My Mechanics List Part 10

10 Mechanics I’d Like To See In Future Installments List

# 2 - Capturing (Thracia 776 style)

                     Back when I made my first post I talked about how money could be replaced by something. Everyone who played Thracia was able to instantly figure out that I was alluding to the capture system from Thracia 776. In that game capturing enemies eliminates the need for money. Sure you can choose to sell stuff and buy things from the money you get there but you had to use the capture system in order to get that stuff to sell anyway. As long as the player has enemies (and in a game like this the player will ALWAYS have enemies) they will always have stuff. Capturing can be a de facto method of getting the player to play faster because if an enemy has a rare weapon or item you don’t want them to use it too much because you want to use it for yourself. Chapter 17A of Thracia 776 comes to mind when talking about capturing. Capturing can also be used as a gaiden chapter objective which can be fun since the player is given an extra level of challenge due to the fact that the capture system nerfs the player’s stats.

                              The capture system also gives the player some flexibility in how they play. You can be like me and capture virtually anything that’s got a cool looking weapon or item, or you can capture very little and just get by with what you have. It’s all up to the player, which makes the mechanic brilliant. It also gives the game an incentive to have the constitution stat since constitution now affects more stuff than just attack speed. Interestingly enough it gives brave weapons an extra use and bulkier characters with high constitutions now have something extra going for them.

     So basically, I think we should replace money with the capture system. If we’re being frank money is only really needed to buy weapons, items and other things like that. The capturing system does all of that for you without having any of the balancing issues that money can bump into. It’s an all around cool system to have and I’d like to see it return. Bytheway, the “capture” system from Fates doesn’t count. It’s fluffy, superfluous and gimmicky. Nowhere near as cool as Thracia’s system.

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10 Mechanics That Should Be Gone In Future Games

# 2 - Warp

                  I was going to put something else here, but that something else has now been bumped to the # 1 spot. Basically there are going to be two mechanics vying for the number 1 spot on the “10 Mechanics That Should Be Gone In Future Games” list.

But I digress, we’re here to talk about warp. Yep, I’ve never been a fan of warp and quite frankly I think it needs to go. My main issue with warp (especially unlimited range warp) is that it can break a level into thousands of tiny little pieces. There’s a term that floats around in Fire Emblem circles called “warpskip”. As its name suggests warpskip is when players use the warp staff to “skip” entire levels. So instead of actually playing those levels they just bypass entire enemy armies, kill the boss, seize and move on to the next chapter.

                      What’s worse is that an unlimited range warp staff can break just about any level in any game. It is that good. I’ve been analyzing the map design of multiple Fire Emblem games in preparation for a new series of blog posts and I have a rule where warpskip doesn’t count against a map. Why? Because warp can break anything. Most games would have terrible map design if warpskip counted against them. Any character that can use Warp is automatically considered great, if not game-breaking, simply because of this staff. I wonder how good Safy would be if warp didn’t exist in Thracia 776. I imagine that she would still be a pretty good unit, but she wouldn’t be the game-breaker that she currently is.

I realize that this isn’t the first time I’ve been saying this either. Back when I made my “Ten Tips to Improve The Fire Emblem Series” list this was the first thing I talked about: http://thecrusadergrant.blogspot.com/2015/11/tips-to-improve-fire-emblem-1-get-rid.html

Too long didn’t read version: Warp is way too game-breaking. It eliminates the strategy of the game, it rewards the player for playing less of the game, not more and the series would be better off if Warp never returned.