu!
Someone finally said it... Thank goodness it was Chad - I mean Chazz.
Most other SRPGS don't feature permanent death for this very reason, even ones where it's very easy to replace lost characters because having a player reset is often not a compelling or interesting "choice". Most often times, battling through a chapter where your best unit died in the second turn is more enjoyable and challenging than loading your save.
It's why a 0 Divine Pulse Casual run sounds way more enticing than ever touching Classic again. It's far more effective at working with the modern mechanics than trying to force old traditions to work.
Plus, it still *does* punish the dead units by robbing potential EXP and levels especially if they died early on and not because you threw everyone at the boss of the chapter.
The editing is extra great this video.
The production values in this video are orgasmic, to the point where I think I've become pregnant.
Chaz, you better take responsibility for this child!
Liked and subscribed.
Greetings and welcome. Welcome to Choosi's House!