Saw the FEE3 presentation and holy moly this game looks top tier!! I can tell a lot of care and love has been put into this and I absolutely cannot wait to see what you have in store for the rest of the game. The setting and gameplay look super unique! I wish you good luck on this passion project!
2 Likes
Just got hip to this project. This looks like one of the few I am super interested in, itās up there with immortal sword. It sounds so ambitious like so much work is going to go into this. I bow down to you and your team. Is this hack going to include supports??
Is this project still alive? I joined the Discord and it seemed dead. Havenāt seen anything posted on the project in a while save for an FEE3 showcase a few months back.
Well I guess now is about as good a time as any for this sorta post:
Iāll try to keep it brief: projectās on indefinite hiatus
Coupled with the lack of very nearly any feedback and having no record of anyone playing beyond the first 7 chapters, my motivation to do any actual work towards this has greatly diminished over the last several months.
I still continually add to a growing list of things to incorporate as any stereotypically generic idea guy would, and inevitably never follow through. True to the role, things got way too ambitious for my own good.
The only progress Iāve made since the last patch is a handful of new maps, a dozen-ish new mugs, and like 4-5 tilesets in various stages of completion/updated to various degrees all that will probably never see the light of day, let alone actually make it into the hack.
Thanks if youāve shown any interest or support, and sorry if you were actually looking forward to this.
22 Likes
Sorry to hear - totally get it.
Admittedly, Iāve been looking forward to playtesting and drafting up feedback, but havenāt had a chance to yet.
Will do so here once I get a chance to give it a proper spin.
Hope stepping away from it āformallyā helps with reinvigorating motivation - know it does for me. Good luck.
9 Likes
I understand as well. If I had known you needed playtesters, I would have likely played this hack sooner. It caught my interest for sure in the FEE3 video.
Iāll be playing this as well when I get the chance (once I graduate from HS here in a few weeks).
In any case, I hope life is well for you outside of FE!
7 Likes
The unfortunate reality about posting an in-progress hack is that fewer people are willing to play hacks before theyāre finished. I first posted my first hack when it was complete and received a much larger response than the sequel, which is in progress right now and Iāve been releasing in chunks.
Maintaining motivation for hacking is hard, but if you still want to use all of the ideas youāve built up and the response you get affects motivation, it might be worthwhile to keep quietly working on the hack at your own pace and drop it when itās complete. But I wish you the best in any case.
Iād also just like to take the time to say that the magic tome sprites you made have become a pretty significant gameplay element in my hack, so thank you so much for uploading those to the repo.
13 Likes
That sucks. I think lots of people were interested I just think very few people play unfinished hacks because you canāt dive into it. Itā like youāre having fun and then boom nothing else added. I personally was looking forward to this one but didnāt play because it was unfinished.
4 Likes
I was especially excited about all the diversity I was seeing. Little to no hacks have a lot of diversity in their characters.
3 Likes
Hey, I know this is on indefinite hiatus, and I know I said Iād play it before. Uh, finally got around to it, haha.
I want to start off by saying that youāve created something really special and unique, definitely one of the most standout hacks Iāve ever played, you should be very proud.
Gonna do a standard chapter by chapter āreviewā.
Ch0/0x
Youāve probably heard it before but it bears repeating how unique and imaginative these chapters are, big fan of them.
Ch1
Very decent earlygame chapter. I would say that Iād really appreciate it if the supplier started with an iron lance, and that the boss should come one turn earlier. I was able to make it to that area before that turn and thought I had to kill the other armor/kid to beat the chapter, so this would just make it more transparent.
Ch2
Kind of challenging chapter, but very rewarding to figure out. I had to make use of my mounts and repo pretty carefully to get the top village, but it feels a bit bad not to really get anything at all for my troubles. Nice antiturtle regardless.
Big issue I noticed here, the enemies are really bulky, to the point where my strongest units have to take 3 rounds to kill them, which feels pretty awful, frankly. Iād just lower enemy defense and res by 1/2 points each, so player units actually feel good to use, cause as is I was feeling frustrated with how hard it is to kill every individual enemy. Also feels like you overdo the 1-2 range on enemies here, it feels really unnecessary when I donāt have that much good 2-range myself, but the bulk is the main thing.
The prices on the shops here are kind of crazy high, Aurelia was almost out of her tome uses and I couldnāt even buy a fire tome with the money Iād been given, I had to sell a vulnerary. I think you should either lower the cost of items or give more gold, eitherās fine. Also, the peg having only a slim lance and the myrm only having a slim sword feel pretty bad, either give the money to buy irons or just have them start with irons, it wonāt make them broken.
I was starting to notice here how low the hitrates can get, which I donāt think really works with such a low amount of units stretched so far. Iād recommend lowering forest avoid to 15 and upping skill on units or hit on weapons.
Was a big fan of the soldier running away, I ended up sparing him.
Ch3
The enemy bulk is a big problem here too, though I wonāt hammer it in too hard. In addition, Iād recommend getting rid of stat variation (when enemies can roll up/down on stats upon restarting the chapter), since it makes their already very high bulk possibly even more difficult to deal with.
Feels pretty bad that no one at all can use the silver lance, too, since Iād love a jagen-type unit with how many bulky enemies I have to deal with. Maybe change it to a silver sword and let Verdaine use it? Or one of the armors can use it, maybe? Not sure, but you might not need to do this at all if the enemies get toned down in their defensive profile. Though the fighters are easily doubled by Verdaine, at least, so they are fine. I think itās mostly the soldiers, armors, and thieves that are just a bit too bulky for my tastes, especially the thieves.
Strangely, the enemy bulk problem seemed to mostly disappear as the chapter went on with the addition of significantly more units which was much needed, but the thieves were still stupid hard to kill, for some reason.
Iād also love a preparations menu by this point, since Iāve got quite a few items and Iād like to arrange them without spending time on the map. It seems like itād work fine from a story perspective, too.
I want to take a little while to talk about a part of the chapter that really frustrated me, and that was the part where everyone ran away with the staves. It felt really opaque and blindsided me, since all the thieves with the good stuff were far away from the units that could actually kill them, and there was very little time to actually catch them until a bunch of extremely deadly reinforcements come out with no warning and force you to let them go which feels awful. On top of this, they have pass and are relatively bulky (not to mention the sage-thief person, who has as much def as an armor!), so I ended up feeling like the chapter was really unfair, especially since I didnāt know where they were escaping.
The guy with towershield+ charging you also feels unfair, since he seems explictly designed to be fought by the king dude, but the thieves pass through his range, so it means that if you want to try to kill the thieves, you have to sacrifice one of your units, which also felt really frustrating to me. Iām not sure how youād fix this, maybe have the thieves come a turn later and be transparent about where they escape to. I know you display where the sage-thief perosn escapes to, but the generic thieves I didnāt know if theyād go the same way or not
I donāt know if you know this patch exists, but thereās one that lets you display an orange arrow on the map, which can be used to easily show escape points. Using that would improve this chapter a lot, I think.
Ch4
Right off the bat, I feel the enemy bulk issue is mostly solved by this point just because I have so many units to deploy and stronger weapons that just barely let me nab those 2HKOs like thunder, and my units finally started doubling and ORKOing. Still think a few of the enemies here could stand to be a little bit less bulky, though, as well as have their stat variance removed. The thief especially really struggles with not being able to dodgetank and having truly pitiful damage against everything during a part of the game where I feel like I need all my combat units fighting. Couldnāt buy him an iron sword either cause theyāre like 700g for some reason and I donāt have nearly that much money (I have 50g at this point).
Really fun gimmick for this chapter, I totally didnāt see it coming, haha. My one complaint would be that I felt like the drawbridge thing was kind of useless, since it only really ended up feeling like it hurt me.
Martijinās lightning ran out like halfway through this chapter, that was really really frustrating. I donāt know why it only has 35 uses and he only gets one when he doubles so often, really burned through those uses way too fast. I donāt know if I missed a huge gold stash or what, but I canāt afford one either, without selling weapons. If this was the intent, I get the idea, but for basic weapons it just feels kind of bad.
Once again I have no idea where the thieves are going, again kind of just adds to the frustrating but something that is easily remedied with a patch.
Feels like this chapter has way too much 2 and 1-2 range flying around for how limited my options are and how little healing I have (1 healer with 1 range). Honestly feels like the cleric deserves the 1-2 range healing over the Athos guy.
One of the escaping thieves tried to attack me, no idea why. Might want to look into their AI for that.
Weird bug I spotted.
Had to end up letting the torch thief go because I felt like I just physically couldnāt move any faster than I already was, especially with the zanbato thief attacking me and reinforcements coming from the back.
Sorry if I sounded a little frustrated with this chapter, but I felt like it had a really cool premise! Definitely was fun for parts of it, and not-so-fun for others, but I think with some tuning, this could be a great chapter. Also, to be completely transparent, I let the pegasus die last chapter because I was really trying to get the warp thief but just was not able to at all, and she neded up getting onerounded by the OP dude who appears midway through. Definitely my fault, and I feel like if the previous chapter gets tweaked up, this one would be much better too.
A positive I can mention here is that in Ch3 I was feeling really down on the armors, since 4 mov is pretty awful and the chapterās terrain wasnāt conducive to them being able to position well. However, this chapter, I had a lot of fun utilising their armor march! My only complaint in this regard would be that the handaxe is often needed to have them both be useful while still staying near each other and the hitrates on it were often far too low for my liking, but this is pretty minor.
Cool cliffhanger ending for the part!
I wanted to drop some feedback ASAP because I wanted you to know Iām making my way through this game, and itās been really cool so far! Iāll let you know my updated thoughts after the next part is over, too, since I have plans to make my way through the entire demo at the moment (Yes, even past Chapter 7!). Even though itās on hiatus I can really tell the level of passion and work that went into this, and itās a shame you havenāt gotten more feedback before. And if you want any clarification on my points, let me know! Iām always happy to try to help as much as I can.
Hope you find the drive to return to this project after your hiatus, itās pretty epic. Take your time, though, I know what it feels like to be demotivated. And I donāt mind if this is never completed, itās still well worth playing in its current state, I feel. 
15 Likes
Hereās my thoughts on the next part. Going to be continuing further from here but will probably take me a while longer.
Ch5 (ch47?)
Honestly, very solid chapter, possibly my favorite one this far. My main issue here would just be the enemy weapon types, since it feels like there are too many axes/sword enemies for your unit composition, though itās not unmanageable by any means. This might be up to how I split, though (dragoon + scout up, vagabond + pirate down).
Totally missed that units could move off the ledge, maybe I was just being absentminded but would be nice if you pointed it out, even if that breaks the immersion a bit. Funny workaround you have, though, with the ledge being a unit.
Other than that, again going to recommend displaying the escape point for the boss here.
Ch5x?? I guess I can just start using the ingame chapter names since it's getting confusing.
Uhhhhā¦ (Cursor is offscreen and not movable)
Not a softlock since it can be fixed through the unit menu, but definitely something to make sure to fix.
The quest felt kind of awkward to me, I was able to complete it but no idea what I did to do it right, haha. Had no idea it was a recruitment, but pretty cool quest! Ended up going with the blue hair guy, cause I chose randomly.
ChN1-2
Return of the enemy bulk!
I jest, of course. Itās fine for every unit but them, I get that the villager unit is supposed to be bad but I do want to be able to feed kills to them. Ofc, if this is fixed earlier, itāll be fixed here too.
In general, here enemy bulk is much more manageable feeling because I have a lot of strong units, the scout, the lord, the pirate all have pretty good damage output. Way better feeling than the first part.
Honestly, thinking about it, if you just made enemies have way less res (0 res instead of 1-3) you may not even need to reduce defense. Itās kind of weird that they have any res at all which often stops magic users from hitting threhsolds by just 1 or 2 damage, and armors having more res than most enemies strikes me as odd, especially in a setting with no effective weapons. Of course, the light mage takes care of these armors specifically very easily, but still.
Would love if vulns did 15 HP instead of 10, btw. Easy change and imo you only gain from it.
Not cool that a hostile green unit appears from behind with 3-10 range and 7 mov, I had to reset because of this. Doesnāt help that danger radius checker doesnāt display green unit range, which is kind of an issue with siege. The range pretty much covers the entire map, too, because of the high movement range. For reference, I was pretty much at the boss by this point, was just a turn or two away from winning. I wouldāve been there earlier but I had to play pretty defensively on this chapter due to very very limited healing and having few units + the KE merc. When you trigger his range, like 3 enemies charge you, which is difficult to handle, so I had to retreat back.
I feel like this is kind of an issue on some previous maps, too, where I want to charge forward, but due to the amount of enemies coming near me, I have to kind of peel back for a bit. This is fine, of course, but then there are anti turtles sprinkled in which I feel donāt account for this happening and expect the player to not slow down at all. It might be on me, though, Iām not exactly the best FE player.
On my second try, I lost a unit to the boss because I missed several attacks in a row in an attempt to escape the siege weaponry. Not sure why the boss is so bulky + on a high avo tile. Not an FE6 boss or anything by any means, but still annoying. Easy change, though, just put the boss on a forest and make forests have lower avoid bonus, or just take him off of terrain totally and give him some more defenses, since my low hitrates are the main issue here.
Luckily I saw this coming and savestated, but itās an easy enough fix. Though after I savestated, the siege guy just targeted and killed the boss anyways?? So I had nothing to worry about, I guess. Makes more sense this way why the map is set up like this, but I had 0 idea of how it would turn out so I was super scared.
Otherwise, pretty decent map! I think it kind of has an issue with being a bit plodding with the playspace being essentially a thin winding corridor, but my main issues are mentioned above and can be easily fixed. I also feel like the gimmick with the terrain changing wasnāt super impactful to how it actually played, although it was neat!
Very weird that I get a KE with no sword unit that can use it, btw. Maybe Iām dumb and missed an entire unit, though. Definitely a possibility.
ChN1-3
I am almost out of healing by this point, really sucks. No staff user, no vulns buyable (and no money to buy them with even if they were).
Whatās up with these 6 extra deploy slots? Surely I havenāt missed 6 units, right? (I just have 6 guys by this point) I didnāt use them since it seems quite unintended but not sure.
omg I love festals so awesome
The issue is that this guy just seems unkillably strong and bulky and I donāt want to go anywhere near him, so rip.
This guy didnt move even when I was in his range
Extremely weird that Morrigan here has 15 AS to the enemyās 0AS, but still isnāt doubling. Not sure what that is about.
Please, please, please remove the Nos/Resire enemies, they only serve to be extremely annoying and encourage passive play (bait and switching and EPing them). Not hard to deal with, but just not fun to fight, imo.
It doesnāt seem to matter but the chests just having basic weapons feels kind of bad, especially when I have no one who can use flux. Maybe put the monkās droppable resire in one of them instead?
Canāt steal the bossās leather shield for whatever reason. I know the scout doesnāt have the steal skill, but she can steal, right? I remember seeing the command. If I could, I feel like his skill would be really cool!
This map feels a bit plodding as well, with stuff like opening doors and waiting for the healer to catch up slowing the pace down, as well as the abundance of high range enemies + opening doors and chests w/no thief. Honestly, maybe experiment with giving the pirate a handaxe, I feel like it might make this entire part better.
Story
Even though I wasnāt paying all that much attention (not saying the writing is bad, I just tend to forget/not read writing) it felt like almost nothing happened in this part compared to the last one until the end, where the game dumps a whole bunch of stuff on you which I had a hard time caring about. Edgy sword dude has a cool sprite, but I donāt really have a reason to care about his history with the lord when itās laid out so vaguely. The part also seemed pretty short, only 3 chapters compared to the previous oneās 4. Not complaining though, just seems a bit odd.
Cool routesplit, looking forward to what else is in store. Like I said, the next bit might take me a little longer, maybe a week or two from now I should have a post.
5 Likes
Right off the bat, big thanks to Relic for having a go at the hack and for all the feedback. I would have responded earlier, but this got me to do something I havenāt done since the 27th of November according to my last saved version, that is, actually opening the hack. As such, the delay in response comes not entirely from me just being lazy like normal, but actually replaying and addressing the concerns. Iāll pretend nobodyās been playing it since itās just that bad. Poorly worded responses ahead:
Ch0/0x
So far so good. I still have plans to add more 0x too.
Ch1 (A1-1)
I didnāt give the merchant an iron lance, but gave the walking stick +2 might. Iām thinking of locking the merchants to 1 unique weapon of each type that they all can use (gonna be one merchant for each of the 7 stats), as theyāre meant to be more of support characters. Here itās different since you need all the capable units you can muster. Speaking of support, I gave them something very valuable, the potion (staff), which will also be unique to them, and heal an amount equal to their magic stat (cause thatās how giving the heal property to anything other than a default staff works, but Iām fine with it). Itās proved very helpful, but not overly broken nor completely necessary with the other options he offers. It has Live to Serve on it (self heal), with the only other two viable skills for it being Breath of Life (heals 20% of units within 2 spaces) or Staff Savant (2 range) which I think are both too OP. I also gave his other stat boosting dancerās ring turned potion 10 uses (will eventually be purchasable) and buffed rally luck to its Fates equivalent which gives +8, and sprinkled a tiny bit of crit rate on some particular enemies to encourage using it.
Rather than have the boss come earlier, I changed the AI of the archer nearby to mover earlier, which will effectively block you off from reaching the first armor/kid, as I want you to kind of have to deal with all the reinforcements in the bottom center area, as well as see that knights have armor march.
Ch2 (A1-2)
Yeah the no reward thing is me trying to make a meta play with what the events at the end of the chapter reveal. I want to have each merchant have some little quest like that, and the reward for completing them all is a secret side chapter.
Lotta good stuff here which is all addressed accordingly.
Did you miss the wind tome or the hidden gold in the fort chapter?
Made Frosttide 40 uses
Get 750 gold at the start instead of 500
May add some other source
The unarmed soldier at the end does have a droppable red gemā¦
Gave the myrm and peg irons
Lowered forest, mountain, peak, and house avoid by 5 each
May still play with this/skill in the future
A little rebalancing with enemy levels and stats to make things a little more forgiving
Good choice sparing the soldierā¦
Ch3 (A1-3)
I kept the enemy stat variation, but trimmed the fat around them so I think itās manageable now.
Merchants will warn you before they switch parties a la the merchants in Echoes, maybe Lucian wants to take that silver lance with him?
Jaigan comes in a few chapters, but yeah, fixing the bulk makes things much smoother. Thieves should def be easier to deal with as well.
Added preps, Verdaine mentions taking a moment before entering the castle for the team to prepare, howās that for gameplay-story integration?
Kinda disappointed that the chapter came off as frustrating and unfair. The main gist of the gimmicks in this chapter are the chaos and choosing what you want to go after (and how badly/what youāre willing to do for that warp staff). The warp is supposed to be kinda like a āgood luck getting thisā situation. To add to the fun, the boss on the throne can flee under certain conditions! But yeah, me trying to make more meta level stuff. Towershield guy is actually the boss from another chapter, but yes, that enemy is explicitly designed to be fought by the king dude.
A note regarding hints:
I donāt like using red text, and donāt plan to use it aside from moments where itās like I, the developer, am talking to you, the player, in a very meta sense through the characters or whatever dialogue is happening. As such, there is a bunch of dialogue throughout the chapter hinting at things to come.
Also probably gonna make the right knight move next to the left onc once their side is clear on ally phase. This way theyāll help clear the way, and are set up for armor march the turn you get them.
Ch4 (A1-4)
Enemy bulk and 1-2 range toned down
Thieves are only supposed to be able to use daggers/knives and no swords, need to make a sword weapon lock to properly do that which I havenāt yet. Thieves also pretty much rely on crits for damage, which I also buffed more on daggers.
Drawbridge is only really useful depending on where you are when the back reinforcements come
Added a droppable lightning tome on the first skeletonwitch
Added the thief arrow
Dotted a few more heal tiles around
Donāt know why the thieves attack, maybe they just want you to get the chest items
Cutting the bulk should also make things smoother
In addition to the chapter specific stuff, thereās been some minor stat rebalancing here and there, slightly updated/new dialogue at a few points, couple different items and weapons strewn about, a new minor character introduction, and maybe some more stuff I canāt remember.
Iāll get to the second post here in the next couple days, and maybe even post a hot fix patch hopefully this weekend if I donāt just drop it entirely in the meantime. Thanks again Relic, and thanks to the other posters. I guess I should also say sorry that this is making my post from last week come off as some lame last ditch effort marketing attempt to garner interest now. Iām still gonna keep the indefinite hiatus in the thread title for the time being, at least until I can actually get back to progressing with new material instead of just fixing existing stuff. Letās see what happens next.
10 Likes
Back in the saddle after pulling the plug! Best of luck, will give it a whirl in the near future!
3 Likes
Theā¦ what? I totally missed those, damn. Thatās on me, then.
Tbh, this idea comes across, but it doesnāt stop it from feeling really awful letting super valuable staves get away. I think the idea is fine, but the issue is that itās not really telegraphed well enough, since most your units are going to be like, over in the upper left ish (Just right of the chest room)? And the thieves are super far away, have 6 mov, and pass, which made it unreasonably tough for me to get more than 1 staff. Doesnāt help that you end up having 1 turn less than (imo) you should, because once they enter the range of the OP guys down south, theyāre as good as gone. In hindsight I feel like I came down too hard without making my specific issues clear enough, though I think the idea is still good.
I think adjusting the bulk should definitely help, though.
This is a good change in theory, I think, but the issue with crits is that if the base damage is not high, the crit damage also tends to be pretty low, and if the crit isnāt 30+, itās really unreliable (Hell, having a 30% chance to crit twice only gives you a ~50% chance to crit once, I think). I also worry about enemy thieves, but seeing as they were doing 0 or 1 damage to most my units, itās not too much of a concern. Though I havenāt seen anything so this could be just what thieves need.
I do not think this is necessary, I was honestly using rally luck a good bit cause he had nothing else to do. I think this really just encourages clumping units together, which I think ch1/2 donāt really incentivise already, so it might end up feeling disruptive to the flow. Also not a fan of enemies being able to crit you in general, even if itās for the purpose of using the rally luck skill.
I can see how this makes sense, but I feel like it wasnāt super transparent as much as I wouldāve liked. Itās entirely possible I was just not reading the dialogue with enough attention to notice Lucian was going to leave (actually this is 100% the case lol), but I think that there needs to be some sort of indicator that the function of these units is similar to the echoes merchants (that is, ferrying items between parties is as important to these guys as being actual combat units). Probably wouldnāt stop me from skimming over it, but maybe adding some dialogue that alludes to this more clearly could help? Though from what youāve said, it seems like you may have already done this. EDIT: On rereading, you literally just said they will warn you, lol. I really gotta read stuff more carefullyā¦ But yeah , nevermind on all that, you seem to have a good grasp on how these guys need to telegraph.
Glad to see you getting back to work on the game, and a lot of these changes are looking great! Sorry for giving even more feedback while you were still preparing your changes for the first post, haha.
5 Likes
Hey N,
Downloaded the patch and started playing. Will try to capture my thoughts clearly below.
Ch.0
The eventing and visuals are good. Hackās pretty cinematic and easy to look at. The snow effect is great and the general vibe is nice.
My immediate request is to add the QoL patch that enables fast text from the outset. The intro can be a bit long and I felt like it took a little too long to get into gameplay. Changing the auto settings to Fast movement and Fast Text will go a long way in making the opening scenes feel a bit snappier.
I appreciate the concept of this map, but it felt unintuitive and it took me multiple tries to get right. Initially my thought is to send everyone right. Then the greenies become red and I have to send Nikolai and Morrigan in the opposite direction. I canāt imagine a player getting this on the first try, honestly. It becomes significantly easier when you know how the map is going to play out. I feel like it is like an interactive cutscene. As such, itād be nice if things were more lenient - ie giving out vulneraries on everyone. I donāt really know how you could keep the same story beat w/o altering the map flow dramatically, but if youāre going to guide the player down a very specific path where only a single set of actions can be done, it should be harder to mess up - ie this kind of opener shouldnāt take me 3 tries to beat because I got sucker punched by the changes. Not to be harsh, but I could see someone trying to play this and dropping it here. I think what youāre doing is interesting, but it isnāt a great gameplay experience.
Unsure specifically what Iād recommend other than making it harder for a player caught off guard (I think many will be) to mess up - make enemies a little weaker (do the sentries need to have a zanbato? are steel weapons necessary in ch0?), and add more failsafe options like giving everyone a vuln so I can heal up when I need to run around enemies since fighting quickly becomes a poor option.
At the very least I play all of this and am intrigued to keep going, but off the bat this type of experimental chapter may push players away unless you make it really hard to lose here. Right now itās too easy to mess up because the player doesnāt know whatās happening.
Iām a big believer in the intro map as the most important map in the game, and this setup would likely turn off a lot of players from continuing because it feels kinda clunky to play right now.
Hope this is helpful.
Ch.0x
Map is pretty, eventing is excellent, I am a fan of nightmare sequences. Not much really to add here other than it is a bit funny to see a unit called āEnemyā that you can talk to. May want to change this so it isnāt so spooky.
Ch.1 A1-1
This felt like a more proper gameplay introduction. Not crazy about the unit mix - while the merchant is interesting, having 5 units and only 3 that can really do combat can feel restrictive. Boss basically requires Aurelia to do anything. Do they need to be an armor? Itād be nice to offer flexibility in how I can take out the boss. I like the hurry up reinforcements at the end, but felt that they offered opportunity to grind since they didnāt look super buff? The boss moving helps this, but there didnāt seem to be incentive to not stick around and farm them, which feels counter to the narrative intent. Iād consider beefing them up and pushing them back a few turns to make grinding less of an easy choice. Unsure if scarier ones come later since I beat the boss shortly after and left.
Lucian does seem like a neat unit, Iām keen to see how the game expects me to use them. Albeit, rally luck makes me think āGreat there are low percent crits I need to use them forā, but I hope thatās not the case and itās just the first of other rallies they get?
Otherwise yeah this was a fine map.
Ch.2 A1-2
Wouldāve loved preps given the droppables and such so far, but not a huge deal. Any reason we canāt go to preps yet?
I like the setup and love the song choice. The fishing village and the little dock event are cool. Pretty intuitive little puzzle.
Phaedraās palette is good. I like Callistoās mug.
The map flow felt a little strange. The mapās enemies are pulling me to go to the left side, but thereās a village in danger up right (good!), but the issue I have is that i probably am not well enough equipped to fully split, so I tried sending Verdaine that way, but the swordreaver brigand is a bit mean. I get Callisto can do damage, but 32% hit for 75% of their health is not a bet im comfy taking, so I retreated w/ both units. I think itād be better to remove the swordreaver so your sword dude can handle this a bit more cleanly.
The top brigand felt a little too fast, I tried sending Callisto straight up after going down to avoid swordreaver brigand. They got 2HKOād and died, this is my fault entirely, but I wanted to see if I could rush to get it. Maybe turn this back another few turns since I was still kinda near the dock when this happened.
Iām going to pause here and try again later.
Overall - nice work, clearly lots of efforts in the aesthetics across the board. Writing is solid and easy to read. Biggest area of opportunity is gameplay and Iād argue youāre in a good position to continue making tweaks as you get more feedback.
Some inspirations I felt while playing:
- Bloodlines
- The Lonely Mirror
- Staff of Ages
- Midnight Sun
Overall - nice work and Iām keen to keep playing. Will continue to share my thoughts as I work through. Let me know if thereās anything else I can clarify here.
3 Likes
Quick note regarding something I forgot to mention.
I assume this means that this is intentional, which I think is fine. The issue, to me, is that it goes against the preestablished notion people have about thieves, which I think means they wonāt plan around being attacked and could lose a unit/donāt think to bait one of the thieves to get treasure. So Iād see if you could address that, if you could.
Also, not relevant, but related to thieves, Iād recommend getting rid of lockpicks and just giving thieves locktouch. Makes things much easier for inventory management and is a nice touch to make the game feel better.
Right then, onwards to the next part it is.
A2-1
Right off the bat, I really donāt like how you have to leave one of the armors behind. On their own, theyāre awful feeling to use and just generally awful, what really makes them work to me is armor march on both and being able to deploy them together.
Uh, looks like someone wasnāt properly removed from the partyā¦ I used this guy as a meatshield until he died, which was actually really useful, honestly. I feel like this indicates that you may need 1 more unit in the beginning of the chapter.
Upon restarting the chapter, I can farm unlimited gold/knight crests. Probably needs to be fixed. You can do this with a counter check, since those persist through suspend.
This guy never moves as far as I can tell, a bit weird.
Not a fan of Rikard facing crit, even if he can take one. He just got crit here which was crazy, I thought heād die. I get that the horseshoe exists but both him and the myrm face crit and you can only use the horseshoe on one of them.
The thief with has much worse bulk, defense, strength, and speed than every relevant unit. Heās actually much, much, much worse, and needs some kind of huge buff. Giving daggers more crit wonāt cut it, imo.
Welp. Accidentally used a demo potion. Guess thatās a reset, haha. Luckily it only happened on t3, I suppose. Might want to keep note of this.
This guy, uh, lunged me?? I went in the rom and apparently the weapon he is holding has lunge, but it doesnāt say that anywhere in the game itself.
Totally missed these guys showing up, even though I think the camera panned to them. Maybe have a dialogue cue that theyāre here now, haha. I also am 90% sure someone is going to die because martijin has no lightning tome, and I couldnāt buy one for him in preps, but this shouldnāt be an issue anymore.
Oh man, really appreciate this guy showing up, haha. Glad he has a torch too, since i missed the one last time.
This enemy has healAI, kind of annoying cause he runs into the forest.
Honestly, I think the thief should start with one of these.
Maybe uh, buff luna. This is kind of sadā¦
I saw a thing here, is there a secret event I can do? Not sure how to trigger it.
This guy with the boarding pike gets 3 hit KOād by one of my strongest weapons and has crazy big res, seems a bit overkill. I donāt think lowering his res would help either since the mages start pretty far away from him.
The apothecary in the bottom right doesnāt seem to heal the boss for some reason. Not complaining but not sure that was intended? The threshold might just be really low, though.
Overall, alright chapter, Iād say. I definitely really enjoyed part 2ās cast much more, though getting a strong archer here as well definitely helps.
A2-2
10 deploy here feels kinda bad, I would like 11 or 12. Not a big deal, though.
Not necessary but it would be nice to have the talk convos for recruitment be 2 way, that way I can check the talk field on the recruitable to see who recruits them. Again, not necessary, but could be nice. Also, not a fan of how she shows up after preps, it feels kind of unnecessarily not transparent.
Uhhā¦ what? This entire convo makes no sense (Iām recruiting Jayde w/Aurelia), Iāve never seen the guy on the right beforeā¦ And the dialogue feels like itās implying things that donāt happen. I assume this is an error, since it makes sense later on when Onyx does show up and the same conversation plays.
These convoys are unkillably bulky. This is one of my strongest units wielding a steel sword, doubling, and having the boost from Aureliaās skill. I should not be doing under half of their HP.
Aaaand thereās a physic troub to undo all my damage. I donāt know how I am supposed to get one of these guys, let alone all of them. Iām missing the peg, sure, but these just seem intentionally impossible to get. This troub is also super annoying with healing other enemies, but the convoys are the main issue here, the other enemies getting healed were mostly fine.
In addition to the convoysā bulk and the physic troub, it feels like even when I try, Iām just not able to extend far enough to get any of them. This isnāt super helped by the amount of effectives on enemies limiting the movement of my highest mov units (Remember, I lost the peg).
Why do enemies have leather shields if I canāt steal them? It just serves to make them randomly more annoying, unless Iām missing something. This guy is def faster than the cav and canāt steal it, so idk. I think it may be because he doesnāt have the steal skill explicitly, cause this is skillsystems.
Maxwell having Opportunist as a skill feels really awful, just because it feels more like you are losing damage against other archers + mages than gaining damage against everyone else. Iād rather he just have +2-4 str stat with no skill.
Lost Reshi, the map was just way too chokey and slow-moving for me to get to him. I assume this should be helped out a bit by enemy bulk being reduced, at least. Putting several enemies right in front of the bridge really slows down my progress. It doesnāt help that my army was kind of split and not all in one place so it took me time to get everyone together and take on the armors/archers/monk all at once, and even then Bijou still died.
This convo also seems incomplete (recruiting the villager).
Obviously you know about this already, but I think it bears repeating that the thief was able to do almost nothing this entire map. There was nothing to steal, and he did 0 damage to most enemies.
Overall, this map feels kind of like a step back from the previous part, with a lot going on that I enjoy (the transporters, Reshi, Onyx) but it feels hindered by the fact that Iām back with the part 1 cast. Thereās just not enough damage output for how bulky the enemies are, even with my really buff Verdaine and the armors. I do want to stress though how much I like the idea here, and just needs some easy tweaks to improve the execution and make it much better.
I think the bulk lowering youāve already done should largely solve the problem here, though, and maybe playing with the timing/bulk of the transporters should help too.
A2-3
This map really solidified for me that Theodore is the worst unit in the game, by far. Since Iāve lost 3 units by this point, he really needed to carry his weight, and time and time again he let me down by doing 0 damage to nearly every enemy on the map with both the dagger and knife. Even with the unintended iron sword usage, he was maybe doing 2 or very rarely, 4 damage to an enemy.
I think reducing enemy bulk and upping dagger crit isnāt enough, since that maybe lets him do 6 damage in a single round if heās lucky. I think either his base strength needs a buff, or dagger base mt needs a buff (probably the former). I also feel like his speed needs a buff, though that might just be because he struggled to get any exp at all. He was tied in speed with the generic thief on this map, which I think says everything, haha.
I think this map is easily overall the weakest so far, due to the fact that itās so filled with 1-tile chokepoints and pillars everywhere that drastically cut my unitsā movement, which combine to slow the pace of the game down to a crawl.
This also negatively affects other things, like the antiturtle. This was me moving as fast as I possible could, but because the chapter was so tight and constrained with conga lines of enemies blocking my way, the spider caught up to me in no time. This is really, really bad, since the spider pretty much ORKOs my entire army. I had to rely on Aurel to dodgetank it. Since itās a green unit, too, you canāt just choke it with a unit that might be able to survive, either.
Once I was approaching the end of the map, just around that part where the screenshot above shows, enemies began to charge me in huge groups, which just slowed the map down even more, since the space was so limited and the enemies would often be too strong for one unit to EP (this is fine, of course, but it slowed me down, letting the spider catch up).
Although this is the biggest issue in the chapter and the thing that makes me dislike it so much, thereās also a few other aspects that make it not super fun.
One of the bigger things was the boss being super annoying to kill. I actually didnāt know how to kill the boss at first, and I was thinking about how I might have had to end my playthrough here. Luckily, a smarter friend of mine pointed out that barrier pretty much solved my problem. And yeah, it made the boss possible to kill.
So, even with barrier, the boss took me ~6 turns to kill? Way too long, it was just tedious, especially with the hitrates I had, pretty much only Verdaine with a steel sword could do the job.
However, I think the fact that this boss requires barrier is just really not fun or interesting. Admittedly, I take full responsibility for not remembering that I could use it, but I donāt think forcing the player to use barrier on their strongest unit and hit end turn 5 times in a row is super riveting design, Iād rather he just be normally killable, Nos/Resire makes him super annoying.
Other than this, I felt like the amount of keys I was given for the map were way too low, and padded it out even longer with me having to run around with Theodore getting every chest and door. I eventually gave up since I didnāt want Aurel to succumb to the spider (although he was doing a good job dodging it on a pillar) and I left several chests behind.
Since I did a couple runs of this map, I noticed something weird with the chests. Theyāre, uh, random.
Now, I understand why they are this way, to add replay value. But I think random chests like this are just super flawed, for the pure reason that the value of their items is extremely, extremely unbalanced, and can lead to one player just getting the short end of the stick with regards to loot for no reason. For example, I got an iron blade from one chest, when an enemy on the map already drops one. I would have much preferred a greatlance or poleaxe.
Of course, statboosters being random is even more unbalanced. It feels really awful to get something like a goddess icon when you could have gotten an energy ring. The difference in value in these items is crazy! I have a similar issue with promotion items.
Speaking of the chests with promotion items, this may be on me again, but I came across them solely by chance, there was no hint. I think something this large shouldnāt just be a secret I happen upon randomly with no hints. Of course, I couldāve missed the hint because I was speeding through dialogue or something, so if thereās already one or you plan to add one, ignore this.
Probably my last issue is the Nosferatu shaman in the throne room area, that guy is way too powerful and bulky, and nosferatu is a pain to deal with. Of course, I could handle other enemies one at a time, then handle him, but the spider from the back doesnāt really allow for any sort of slower pace on this map.
Maybe the peg or Reshi or Bijou wouldāve helped, but I already had to bench a unit, so Iām not so sure about that. I think this map needs a total rework, honestly. Though I think again the ideas here are pretty neat. Really sorry to be so negative on this one, but I think every other map in the game is far above this, really.
A2-4
I noticed Thesea doesnāt come back when sheās killed, why is that? Merlinus does it in both games he features in, so I feel like it should be the case here as well.
This map, overall, I really liked the idea of. Thereās so much going on, itās super cool! I just think that itās hindered by some basic execution issues that I wanted to bring up.
This fog palette isnāt great, since thereās so little difference between it and the regular palette, as shown here. Iād recommend making it more blatant.
One of the biggest issues I found out on my initial run-through of the chapter wasā¦ this. The player has 0 idea of the fact that Morrigan is going to come through here, and so all my units were extremely far from her, resulting in her getting stuck. I knew on my reset, of course, but it felt cheap the first time through.
Man, for the amount of fliers on the map, even with morrigan, really wish I had a better secondary bow unit.
One of the greatest annoyances I had on this map was this unit you have to defend, holy crap. She cannot be controlled at all besides movement skill spam, and even then, she keeps just running into enemy range, and eventually died by getting one-rounded by a gargoyle. Being able to carry her would help so, so much.
I felt like the drawbridge here was way useless, I actually accidentally raised it, putting me in a really bad position. Thereās also a bug where after you raise + lower it once, it wonāt raise again. Not sure if this is intentional but it felt weird. The dialogue for putting it up + lowering it is also the same.
Was not a fan of the fog here, it was weird to have random clerics running to get killed as extra fog vision, but I really liked how it disappeared halfway through, really cool event.
I felt like, even moreso than usual, all my non-Verdaine units were severely underpowered. Maybe this is because I only nabbed one promotion item the previous chapter, but no one was close to promoting here, so I feel like thereās a bigger issue there.
Random question, it feels really unintuitive to just let the warrior dude die after I talk to him, since his con is too high to save him. He is alive in the end event, so I assume I did everything I needed to? Iād just have him be erased off of the map once someone talks to him.
In general, this map feels like the enemy density is far too high for the escort objective, with constant reinforcements, even guys spawning right in the middle of my army, which got pretty annoying. Iām being constantly pelted by lots of reinforcements while I have to try to keep my army alive + escort the ??? person to the boss.
Thereās a couple of issues I had with the mapās design itself, the biggest one being that the bottom of the map, where the green warrior is, feels extremely constrained and tight, way too much so, in my opinion. Most of my units naturally went there, since I had to save the green guy, realised that I sent too few units there, and then proceeded to send everyone else. This area of the map is super slow to move through but also the natural place to go to, meaning I couldnāt get to the boss in time.
I also think the map is way too big, since it feels like my units are constantly short 1 or 2 movement points from where they need to be, and the gargoyles outrange most guys. I assume this is exacerbated by the units I lost, but still felt pretty bad.
Last thing, I really dislike how itās not transparent at all when the map is going to end, felt really bad to just have it randomly end on me (since the ??? person died).
I know Iām being really negative again, but I think this map is fantastic at its core. Thereās so many different things going on, I love the whole fog lifting and being replaced by a blizzard, the objective change, drunk guy washing up on shore, itās all great. Conceptually, one of my favorite maps Iāve ever played. Just needs some more work.
Something I feel like this chapter really nails is the atmosphere, from a gameplay perspective. I definitely felt on my toes for most of the chapter, as much as I complain about some of the less fun aspects. Iād just tone certain aspects down.
Story-wise, not much to say, honestly. Same as the first part, seemed fine to me. Though this map just seemed kind of random with no ties to the greater story, which I assume wonāt be an issue in part A3.
Going to have to stop now, because when I went to N2-1, I was greeted by this:
Seems there was a party switch that didnāt happen 
.
Overall, my thoughts on the game are just, really strong concepts and a lot of fun ideas I am a huge fan of, just needs iteration and polish. Definitely would highly recommend this hack if/when that hotfix gets pushed out.
3 Likes
New patch in the first post
Thanks for giving the hack a shot! May be some stuff in here redundant with my reply to Relic, but letās get in to more updates:
Ch0
Added the fast text after the spooky narrator intro bit, cause I feel the slow default speed fits nice with that.
Bit of an overhaul here to the chapter design, because truth be told, Iāve still failed several times at this chapter just trying to get through it, and not by just trying out different situations the player could get into. To start, there were essentially 6 ways of splitting the party, 2 I think that are impossible, and 4 Iāve successfully managed to beat. Basically, changed some positions/timings, and blocked off the top path around the lake, to force a more foolproof approach. Now thereās essentially one path, but halfway through the map, the options open up into the familiar amount of chaos as before; now more lenient for a new player, but still tricky if you try to get that nice shiny angelic robe off of SnoāNeil. Managed to fit in a little extra as wellā¦
Also gave Nikolai his starting prf, which is essentially a slightly better steel lance with the battle veteran skill (+1 dmg and 5% hit per 10 levels). If I ever get to modifying skills, Iāll change it up a little, but I like a progressive weapon like that āgrowsā with the character as a prf. Also have some nifty things planned with it story wiseā¦
Ch0x
Yeah that was just me being lazy, and not caring about the unit ID. The āEnemyās are now all quaint āMtn Folkās.
A1-1
Merchant got a decent buff to make him more combat viable, he also has potions which heal an amount equal to his magic stat (because staff coding, you know the deal with thatā¦). Also redid the potions to function better as rebalanced dancersā rings.
Boss is now a soldier, he was originally an armor to show off that armors have armor march, but I feel that gets easily lost here and introduce it with the player armors in A1-3.
The reinforcements arenāt meant to be hurry up reinforcements, but more so to pinch the player into the lower mid section as the boss starts moving too. May add some better dialogue to somehow shore that up.
So thereās gonna be 7 merchants, one for each stat sans hp and move (I think). Theyāll all have their respective rally to match their respective stat, and a build to reflect that stat depending on how much you choose to use any of them. They also serve to ferry items between the two parties in the first half of the game. Iāll add some more details about them in the future.
Luck is a pretty minor factor in hit and avoid, so crit is kinda like the only thing itās helpful for, which I did make sure to tone down a bit further. Given the minimal unit count and his ability to heal, rallying shouldnāt be too much of a priority, but I felt it was the easiest rally to have and not make everything dependent on.
A1-2
Preps added, Verdaine mentions taking a moment to prepare, because gameplay-story integration of course.
Pent made the track, so thatās why itās
like the only good thing in the game. Fishing will hopefully be expanded upon someday, same with mining.
As mentioned in my other post, I toned down a lot of enemy bulk, which should open up some more options. Donāt forget about movement skills, as you can safely get a unit to the village and back with the rest of the party in the low-mid left side of the map. Those brigands were originally stronger and meant to be the anti turtle, as theyāll chase you around the mountain, but flee when the boss is defeated. May save that for hard mode, blocking off the center and right paths may help that point.
Delayed the top brigand by a turn, and made him a sword brigand (along with the former swordreaver guy), that along with the bulk fixing should make getting to him in time more manageable, but still provide a tight pace to meet.
Never actually played any of those other hacks, but I know Iāve seen the Bloodlines comparison made before. There is/will be some more nods to Order of the Crimson Arm however.
Some other notes regarding these early chapters, mostly thief stuff:
Been playing around with knives some more, what I settled on (for now at least) is very low might, high crit, and negate defense. The high crit may look scary, but theyāll mostly only be equipped by non combative units (sans weird AI I just mentioned above). Assassins are gonna be real scary though. Theodore can also get a knife (1-2 range) in his chapter, coupled with his new opportunist skill should actually make him pretty decent in combat but still very squishy. Weāll see how that all turns out.
I tried giving Theodore locktouch, but his AI didnāt seem to be smart enough to realize he had itā¦
Yeah this was a poor attempt at sarcasm, given I used the same sort of response in a non-sarcastically intended manner hahaā¦ Their AI is indeed set to get treasure and escape, of which the path is not blocked. So no idea why theyāre attackingā¦
So with all that being said, I actually have a new patch ready with all the updates Iāve mentioned in this post and the last, along with some more polish and tweaks throughout up to chapter A1-4. Thereās still things Iād like to add/tweak, and Iām certain thereāre issues, but hey, itās something. Patch link is in the first post (speaking of which, why did the click counters get reset? I havenāt touched those in the postā¦ Lameā¦). Iāll keep working on cleaning this up and getting to Relicās other posts, but am happy to take anymore feedback in the meantime!
10 Likes
Iāve been following this project since thread release and have actually played the early game 3 times, though each time Iāve gotten distracted and came back a few months later to repeat the cycle. Iāve finally given it mostly full run of the existing content.
In short. Frozen Throes boasts some of the best aesthetics on the mapping front Iāve seen as wells some very creative map interactivity that is not commonplace.
Or the real answer,
Hack good.
Story
The the story was pretty atypical for a FE structure. Part 1 Aurelia split is a solid interaction, introducing some of the cultural and political aspects of the world.
Moving into Part 1 Nikolai, Iām still not fully sure about what the objective of Nikolaiās group is
Part 2 Aurelia is where it got very confusing, but Iām chalking that up to the fact that the text doesnāt appear to be finished?
The minute to minute story aspect seems to go for more of a small-scale RPG exploration feel with how many chapters focus around ruin-diving or treasure-hunting, and less of FEās big war against big bads. At least so far, anyways.
Map feedback
What I do appreciate about each map is how a strong attempt has been made to make each map have some unique kind of interactivity to keep every map from being the standard FE formula. Every map of frozen throes is memorable in its own way, and there arenāt any maps that just kinda blend in with the rest. Also worth mentioning is the commitment to the snow aesthetic and how diverse it is across so many tilesets.
Of course, my feedback comes with the guarantee:
Aurelia Split One
ch0
-The changes through use of weather condition, palette and tile changes are very effective and a good indicator of whatās to come.
-Frostide could use description that its flier effective (which I guess is why the new version wyverns now since I never found this out on my last run.)
-Pull OāNeill is pretty hard without being nuked but I assume this is by design.
ch0x
-Exploring the base was very fun, found the crusader quiz, wind tome and pure water, but I can tell thereās a bunch more I havenāt found
-The shark scene was awesome. I also appreciate use of fog palette to simulate steam.
-It might be worth putting escape tiles in front of the doors to make more obviously visitable.
chA1-1
-Pretty short map, so not much to say besides it worked well.
chA1-2
-Lucian class description is still unable to fight when he can use many weapons.
-Top village closes if someone other than Lucian visits which kinda stuffed me due to mid map memory loss.
-Fishing on the dock was pretty neat, I forgot about the fishing rod for every chapter after this.
-I must have sent Calisto onto every hill and mountain with the pickaxe and found nothing. I had to look it up since it was driving me nuts, and it looks like you get a dud item and it was next to the house? Not sure if this means the event was purposefully ādisabledā, but in case it wasnāt I feel from the wording it makes more sense if on hill. I canāt be the only player to have searched for ages for something to use with the pickaxe on this map.
-The middle house appeared to be on the wrong tile next to the actual house?
-I played this map like 4 times and didnāt get the horseshoe event and only saw it due to the looking up the pickaxe thing. 20 luck seems significantly game-changing for something thatās effectively a secret.
-Really gonna make me murder a defenceless guy for his red gemā¦
-Overall the map plays pretty well, but I do think having all those houses to visit doesnāt mesh well with the top village being very strict in terms of turn count, I had to do the bare minimum for the right village and then charging everyone up as quickly as possible to get the top and then come back for quite a few of the houses.
ch1-3
-I think this is HM weirdness popping up, but Rikard dies on the second turn enemy phase to 3 80%s from the thunder mage and it seems infeasible to stop that mage. As a result, Bijou dies on turn 3 enemy phase from the same mage but that one is more preventable. Had to wait for a 80 miss for Rikard to not die.
-Again, I think possible HM weirdness, but Theodore turns green next the greatlance armor and gets exactly one shot. This seems odd because thereās no way to plan for this happening for a blind player.
-Hammer doesnāt work on the lance armor which makes the two charging armor knight fight quite a bit harder.
-I felt the thief spawn felt like being blindsided since thereās exactly a single turn of action players can take for some thieves before the promoted red squad shows up. While the dialogue does indicate something is coming, the precision of positioning needed to catch a thief makes it not meaningfully helpful. Considering the item in question is a warp staff, I think what is most likely is that it will cause players to just reset and plant someone next the door next time around. I think the player either needs meaningful information to be able to adjust their positioning to whatās come before such a huge change rolls around.
-Thief boss doesnāt seem killable, but I assume its just a tease (and Latona is not very useful anyways).
-I got stuffed by the very red lanceman charging my units as I went for the warp staff.
-Overall, while I thought the map is conceptually interesting, in practice in came off as frustrating since I had to reset many times for things that didnāt seem like I could plan for without prior knowledge of the map.
ch1-4
-Not actually sure what to do with the dog. It doesnāt seem catchable since Verdaine does like 6 dmg with a steel sword and he starts 7 move and 7 spaces ahead and no one can use the high tier staffs. But on the other hand, wording of the previous convo makes me uncertain if I was supposed to let it go.
-The flooding killing a few skeletons never fails to get a kick out of me.
-It seemed like the top thief was going to way out of my reach, but then it seemed to charge me instead? Not really sure where it was going.
-Drawbridges to block the strong reinforcements is a very neat gimmick.
-The whole skeletonwitch thing was very bizarre and if the purpose was to confuse me, it succeeded.
-While intitially pretty straight forward, the map changes through the water and small amount of interactivity from the drawbridges makes it much more memorable.
Nikolai Split One
N1-1
-I wasnāt sure what the breaking the barrels did besides the thrill of destruction, but it looked like the N1-1x had a convo for the aftermath of that which I thought was pretty cool.
-The invisible āledgeā unit is a pretty funny implementation. They can be moved by movement skills but I suppose thatās a minor issue to resolve later.
-Having to fight Zonta twice as he books it is pretty funny.
-When Morrigan said the bottom house looked funny, I assumed it meant the brown house and it took me quite the amount of dicking around the realise the bottom right house was also visitable. The dialogue was pretty necessary there.
N1-1x
-Some of the most creative use of the existing tiles (alongside the newer tiles of course) to create an indoor environment I have ever seen. I found the exporatory segment incredibly impressive.
-I especially liked the views of the floor below/the outside from a different elevation.
-The meal quest is a cool diversion.
N1-2
-The tranq bow forced me to drop more vulneraries, my only weakness.
-The avalanches were very funny. Sadly, I was miles away from killing edge guy.
-Monk dialogue seemed to be just Nikolai.
-I tried training Arantxa on the longbow scout since he got pushed into a dead end, but then the mauthe doog showed up and she was dead meat.
-That aside, the mauthe doog timing seemed a tad unfair on HM, especially since there is so little time to respond since the map is very small and howl 1-10 that also doubles (one-shotting Serafina). It probably needs some indication since danger range doesnāt show it. I think either having the mauthe doogs show up later and/or reducing howl range would be fair.
N1-3
-Equal amount of deploy slots on both sides of the map seemed to indicate I could deploy from either position which is pretty cool. Deploying from my initial position felt like a major mistake since I got hammered trying to open the door.
-Armor knight guarding the door should probbaly have boss AI since he doesnāt move.
-The berserked warrior charged at a pretty inopportune time but I was able to indefinitely bait him around the jail since he had 4 move (I needed it!) Seems like some fun possibility for leading him into the massive choke.
-Speaking of which, the nosferatu shaman having good mixed bulk alongside the charging resire monk made it a tough fight, I think only one or the other would be necessary. The double armor and longbow choke ended up being harder than it seemed since I had the vagabond running rings (he ran out of miasma uses and I hadnāt picked up the flux tome) so it felt like I had one unit that could do any damage to the armors. I think maybe an armor effective here would have helped a ton.
-Suffered from some inventory issues here, I assume no convoy is due to split party shenanigans.
-The end event where they float away on an a piece was absolutely fantastic. I noticed Aranxta didnāt show up here, but just kinda showed up in Aureliaās party without explanation? Maybe there was something I missed there.
Aurelia Split Two
A2-1
-Restarting the chapter after saving dupes the items, probably needs a global flag here to prevent this.
-Almost got a heart attack when I thought I was going to lose armor march, thankfully did not happen.
-Statwise, this chapter was actually quite the difficulty spike compared to every other chapter so far. I believe this is because every single enemy on this map is very fast (lowest with lookout at 9 spd and highest with vagabond at 13 spd) while they also donāt have significantly lower bulk. This made most of them quite tough to kill since so few of my units were doubling but they also had passable bulk.
-I got baited into breaking the wall to try and split but that ended up clearly not being intended with how team Aurelia showed up and how fast the red houses got destroyed.
-Use of torch light and the yellow house breaking to signal anti-turtle was quite creative. I actually prevented the yellow house from breaking with Verdaine, so probably needs an alternate event besides destroying it here.
-I noticed how the vagabond class only showed up in forests, especially that one jumping me at the start.
-Staircase here seemed to be a wall.
A2-2
-Iām a bit of a sucker for convoy chase missions, so this was already up my alley.
-Jayde convo seemed to have wrong text, and having 4 portraits at once combined with moving map sprites leads to a glitched portrait.
-These arenāt convoys, theyāre TRS tanks! I assume this is some unintentional HM weirdness striking again. The most damage I could do to one of them is 5-6 with thunder Aurelia or greatlance Rikard, unlessā¦
Theodoreās time to shine. Wagons fear his wrath. I think convoys were supposed to be a bit tanky, but I think the map would work better if convoys didnāt have bows since the player isnāt sure if they will attack or not and if they could be fairly easily killed by most members of the party instead of a few.
-I missed the iron shield but got the others. Had to surround them with bulk units while Theodore got to work. The item being converted to a white gem as they reached the other side was a pretty neat touch, they I could maybe using the sleep staff to intentionally acquire vast amounts of money.
-I forgot I could use the sleep staff, but aside from that I donāt think the merchant recruit is feasible under normal conditions on HM. I didnāt feel like I was missing out on much though.
-Two cavs bottom right canāt use weapons.
-In short, a pretty fun chapter though there were some minor hiccups.
A2-3
-The cobweb libary with spiders was a very cool set-piece. Made more funny by the red thief racking up kills.
-I just murdered the sleeping Elder Bael with Theodoreās defence pierce so that made life easier. While the sleeping boss death reinforcement is cool, I do think that:
-There is massive choke on the middle as the player funnels through a ton of units a one tile pillar while tackling a line of enemy units simultaneously. I had to use my tankiest units while everyone else just kind of cheered from the sidelines and this definitely would have resulted in the elder bael catching up and ruining my day. I think both the middle path should be widended and/or that there should be some alternative way of slowing down the Bael boss besides the Theodore special.
-The impressive map changes with use of elevation, and really elevates (heh) the coolness factor of the walk to the final boss.
-There are no tile changes on the two chests at the end. I triggered them by accident, not sure if I missed a clue there? Maybe it should be a switch tile or something. I didnāt notice the doors, so that was on me. More cool spider lairs though!
-While I would say nosferatu and good mixed bulk on throne boss would be extremely frustrating, Roscoe has good avoid on the boss so it kind of worked out?
-I only realised this as I was writing up my feedback post but making the random chests promo items seem peculiar because since theyāre such game changing items. Iām not big on randomness for rewards in general in the FE format.
-A neat split map with spooky spiders and everyone loves spiders!
A2-4
-The use of fog greens to show the map before they all perish is pretty cool.
-Monsters attacking from different sides signalling their approach by breaking the walls adds to the map.
-The game crashed when this cantor attacked this cleric for some reason.
-The receding tide and sudden blizzard with the huge palette change was incredibly awesome.
-I enjoy to use of fantasy creatures like sharks.
-I think the mid map objective change to optional escort worked well here.
-The promoted wights were really spooky. Perhaps a bit too spooky. This one, however was not.
-Boss had a good bit of crit from anethema which was unfortunate.
-A minor criticism is that it was not obvious when map ends and for me, map ended on the turn before āIsmaireā reached the temple.
-One of the best defend maps Iāve played. Very epic.
Units
These is just my impression of the cast from my run, which is subjective to personal bias and deviation from how a unit normally performs.
Aurelia Split 1
Aurelia
-Pretty solid chip early with budget longbow from wind.
-Her viability fluctuated significantly after the early game depending on if enemies had a speed stat.
Verdaine
-Verdaine was very strong (as expected of a cavalier with more levels) and while his offences were decent, 7 move with good bulk let him be my main tank and anti-turtle delayer.
-Reposition on a canto unit is always helpful.
-Horseshoe gets him 0 hit from halberd which was pretty funny.
Lucian
-Fed him bunch of kills with walking stick some reason.
-Never saw him again, where did he go?
Roscoe
-Slept on Roscoe first time around since his offensive stat spread looked so mediocre. This time around however, his good bulk and all rounder stats made him pretty effective.
-I got lucky with his speed growth, so giving him a speed ring was just enough to cross many thresholds and turned him into a murder machine. I imagine his mediocre stat spread makes him much less useful on average.
Elena
-Staff
-Pavise???
Calisto
-Pretty solid peg knight, low strength is usually offset by doubling.
-Again, reposition on canto unit canāt not be useful.
Phaedra
-Seems to be inferior to Calisto in every aspect.
-The 1 point of speed difference between Phaedra and Calisto (9 and 10) actually makes a world of difference on HM. A lot of 1-3 units have 6 speed so if Phaedra didnāt get 1 point of speed on previous chapter heās 3rkoing or 4rkoing everything.
-I feel like he quite needs a buff in offensive stats because he also doesnāt have good bulk. Unlike some of the other mediocre offensive stat spreads.
Martijn
-Reliable doubling against res makes up for low magic stat, a solid unit throughout.
Aurel
-Obseletes Elena for now and presumably for the future until he dies or something.
-Has the actual stave rank to use the 1-3 loot and staff savant is just cherry on top.
Rickard
-Thought he looked bad first time around, but his mixed bulk and good strength makes him fairly useful despite his low speed stat.
-Armor march on two armors is an extremely fun skill setup.
Bijou
-Most acts as a pair of boots for Rickard.
-I tried using her, but I felt her bulk wasnāt significantly better than Roscoe or Verdaine to make up for her weaknesses, that is incredibly lackluster offenses. I feel like she doesnāt have much going for her.
Theodore
-Easily my favourite unit out of the cast. Initially looks like one of those lame thieves with no combat, but boy was I wrong.
-Opportunitist with 1-2 range choices pairs extremely well with his ignore defence and small crit, letting him chip units with good bulk and have a decent odds of outright killing lower HP units.
-Held back on HM by the fact he is pretty close to orko range.
Most part 1 Aurelia units generally pulled their weight and all of them except Phaedra would end up on the main party going into part 2.
Nikolai Split 1
Nikolai
-Decent bulky infantry.
-Very helpful on his split due to being one of few units with real bulk.
Morrigan
-Absolutely carried Nikolai split by pulling orkos with the steel bow and infiltrator giving her way more damage than she first appears.
-This screenshot is from end of 1-3, somehow got more than 14 levels in 3.5 chapters.
-Sentries in ch0 give a full level each, probably gave her a serious handstart.
-Awesome.
Rackham
-Really mediocre stat spread, suffers from similar issue to Phaedra where if he doesnāt get a 1 or 2 speed levels off the bat. he canāt double anything on HM.
-No bulk as well on top of possible immediate mediocrity.
Aleister
-Slightly more speed gives him more of a headstart than Rackham.
-Basically same situation as Martijn but with less speed starting off.
-Very valuable for dealing with armors.
Arantxa
-Deadweight.
-Not fully deadweight, did help with my inventory issues.
Serafina
-8 base magic seems to be a poor trade for a measly 4 base speed.
-Can chip and needed for armors, but seems like a disposable unit otherwise.
Yssa
-Didnāt see much of her, but staff is staff.
Part 2 had more of a unit viability disparity with Morrigan being so strong offensively, which is not necessarily a bad thing since there is far less room to maneuver in part 2 than part 1 in terms of how many actions the player has.
Aurelia Split 2
Maxwell
-Decent damage at base
-Useful on 2-4 with ballista but his rates are fairly shaky with it
-Has almost the same stats as a generic HM enemy archer but with far less speed, which is a sorry fate.
Onyx
-Having similar stats to base Verdaine is a tad unfortunate.
-While charge gives him effectively minimum +2 dmg and his damage output is acceptable, his mediocre stats in everything else especially speed brings him down compared to part 1 units.
-Reposition with canto is still going to be good regardless.
Jayde
-Staff on horse.
-5 base speed has it rough.
-Repo horse.
Reshi
-Looked like a better healer than Lucian with a better rally, but I never got him so it will remain a mystery.
Theresa
-Supply reposition bot is better than nothing, even if she canāt canto after using it like the actual cavs, making her worse than them even as a utility unit.
-Necessary to train Acama I guess?
Acama
-Actual deadweight
-I have no idea if she promotes into a master knight or something but with bases and growths like that, seems entirely unviable
Alicia
-Worse base stats than Onyx two chapters later, this unit has it rough.
-Repo horse.
-Also her imbue just didnāt go off at all. That is probably because of misleading imbue description. In 2020 version of builder skillsys, imbue is actually heal for mag% of max HP, which goes to 4% of 21 HP, which rounds down to 0. (Thanks Pushwall and Epicer.)
I think it might be because of HM scaling weirdness again, but I felt that not a single unit in part 2 was worth bringing full time since they are so outclassed statwise not just by my own part 1 units, but just some generic enemies. If I brought these units to 2-1 theyād be demolished by the generics there, though they can get by from 2-2 to 2-4 since enemies donāt tend to have good speed. However, the bosses and promoted enemies tend to have really good stats so they arenāt a suitable replacement for trained level 1 units.
Misc
Unrelated to the maps but personally Iām for removing prep screen markup just for ease of access, shops can just sell non-basic weapons instead. This is more of a subjective design decision but I like not having to plan around buying basic weapons to optimise gold.
I noticed a bunch of random text and description errors such as the one on civilians, generic FE boss names and stuff I canāt remember. I understand theyāre not high priority stuff, but I think a bit of time on that really increases the polish. Giving more enemy units specific faction names I think would be a help to the story.
In its current state, Frozen Throes already stands as an incredibly innovative project that stands out. While I certainly do not wish to put any pressure into continuing a project if one does not enjoy it, I think it might be worth cutting back on some of the things on the roadmap to create a finished product, as what it is already here is high quality.
9 Likes
Hey! First of all I want to tell you that I really enjoy your game. I finished most of it at this point (only need two more chapters from Aurelia2) and I really admire the amount of creativity present. After reading through older posts up to the more recent ones I am tentatively optimistic that the hiatus might not be too long anymore.
I wonāt give you super detailed feedback on each chapter, as I didnāt take notes, but I might replay it after finishing it since you released a new patch by now. However, I wanted to give some unorganised comments.
- why donāt the two armors have a support? Since they benefit from standing next to each other for their skill proc, it feels like a missed opportunity. iām playing on hard mode and with the overall low growth rates, supports definitely look attractive.
- I got pretty confused with the fishing rod and pickaxe in chapter 2 (i think) but that may just be me not paying attention to dialogue
- The boat map is great. Not sure how youāre supposed to kill the bosses but anyway. Also the Arantxa thing was a bit confusing with her having a Dragonstone suddenly. It would also be great to see green enemy ranges in the global ranges and for them to also drop pilfered items after death
- I want to compliment you on your achievement of making archers feel great to play with. Love the heavy player-phase focus of the hack.
- The thief feels completely trash though but you seem to have addressed that issue in the last patch.
- How the hell are you supposed to get Rishin, that seems insanely tight, if not entirely RNG-dependant
I am pretty sure that I will replay the game with the new patch and provide you with more detailed feedback in the next months. Until then I really want to emphasise that this is by far one of the most promising and creative hacks Iāve played. Each chapter is its own beast. WIsh you all the best!
7 Likes
Oh and Verdaine keeps his level after promotion, o heās a level 10 paladin now while Rikard is a level 1 Great Knight
1 Like