After making a hack, and playing lots of them and watching all pandan videos, I developed a critical sense for units balance and how to design good units, or at least good enough that they contribute substantially in a map and they don’t lag behind.
Here are tips to how to design the archetypes of fire emblem and more.
–Armor Knights.
There are two ways I reconmend to make armors good.
A) give them +1 move.
Before you scream “armors knights aren’t supposed to be fast, they have less move for a reason” go to option B. Essentially, you turn armors into a standard bulky infantry unit with a weakness to armoslayers. For those who think that increasing the move invalidates the armor purpose, that is, a mobile tank, here’s option B.
B) go bonkers with stats.
After all, if the armor isn’t supposed to move around too much, you can give more than competent stats so that it can do it’s job. Tanking.
The main issue with armor Knights is that the role they serve is often overshadowed by literally half of the player’s cast, “What do you do?” “I take hits” " So does my cavaliers, mercs, figthers, and even my mage which last linger than you since he doesn’t get doubled." The price for move isn’t worth either since most maps in hacks are big. So, if the armor is gonna fight, make sure that he delivers the pain and earns his bread. One counter argument is that if an armor
gets too powerful, he might get warped, rescue/dropped to further amplyfing his strenght, much like a Heavy greatly benefits from teleporters. And you know what? That’s good! Let the few units capable to carry Mr Armor knight sorry ass to the frontline. Armors deserve better.
Even then, with such high con, not everyone can carry an Armor.
The last significant issue with armors is that they flourish in an EP game.
This slow down the pace of the game (which isn’t bad per se).
The ability to survive longer than any unit (against phisical attacks) is often regarded as a sinpthom of EP game, but it isn’t the case. When your armor is the only unit that can witstand more than two rounds of combat (against phisical attacks) then it might make as a good choice to slow down the momentum of the foes. Make sure also that the armor doesn’t miss (I hate missing) and that it deals BIG damage in return.
–Cavaliers (anything on a horse, really)
I find it hard to balance them, since it appears that no matter what you do, balance is never reched, either way, you get OP or UP (underpowered) mounted units.
If you put too many horseslayers, cavaliers will be greatly nerfed. Giving them poor stats makes
them feel bad to use. But let’s focus them on the main point. THE HORSE.
What is the greatest enemy for a horse?
A forest. A mountain. Okay, there are many enemies for horses.
The point is that, like fliers, mounted units are terrain dependant.
The bigger the map, the better horses gets. The more harsh terrain is present, the
worst the cavalier gets. I know that people don’t like having too much harsh terrain (just look at how many people like desert maps, especially if you cannot deploy mages or fliers),
but I have an idea. How about splitting the map in two routes? A long route with clear terrain and
a small one with forest/hills? You can split the army in two groups and send the cavalry to the longest path. Alternatively you can min max the stat spread of your cavs. You can make a cav with high SPD, another with high STR and another with high DEF. This way, not only you can promoted them early (as it is unlikely that the SPD capped cav needs another lvl in another stat) but you can use them more effectively. Allow me to explain. You have a cav with high SPD, and pretty much nothing else in bases and growths. On lvl 15 he capped SPD at 20, now, do you need to lvl up 5 times to maybe gat another stat up? it’s not like he needs more SPD, maybe a point of STR will improve his combat, but even then, with effective weapons (I like using effective weapons) he can be pretty efficient in dealing with armors/cavs since he doubles.
One thing I strongly disagree is to reduce the move from 7 to 6. I don’t like when the cavs are barely faster than infantry (imagine an armor outspeeding a paladin).
In summary, apart from terrain, horseslayers, and crazy stats, the best way to balance cavs is to make sure that while having acceptable combat, the player has ways to utilize their movement advantage without breaking the game. You can also make their caps lower, so that they don’t destroy the endgame like Seth does.
–Fliers
Essently, read again with I wrote above, but imagine the horses have wings.
Honestly, I find that many hacks get the jist of balancing fliers.
Besides their ARCHnemesis and the presence of closed maps (castle, ruins, anything that has impassable barriers) I think that the best way to balance fliers, while not reducing the move, is to give them ways to be effective, inside and outside combat. What I don’t like about pegasus, is that with their flimsy arms, they deal 2-3 damage to most enemies. On 4 Kings by KrashBoomBang, you get a peg pretty early one with her personal weapon, the ward lance.
She can oneshot mages, and she will be the first one to do so for a looong time. Besides flying, this gives her a niche. She can do something that nobody else can and it makes her unique (much like the entire cast of 4K). She also flies, meaning that she can kill that bolting mage that ended the chapter eraly by killing Lionel.
Another way to use them is to send fliers to loot save villages.
Not to brag about, but in chapter 1-4 and 1-7 of my hack Temple of Ardesia, there are plenty of villages that can be saved by a flier. Sure, you can use a reckless strategy to send your wing less units towards the enemy, but having a flier will make the task considerably safe and easier.
–Sword Infantry (mirms, mercs, thieves)
I make here a distinction from Axe and Spear Infantry since magic swords are uncommon and less effective at enemy phasing compared to the other 1-2 range options.
I a unit is essentially locked at one range, make sure that it can do it’s job correctly.
A good exmple is Rutger, but not anybody has to become a crit machine.
You can give it thief unitlity, with lesser stats. You can give it a personal 1-2 range sword with lesser stats. You can do anything, just remember that it’s combat has to be good.
Swords are the best weapon, right (at least in fe6)?
Make sure that your combat units do combat well. Duh.
Axe/Spear Infantry
The main difference is that thanks to hand axes/javelins, they can do enemy phase to some degree. Now, many don’t like EP hakcs, has this incentivize the player to lower it’s brain functions and enjoy having the strongest unit available to clean houses. According to game, the design of Infantry varies.
A) 1-2 is supreme
Then Axe/Lance units will be more imporant, assuming they have a similar stat spread compared to Sword/Bow units. May as well tweak their stats so that they don’t compare to sword/bow units. In particular, make sure that your pick units (units that can reliably one round enemies) don’t get overshadowed by the EP units, and make sure to not have a unit that can clean houses, like Seth/Marcus.
B) 1-2 sucks
In that case, treat every combat player unit like a sword unit. Good player phase combat, low enemy phase prowess. Essentially, you consider each foot unit as equal in terms of 1-2 range option.
–Archer (or anything that can shoot from far away, like ballistas)
Give them a 20 might bow with 1-5 range. Problem solved.
Nah, just kidding.
Archers benefit in an Player Phase environment. The ability to deal with fliers effectively only comes to play when the fliers are actually scary, not in FE7 when every peg wield steel lances that barely manage to lift without plunging into the ground.
The ability to deal damage from afar comes useful when you don’t wanna engage too many enemies or take a painful counter attack. They also come useful when defending, like shooting behind a wall. Maybe having an armor to choke a point will be useful, huh?
You can make archers work with 1-2, 2-3 or even 1-3 range. Make sure they don’t have the stats to EP, but have the stats to PP and you’re good to go.
It’s not hard to balance archers in an PP game. However, if your name is Will or Rebecca, and you’re not married to Pent, and you’re stuck in FE7, well, maybe you should change class.
And I say that as someone who likes bows!
–Mages (also shaman, monks and anything that does magical damage)
Balancing mages depend on two things: how much res the foe’s have, and how many enemy mages there are in the field. In classical FE, the foes have 0 to little res, making mages be a true glass cannon, as it deals essentially true damage. If the foe have mages, they might struggle, as the magic triangle isn’t significant enough to put a dent in the magic mantles. It’s like watching two armors fight using slim lances. They take a while.
So, how about you make another triangle? How about the archer->mages->infantry->archers?
Runescape did it. How about mage armor->armor->dread fighter->mage->mage armor with armor<->mage and mage armor<->dread fighter.
(essentially, unit with high DEF and deal magical damage defeats armor which has high DEF but 0 RES and deals phisical damage, which the mage armor resist. Armor defeats dread figther, since dread figther has high RES but low DEF and deals phisical damage which the armor resist. And then we have mage with high RES and deals magical damage which gets blasted by the dread figther and so on.
When magic comes to play, everything shifts. The lack of magic makes phisical unit powerful.
The high presence of magic units (apart from turning any map into HHM Cog of Destiny) incentivize the use of Mage killer units or mage resistent.
Always consider the role your and the enemy mages will have on the battle before design units. Do you wanna make a classical FE (everybody has 0 RES) or give RES an actual reason to exist (and the talisman).
–Staffers (priest and troubs, no, not the personal of an hotel)
Staff utility is always welcome. There are two ways to make staffers.
A) High MAG, everything else is crap.
Probably this unit will always be used to spam staves, even after promo, where maybe
it will get a chance to do some damage.
It evaporizes if any enemy breathes in its direction.
B)Low MAG, but every other stat is pretty good.
Aka, Onisim. Aka, the Chad healer. Maybe it’s not good at healing, but recover can still be
used as an (expensive) alternative for the differently magical units.
It can take significantly more hits (more than 1 than option A) than any ohter healer, and maybe it can dodge some attacks, but it’s staff utility it’s not good. I still think that it’s fun to have an healer descend into battle, attacking and healing like a true Medic.
You can never go wrong with healers. Design them as you prefer.
–Lords
Make sure they don’t suck. Since they are forced deployed, and their deaths result in a game over, it means that the lord should do something, while everybody else perform his part.
I don’t wanna drag Roy (aka potato bag) from point A to point B while avoiding all combat else he’ll be coocked (or fried in this case). Make sure that he contributes.
Apart from that, treat him like any class you want him to become. Sword lord, Axe lord, Bow lord, Mounted, flier ect, make sure he does something while not making him overpowered.
Sure, it can be fun to watch a 15 years old tear trough ranks of soldiers by himself Hector but I would like to use other units beside him.
–Jeigan–
Special units who are significantly stronger than your starting party which makes the life of the lord’s party and yours significantly easier. Any class can be a Jeigan, but some a better suited (paladin) than others. Whenever it’s combat or utility, long term or short term longevity, make sure that your Jeigan does a good first impression. Nobody wants to use a Jeigan who can barely scratch a soldier.
–Solider (aka FE Goomba, also monks and anything that has 0 base stats)
A blank sheet. Do whatever you want to. Remember that if you turn your soldier
into an armor lite knight, he will make your other armor knights blush, since he’s faster without heavy armor, but he also has the same if not better durabilit than them. If you go the armor lite way, make sure he doesn’t shadow your other armors.
–Est (aka, I’ll do my best! I promise!)
A unit with crappy bases but absurd growths that joins in the late game.
Training them is a pain, but if you managed to find the perfet targets for our waifu est, you may get a powerful, all capped unit perfect for the end game. Make sure that there are suitable targets to train the est. If the est is a staffer, then make sure to lvl it up with special staves and make sure it doesn’t get 999 tuns to cap it from lvl 1 to 20 without dropping a sweat.
Yeah, staff est aren’t done for a reason. Balancing them is hard.
In other words, make sure that no other units is greatly superior or vastly overclassed by any other. Unless you wanna remake FE6 and put as many Gwendolyns, Dorothy, Sophias as you want, each unit should DO something, and not be a simple bench warmer.