Map Design (Continued)

This map comes from Fire Emblem: The Rune of Shadows

             
          Terrain is also important to a good map. The placement of forts and forest tiles is important when creating a good map. When done properly it affects the player’s strategy. When done poorly it becomes an annoying gimmick. Examples of poorly done terrain include desert maps where everyone who isn’t a flier or a mage has drastically lowered movement. This doesn’t really enhance the strategy of the map, it just gives fliers a huge advantage over all the other units and that’s not promoting good strategy. Holy War also has examples of maps where there’s huge forests all over like in Chapter 1 where the whole point seems to be to unnecessarily slow the player down. Chapter 2 is also guilty of this as well. Elevated terrain, like what Radiant Dawn does, adds some new dimensions and dynamics to map design. Get too close to a ledge and you can get penalized for it. Elevated ledges can also help the player out in defend chapters because they give you an advantage over the legions and hordes of enemies coming at you.

                       

 How well a map includes reinforcements can also add to a player’s enjoyment. A lot of Fire Emblem games like to use the abominable ambush spawns. AMBUSH SPAWNS ARE TERRIBLE FOR THE STRATEGY OF A GAME! Ambush spawns come across as unfair because unless you know where they’re coming from they will punish you. Mangs does a good job in his video of pointing out that a good way to have reinforcements in a map is to have the boss hint at the player about where reinforcements are coming from. This gives the player time to prepare for these reinforcements.  

                     Before I start giving examples of good and bad maps I’d like to point out two different elements of a good map: The appropriate size that a map should be and the map objectives. Big maps have a stigma within the Fire Emblem community because more often than not they have lots of empty and wasted space. Mangs already points out in his video that the best thing to do is to cut down on the map size. “Rather have your map be shorter than longer”. In my opinion a good map always needs to have something going on in each section of it. As for objectives, multiple objectives means different and varied strategies. Games where rout is the only objective, or one of the few objectives that the game has, tend to be solved the same way each and every time. The way one approaches a defend chapter is far different from how one approaches an escape chapter or a seize chapter.

                   Ok so now comes the point of this post where I'm going to list examples of well designed maps that do different things very well in order to help the reader see the applications of everything that I've been talking about:

                A Map with well Implemented Side Objectives: Sword of Seals Chapter 11A - The Hero of the Western Isles. You have three recruitable characters in this map (Klein, Echidna and Tate), numerous villages spread throughout the map, an armory and a vendor shop and an arena. The player is also rewarded with promotion items when all the NPCs survive, which acts as a great incentive to keep everyone alive. Also, this map has multiple paths toward the throne including a couple of breakable doors. 

                Example # 2:

                 Fire Emblem 3 / 12 Chapter 5. Here we have out of range thieves that hold droppable goodies that are out of the main character's range. You also have a village way the heck out to the northwest corner as well. If you try to deal with the thieves you run the risk of getting into Jeorge's range along with the range of his snipers. Since only a flier can catch up to these thieves this constitutes as a problem. Also there are enemy wyvern riders perched on a mountain-top that can easily charge at you as well so watch out.

                        Well designed choke-points, anti-turtling incentives & side objectives: FE 3 / 12 Chapter 8: Having a powerful hero and his army of highly-leveled mercenaries come at you from the back is a powerful incentive for the player to keep on moving. There's also a thief carrying a star shard that heads toward Astram's army. You have to kill this thief quickly with a flier in order to get it. In FE 12 Marth and Hardin have a conversation after which Astram's army charges at you. At the same time the armor knights will slow you down as well. Enemy archers are also placed very well in order to discourage the player's fliers from flying circles around the enemy armored knights. Also, I love the double bridge concept!

                              Well designed escape levels: Thracia 776 Chapter 6:

                 This map has numerous villages that give you good stuff (a Knight Proof, a recruitable character named Hicks, an Elite manual and the Odo scroll for example) providing for an excellent side objective. Also, there are plenty of enemy reinforcements that show up near the small line of trees that constitute as an anti-turtling incentive. There are also two escape arrows iirc. This map also has numerous choke-points in case enemies either catch up to you or in case you decide to go for the extra goodies (I always do). However, there are numerous avenues and paths available to enemies and players which make blocking off choke-points easier said than done.

                        Thracia 776 Chapter 7: 

                            Chapter 7 is an example of a big map that has something going on in every part of the map. Off to the left-hand side are an army of bandits and hunters that threaten Finn and Safy. The map gives you side objectives in the form of houses that you can visit off to the side. However, should you go for the ones at the top then the aforementioned army of bandits will come after you. This level also gives us a recruitable character in the form of Shiva. Shiva and his army of swordmasters act as both a deterrent to the player's army coming from the north and to Finn and Safy coming from the mountains. The swordmasters themselves aren't very powerful, but trying to recruit Shiva can be tricky. Also, the Manster army will approach the player from behind if the player does not hurry up. This provides the player with a wonderful anti-turtling incentive (provided you don't prevent the boss from spawning). 

                        If you guys want to, I can keep going with providing examples of well-designed maps of different things. Let me know in the comments section whether you do or do not want me to make an extra post detailing different kinds of well designed maps and what kinds of maps you want me to make examples of. Map design is a tricky thing, but when properly executed it can enhance and augment the player's strategy and it can provide an extra layer of enjoyment for the player. 

             Additional Supplemental Map Design Materials

• https://www.reddit.com/r/fireemblem/comments/3j945x/review_mystery_of_the_emblem_a_classic_neglected/   

                 ^ This is an in-depth review of Fire Emblem 3. I do warn the readers though that this guy goes full fan girl on the game. Well I disagree with a good number of the things that he says, he does make some excellent points and he got me to look at Fire Emblem 3 in a totally different light.

• https://www.reddit.com/r/fireemblem/comments/3fsxdy/mystery_of_the_emblem_map_design_thread/

                   ^ This is the in-depth map design review of Fire Emblem 3 Book 2 that the guy above makes. You can glean a lot of amazing in-depth analyses of what makes a good map design and why Fire Emblem 3 gets the praise that it does for it.

• https://www.reddit.com/r/fireemblem/comments/3bd95n/map_design_thread_nohr_part_final/

                      ^ This link gives some wonderful insights into Nohr's map design. It gives the good, the bad and the ugly. It gives you everything about Nohr's map design. I do warn you though that it does go into detail about Fates' map design though.

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0_yzDuUjys 

                ^ The Newcomer's Guide to Fire Emblem Thracia 776. Not about map design per se, but it does give some wonderful tips and insights into the game. This is where I got the comment of blocking the boss spawn from. I highly recommend it since Thracia 776 is not noob friendly.

Ten Tips to Improve Fire Emblem # 3: Map Design

                  So before I begin I highly recommend that everybody see Mangs’ video about map design. It’s very well put together and it brings up a lot of good points that go into making a map:

                  For those of you who read my post titled “Extra Thoughts and listed 3 maps with good map design and 3 maps with bad design I thank you very much for that. My intention is to look at the top 3 games which in my opinion have the best map design and the worst map design. Hopefully by analyzing what previous games have done right and wrong we can learn from them as we move forward when it comes towards making better maps.

Top 3 Games with the Best Map Designs

               Fire Emblem 3 / 12: Mystery & New Mystery of the Emblem

   Fire Emblem Thracia 776

         Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn  

Top 3 Games with the Worst Map Designs

   Fire Emblem 2: Gaiden

                                             Fire Emblem Genealogy of the Holy War

     Fire Emblem Awakening

What Fire Emblem 3 / 12 Got Right

• Best enemy placement in the series. (Especially FE 12)

• FE 12 has the best Enemy A.I. in the series.

• Reinforcements are implemented well and encourage the player to keep moving forward
• Choke-points and terrain are implemented well
• Side objectives are executed creatively
• Both games had unique gimmicks and ideas (like the usage of Gra and Archanea’s troops in Chapter 17)
• Fire Emblem 3 added dismounting, which helped to keep mounted units from totally dominating the game
  
  

  

  
  

  
  

What Thracia 776 got right

• Ballista placement is excellent. Since ballistae are powerful and accurate you actually have to worry about them.
• Best Escape chapters in the entire series.
• Terrain is well implemented
• Thracia also used the dismounting system that Fire Emblem 3 invented.
• Multiple maps give alternative routes to victory
• Side objectives are well implemented
• Chapter 14 is one of the best defense chapters in the game
• The maps gave a fantastic feeling that you were commanding a small, underfunded army that was going up against a better disciplined, better organized and better funded empire that was hell-bent on destroying you
  
  

  
  

  

What Radiant Dawn got right

• Different victory conditions ensured varied strategies
• Elevated terrain had interesting implications and helped the player put thought into his / her positioning
• Elincia’s Gambit rivals Chapter 14 of Thracia 776 in terms of “Best Defense Level” in the series. 3 - 13 is also really good too
• The game gives the player that feeling that they’re fighting in an epic war.
• The player is often pulled in multiple directions
• Decent enemy formations

Can anyone guess which map this is?

What Gaiden got wrong

• Having rout be the game’s only objective means that the strategy is watered down and super simplified requiring significantly less thought from the player.
• Terrain is rarely used in any of the maps. In the few maps that do use it, terrain rarely makes a meaningful impact on the strategy of the level
• Lots of big, open, empty fields
• Low enemy density in a game where weaksauce enemies are the norm
• Game does not punish turtling
• Game does not provide secondary objectives at all
• There are two mazes near the end of the game that are frustrating to navigate and both are a colossal pain in the butt.
• No interesting gimmicks are implemented in any of the levels.
• Game does not provide any side objectives whatsoever 
  
  

  

  
  

What Holy War got wrong

• Gigantic maps exacerbate the dominance that mounted and flying units have over unmounted units earning this game the nickname of “Genealogy of the Horsey War”
• Poor implementation of terrain
• Having the same objective waters down and simplifies the strategy of the game requiring little thought of the player.
• The closest thing the game comes to having meaningful side objectives include sending fliers over to random villages or pulling a Hail Mary to get to a certain enemy. In essence, they require little thought on the part of the player.
• Silesia and the Augustria chapters force the player to do an unholy amount of backtracking that’s tedious and irritating to deal with. 
  
  

  

What Awakening does wrong

• Despite more objectives than Holy War or Gaiden the strategy is mostly the same for the entire game, requiring little thought on the part of the player (there’s a reason why I keep using this phrase over and over again. Can you see what I’m getting at here?)
• Lots of big, open, empty fields.
• Lack of meaningful side objectives for the majority of the game.
• The AI in this game makes enemies act like zombies. They will rush at you with no regard for their safety which make them predictable and in some cases kind of stupid.
• Rarely is the player punished for turtling
  
  

  
  

  

            So as you probably noticed, I repeated myself a lot when talking about what these games did right and did wrong. This should give you a good idea about what goes into making a good map. There are multiple elements that go into a good map, and good maps come in different shapes and sizes. The important thing here is to ask yourself how certain choices affect the player’s strategy. What are the components of well designed map you may ask? Well….

                For starters, there needs to be thoughtful enemy positioning. Something that FE 12 does really well is having multiple enemy units be in range of each other. If you attack one enemy unit chances are you’ll be in another enemy’s range so instead of having to fight against one enemy unit you now have to fight against 2 or 3. This forces the player to consider the consequences of each of their moves because it’s very easy to mess up in the harder difficulties of Fire Emblem 12. Long range enemy weapons like ballista, status staves and siege tomes when utilized properly can help to act as a deterrent to the player’s advancement. Flying units (especially wyvern knights) can successfully serve this purpose too.

                   Another element of enemy positioning involves placing them in groups or formations that the player has to deal with. It’s easy to take out a small handful of enemies, but an actual army on the other hand is a different story altogether. It’s also important to think about what units make up this army or formation that the player has to break. If a group of pegasus knights charges at you, you could deal with them using armor knights, paladins or you could bait them out and then snipe them out of the sky with archers. By contrast, if this formation consists of pegasus knights, swordmasters and a few mages then that’s an entirely different story altogether. Enemies in general are a lot more difficult to deal with when they travel in tight formations or straight-up armies.

              Another defining characteristic of map design comes in the form of secondary objectives. Secondary objectives are when the game designer provides additional goals for the player to achieve that aren’t necessary toward completing the game, but they do add spice and creativity to a map. When done properly they provide incentives for the player to act in a certain way. Examples of secondary objectives are:

1. Treasure chests / villages: Sure they’re usually not crucial toward beating the game, but who the heck wants to skip out on that? They usually provide the player with sweet weapons, stat-boosters and in the case of villages they can often provide recruitable characters. It works even better when the map places a thief or a brigand in a hard to get to spot in the map which is a critical component of doing this right. YOU NEED TO PROVIDE AN OBSTACLE TO THE PLAYER! If you don’t do this then there’s no incentive to rush and the purpose behind placing the treasure chest is all but completely lost.
   
   

   

 

2. Recruitable characters: Everybody with a heart and soul (a.k.a. not yours truly since I am an evil Sith Emperor who has no qualms killing off worthless scrubs like Matthis. Mua! Ha! Ha! Ha!) wants to recruit every playable character in the game. This can provide a nice tricky element to the game since you can’t kill these units off and yet at the same time you don’t want to be killed off by them either. One prevalent example that comes to mind is when trying to recruit Ayra in Fire Emblem 4. Recruiting Ayra is a tricky business since you have to lure her away from the castle without killing, or being killed by, her while also conquering the castle. Many new players (including myself a long time ago) found this process difficult. That being said, you don’t want to make the recruitable characters’ requirement too convoluted otherwise you just get Xavier from FE 5 who’s recruitment is so frustrating and rage-inducing that most players don’t even bother trying to recruit him.
   
   

   

3. Rescuing NPCs: Another way to create a good side objective is to have the player rescue a poor, helpless NPC. In order to do this properly you need to give the player a proper incentive to rescue them. Holy War executes this concept the best since rescuing NPCs gave the rescuer a free level-up. A poor way to do this is to have the NPCs run towards enemy units like Paralogue 3 in Awakening. What’s even worse is that if you save a second and a third villager all you get is a log and a ladle respectively. Are you kidding me? That’s what I get for risking my butt to rescue those imbeciles? Well screw that nonsense! Those pot-heads can go ahead and kill themselves for all I care. 

Extra thoughts

                        

                     So I was asked recently if I prefer Pair Up to Rescue. Before we answer that let's specify which version of Pair Up since there are two different versions. If it's the Awakening version of Pair Up then heck no. Awakening's Pair Up system is so ludicrously broken that it watered down the strategical aspect of the game. There was no reason to not use Awakening's Pair Up system. Fates on the other hand is an entirely different story altogether.

                  With Fates, Pair Up is much more balanced. I really love the fact that enemies can Pair Up too in Fates which means that neither side has a game-breaking advantage. Pair-Up also lets lower movement units to stay on the front lines of the battlefield more often (see the part of my previous post that talked about Armor Knights) and the fact that enemy units can do it too makes things a little more even. Plus as far as I'm aware, you can't skip the game with the Fates version of Pair Up the way you can with rescue chains so I'm more inclined to lean towards the Fates version of Pair Up than with the rescue mechanic. There might have to be some tweaking with Guard Stance, but it looks like the developers are on the right track. In games where the rescue mechanic existed it was only the player's units who could rescue which means that the player had a huge advantage over the enemy if the player could properly abuse this mechanic.

                    So the tl;dr version: Fates Pair Up > Rescue > Awakening Pair Up 

                  So DRP reminded me of a point that I forgot to bring up when I was talking about "nerfing the ponies". Archetypal Jagen and Oifey characters usually tend to be the game-breaking powerhouses that dominate the list (Seth and FE 7 Marcus say hi). In theory they're supposed to help newer players with the early-game, since the early-game tends to be the most difficult part of the game, but when done wrong they just dominate the entire game and they disincentivize the player to use other units. How do we solve this problem?

• Kill off the character: If they're not around for the entire game then the player is forced to use different characters and level them up. In order for this to work you have to kill them off relatively early on so that there's a significant portion of the game that they're not available for. You don't have to kill the character off, but at least do what Thracia 776 did and make the character unavailable for the majority of the game. That way you're forced to use your growths units (or at least it provides a pretty strong incentive to do so).    

• Make them a class other than a Paladin: A paladin with fantastic bases and weapon ranks will destroy the game. A general, on the other hand, probably won't. In case you're wondering why I'm saying a general, it's because DRP uses this idea in his game Realm of Ascension. A low movement unit with high base stats would still be useful to the player but they would have legitimate drawbacks to them. If you're going to go this route then the character shouldn't have high movement in general just to balance them out. '

•  Get rid of these types of characters and buff your growth units: I would like to point out that this idea has been done before by Gaiden. You don't get any early-joining paladins in Gaiden and I think the game did fine without it. To be fair, when you've got mother freaking Alm on your side you don't need anyone else (unless they're a lousy warp-bot) but nevertheless I think this might be the next stage in Fire Emblem's evolution. If your growth units are strong enough there's no need for a pre-promote. I think it would be better having a team of useable units as opposed to a mega-juggernaut who has to carry an entire team behind him / her. 

                    Next up I plan on discussing map design for Part 3 and I would like to know something from those of you who are reading this right now:

•                        Name 3 games that in your opinion had the best map design and why you think this way.
•                        Name 3 games that in your opinion had the worst map design and why you think this way. 

Ten Tips to Improve Fire Emblem # 2 - Balancing the Classes: Part 2 - Buff the Lamer Classes

                Okay so before I begin I’d like to recognize the fact that Fates has more or less addressed a lot of the issues that this post is meant to cover so it’s only fair to talk about those changes while adding some of my own thoughts to the mix as well.

               So in the previous post I mentioned that in addition to nerfing ponies we needed to buff some of the classes in the series that have traditionally gotten the shaft. I identified four classes that get this shaft: Archers, Armor Knights, Thieves and Fighters. The topic of this post is to come up with ways to buff and revamp these classes.

Archers

                 Why they suck: Archers are traditionally considered lame because bows are considered lame so it’s only pertinent that we should discuss the weaknesses behind bows. The purpose behind bows seems to be free chip damage at range behind the front lines. While this is neat in theory in practice this function is ultimately worthless in most games. The reason why is because archers lack an enemy phase which lowers the amount of experience they can receive and puts them at a HUGE disadvantage that the other classes don’t have. What’s worse is that hand axes, javelins and magic can basically do the same job that bows can while also protecting the user during the enemy phase. In essence, hand axes, javelins and magic do the same job as bows in addition to being able to do more so bows are basically rendered obsolete. Heck, even their ability to deal extra damage against fliers is relatively meaningless because most enemy fliers are pretty easy to kill so the extra damage is simply overkill most of the time. So how do we make archers more useful?

• Give Bows 1 range: Since the biggest criticism of bows comes from their lack of an enemy phase it only makes sense to give bows 1 range in order to solve this problem. Giving bows 1 range means that archers can defend themselves during the enemy phase. That’s the easiest solution to the problem but there are other alternatives.

• Give Bows Uber Range: So DRP came up with a wonderful idea in his game Realm of Ascension where bows can get some really good range. Longbows can attack from up to 10 spaces away and the rest of the bows in that game can attack from 4 spaces away. This means that bows can actually snipe enemy units without worrying about a counterattack which is how bows are supposed to function in the first place. The rationale behind this is that in medieval times archers could snipe people from super long distances away so naturally he decided to try and reflect that in his game. Congratulations Based Cat Commander, you’re better at designing bows than “Intelligent Systems”.

• The Fates Solution: So the way Fates solved this problem was to give hand axes and javelins an uber nerf while magic doesn’t seem to be anything spectacular. This makes bows look good by comparison. Also, bows beat Hidden Weapons on the Fates’ weapon triangle which means that archers are anti-ninja units. Based on what I’ve heard thieves (and therefore ninjas) “are the bane of everyone’s existence”. Based on what I’ve seen from people who play the game hidden weapons enemies whose debuffs are capable of stacking are legitimately difficult to beat.
  
  
  
  
  

• Make a higher percentage of enemy units fliers: This one is pretty obvious, but it’s worth mentioning. More fliers means that bows have a better chance of dishing out bonus damage which would make them more valuable.

• Buff Enemies: The tougher the enemies, the more necessary chip damage becomes. Tougher flying enemies with higher defense and HP stats (basically tougher wyvern knights) make bows necessary because their bonus damage against fliers actually means something. This doesn’t have to apply only to fliers, but you get the point. Case and point: Fire Emblem 12.

• Buff the class stats: Another major weakness that archers tend to face is that their base stats usually suck. Think about Rolf in Path of Radiance for example. His base stats are atrocious in addition to all of the other weaknesses associated with the archer class. The sad thing here is that he’s not the only example of a crappy archer that joins the player relatively early. It seems to me that if you want archers to be better it would be prudent to improve their base stats so that they start out better from the get-go. To go along with this, I also suggest that you make caps of the Sniper / Marksman class better as well. This is something that Fire Emblem 12 did really well. I would also like to add that giving Snipers / Marksman extra range like how they did it in Radiant Dawn would also be a good idea as it would make them even more unique / useful. 
  
  
  
  
  

• Overall Recap: Overall, the best way to fix archer problems would be to make them like they were in Gaiden while making their caps like they were in Fire Emblem 12. In Gaiden archers consistently had 1 - 3 range at the start and then got 5 range upon either promotion to their third tier class or upon equipping a Steel Bow. In Fire Emblem 12, the Sniper class caps were actually pretty good so statistically speaking there’s a reason to use them. By increasing their stats and giving them additional range archers could be a force to be reckoned with. The question remains if the game designers are able to see this.

Armor Knights

                    Why They Suck: The two most important stats in Fire Emblem are speed and movement. Speed lets you dodge enemy attacks in addition to being able to double attack. Double attacking equates to killing things faster which is a huge metric for determining unit worth. Guess which two stats armor knights fail at the most? Yep. The two most important stats. Their extra defense is also superfluous since most paladins and wyvern knights can take hits well enough while also being able to provide so much more. Also, in many instances there are plenty of examples of armor knights who fail to have sufficient defense whether it’s a player controlled armor knight or an enemy armor knight. Meg and Wendy are premier examples of this. However, they don’t fail to lack speed so they end up getting 1 round KO’ed by enemy units (or by the player units if we’re talking about enemy armor knights) thus failing to be effective at anything other than getting killed. So how do we solve this problem?

• 
  The Fates Solution: The movement issues that Armor Knights face can be solved with the Pair-Up system. Pair Up lets Armor Knights get out on to the battlefield quicker. Also, Defensive Formation exists.

• Increase the Enemy's ability to deal damage: Extra defense is usually considered extraneous because enemies are weak and other classes can take hits well enough in addition to bringing something else to the table. If enemies dealt more damage as a whole then the extra defense provided by Armor Knights would actually mean something.

• Decrease the number of effective weaponry against them and make defensive skills more reliable: Think of how many weapons are effective against armor knights: Hammers, armorslayers, heavy lances, your lord’s rapier / rapier knock-off prf weapon. That’s a lot of easily accessible anti-armor weaponry. Plus armor knights usually have low resistances so mages can usually wreck them as well. An easy solution to this is to cut down on the number of anti-armor weaponry and make the weapons less accessible. Combine that with the increased defense of armor knights and they’ll be much more likely to be a threat to the player. Also, another idea is to make skills like Pavise (the Awakening and Fates version) and Aegis have a 100 % activation rate which will help augment the defensive capabilities of Armor Knights. 
  
  
  
  
  

Thieves

                  What holds them back: Thieves tend to play like swordmasters with all the strengths and weaknesses of a swordmaster amped to 11. They have low defense and low strength while having super high speed and skill. Usually thieves come with a one hit KO ability that is balanced out with an unreliably low activation rate. The utility that thieves bring is ultimately superfluous since door and chest keys can be bought and usually the things that they can steal are nice but unnecessary. The amount of stuff you can steal is nice, but again ultimately fluffy and unnecessary. So how do we solve these problems?

• The Fates Solution: Hidden Weapons say hi. Hidden weapons give stat debuffs to enemy units. Even if your thief doesn’t kill an enemy they still weakened said enemy and made a valuable contribution. Plus in Fates hidden weapons have consistent 1 - 2 range that you can double attack with unlike axes and lances.

• Bring back the Thracia 776 version of stealing stuff: In Thracia 776 thieves can steal equipped weapons under certain circumstances. I don’t know how that works specifically (I’m guessing it has something to do with constitution) but it’s really cool being able to steal a mage’s weapons and watch them meander aimlessly since they can’t do anything. Obviously there would need to be a way to balance this out. Thieves couldn’t do this to everyone in Thracia so I’m assuming that constitution had a role to play which could work when it comes to balancing this stuff out.

• Overall: Despite what I said in my last post I don’t think that thieves suck per se but I do feel like the additions made above should come back into future games. While we’re at it, I also think that thieves shouldn’t need a lockpick to do what they do. It limits their utility to a certain number of uses and I think it hurts them, even if only by a little bit. 
  
  
  
  
  

Fighters

                           The issues that hold them back: Fighters usually lack speed and skill in most Fire Emblem games. There are exceptions of course Othin, Halvan, Dagda, Boyd, Barst and Nolan) but in most games in the series they aren’t that good. I think another major issue has to do with an axe’s accuracy. Since the weapon triangle predominantly affects accuracy axes tend to get the shaft since their accuracy is traditionally lower than the other weapons. In games where the weapon triangle can give a 15 - 20 boost to accuracy that can translate into a low hit rate for the axe user. In games where the weapon triangle doesn’t give as much of a boost (or where the avoid formula gets screwed over like the DS games) axes tend to do better as a weapon type overall. So how do we fix fighters:

• Give them better speed and skill: This one’s a no brainer but it needed to be said. All the best fighters have a lot of speed and skill, the worst ones don’t. They don’t need to be swordmasters with axes, but they need to able to double attack for a good portion of the game.

• Buffing Axes: Axes are kind of tricky to make due to their higher might. If you make their accuracy too good then they start to become some of the best weapons in the game. If they’re too inaccurate they suck and wielding them becomes a negative (Fire Emblem 6 says hi). Axes are also traditionally heavy weapons in games that employ the weight system. Fire Emblem 12 did away with weight and Fates and Awakening have continued this trend so this might not be an issue. 
  
  
  
  
  

Overall: So to finish this tip, the overall point here is that nerfing traditionally powerful classes and buffing traditionally less useful ones will make better games because ideally you would have more useful characters to rely upon and encouraging people to use multiple different characters is always a good thing.