Since this is #fedl and there's been various whining in chat in the endless wave of FE conversations... what are some FE maps you like and think are well-designed? What are some that suck?
Note of course that this is subjective - a map that forces you to do something strange & unexpected some people might love and others might hate for the exact same reason. This also clearly isn't the same as strategic depth - roflstomping everything with the Black Knight in Radiant Dawn C1-9 is not exactly challenging, but it's cool, so who cares. Maps that do something unexpected, have several ways to solve them, sell the plot / theme of the map, and are in a good challenge spot are probably good. Maps that are slow & boring, go against the theoretical overarching plot, and grindfests are probably bad.
Some maps I like in no particular order:
* Elincia's Gambit (Radiant Dawn 2-E). Epic scale and lots of fun. I wish they'd skipped the silly part about Elincia fleeing the capital, but whatever. Lots of competent enemies, but lots of things in your favor too - chokepoints, high ground, distraction soldiers, flyers with Canto harrying the oncoming soldiers then getting back to high ground. If you suffered a lot of deaths, you can play the map like a coward and probably be okay; if you're more confident in yourself, you can try and kill Ludveck. Up to you. Some of RD's better music, as well. It's also like the only map in Radiant Dawn that is challenging yet doesn't give you some kind of overpowered "I win" character or advantage. Elincia & Geoffrey are pretty awesome, but they CAN die, especially Elincia if you aren't careful against the Crossbows. Great stuff.
* Blood Runs Red (Path of Radiance, C9). I dunno, I just like this one, though it's a tad FAQ-baity. Moving boss! Moving boss you don't technically have to kill! Vigilantes you can smash through if you want to avoid the real enemies for some reason (in a game with no grinding, not a good option, but it's there). And the BK randomly showing up and murdering any units unwise enough to hang out near the center, and even move on Hard mode. Not to mention murdering Zihark and/or Jill if you want to just be weird and see some alternate conversations (especially fun to have Lethe do both murders - she gets dialogue in each!).
* Renewal (Awakening C10). Just a good balance of options for this map. You can take it slow & safe and let really really good items get away on the thieves, or you can be dangerous and push forward - but you have some tools to make it safer, and archers aren't THAT common so your peg knight rush isn't doomed. Ninja reinforcements as usual, but at least this is a map where it's very very obvious where they'll be coming from, which is something. Great music, too, nicely sets the mood, even if they push the "everyone loves Emmeryn" thing way too hard.
Honorable mention: Invisible Ties (C23, Awakening). Wow, FE doing setup plot competently? What is this. Cute map setup with the barrier, great music, thematically strong with following through from the Prologue. Only an honorable mention because I'd definitely have rigged Validar's stats to be proportional to Chrom/Avatar - he's way too easy as is, though they obviously didn't want to stop no-Chrom no-Avvie playthroughs - and that the "safe" way to play the map on Classic is to blockade the west stairways and wait until reinforcements stop spawning in the dangerous east, which is kind of lame.
I might also have given an honorable mention to the mission in Shadow Dragon where invincible Gharnef is chasing down your characters like the T-1000, except that he starts kind of far-off and then disappears of his own accord anyway. If they'd have had him chasing you the whole time, and have him not quite so easy to trap behind a river, that'd have been pretty cool and something different! (Better hurry up and fight that boss...)
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Some maps I don't like, also in no order:
* Traps (FE6 Chapter 6). Yawn. You can probably finish this map in 6 turns if you play to just kill the boss, but no, there are a zillion doors to open and one thief to do it. There is no actual hurry to do so aside from Cath theoretically stealing your shinies (easily slain or talked to though), so you can clear all the regular bad guys, then slooooooowly march your thief around opening doors, preferably with an army at his back because some doors have soldiers inside to kill. And then there's a zillion treasure chests to open up. So the mission takes 30 turns or so since god forbid we loot the place AFTER we kill the lord. As an extra bonus the trigger for the final reinforcements is FAQ-bait: rather than a turn counter, you have to move all your units to the top of the map (Rather than just idling them and ignoring them). Since this is a game with no grinding, you WANT the reinforcements to appear. Sigh.
* Rivals Collide (Radiant Dawn 3-7), aka Elf's favorite map. Strategically it's a total dud: survive for 10 turns against an enemy who sits stock still, so it's secretly a "how much XP can you loot from meaningless deaths" map. I could sort of understand it if the DB was overwhelmingly powerful and this was an optional challenge a la trying to kill Mercs in 3-13, but they're not. Anyway, Chapter 3 plot is usually stupid, and this is no exception, but style COULD still have been salvaged. Radiant Dawn clearly wants there to be this big Greil / DB rivalry... and then *fails* at setting up and selling it. This should have been a big fated badass confrontation! Hold it back a little, have them nipping at each other's heels for awhile, and then make it personal somehow; play the rivalry up. Have some style - Sothe vs. Ike in an empty hallway in a cathedral or something. Ideally control the underdog - so either Sothe vs. Ike, or Ike vs. the Black Knight. But the BK doesn't really factor in unless you want him to. And of course the game isn't going to let Sothe show that he loves Micaiah enough to defeat his badass idol Ike because Ike10 is the greatest being to ever walk the planet. Sigh.
* From Pain, Awakening (Radiant Dawn 3-E). See above! Another map you can win via spamming End Turn if you want - or it not, darn close to it, so another strategic dud. This MIGHT have been acceptable if it was being used to make a point, but it doesn't really work. To get pretentious: one of the powerful and interesting things about video games-as-art is the ability to make the player do something they don't want to do, if they want to advance. Incinerate your beloved companion cube. Work with Mr. Suspicious Not The Traitor. You the player KNOW it's going to end in fire, but you have to continue on anyway. So... you're going to make me help end the world. Isn't that supposed to be a BAD thing? And our heroes keep running forward into oblivion? And we are actively encouraged by the system to get the kills ourselves and deny our bloodthirsty allies the kills because yum delicious XP as the world dies? This is hugely dissonant. I *wanted* to just spam end turn, and even worse, I could have, but I wouldn't been rewarded for doing so, not even with different dialogue or a cutscene. Blah. They needed to do one of two things:
A) Sell the clash better, and clearly make it an understandable fight that for whatever reason the implications are clear to the player, but not the characters, who think the herons have the medallion under control. You need a better excuse than "We are invading Daien for god knows what reason* why are they fighting back I don't get it." (*Yes I know the official reason, it is stupid.) Then you the player see the death counter and know what's going on, but the characters are clueless - you get to watch the tragedy unfold in front of you. (And maybe allow fights with the big enemy heavies, too, unlike in-game.)
B) Have some scene before the mission along the lines of MIST: "Ike! We've made a terrible mistake! We started a worldwide war which will unseal chaos according to the prophecy, and it's grown out of control!" TITANIA: "We have to stop the war now before it's too late!" And then you run around with a "Talk" command trying to get everyone else to stop fighting, which will be largely useless of course, and you can watch in horror as the the number of casualties ticks upward while futiley attempting to save as many as you can. And then award bonus XP based on the number of troops whose live you *saved* rather than lives you *took*. It's not really Fire Emblem, but it'd fit the plot better.
As is, this mission is terrible for the same reason the back third of FF13 is frustrating: both you-the-player and the characters know that course of action X is terrible and will end the world, yet they careen toward it anyway without at least stopping to say "OH GOD NO THIS SUCKS WHAT THE HELL ARE WE DOING." It's too bad because this mission at least has far more style points than Rivals Collide - what they were *trying* to do was pretty cool, it just failed.
Honorable mention: The Heart of Crimea (Radiant Dawn 3-10). I can't stick this with the stinkers above because it's okay from a strategic perspective, just wut at the plot excuse for this map. Look, here's your excuse: the Begnion army is on another country's soil without permission, Elincia tells them to GTFO, Zelgius complies, random Senator dork doesn't and decides to attack, and it's Elincia's band you control for the fight (also handing them some XP they could have used far more than the Greil Mercs). That's a great fight. Instead I get the impression they tried to do something fancy that ended up utterly incoherent - so everyone retreats, except some idiots with the Senators who want to fight, but we can't have the Gallians fight them because uh because, and Elincia is a damsel in distress despite the fact she VERY CLEARLY is still on a pegasus, so save us Ike you the best. Even if she hypothetically had truly disarmed herself - and it'd have been very easy to still have a sword unless the enemy had binoculars or something - uh why can't the class with the best movement in the game just fly away if in danger? Couldn't they have at least bothered to make civilian Elincia be in danger? Fail, scenario plotters. And then the Crimean Knights will throw away their rare charges of good stuff unnecessarily: Callil, stop wasting your Meteor shots. Sigh.
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What is this I don't even category:
* Battle Preparations, the "let's go shopping" mission in FE7. Is this the only FE mission with something approaching a chat-in-town deal? I'm glad I played on an emulator with save states, but otherwise this mission seems designed to test your OCD until you get a perfect string of Arena victories off while doing shopping... on a TIME LIMIT. Potentially cool as a change of pace if they'd included a ton more potential conversations and included some other non-combat stuff (go to the tourist site for a free support gain? I dunno.), but they didn't. Not sure if it's good or bad, but figured I'd mention it here anyway as possibly the most unique FE map I've played.
