Fire Emblem Had Bad Bosses. Engage Fixed Them.

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[@Drayze1]

The point of FE1 bosses was never to be strategically challenging. They're a ball of stats positioned on top of the seize point in order to ensure that you've gotten enough of your units to the seize point and cleared out enough of the enemy pressure that the battle can be considered "won" when they are defeated. It was also to discourage the player from just warping Marth to the end. Even with his rapier, Marth can't attack and seize on the same turn, so he will inevitably be attacked by all the enemies surrounding the boss if you try that. Since FE1 was designed on the assumption that players would be approaching the game in a similar manner to an ironman, where at the very least Game Overs are considered to be undesirable, the idea that someone would just keep reloading until this plan worked wasn't really considered. Basically the devs just had too much faith in players.

[@powerfulberry237]

Underestimated the players*

[@nikolayrodriguez272]

Well god damn, now i know why something like casual mode didn't exist before, people like me playing the first time (or any playthrough at this point) didn't like to lose units forever

[@lazykatie42069]

they also failed to account for people bringing two warpers, one warping a boss killer capable of one-rounding the boss up to kill the boss, and the second one to warp Marth to the throne to seize turn 1 this was of course limited by the amount of warp staves in the game but it was broken nonetheless

[@kakalukio]

@@lazykatie42069 Warp is just inherently problematic. Giving the player the option to flat out skip most of the level is just begging for silly things to happen. Especially when you're looking at the min-maxing/competitive part of your playerbase. Of course those players will take maximum advantage of these kind of tools...

[@islandboy9381]

I always imagined how FE would have been recieved if it had a Undertale like system where the game internally kept up any time you reset to brute force through a chapter and not let anyone die, that the game would make you self aware of it and not give as many rewards as it would the intended way. I know that sounds horrible in practice but also would be really interesting 😂

[@MythrilZenith]

8:15 "Bodied by a swordmaster" - footage of Marisa dealing 1 damage

[@lazykatie42069]

and she's not even a swordmaster there, she's still unpromoted which explains the 1 damage

[@nathankeel6667]

" I'v got adult things to do, like play fire emblem" that is surely a line of all time

[@ImportedCheese]

I wish Engage Madenning bosses had their break/effective defense scale with depleted health bars. NEVER being able to break or deal effective damage to bosses just makes them feel like overinflated balls of stats - I think break vulnerability on the first health bar and reduced effective damage on all health bars would have been a nice compromise.

[@Gensolink]

damn removing a core part of gameplay is bad who would have thought. It's not the first time they did it, I will never forget swordmasters not having crit bonuses in POR maniac mode, like WHY ? It's cheap, removing the whole point of the class to begin with. EDIT : it wasnt just for swordmaster, they nerfed berserkers and sniper too ! Good job !

[@ImportedCheese]

@@Gensolink It's because crit classes were just too dominant, ofc!!!

[@IamHattman]

I'd honestly do it the other way around, give some bosses a 'shield' bar or something, it's literally a normal health bar that's immune to break and crits. Maybe have later bosses with multiple bars have a weaker shield bar that can be broken and crit but only takes 1.5x damage on crits. That would have encouraged an approach using multiple tools at different points in the fight.

[@papersonic9941]

​@@GensolinkI'm fairly certain that's just because they didn't have the crit bonus in the Japanese version, and Maniac is exclusive to that one, so if you're playing it it's because it's the JP version.

[@AlexT7916]

​@@Gensolink It's because the crit bonuses were only added in the english version of Path of Radiance, which didn't have Maniac mode

[@mauricioalvarezpino1818]

Personally, I don't mind breaking bosses being abstent in maddening, you already have a lot of tools at your disposal like 3 range, backup units, poison and engage attacks, I didn't really miss it, in fact, I feel it's necessary to make the bosses actually difficult and fun to plan around, or else it could've turned into a "break, hit with someone who can't break, break" loop like it already was in hard.

[@Greideren]

Yeah and that would trivialize bosses to an absurd degree, making it so that the only truly challenging and memorable bosses would be the ones that use weapons that can't be broken as easily.

[@skypaladin9878]

I think it should be an item like the Hopson guard though, so player feels like it's fair for the boss to have it, because I can have it too

[@clintwaki6936]

Almost every boss is already deleted by Corrin Hex + boss killer so the lack of breaking only feels bad in the first 5 maps where every unit needs to dogpile the boss and slowly widdle them down.

[@powerfulberry237]

​@@skypaladin9878i'm glad the majority of the intelligent FE fanbase doesn't think like you do. The "it's only fair if I can have it too waahhhh" mentality is pathetic considering ur up against AI and it never made sense in games under this context anyway We are supposed to have the brains the AI doesn't. All that matters is if the player has got the tool to get over any part of a game.

[@skypaladin9878]

@Powerful BERRY Actually it goes "Posers! You guys are so lame you have to cheat to win! The difficulty in this game is a joke! All of FE is a joke! I should play Mario &Rabbids for REAL strategy game," at least, that's what the reviews say

[@supremesage2206]

I both love and hate how sometimes if you take too long or reach a certain point in the map that the bosses just decide to move. That shit scares the hell out of me whenever it happened, even more so if the enemy has wrap.

[@GGMK2002]

The second and third health bar is what made the demonic beasts fun to fight and I’m glad they’re back

[@dominicjannazo7144]

Some of the bosses in 3H were great. Or you can choose Golden Deer and have a final map of 13 stat inflated human bosses you one-shot that feels kinda underwhelming.

[@wouterW24]

@@dominicjannazo7144 nemesis greatly suffered from being the only final boss with a single healthbar and not getting latent ability perks. Same goes for the elites. It's likely something the engage dev thing noticed and just expanded to humans. It was a final battle with some tactical depth though, so imagine it with the elites having one revive and Nemesis 2 or something.

[@thelegacyofgaming2928]

Golden Deer for life

[@creativename1673]

@@dominicjannazo7144 tbh the entire map can be considered the Nemesis fight, and unless you try to cheese him, he effectively has 11 healthbars, only they're scattered around the map

[@BTrainStudio]

This topic is definitely my favorite part of Engage. The boss fights are the best in the series. I hope they keep similar mechanics for future installments. Some of the monsters from 3H were the most memorable moments in the game for me. As for the break system, I agree that they shouldn't have taken it away for Maddening. I think allowing break but needing more than 1 units to achieve it would have been interesting. 2-5 Units needed to break the boss for one turn would make you consider which classes and inventory you are bringing for each boss.

[@namelessbag]

Engage almost perfected bosses. Once you get Corrin, they simply become too goddamn pathetic thanks to debuffs + freeze. Before Corrin, they're actually pretty damn fun and fair to fight. It's amazing how easy chapter 17 becomes once you realize how broken Corrin debuffs are to bosses

[@orangeslash1667]

Interesting.

[@thelegacyofgaming2928]

Ike trivializes the entire game. Idk why people keep complaining. Fire Emblem will never be a difficult game. It's meant to be fun, not difficult.

[@orangeslash1667]

@@thelegacyofgaming2928 I remember playing a strategy game called Sakura Wars So Long my Love. The final boss of that game was haaaaaaaaaaard!!!!!!!! What's funny is that Sega confirmed that Sakurai Wars was inspired by Fire Emblem.

[@namelessbag]

@@thelegacyofgaming2928 Ike doesn't trivialize the entire game, have you even played the game on maddening? Also, easy = fun is a subjective opinion. I can only have fun with hard games because easy games are so braindead that I don't even feel like I'm the one playing anymore. My first FE 3H playthrough was an absolute chore because by the mid point of the game, all I was doing was pressing end turn and let the enemy kill themselves on me due to easy the game was. That's absolutely not fun unless you like power fantasy shit

[@theboostedbaboon4586]

Your essay question at the end of the video about excluding mechanics for challenge reminds me a lot of pokemon. Competitive singles pokemon banned dynamax in 8th gen and almost banned terrastalization in 9th gen, and the discourse is very much balance vs. identity. Competitive 6th gen stands out because it allows mega evolutions, but there are also arguments against it for balance purposes. But for a single player game like fire emblem, I think there should be more creative ways to raise difficulty. Decreasing resources or altering the layout of a level itself seems like a better way to raise challenge than to disable a core mechanic like that. There is no variance in the tools an opponent will have like in a pvp game with a team builder, so you can design a higher difficulty with specific intentions without removing a mechanic. Unlike pvp pokemon, which will always allow for the most broken use case of a mechanic unless you banned it altogether (or bann like 50 pokemon who are only overpowered when abusing the mechanic).

[@guyfromfireemblemtheblazin3391]

imo, a boss fight is more than just the boss itself. the enemies around the boss, the terrain, your options, and special options (like with the valter/caellach example you used) should all be considered part of the "boss fight." alternatively, i think some entire maps could be considered "boss fights," like chapter 10 in conquest

[@Safcrine]

Another way Engage fixes the "defeat boss" map objective is that there are often multiple bosses (With multiple healthbars) to defeat. (Elincia's gambit with multiple bosses would help fix that map)I get that some people really despise fighting the four hounds ten times, but it really does help to stop trivializing certain maps. Defeat boss objective with 3+ bosses is something I hope the series does more of in the future. However, I still think bosses shouldn't outright negate game mechanics like Break/Weapon effectiveness. (Honestly surprising how on Maddening, break is more of a hindrance to the player than a boon). It's only acceptable if they have an item that the player can also receive (Like the shields from three houses that negate effectiveness). They need to stop giving every boss the same skill that just negates certain strategies, It just end up turning bosses into Damage sponges. I think weapon effectiveness should be reduced to 1.5X on bosses, that way I am still rewarded for bringing the correct units, like one of the main reasons to use Archers is their ability to reliably bring down fliers, and without the damage increase against flying bosses they end up being unable to perform as well as a Swordmaster/Warrior/Halberdier for example.

[@CountShaman]

Honestly, people who complain about fighting the Hounds alot are just looking for things to complain. Fire Emblem has always been inconsistent about how often bosses retreat. If anything, the Hounds being more consistent makes them less annoying than the others who just flees due to plot convenience. If their fights are actually the same thing every time, then the complain would be valid, but the fact that their fights are as fun, different and challenging as they are makes every encounter worth it and better than just fighting random minibosses that lack a coherent strategy.

[@sableye126]

Hearing the Persona 3 miniboss music in the background of somebody talking about poorly designed bosses is one of the most fitting things I’ve ever seen

[@shannonjones8877]

They should have made bosses in maddening immune to WTA break, but not smash weapon and staff break. I mean that's already how Generals work and that's powerful but fair. It would also provide another tactical reason to use smash weapons.

[@ProfessorBopper]

Agree. Smash weapons would’ve really benefited from the extra utility. I rarely used them and think they had lost potential

[@lucitheunlucky]

I don't mind some bosses being unbreakable, but I feel it should vary. Like, maybe some bosses should be breakable, but have super vantage. Then you can still break them so that you're forced to use a bulky unit to take a hit and break them, then you can let your glass canon blast them without the fear of eating a hit. I feel like there are a bunch of skills that can make each boss unique, rather than just veteran+.

[@shury4260]

The lack of break on bosses is really only a problem early game, mid to late especially after getting byleths quadra dance bosses are usually just puzzles on how to allocate exp since they just crumble under all the shenanigans you can do by abusing all the resources the game gives you

[@Xeconis]

This is so real and true, every boss after chapter 15 was just me determining how to clear the immediate area and get Ivy to tear through 3 bars of HP. Engage gives you so many tools that they effectively nullify their own countermeasures against various methods of "cheese". This is also apparent when looking at the subject of dodge tanking. They swapped back to hybrid roll from Fates for Engage to make use of rates under 50% being true rates. This, in theory, nerfs the Avo stat for the player and makes it harder to dodge tank without reaching 0 hit. However, when you introduce +30 Avo foliage, Weapon Avo skills, Covert typing, and even some of the engravings, now you're looking at one of the easiest games to make a dodge tank in. Chain Attack also serves to nerf this with a forced 80% hit rate, but eventually Corrin can negate that as well. A running theme they've had in the series, and something that many of my friends all agree on, is that balancing a Fire Emblem game is not truly possible as soon as you introduce Warp and/or the ability to refresh more than one unit on a turn. Providing tools for the player is great, but too many easy to access and obvious ones will remove a lot of the analysis and strategy required on a given map, rendering it as "just another X" scenario. Edit: This is why chapter 11 in Engage was one of the most refreshing experiences the franchise has had in over a decade, as it actually takes away some of your greatest assets and tests how efficiently you can navigate through a group of enemies with very notable advantages over you

[@thelegacyofgaming2928]

Yea, this vids a bit weird. This game is very easy after about the midpoint, which is similar to previous titles being easy after the early game. We the players are just too smart for any fire emblem game to be truly challenging without introducing some sort of OP mechanic for the bosses. This game is just as easy as the others, if not easier than some of the others.

[@elolawynladriel]

Other option for "bosses" could be to face a big ball of death that stick together and is formed by multiple classes with different weapons. No capture and no boss kill, only kill all. The ball could be formed by mages, clerics, armor knights, a unit that buff, all carrying different weapons: bows, barrier staves, killer weapons, siege weapons. The ball always stick together, the trick is to attack hard without allowing retaliation.

[@asianboywonder2312]

Boss: this tercio formation

[@ProfessorBopper]

The closest I think we’ve seen to this idea is some of the big Kaga rectangles in Genealogy of the Holy War. Eldigan’s squad and Beowulf’s squad and it really is a mixed bag there, but I think that there’s something really fun in there

[@marcoasturias8520]

So... Just a rout map?

[@CreutzfeldtTV]

As per your question…breaking is broken…it trivializes a lot of player phase in combat in general. It doesn’t matter the difficulty if you learn to abuse it so I think it was absolutely necessary to remove it from bosses in maddening.

[@theghostcreator776]

"Breaks don't matter" "Breaks trivialize the game" We can't have both people which is it!?

[@marcoasturias8520]

Breaking is the weakest thing the player can pull off in this game.

[@CreutzfeldtTV]

@@marcoasturias8520 I hear you but if you use it right you can basically never get hit in player phase, that was my experience on my second maddening run. Plus, bosses hit hard, avoiding their damage on player phase would allow you take down strong bosses with multiple weak units.

[@vaughnrudy8084]

Crazy how they put press turn in the game and also made it so that bosses move most of the time then bosses got way cooler

[@tdimensional6733]

Very insightful video, and honestly insanely helpful when it comes to designing FE bosses myself. Having the hallmarks of fun boss design (mobility, unique challenges/rewards, auxiliary triggers upon defeat and non-combat options for dealing with them) all in one place makes this great for a refresher course.

[@Greideren]

Yeah I completely agree. I think the only think he missed is those bosses that have a stupidly high avoid in games where you can't play around it. Combat arts for the extra hit, Gambits since their accuracy is calculated differently, or attacks that never miss like the Engage attacks. If the game doesn't have tools like that then the high avoid bosses are as unfair as one with almost capped stats in the early game.

[@vaughnrudy8084]

Also making bosses immune to break keeps them from being absolute pushovers who crumple instantly on maddening. The challenge of maddening is never One Guy its the fact enemies are imbued with the power of friendship too and will tag team ur ass

[@windwaker0rules]

I think three houses was the first to make bosses better because some had multiple HP bars so you couldn't juggernaut them down easily, were usually weak to non damaging skills, and didn't hit like a truck. Too bad they added miracle on higher difficulties but thats just gimping a good system for no reason.

[@AkameGaKillfan777]

No they didn't, Miracle is on certain monsters regardless of the difficulty

[@windwaker0rules]

@@AkameGaKillfan777 technically yes but their luck stat makes it more outragous on higher difficulties.

[@bladerdj3503]

It really feels like they polished and finalized the idea of Extra Health Bars in Engage. In Three Houses it seemed like a cool idea that enemies would grow stronger the further the battle continues (like in a multiple phased boss fight). But it had 2 problems: 1 it was too common since Monster enemies quickly became normal enemies after the red canyon sidequest. Before that they felt like highlights of each mission they appeared in, after that it was a bit too much. Simple being part of boss fights added so much. It was more than "how do I kill them with my 8-10 units the fast as possible?" - You have to position your units in a clever way to make sure you can ORKO them twice. Or to have a good position to survive them. I feel like this would've never worked this well if not for the Break-Mechanic so I'm hesitant to try Maddening out in the future now. But generally I agree that this game handled boss very well. In general, many of the things introduced in Engage might be stuff for the series in general to evolve.

[@SmugHomura]

Great video! I'm surprised you gave no mention to Three Houses's armor tiles on bosses. I found them to be a very nice addition. regular bosses had a 2x2 tile, super big bosses had 3x3. normal attacks would half break it, special skills would fully break one, and battalions would break their main target and half break adjacent tiles. The boss had increased defenses while the tiles were up. What I think makes this mechanic great is that first of all, it's not required to kill a unit. You can actually just brute force a boss if you have the strength which is nice. If you don't have the strength, it becomes a puzzle where you try to make the best use of your tools in order to break all the tiles. I fondly remember being at the end of Black Eagle's route having to plow through a 3x3 tile'd boss and if I didn't solve it THAT turn they would kill too many characters for me to continue. Edelgard's Raging Storm bailed me out of that one when I had exhausted all my other options. Regarding regular bosses, I honestly think IS can just double the health of bosses and reduce some of their damage. I think it's really annoying that bosses usually come down to trying to 1-round them because bosses do so much damage they will outright kill anybody that's not a general. Maybe give them some environmental effects like putting flames on the ground, creating barriers that separate your army, having damage over time effects and all that. Make it more of a dance and a war of attrition instead of "who can safely touch this boss without dying?"

[@krish0531]

I feel like keeping break or other identity defining mechanics in harder difficulties wouldve made for a better hard mode for the game. Imagine for example if they instead wouldnt let you engage with your emblems or took away your ability to pair up in awakening. It would be like getting a 'hard' mode in pokemon that just prevented you from catching new pokemon

[@chrisnazar5124]

Awesome vid, bop man, you pretty much hit the nail on the head as to how I felt about the Engage bosses when I played it the first time

[@zhobin7907]

I think no breaking on maddening bosses is definitely some form of missed opportunity considering how few chances are for breaking regular enemies and not having them die one attack later. The Block Recovery skill from Soren sounds really cool, but I couldn’t find much actual use of it because, instead of break attack -> attack with block recov -> attack again (and they’re still broken), enemies just die on the second attack. Bosses being able to be broken also adds another layer to manipulating what weapon bosses hold. There’s one specific instance of Zephia with a Thoron and a 1-range sword and I’d love to think “I should purposefully have her activate Thoron so I can break her through punching”. Break loops are too strong though… maybe have it so you have to break them twice before they actually break? Another idea is the break only lasts during the one combat. When you attack with break, the enemy will not counterattack during that combat, but the break status will not apply. Basically, you get some free pokes. Then again, Block Recovery still doesn’t have any use lol

[@AnnefeatHertz]

oh hey, perfect timing. i just finished fe9 hard mode like two days ago, with the final map taking me like four seperate attempts (it took one on normal lol), each individually requiring several days in between, because i was overcome by such irritation nice video tho !!

[@ScoopsMayCry]

For the short answer response I will say no don't remove unique game mechanics because that's what makes the game cool, I think it'd be more interesting to work with the mechanic than to remove it or expect the player to rely on it sometimes

[@Speedwinghere]

Great video, I agree with the overall sentiment of the video that engage has some of the better designed bosses in the series for sure. I'm going to be the comment you made fun of however and say that imo not being able to break bosses should be the default on all difficulties not just maddening. Chain stunning a boss with no retaliation is ridiculously overpowered to point of how is it even a boss fight at all. Engage already offers that ability in engage attacks, however that is better designed imo as it comes with the tradeoff of holding your engage attacks for that moment or securing the engage refill tiles on the map prior to the boss. This means you are at least trading a resource or securing a bonus (of sorts) map objective for extreme power rather than just having it at all times for free as long as you have a variety of weapon types. Honestly the more I think about it I think I'm just not a big fan of the break mechanic in general, fun idea on paper but rough implementation and game feel.

[@Greideren]

Break is one of those meachanics that help the enemies more than it does the player. Sure, it has its uses but its main purpose is to make it harder to just plop a good unit in range of a bunch of enemies and watch them die. And even then it doesn't work against Vantage + Wrath.

[@CreutzfeldtTV]

I have a confession I’ve never boss cleared a map. I always route the enemy even when they don’t ask me to

[@50mLsalt]

love the bosses in this game especially after going back to older games

[@Macer84]

my biggest issue with engage maddening is that EVERY BOSS starting in chapter 3 is immune to break, so they just ignore one of the core mechanics that (in my opinion) make bosses in the game so fun to plan around on lower difficulties.

[@TheRJKid]

I think it's fine to have bosses be unbreakable as they're already immune to effective damage. I do like multiple health bars but I feel like three extra health bar starts to drag as the game goes on. Maybe having more frequent non-defeat boss maps would make the bosses less stale.

[@GenericSoda]

I've always disliked enemies that ignore core mechanics: enemies like the Nightmare in Mega Man X6 or color-coded enemies in DmC make the gameplay more frustrating and shouldn't be discarded to artificially create difficulty. I think if Break is harder to achieve on harder difficulties, like filling a Break meter or meeting a damage threshold, that would be a more sensible change. Also thought you should know the Gilliam I have in a recent FE8 iron man is absolutely yoked and carrying the team

[@Tuffkid42]

It’s too bad this script was (probably) written before you could sing the praises of Elly De La Cruz.

[@zdelrod829]

I honestly think that the way Engage did it was a much better way than a certain leader of a church in one specific path in Three (and a half) Houses

[@zdelrod829]

@@mihaimercenarul7467 Silver Snow's final boss is a wreck, especially if you have underleveled units, to the point where The Immaculate One can outheal any damage you may deal.

[@franbh94]

"Should a game mechanics be stripped away for the sake of challenge?" I think that could be extended to effective damage as well. Effective damage has been a staple of the series and a way to try to balance certain classes. What's the difference between taking out that mechanic and not the other? That you can use frailer characters to punch the boss? In my opinion, Multiple Health Bar Bosses are a good edition... But they are still a step away from being "engaging" (pun intended). Because, as I see them, the multiple health bars turn them into a big HP piñata who hands XP instead of candy. If you are able to kill the boss once, what's saying that you cannot kill it a second time? I'd like to point out Gensou Shoujo Taisen (or Fantasy Maiden Wars) a fangame made out of fans of Touhou Project and Super Robot Taisen (Super Robot Wars). What's important about that game, is that it is a SRPG (with different rules than FE, sure) with bosses with Multiple Health Bars. Early in the series, Bosses can get 2 health bars, with Final Bosses of Story Arcs getting up to 6 Health Bars. However, these Bosses keep the battle engaging with them. How? Each time a Health Bar is depleated, they get a new Attack, can get a new Skill and they lay out modifiers into the terrain that further changes the battle. For example: a Boss takes away your healing (cutting it in half and then negating it), another boss makes it that Chain Attack/Defense cannot be done (their equivalents), another that they receive 0 damage from ranged enemies... These modifiers change how the game is played and keep the player from being complacent with their dedicated Boss Killer. Fire Emblem, right now, has Skills, multiple weapon tiers and even Forged Weapons. Make it that a boss gets different skills, their weapon gets magically boosted (as if forged) or even have a boss Promote after taking them down to their last Health Bar. That would keep me engaged instead of thinking "Now I have to depleat 120 HP but attacking first with *this* guy as he deals more damage and I don't want it to go to waste".

[@d3-ll754]

What's funny about your example is that it's how boss monsters worked in 3H. Each time they lost an HP bar, they gained access to new Skills, and also each HP bar had more HP to chew through than the last. I just wish the human bosses could have received similar treatment.

[@franbh94]

@@d3-ll754 I think that would make for better fights. I haven't played 3H nor know much about it, I admit, the only thing I know is that there is a boss with 4 health bars and Miracle for each of them (with a hefty Luck stat to back it up). Have the bosses use Temporary Terrain as the Veins in Engage. Have them change weaponry and stats. Have them unlock new skills, change classes, use AoEs (like Ashera in RD which, I think, were re-used in 3H). However, I think Gensou Shoujo Taisen can get away with it because it doesn't have permadeath (FE Casual Mode is the standard there) so bosses can be stronger. Permadeath and now rosters getting smaller with a single character embracing an archetype (if not, stereotype), makes it that you won't risk them at any costs. There is a certain point up to where you can get with difficulty in Fire Emblem due to this.

[@Icu282]

Surprised with the chain/team attacks, they don't also include another similar system games like Disgaea use, where the chain is a separate mechanic from the team attack, where if you tell the units to attack the same enemies, but execute the action for all the characters at once the chain instead builds up that way (in the order you told the units to attack in), and a damage multiplier goes up every time the same enemy is hit. So like if you hit them with a unit that lowers their defense first, then all the other units do so much damage to them

[@blueberriesinmycoffee1234]

Fire Emblem has systematically made me unable to trust my own intuition on what a good, memorable boss is and isn't. My first thought after beating Julius in FE4 was, "That looked cool! The only thing that would've made it better is if Naga's Tome wasn't there and I had to carefully bumrush him with anyone who can do more than 2 damage." Like, I WANTED to do that, what am I becoming? XD

[@patrickschoof739]

You've articulated what's bothered me about FE bosses for so many years

[@javib2978]

Okay stop. When I played Fire Emblem 1 on the nes. In emulator, I found the bosses to be challenging and brutal. They are defeated for being challenged, not for shock value.

[@shadexvii3975]

The revival stone mechanic reminds me of a system like it in a mobile game. It’s functionally the same thing, except when one of these new lives gets activated it often triggers unique actions of the boss.

[@paz8723]

the HP bloat is getting ridiculous i think Engages final boss has something like 600 effective HP, not to mention its shield technically having a health bar of its own

[@ScubaLuigi]

"Or they're a major villain in the game" shows Hyman perfect

[@xaeoxic7328]

I think 3 houses did it well with beasts. You can brute force blast them, or break them down to debuff from all side. It felt like a boss fight which required some work around other then murder this person (of which I did in Claude's route when I just warped to edelgard, the mission with dedue. I ended up saving dedue that mission too, wish he would have joined me)

[@freetoplayking7362]

1:01 Look, it's really simple. For chapter 1: train Gordin on Gazzak by shooting Gazzak 250 times with an iron bow for chapter 2, if defence is high enough, break Gomez's hand axe by having Gordin standing there, facing it (healing with the fort nearby), and level up your units on the weaponless boss without killing it (it'll take over 500-550 turns) I learned it from a certain scuffed hard-5 iron man runner

[@GleamingGarmore]

I appreciate the commitment to baseball on this channel

[@joobergoob]

I wish we could get “commander type” bosses in FE. And what I mean is they are planted as a leader, who empowers or gives commands. That way the battle changes dynamically once they are taken down. For example: a strike mission where you have to take an objective by a certain turn order. Enemies are placed on strategic points that make travel hard. The commander gives a buff to defense making it even more tough to advance. If you send a small squad or an assassin and take out the commander, the rest of the enemies lose their defense buff and start leaving their posts to attack (I must avenge my lord!!) the boss enemy doesn’t have to have crazy stats or abilities. Just make their interaction more dynamic.

[@wellingtonmcskellington4833]

Finding out new mystery had no warp cheese on lunatic was one of my saddest fe moments at the time, that's like 70% of what makes the ds games fun

[@thedom2753]

Snagging Caellach's hoplon guard and sitting Joshua next to him will never stop being satisfying

[@neog8029]

I get why they wanted to make something like Veyeran+ in Engage. The Break system is fundamentally strong and that strength is shown more on enemies that don't die in 2 rounds of combat. They also didn't want you to just be able to bow Zephia, Hammer Marni, and Ridersbane Mauvier since they are the bosses on like 7 maps. But it just feels bad that the bosses ignore core systems. Again. I get why they did it and I think most boss fights would still be "Debuff with draconic hex, chip with 3-range, finish off a health bar, repeat" anyways. But the ability to use more tools would at least open up more possibilities.

[@grantsheep2774]

well i just learned that verteran + is there only in madening i prefer it this way u have a lot of way to deal with boss (outrange/ backup / alcrity/hold out/ engage att) if can break them they become even more of a joke if they wanted to make them breakable they shou ve made them way stronger but zephia and griss might become unfair at this point (when they respectively have celica and sigurd) (btw i m sad they did not put that many skills on ennemy units like vantage or canto)

[@ProfessorBopper]

I’m kinda glad enemies have have fewer skills. It’s fun, but I think it’ll never be as fun without the dual screen setup of the 3DS. That system really made skill emblem fun and snappy

[@grantsheep2774]

@@ProfessorBopper I miss boss with vantage and archers with lunge but maybe after like 10 years of getting abused by conquest luna and awakening luna+ i finally dev a stockholm syndrome

[@marcoasturias8520]

​@@ProfessorBopperI don't understand why people get nervous around enemies with abilities. Its basically like having effective weapons, the player has to check to avoid the surprise. Why are abilities so different?

[@MegamanStarforce2010]

the big issue with later bosses, specifically literally everything after Corrin, is they get just crippled w Draconic Hex. add Dreadful Aura stack and they can't even move, but you don't even need that. fact is warp kill skipping is still just as much of a thing as it always was, it's just mildly different how you do it now. now it's Micaiah Rewarping a whole group to the boss including your Draco Hexer(the Rewarp staff being common, low rank, and cheap btw) and Byleth, invalidating their existence when you get there with the nerf, and then just hammering through their lifebars on a whim with a group dance.

[@dry90125]

Nothing makes me cream my jeans quite like a segment where bopper green screens a visual metaphor

[@nachfullbarertrank5230]

I love the lil funny montage at 8:15, reminds me of the homestuck flash animations

[@cavaliertechnician4953]

How FE balances the Darryl Isaac hammer forge

[@ThatguycalledJoe]

You know I feel like a really easy solution to bosses moving off of the seize point would've been to just make the maps "Whack the boss and THEN seize.", but I don't even really like Fire Emblem so what do I know?

[@dealmakerscasino9762]

Excellent video man.

[@plentyofpaper]

I love what Engage did to bosses. Although I'm also not a fan of how the break mechanic doesn't work against them in maddening. Fol different reasons though. Breaking a weapon is a tool for allowing units that can't survive a round of combat follow up. Without it, you have fewer viable strategies, and fewer units that can contribute. In maddening, bosses were pretty much, debuff, immobilize, pulverize. That all works in hard, but you can also break, attack with a fragile character with a smash weapon, use that weapon to reposition them to a space with more openings, follow up with another break, etc. I'd use more varied tricks, and a wider variety of units. I'd rather maddening give the bosses an extra health bar, and varied protective abilities. Some with effective weapon immunity, some with freeze immunity, some debuff immunity, and some unbreakable. Make them all feel a bit different, and not just Corrin fodder.

[@michaelgranholm7598]

2:49 Bro that's not a Push Up.

[@Orih9]

I’ve never been a fan of difficulty modes that actively take away major aspects of gameplay, like Final Fantasy 7 Remake where hard disables items, a common reward earned from treasure chests and often has shops dedicated to purchasing items.

[@IcyDragonPolaris]

Taking away Break in Lunatic would be like limiting you to four party members in a team in a Pokemon game

[@a.e.5923]

Nemesis also had multiple health bars

[@tahamohammad8842]

No he doesn’t he has 1 health bar with 103 hp, even on maddening. Interestingly enough, he’s the only final boss of three houses to not have multiple health bars

[@cairyth2051]

I'm sorry, was that lance called 'breedable?'

[@benjaminborkowski12]

I actually think Engage handled multiple hp bars poorly compared to 3H. 3H gave the enemies new skills as the battle progressed, which wasn't utilised well in that game most of the time but atleast it was a great idea. Engage dropped it, making the multiple hp bars effectively just an inflated HP stat

[@Invus1]

Engage had it, with Dark Emblems going berserk. It was just only there sometimes and generally didnt matter.

[@Avghistorian77]

That was a thing? The bosses were so easy it never even crossed my mind.

[@starryslight7095]

Ha ha ha you didn't give special thanks to Valter which. Good. I don't think he even knows what thanks is. Hed try to eat it hes valter Anyways I had a visceral reaction to the pavise bosses in the fe4 segment they literally made my brain consider exploding 😭 ugh that game was terrible for my blood pressure, absolutely shaved years off my life. Also is Lewyn holding the--- bopper did u figure out how to get the-- Great video breaking down what we hate about fire emblem 🙏 you are making me want to buy engage so bad but man i don't got the time OR money for it 😭 one day ill understand the boss hype

[@okapi_q]

Love seeing some positive Engage discussion! There’s so much about this game I love, especially when it comes to playing with and adding onto the mechanics of FE, but whenever I talk about the game with friends all I hear is “yeah but Alear’s hair is dumb, game is bad”

[@ultimate9056]

The gameplay is some of the best in the series however it is bogged down allot by the art direction and story. It's really hard to play and enjoy a game whose story doesn't motivate you. While 3 houses had a lot to be desired in the map design and balance its amazing character interactions and interesting story made by quite easy to simply overlook its flaws in its gameplay. I find it baffling that IS decided to keep the same story writer who wrote Fates

[@Fefedefefessle]

'Still a plank of the theseus' - dunno if this is bait, but just in case heads up; Theseus is the name of the captain, not the ship

[@ProfessorBopper]

The ship has no name, so I think it’s appropriate to use Theseus as a synecdoche for the ship itself

[@Fefedefefessle]

@@ProfessorBopper fair

[@zxylo786]

I didn't play Engage. But I can tell you that from all the games I've played. Conquest had the best bosses gameplay wise.

[@Robin-cw5zu]

I felt maddening for Engage made were great, but made some of the bosses OP. Moving when player is in certain range? fine. Unbreakable? perfectly fine. Multiple life orbs? Fine. Multiple bosses? Perfect, honestly I love it. Resistant to all effective damage, with defensive buffs, stacked life orbs, and multiple lethal bosses with the same range and extra shit? Not fine. Not fine…

[@wanone3377]

you never mentioned about the bosses in conquest. aren't those as good as engage, if not more well designed and challenging? (especially on hard/lunatic) thanks to skills conquest boss have wide varieties of combo you and the enemy can do, and more often than not the bosses have menacing skills and not just lazy counters. unlike engage you have no access to range 3 weapon (unless that shuriken from online rewards), no engage attacks so dual guard is the only safe attack. tankers may do the job, but even they have limits due to the weapon triangle or weapon type (phys or mag), making them not work all the time. note that there is no dodge tank bc bosses always have MAD accuracy on conquest with almost no way to boost avoid other than weapon adv. also true hit. admittedly the ninja chapter is dog shit in that regard due to kotaro's insane dodge rate on throne + high mag stat flame shuriken, but every other chapters don't have that level of bs.

[@michaelberube5236]

Engage bosses, to me, are just another shade of uninteresting bosses. They move now, but that presents its own problems: since they can be aggrod to charge, and the player has access to divine pulse, the player can set up a a kill zone of chain attacks, use Etie/Alchryst/Whomever to Astra Storm them outside their range of retaliation, and then when they charge into said zone, debuff them with Corrin and use chain attacks to whittle them down before one shotting their final bar. See cheesing the Celica paralogue, or Chapter 14 for an example. The multiple health bars for each boss is a neat gimmick, but I feel Engage squanders this too, if not in gameplay then at least in feeling: in 3H, it being a mechanic attached to only monsters made it feel special. Like, of course a 5 story tall demon bird wouldn't go down easy. But in Engage, when everyone and their mother has multiple bars, it doesn't seem as special anymore. For example, why does this random bandit have as many health bars as the thematically important princess of an enemy nation? Its nitpicking, I'll admit, but I don't really like Engage, so, eh. As you said, taking away gameplay options for arbitrary difficulty is never enjoyable: HHM Cog of Destiny only letting you deploy 6 units wasn't fun, Ashera only being able to be killed by Ike wasn't fun, and Engage taking away not one, but two core gameplay mechanics makes it feel especially dull, and encourages a singular approach to fighting bosses. As for what I feel makes a good boss, Hegemon Edelgard from 3H I think was my favorite. She fit the requisite parameters of being thematically important and tough to kill, and her not moving was circumvented by having her launching artillery barrages across the map every turn. It gives the player the feeling that, even though they can't retaliate, that they've been fighting against her the whole map, and it lends a special weight to finally putting her ambition to rest. I think, therefore, what makes a good boss is one that is involved through much of the map, one way or the other, either from launching attacks across the map, or doing consistent hit-and-runs with Canto, or something similar. As always, great video, thanks for brightening up a lazy Sunday.

[@Profecy02]

Hard 5 Hyman with multiple health bars

[@TerminaFE]

This made me realize how I have heard people say Engage has the best and worst bosses in the series, framed entirely by story versus gameplay circumstances. This video is a perfect example of the gameplay camp. Yet despite all the praise for the design of revival stones the same people will often mock fighting the same set of Four Hounds bosses throughout the game. From what I can gather, it is because when talking about Engage, story and gameplay have become so atomized and segmented that people don't really confront how you drain Zephia's health bar close to a dozen times specifically due to the stones. The out of map story reasons for refighting Zephia again and again is bogged down with an initial reaction of "how many times do we have to teach you this lesson". In contrast, the rinse and repeat within a battle feels fine however since it is a stimulating gameplay challenge. The dopamine you get knocking down the health bar downed is the polar opposite of seeing the boss for the third time in battle preps. I do think the "Engage gameplay good, Engage story bad" consensus needs to be interrogated more rather than taking it at face value, but I do find it funny that when specifically talking about bosses that pattern emerges.

[@Mijzelffan]

I preferred the monsters in three houses for this, I felt like having to manage your gambits and breaking those shields required more thought about positioning and who would take which action than engage where for a large part of the game I would just use emblem Edelgard to blow through their life bars with the combination of a combat art + houses unite

[@theghostcreator776]

1. Battalions are mindless, you just put one unit in one spot and another in another one then you just wack a boss until it's dead. 2. Edelgard is dlc, the game was not designed with her bracelet in mind and as such should not be considered when talking about the game's mechanics.

[@Mijzelffan]

@@theghostcreator776 that's not taking in their uses/hp. The dlc was planned and designed way in advance then put behind a paywall, it's not 2012 anymore

[@theghostcreator776]

@@Mijzelffan if there are monsters, it's stupid not to save battalions for them. DLC was most certainly not what the original game was built around, it trivializes the entire game. It's also unethical to default to judging a game's design based on dlc as some people are unable to afford the dlc.

[@Nixahma]

Honestly I really dislike how every boss on maddening is immune to break, like, what's the point of the mechanic then

[@kalru]

My favorite boss was Serena from sacred stones

[@magicfish8213]

L is my least favorite letter, too!

[@kalru]

@@magicfish8213 ?

[@naotoueda2838]

Tbh, I think Engage bosses aren't better than other FE bosses, specially after you have strong tools. I can warp 4 units to kill the 3 health bars and finish the chapter in Engage for example. I think what lacks in FE is better maps. Maps that the challenge is reaching the boss and not fighting the boss. Of course having warp to warp skip isn't a problem if the warp is limited when the maps have rewards for playing the chapter honestly.

[@xacmashe3852]

Removing Break on maddening is like 3H adding ambush spawns on maddening. Its lazy, its bullshit, its difficult for the sake of difficulty. Genuinely you may as well add 5 weight to every weapon on Maddening.

[@thelegacyofgaming2928]

Elincia's Gambit is actually regarded as the funnest and best designed map in Fire Emblem. Every Fire Emblem game is cheeseable, even Engage is easy. But if you choose not to cheese these games, then they become fun.

[@Ricard1807o]

I never felt the appeal to cheese maps and skip most of it by beating a boss. Sure its cool to see someone do it one time, but when playing the game i'd be thinking of all the exp loss from not fighting the regular enemy units. You could make a point that you dont need all that exp to beat the game, yet it still feels like a waste for me. Different kinds of player mindsets

[@jske60]

Enage

[@ProfessorBopper]

Captain Picard: “Come.”

[@DEATHRAGE157]

FrontMission does bosses in a better way, the OG FrontMission has the absolute BEAST of a machine, Discroll, dude kills the protag wife in the prolog, and his Wanzer(mech), is always 2-4levels of stronger than what you have at that point, and you can always beat him when he shows up, for a massive XP reward, but its never worth it, because only ONE pilot gets the XP and usually Discroll only shows up when he actually has troops with him, and yes, he charges the player units like a raging bull, if he engages a unit, that poor sucker is just dead

[@kaitohsjade6597]

Giving almost every enemy more Heatlh Bars was kinda meh to me

[@MercuryA2000]

I get nerfing effective damage and break against bosses, but I feel like gutting it entirely is really annoying. I prefer the lower difficulty's decision to just nerf effective damage a bit. It still makes using a hammer viable, just not an auto win. As for break, It just feels really annoying having them ignore it like that. I feel like it would have been better if, I dunno, they got broken during this combat, but could counter attack on the next one, while they had that free stunned round whenever you chopped off a health bar. Might still make them cheesable, but I don't like that, since they replaced the effective and crit negation items with skills, they've been steadily increasing how often bosses get them.

[@louisst-amand9207]

I don't know, to me bosses in Engage are just get around it, kick it till it's down. It's kinda boring to me.

[@joelkasik8409]

I do agree with you on boss design with regards to Engage for at least most of the chapters. My only major issue with them is that in the last few chapters (in maddening mode) the game almost forces you in the direction of warp cheesing the bosses. It also doesn’t help that the game gives you busted units (*cough Ivy, Divine dragon, Seidall and Byleth with Micaiah) and that those last few maps are so ridiculous in enemy reinforcements that cheesing feels required to have any fun. I almost got stuck on chapter 24 of my run due to stupid numbers of enemy reinforcements early on in the level and would have struggled if not for the insane power of Micaiah warping. The late game just forces you to play degenerately if you don’t want to suffer for several hours trying to figure these levels out.

[@hansgretl1787]

Three Houses monsters also had the barrier mechanic which was probably their most interesting trait. That really made you think about how, when and where to attack, especially once you understand exactly how much barrier break you get from specific kinds of attacks. If Engage's boss design carries over into future games, I want them to implement those kinds of mechanics as well.

[@JobyPlays]

on hard mode, sure. On Maddening mode it's beyond dumb af imo to have EVERY boss unbreakable and if they're a type that would have effectiveness suddenly NOPE, no effectiveness, making them a complete stat wall with multiple hp bars was... really silly. And superfluous later on when you get crit machines with reliable 100% chances rolling in to just take 3 swings to kill them and waste your time that way. Engage tried, I'm not upset at it for trying, but it's weird to say they fixed it when they just drew the process out as long as possible.

[@therepeat]

Man I love everything about Engage on Maddening except not being able to break bosses. It's just so baffling. If they were worried about bosses being cheesed, why stop at removing one of the game's coolest new core mechanics? Why not also make bosses immune to crits, and freeze, and poison, and Dual Assist, and Draconic Hex, and Engage Attacks? Why not give them all 3H's Distant Counter? Why is BREAK of all things the line they didn't want to cross? EXP is such a commodity on Maddening that you're only training so many units, and you can only afford so many Second Seals. You can't exactly have full teams of units capable of running long break chains on every boss in the game. I find I usually have 2-5 units of a particular weapon type on my team, which would not be a crazy amount of breaking for any boss. Even if you tailor your team around break chaining one specific boss, what about other bosses? You can't commit to cheesing them all. It also makes the Armored bosses like Ike and Marni less unique since every boss gets their class's ability, and Leif's Adaptability on enemies is also less interesting since it doesn't really matter anymore that he always has WTA. Breaking bosses seems perfectly balanced to me, enabling *one* free attack per unit you have of the correct weapon type, versus some of the most lethal and HP-rich bosses in the series (e.g. bosses with an Emblem's delete-button attack, and midgame bosses that have more total HP than most final bosses lol). In the past I've heard people suggest "break meters" for Maddening specifically, but consider the payoff of Break: it's one free attack. One. It's not like 3H's barrier breaking where you can whale on them for the rest of the turn, it's ONE free attack. Break is perfect as-is. In the end, the bosses are still easily dealt with by, say, Axe Power + Wrath Panette, so why intsys felt the need to prevent Break cheese just boggles my mind. It almost feels like, when they were first designing the game and came up with Break, someone said "whoa that sounds overpowered against bosses" and then they just assumed it would be. But I wasn't one of their playtesters so what do I know. Maybe they found it did end up being overpowered somehow, even though the boss breaking we do have on Hard mode doesn't give that indication whatsoever.

[@munchratt]

Very good video! I think its a little silly when games take tools away from the player to make the game more difficult! Having cool tools to use, and being able to use those tools is part of the fun! In the Persona games, bosses are very often ENTIRELY IMMUNE to all status effects like poison, sleep, freeze, etc. Suddenly, when you enter a boss fight, tools that you can use in every other part of the game don't work anymore, and leaves you with LESS DECISIONS to make than a normal fight! I would rather have a boss fight that takes the tools i have into account and plans difficulty AROUND those tools rather than one that takes away those tools entirely.

[@RobotGuy405]

I personally think not being able to break bosses in Maddening is unnecessary. It's part of the games core system, so the fact that the enemy basically says "nuh uh" just takes away strategic options when you need them most. The challenge of that difficulty should be how you apply that strategy to it, considering the various stat differences in both bosses and the players army will make various situation play out way differently.

[@meangirlovania]

bruh have you *seen* Inuyasha tho

[@ProfessorBopper]

I’ve seen the first 30 or so episodes. pretty fun

[@JR384]

Honestly, I'd have preferred if Break was like, a percentage chance to happen when an enemy has Stalwart or Veteran+ or what have you. Instead of outright negated, it brings a sort of luck factor into it; which can keep the boss interesting while also keeping them challenging. Alternatively to the percentage chance being luck based, having it be build-up like damage in Smash. The more damage you do to a boss, the more likely you are to Break them next combat, meaning you'll get one free combat round with them just to nail home some more damage.

[@chrisgusky76]

No they shouldn't because they're game mechanics the game is built on them stripping can make it harder sure but it also makes them less fun and interesting and takes away the things that distinguishes them from all the previous ones and that is the equivalent of removing it's very soul and can we really be ok with doing that for a little bit of extra " challenge" I don't think so but that's just me.

[@maagic2031]

I am not a big fan of Maddening removing break. On top of axing one of the more interesting systems of the game, it also just makes some tankier bosses like CH10 Hyacinth feel like a complete dice rolls if you aren't poised to throw multiple engage attacks at him, so I end up never using some of the game's more interesting functions until I know I'm at the end of a map. On the topic of engage attacks, I really like FE bosses who have some non-combat way of fucking with you like the dark engage attacks or the judge actions from RD's engame or even the way that Nemesis' 10 elites buff him up. I think it would be interesting for a game to play around with this idea of "you can TECHNICALLY ignore this stationary boss, but they'll be making your life hell if you do so".

[@mintx1720]

Disagree on effective weapons. Modern effective weapons are usually not that strong with a few exceptions. They also have the drawback of being heavy and inaccurate, which is noticible against bosses. Broken effective weapon strategies usually comes from broken interactions like Lance of Ruin + Knightkneeler. Also a lot of easy, die to effective weapons boesses are actually horrendously stated.

[@parkerdixon-word6295]

I was already poo-pooing bosses being immune to bonus damage on higher difficulties, so clearly I'm in the camp that bosses shouldn't be immune to the game's mechanics. The system on lower difficulties, where they don't take *as much* bonus damage, seems like better game design- they still *interact with the game's systems* , but that interaction being reduced lets the system still be *used* without being open to being *abused* by min-maxers.

[@Noahs_Chair]

9:27 *this is the moment he knew he fuck up* I personally prefer older bosses because I feel the multiple health bars makes bosses drag on for longer than they need to. It also clearly did not stop us from doing the million of cheese strats to blow them up. I just feel like the issues with bosses is how Level design works in Fe with enemys only testing the player combat skills aka math skills. The best bosses are usually never the focus or main objective of a map and I think Engage kill the boss marathon making it still fall apart showcases this is the biggest issue.