Hey, always good to see new hacks, especially shorter ones! Below I reformatted my notes that I toke while playing. If you have any questions on what I’m talking about, or want to discuss how to change something, feel free to ask!
Units
-Robert is not an especially weak nor strong lord, but I think that’s fine considering his versatility. I find it a little odd that he can’t pick locks as a Warlock, but I guess Breven needed a niche. Also, I was NOT expecting a timeskip and second promo! Really excited for Chapter 5.
-Dolares is really well done jagen. She can’t one-round anything aside from fliers due to her low Speed, but has good enough Strength and Skill to be a reliable damage dealer. On top of all this, she has increased bow range, which gives her a niche and prevents her from falling off after you get Orobas. My only worry is that she’ll still be too good lategame because of how short the hack is going to be. But maybe that isn’t really a problem? Idk.
-Jakob has mediocre stats that quickly get eclipsed by Isaiah, and he can’t use steel weapons for extra damage due to his poor weapon ranks. Cavaliers shouldn’t usually be powerhouses, don’t get me wrong, but he just feels very underwhelming and lacking in options.
I stopped using him after Ch3, so maybe he gets better, but his low growths make me doubt that.
-Isaiah has high Strength and Skill, AND Speed, AND Defense. Not to mention Ignis. His only weakness is low Res, but most of the other player units have equal or lower Res than him. He’s too good at too much. I recommend lowering everything but Luck and Res by 2-3 points to make him a jack-of-all-trades, or gutting his Defense and Hp to make him into a glass cannon (I would swap-out Ignis for something else if you do this).
-Cliff is probably the most balanced unit in this hack. He has really high Strength, enough to one-shot some squishier units, plus decent Skill to help ensure he hits his one attack. Chivalry works great with his one-shot stat spread, though Gamble is…just okay. He’s not overpowered by any means, axes still lower his hit rate enough to keep him limited, and his middling Speed and low Luck prevent him from dodging most attacks.
-Charlette is a healer.
Staff Savant is cool ig.
-Breven is okay. I will say that his stats don’t seem unsalvagable, and he’s decent in Chapters 2 and 3, but going forward I doubt I’ll be using him outside of castle chapters, and Indoor Fighter makes me believe that’s intentional. Maybe he’ll get better once I’m able to utilize Opportunist more?
-Phyllis seems…pointless? That is, outside of the story. Her stats, specifically Hp and Speed, seem very low for her join time. I doubt I’ll have reason to use her after recruiting Orobas and getting Robert his second promotion. Galeforce is nice, but it alone cannot carry her.
-Penelope is almost the polar opposite of Cliff. Middling Strength, low Skill, high Speed. Didn’t get to use her much in the demo, but from what her growths look like, I imagine she’ll be much better down the line. Re-move is funny skill, though I wish her Luck was high to make it proc more.
-Barely got to use Orobas, and I don’t think I can really comment on him because I don’t know how much (if at all) the timeskip improves enemy quality. Having a second healer is nice either way tho.
-Overall, this roster is pretty good. In terms of changes, look to buff Jakob and Phyllis, either through stats or a special niche. Isaiah should probably be nerfed in some way, at the moment he lacks a real weakness. Also, look to increase the average Luck of the cast by 2-3, I was seeing low enemy crits the whole time. Strong characters like Dolares and (currently) Isaiah can keep their current Luck, as their power offsets it. Oh and, uh…you mentioned a pegasus knight, but I didn’t see one? Were they an optional recruitment?
Enemies
Most of the demo the enemies were fairly weak, about the same strength as vanilla FE8. If that’s the difficulty you’re going for, then…great! If you want the game to be harder, the number one thing to change aside from enemy stats would be more units starting on the map. It felt like close to a third of all enemy units in this hack are reinforcements. That isn’t necessarily bad, but too many reinforcements can make players unprepared for certain parts of the map where they weren’t expected many enemies, or certain kinds of enemies. If you increase the difficulty much, I suggest making a higher percentage of enemies spawn on the map, far away with basic “move towards” AI, rather than as reinforcements. Also more enemy weapon variety would be nice, even if you don’t buff enemies stat wise. Effective weapons and Hand Axes/Javelins can add a nice bit of strategic spice.
Maps
The maps very pretty good, for the most part. Chapters 2 and 3 were the best, I would say. They came with decent side objectives, a design that encouraged splitting the player’s army, and varied enemy AI. Prologue and Ch4 are very straightforward, as the paths converge very soon into the chapters and chests lie pretty close to the boss so it’s not like the player has to try much to get them. Ch1, although not terrible, is easily the worst. The main problem is its size, it’s simply too small. Make it a little taller to push the boss further away from the starting area and the village, and consider removing the reinforcements and putting moving enemies that start below the boss, as to slow down the player’s assault.
Bugs
-Orr, Jefferson, and Monica all have weapon ranks they shouldn’t.
-Jakob crit Orr despite having a 0% crit rate???
-Cliff and Charlette’s Ch1 talk convos are not double-sided (initiable by both units involved).
-There’s an escape arrow on a bottom tile of Ch2, despite the objective being Rout not escape/arrive.
-Monica doesn’t have a battle quote.
Grammar
Probably not comprehensive, as I might’ve missed optional dialogue in contingent start/end events (nobody died).
-Apologize is only spelled with one p
-Prologue End Event: “We need return to the hideout,”
-Prologue End Event: “then we need figure out”
-Ch2 Start Event: “You don’t think it was ruse, do you?”
-Ch3 Village: “My master Orobas as been captured”
-Ch4 Orobas and Phyllis talk: “I assume that the Wildebests”
-Ch4 End Event: “and even the trust of civilions has waned”
-Ch4 End Event: “If train you to use the book properly”
-Ch4 Epilogue Text: “Dolores and the rest of the Wildebeets”
General Design
-Ch1 Start Event: Dolares’ portrait partially obscures tile highlights. Split the convo into multiple text entries to fix this.
-Cliff can one-round the boss of Ch1, and is in range of him as soon as he spawns.
-Enemy thieves have locktouch AND lockpicks. Seems unnecessary?
-In Ch2, you can get a steel sword from a chest and dropped from a merc. Not really a problem, just kinda weird to get two at the same time.
-I recommend using the “Load reinforcements” event, rather than relying on the usual “Load units and move” for reinforcements. This is because “Load Reinforcements” automatically moves the camera to show all the units that spawned, making sure the player isn’t caught off guard. I think you used it in some chapters, but not in others.
-Thomas’s AI changes to aggressive on enemy phase, meaning that he can move and attack the player before the they can adjust their units to avoid his now increased range. If it’s a turn-based event, just make it happen on player phase instead of enemy phase. If it’s a range-based event, make the range event turn off a completion flag of a 1-255 turn-based event that holds his dialogue and is set to player phase.
-Asmodeus’ description should maybe be changed to make it more obvious that’s it’s a reaver weapon, not an effective weapon. Was confused when I saw it doing 6 damage to a monk.
QOL
-I can’t think of any other QOL stuff. You got “Show Enemy Ranges”, “Show Immobile Enemies”, and the mini stat screen. I think you’re good here.
Lastly, congratulations! I’ll be here whenever the full version comes to out to see it in its full glory!
