Promote everyone at level 20 they said. It will make everything easier they said.>spend an extra hour per character grinding (x20)>can't buy stronger weapons because they're for promoted classes only>strong characters only do 1 HP damage in later battles because of older weapons>don't finish promoting everyone until close to endgame>stat benefits are inconsequential by endgame compared to promoting at level 10>turns a 20 hour game into 40 hoursI gave it a try but it was a miserable experience. Always promote at level 10, anons.
>>12697136>they saidWho said?I played the game blind just using my own judgement and had a great time, only small problem I had was that the dragon you get near the end of the game isn't useful unless you do something specific iirc, I tried to level him up and use him a lot but it was never useful
>>12697156>Who said?FAQ writers and people on various forums. I've always promoted at lvl 10 but just wanted to try 20 this time based on the recommendations. Lesson learned.>the dragonI usually give him the power ring and he's sort of useful for a while but I always end up replacing him. You do have to grind some characters more than others to make them useful but it's rarely worth it unless you're just set on using that specific character.
>>12697156>Who said?It was the touted word of mouth for the game for a long time, and as he says, you would see that written in FAQs back in the day.However, I really don't know what the logic is for that, or if it's at all true.
>>12697174>FAQ writers and people on various forumsSaid people are always huffing their own farts and minmaxing enjoyment out of the game
>>12697242Yeah, but the question is if this minmaxing actually works or not.
>>12697247FAQ people will pick an absolutely miserable early & middle game as long as they can do 1 HP of extra damage against the final boss
>>12697254So promoting at 20 really is just a lot of extra grind but for minimal payoff, then?
>>12697259I can't tell you about this specific case because I'm not into SRPGs but in my experience with other games you'll be given absolutely shite advice in the form of walkthroughs with the goal of making you 1% more powerful in the late game at the cost of enjoyment throughout 99% of the game
I only did a level 20 promotion run once, and it absolutely killed my momentum, so much so that I couldn't finish the game.Some characters seems to suffer with this gameplay style more than others, notably Zylo and Bleu (non-weapon characters) went to shit with late promotions.
it depends on the character. mages tend to be a bit better off grinding to 20 - but it really depends on what spells they learn and what version you are playing. Characters like Zylo/Gong etc - they want to promote when they are doing high damage already since they won't get the bonus damage of a new weapon to overcome the promotion losses - this helps mitigate the high damage drop off so both should prob promote immediately at 10. Personal rule of thumb is - always promote when a new weapon you can't use until promoted is first made available - Chapter 5 is a great example of a time when everyone should promote - the enemies don't really get stronger here - but you might wanna promote even earlier than that because the growths might not have kicked in to make chapter 6's initially much stronger enemies managable. So Chapter 4 might be the best time to promote (you even have the heat axe in chapter 4 to convince you that you should promote the dwarves immediately) - since whilst it does introduce the strong boss enemies we haven't seen since Marionette, Elliot and Balbazak are not that tough in comparison to the monster that is Kane and Mishaela without using the Light Sword to 1 vs 1 her.
>>12697273So Chapter 3/4 for most units is ideal - the enemies are mostly all the same levels of strength from 3-5 - it's 6 where the big jump happens and then 7 introduces the torch eyes for the rest of the game and other similar enemies like the Chimera/Blue Dragon/Armed Skeleton join in to add guaranteed damage to compensate for some of your units insane defense stats. Only big issue is the Laser Eye fight for early 3 promotions but that is always a big death rush to the end of the bridge then an easy follow up - mages are the ones who mostly suffer for that - specifically Anri prob always eats shit there - Tao can typically survive one shot. You even have stuff like the Power Spear to compensate for your centaurs getting weaker on promotion by giving them range if you do promote a ton early in Chapter 3. Same for the Heat Axe with Gort/Luke.
>>12697273This is fair, but it still bothers me because it obfuscates character progression.I like to keep my party on a similar level, so I can clearly tell which character is the weakest and which one gets kicked out when a new one joins the party.But then, if I have a character that was promoted at level 10, and a character that was promoted at level 20, and now both of them are at level 5 post-promotion, is it even fair to compare them? Am I kicking a great character out of my party because I did a shitty job at building them?
>>12697289The character who promoted at 10 likely started growing way faster than the one who waited to 20 - one is likely gonna be 10/15 whilst the other is 20/1 and that is why the 20/1 feels so weak in comparison - you have way better growths after promotion than prior and once they kick in whilst fighting weaker enemies they stay strong for the rest of the game. Zylo I feel has like two uses for instance - you either promote him early so he takes a minor shift in performance or you use him like a FE Jeigan and don't promote him and drop him when he falls off and mostly use him on maps you need a guy who can run FAST through mountains and forests on and hit the flanks hard whilst keeping up the late game hits. Gong/Zylo/Hans/Diane/Gort/Luke and then the Fliers + Guntz and a few others really favor the forest/mountain maps.A bunch of characters are kinda like this - a lot of centaurs can be amazing on join time or around chapter 4 but then you don't really want them that much in Chapter 6 when you get to Kane unless they got promoted early.Tbh you can kinda just use whoever you want however you want and then just kick or keep depending on when you promoted. The late game characters tend to be a bit iffy that don't join promoted - anyone who joins after 5 who isn't Musashi/Hanzou in the original release. Blue is amazing if you do level him and prob the strongest at high levels but he is a pain to get there. Lyle is in a similar position but at least eventually gets the weapons he needs. Adam is just frankly unusable - if he could do the laser eye thing every enemy was doing at that point he'd be usable. Alef and Torasu are mages and can just sneak by via magic usage. Granted you can always pass around Dark Sword/heat axe/soul blade/rings etc.
Consider this:>Most of the stat gain from leveling from 10 to 20 disappear with the promotion stat drop. >Level ups after promotion give higher stat boosts than those before.>You will not reach level 20 promoted either without massive grinding.>Level 10/15 characters are strong enough to beat the game.Promote at level 10 to make the game less painful.
A lot of metafags tend to hyperfocus on hypothetical endgame potential instead of what's useful in there here and now
>>12697247Doesn't it depend on the game? I'm pretty sure 1 and 2 have different formulas regarding both growth and whats lost when promoting (no idea about the others,) so its pointless in 1 but makes you busted in 2. Either way, the games aren't super difficult so you don't really need to worry about it either way. Just play the games normally and save minmaxing shit for your 70th playthrough, anon.
>>12697247Well what's the metric? If the last few battles are easier but the total play time is 40 hours, compared to a typical 20 hour play through when promoting at level 10, was it actually easier or did you just make it way fucking harder than it needed to be?>>12697259The reason it's suggested is because you stop getting huge stat boosts past level 20 (both unpromoted and promoted), so by promoting at 20 and then grinding to 20 with the new class, you'll get 40 solid stat boosts compared to the 30 you'd get promoting at level 10.The problem is that the stat difference isn't that big after all. And in most play throughs you don't even need to reach level 20 promoted to beat the final boss, so it's actually pointless anyway.
>>12697425Would I still get a bit of a boost by promoting at 12, or does that matter fuckall and 10 is just as good?
>>12697439Are you asking about Tao because I think she gets Blaze 3 or 4 or the Attack up spell at level 12? She's like the one notable exception for holding off on instant promoting depending on version cause I remember Anri has to wait till 18 for Freeze 3 which is terrible for her growths and performance if you don't decide to instant promote instead.
>>12697445I meant just in general, the last time I played SF was like a decade ago or longer, so I don't recall any fine details.>depending on versionI always was quite fond of the GBA port, because I really like the spritework and music in that one, though I did emulate the original way back in the 90s. Maybe I should give that one a go again some day when I feel the pull.
>>12697528You may as well just bench all the mages in the GBA version. Rebalancing and oversights screwed them over.Most notably their spell progression doesn't take pre-promotion levels into account.For example, in the Genesis version Anri learns Freeze 4 at level 23. This means if you promote her at level 10 she'll learn the spell at level 13 after promotion.In the GBA version she won't learn that spell until she hits level 23 promoted, no matter her level before promotion. It's a 10 levels delay at best and 20 levels delay at worse case scenario.
>>12697562Oof. Is there any romhack which fixes that stuff?
>>12697574the genesis version. the gba version intentionally nerfs them
>>12697575I want to still also play the GBA version though, there's gotta be some IPS patch or something.
>>12697562I think the mages are still great in the RotDD port. Anri definetely suffers a bit with the grind to freeze 3 but is still one of the better units to deploy - just cause Freeze 2 & Bolt 1/2 are very consistent AOE damage. Mawlock (character cards to give double turns) and Narsha (magic boosting can give up to 80% magic damage buff to 5 characters which is absurd on Max/Tao/Anri/Domingo/Alef with the level 3 variants of a spell) give major buffs specially combined.
>>12697136>gave it a try but it was a miserable experience. Always promote at level 10, anons.Thanks for the tip. I also got bamboozled by this.
I didn't even learn that you could grind in the game until the very last battle. I thought all your xp is gone when you redo a battle.
>>12697268>notably Zylo and Bleu (non-weapon characters) went to shit with late promotions.almost objectively false. the BEST characters to promote at 20 are the ones that dont use weapons. due to the wonkiness of rng in sf1, you might still get bad level ups for one, but it is significantly less likely if you promote at 20 for them, and more likely to accidentally turn out useless if you promote at 10 for them. as a chronic grinder and level 20 promoter, zylo is CONSISTENTLY an absolute powerhouse. i can recall only one or two times that he happened to struggle and suck shit, and it was when i promoted him at 10.
>>12697653Yeah but he's gonna be level 1 when you need him to be higher level than that promoted and have no weapon to compensate. Going back to level 1 when it's Dullahans/Golems and other more durable enemies hurts his usefulness. Going back to level 1 during chapter 4/5 - hurts far less. He is gonna get major growths to compensate for it quickly and then keep up.You are just getting those growths way sooner since you level up far faster at level 1-15 promoted than you do 11-20 unpromoted.
>>12697408nothing is lost when promoting in 2. you pretty much only/always gets 1s on level up, sometimes 2s. i dont think you can get 3s pre-promotion, but its been a long time since my last replay. if i remember correctly, sf1 actually rubberbands a bit if you promote at 20, causing more explosive growth in the early levels post promo, but sf2 does not. promoting late in sf2 is basically just adding some free flat stats to your final result.
>>12697664when i promote him at 20 (the kane battle), he's still capable of hitting hard. considering im usually grinding bleu on the gargoyles, he also gets time to get a few post-promo levels as well, and its smooth sailing. >you level up fasterlmao no you dont. every level still costs 100exp (no rollover in sf1 either), and enemies that give you less than 48 exp at level 20(pre-promo) will give you less than 48 exp at level 10 (post-promo). monsters give the same experience for pre-promo 10-20 as they do to post-promo 1-10. if you push to a later battle/chapter and promote at like level 13, then for the first few levels, all of the monsters are giving you 48, because you're trying to catch up. doing it at 20 that segment of catch up is longer.
>>12697653I still have my save, bro.You're not going to convince me when I have this in my hands.Promoting Zylo at level 20 killed his momentum.I've played this game twice before and Zylo was a powerhouse twice. Except this time when I tried to minmax and it just sucked.
>>12697709sir, i can tell where are from the tileset (battle 23, tower of the ancients) and you are 4 battles too late to be promoting at 20 like that. you can hit 20 at battle 19 (the kane fight) and enemies are literally RIGHT THERE next to spawn to do it with. >i tried to minmaxlol no you didnt. you waited too long.
>>12697760So you're saying promoting at level 20 is the best but also it has gotchas that will ruin your playthrough if you don't do it right?Promoting at level 10 requires no grinding, has no gotchas, and it just works, you know.
>>12697765>it has gotchas that will ruin your playthrough if you don't do it rightif you wait too long, of course it will be a problem. >Promoting at level 10 requires no grinding, has no gotchas, and it just worksuh-huh. good luck with that power drop if you wait too long to promote at 10 too. plenty of characters require extensive catering to be useful. you have no argument.
>>12697769>you have no argument.My dude, your argument is "being level 30 in a level 20 area solves the problem".
>>12697709you're not min/maxing at all. this save file is one battle after yours.
>>12697774your complaint is that you're level 20 in a level 25-30 area and not strong enough.
>>12697782Holy fucking shit anon.I said level 30 as a joke, but you're actually level 40.You're literally the autistic metafag that anons hypothesized this whole thread.You created a miserable experience for pointless endgame stats.I'm somehow even more convinced that promoting at level 10 is the correct way to play this game, I do not want that kind of game experience.
Brother. This ain't FE you don't have to min\max your promotion gains SF's designed so you can mostly wing it
>>12697774>>12697783actually by monster experience, its a level 30-40 area, considering im in teens-to-twenties on my file. you literally reached level 20 without understanding monster experience rates and are now complaining that you promoted too late and are too weak.
>>12697790nevermind, im dumb. its 25-30. i was doing the math wrong. im tired.>>12697787yes, my particular file is actual min/maxing (and not even maxed, lol). in that specific file, i was also leveling adam (for kicks/novelty), and have him at promo level 9. i KNOW what im talking about when i talk about promoting at 20, and you literally did it wrong. you waited too long. if you promote somebody at 10 too late, they can very easily have a bad time too. a lot of times its better to wait until 13-15ish to promote, both for the stat buffer against the drop, as well as waiting for a new weapon to be available to further compensate. waiting until 20 is literally for gigastats and grinders, but promoting at ANY level too late will result in a tough time.
>he actually grinded to the extent the FAQ autists told him toI was going to say "first time heh? " but then again even the first times I didn't do this.
>>12697665Yeah, I just remember it being a bigger deal in 2 than 1 for multiple reasons, even though there still isn't much justification to do so there. It can be silly to see how wildly broken some units can get with late promotion though. Only time I'd consider it worthwhile in 1 would be something like the GBA port's turbonerfed characters like Bleu maybe, but if it rubberbands to diminish returns it probably wouldn't pull him out of the dumpster anyway. They massacred my boy.>>12697575The balance changes were pretty bad, but its a neat version for the extra characters and such. Genesis is definitely better, but I can't bring myself to hate it.>>12697802Nah, they do now unfortunately. People with backlogs are allergic to playing a game more than once, so they try to be as "optimal" as possible in a single playthrough now. Considering its SF1, the game is simple and forgiving enough that anyone should just be going with the units they like/are effective, but here we are.
>>12697247You have to think about the era the FAQ was written in. In the 90s to 2000s, almost everyone focused on long term character development and what would put characters into the absolute best possible state by the end of the game. It wasn't until the mid 2010s did short term development start to gain prominence, where instead of worrying about the absolute peak a character could attain, people started looking at what the most difficult encounters were and built for them specifically.For example, FFVII FAQs used to stress the need to go get the Knights of the Round, find ultimate weapons, big materia, limit breaks, etc. but in reality you can walk into the final boss woefully underprepared and kill him pretty easily. Same for Ruby/Emerald, instead of grinding, just exploit the enemy design and AI and kill them with a single character at a low level. 4x magic+demi works just as well as anything advanced.
>>12698328>just exploitYou didn't beat the game.
I always promoted at like level 12 because I'm impatient and there's no way I'm playing without being able to use all the new weapons.
>>12697581>I want to still also play the GBA version though,Why? It doesn't add anything and it doesn't look better
>>12698328>4x magic+demi works just as well as anything advanced.b-b-but it takes 3 minutes longer killing emeral than all three characters at level 99 with maxed out stats in 7777 lucky status with counter + mime & mime + hp absorb & kotr + sneak attack & final attack + phoenix! who cares if you have to play the game for an additional 100 hours to get to that point, the battle is shorter!
>>12698868You could have taken two seconds to look up the differences beyond the balance changes. Most people agree the original is the better version, no need to be disingenuous about it.
>>1269713620 is ridiculous, 14-15 and promoting a few people each battle is far smarter.
>>12697136I have yet to play an SRPG where promoting as soon as its available has had a noticeable negative effect on my ability to complete the game. I always just do it instantly. Min/maxing your xp gained is reserved for powergaming second playthoughs if youre into that sort of thing.
>>12699780Is there any franchises besides Shining Force and Fire Emblem that do that?Optional promotion at early level that resets your current level?
>>12699975>Optional promotion at early level that resets your current level?Ogre battleLangrisserIm not an SRPG expert but I would wager that in games with promotion mechanics the resetting level is standard.
>>12699983Don't know about Ogre Battle, but in Langrisser you always promote at exact level 10.
>>12699993Ogre Battle is more complicated in that you need to reach a certain level but also fulfill specific substat requirements to promote. You mention optional early promotion but when it comes to Ogre Battle its actually more like you better promote as soon as possible or you can miss your chance forever.
>>12699975I want to say Vandal Hearts. But it's been a while.
>>12697136i promoted my Pegaseus horsemen a few levels late in SF2, and they were like flying tanks with a Spear equipped. pretty good.for mages i guess it's pointless.
Just grind at the gate using herbs then egress. It's not fast but it works.
>>12698258>People with backlogs are allergic to playing a game more than once, so they try to be as "optimal" as possible in a single playthrough now.they should read speedrun FAQs instead. and use tools if they don't care about "cheating".
>>12698337he did
>>12699993>>12699983Langrisser 1 and 2 can delay promotion to higher classes with Runestoning. Runestone changes the character class back to the basic class when you reach lvl 10 for current class.but Runestones are best used with level skipping cheatcode and in L1/Warsong, it's quite pointless ,because each class has fixed stats that don't carry over to the next class.
>>12700012for Ogre Battle you MIGHT wanna delay or stop promotion just so you have cheaper units. the "best" dragon classes also have crap movement type which makes them move slowly over normal ground.there's also the issue of using units you levelled up all the way from level 1. those units usually have higher stats but they're more expensive to deploy than high level units you buy. you would wanna have some cheaper units just to explore the map or delay enemies.
>>12697156>Who said?trollsand OP fell for it
>>12701643You'll run out of money and it really only works for healers. Egressing repeatedly works just fine on its own.
>>12697136>spend an extra hourOH NOpathetic faggotg LOSER zoomer shitstain with no girlfriend and no life and no real career and nothing to do with his free time has to sPeNd aN eXtRa hOuR playing his hobby and he's pissing shitting blood mad about itjesus christ you're fucking pathetic. what the fuck is wrong with human trash like you?
>>12702864Are you retarded?
