Warp skipping

From Int's efficient run 2.0 on SF:

So, just for giggles, I started warp-skipping the game with my current army as it exists at the beginning of Chapter 15. I was curious to see how far I could make it. I don't know what I expected, but I certainly did not expect to go all the way to the end of the game, which is exactly what happened. Let me give everyone a quick run-down:

Ch. 15 - Warped Caeda to ORKO boss, Warped Marth to Seize. 1 turn.
Ch. 16 - Warped Caeda to ORKO boss, Warped Marth to Seize. 1 turn.
Ch. 17 - Let thief steal Warp staff, shot him dead with Jake/Beck for the steal. Opened door with Barst, killed stuff. Swordmaster Caeda kills boss, Marth Seizes. 3 turns.
Ch. 18 - Caeda flies to boss, ORKOs, Marth warps to Seize. 3 turns.
Ch. 19 - Bantu Warps to recruit Tiki, Marth warps to Seize. 1 turn.
Ch. 20 - Complicated strategy where I gave Sedgar a Speedwing to fight the 4 Brave Lance cavs, shot the ballista with a forged Thunderbolt, Warped Caeda/Marth/Lena near the village, got Hammerne, flew Caeda to ORKO boss and Warped Marth to Seize. 4 turns.
Ch. 21 - Hammerned a staff, Warped Caeda to ORKO boss, Warped Marth to Seize. 1 turn.
Ch. 22 - Shot boss with double thunderbolt from ballistas, did a Barst/Caeda/Sedgar combo attack, Hammerned staves, Warped Marth to Seize. 2 turns.
Ch. 23 - Warped Caeda to ORKO boss, Warped Marth to Seize. 1 turn.
Ch. 24 - Warp Tiki to suicide on boss, warped Julian to get Aum, warped Caeda to finish off boss, Warped Marth to Seize. 1 turn.
Ch. 24x - Aum'ed tiki, Warped Caeda to ORKO boss, Warped Marth to Seize. 1 turn.
Endgame - Warped Caeda to ORKO bodyguard, Tiki to suicide on Medeus, Nagi to suicide on Medeus. Barst on hand to close the deal if necessary (and he wasn't). 1 turn.


Chapter turns: 20
Total turns: 156

Technically this is by far the fastest way to complete the game, and therefore technically, the most efficient. Does everyone think we should adopt this as what generally happens on an efficient playthrough? Because if so, it would obviously have big implications. For example, Julian and Rickard would have no business being under Catria, what with her joining on the last chapter. Units like Macellan and Dolph might as well not exist as they won't be able to stop sucking before the end of the game, they would become Est-like characters. Units recruited after Ch 14, like Samson and Ymir, literally won't exist on an efficient run. etc

Personally I would be in favor of disregarding or limiting Warp skipping somehow, but if people want this to be the standard, I won't complain. I do want to know which one it's going to be, though, since Warp skipping of this extent has clearly not been considered yet.

I also only count 12 uses of Warp before Ch. 21, out of a potential 20. That means that if he felt like it, he probably could have started his run a little earlier and skipped half the game or more.

I think there's a significant case to be made for a dual tier list for FE11. One list would be the "Most Efficient Playthrough" tier list, which would take warp into account and essentially consists of "units that don't blow dicks earlygame" and "units that can feasibly use the Warp staff", while the other list would be the Non-Warp tier list, which ignores the fact that Warp even exists in favor of a game that can actually be feasibly tiered.

https://fegenesis.forummotion.com/shadow-dragon-f8/stop-sandbagging-warp-t171.htm

We are currently already assuming that we're warping past chapters via Warp, because everyone voted on it. I assume when I said "stop sandbagging warp", people thought "lolz Rena for top tier" and didn't think about how it would affect characters other than her.

I personally think the tier list has gotten far better off ever since this change. It stops putting massive amounts of weight solely on C22, and it kills class setups I never thought were efficient. My stance on being good at combat immediately or quickly > needing to be babied is reflected much more heavily (Barts anyone?) and we have actual playthrough data to go by thanks to Interceptor, IOS, and at times Mekkah.

I would rather not have a dual tier list because it'll be a terrible, horrible tier list, and it'll be less discussion aimed at the better tier list.

Warp skipping doesn't always have to be assumed, but it gives a general meaning that lategame doesn't have as big of an impact as early and midgame. Yes, I understand my stupidity on putting much greater weight on the lategame chapters, but with some of the characters in general it was due to "well, everyone has a shit period".

I dunno what this mean for Catria since apparently no one sees her in Low Mid except for me so... Lena would probably go up a bit now and maybe Barst's position as best character in the game is more solidified.

EDIT: Oh, and two Blue Skittles. Because, you know, Shiida.

Warp skipping doesn't always have to be assumed,

It's either always or never for consistency's sake. Otherwise people would change their assumptions on the fly to support certain characters.

FE3_Player wrote:

Warp skipping doesn't always have to be assumed,

It's either always or never for consistency's sake. Otherwise people would change their assumptions on the fly to support certain characters.

Yeah, you got a point. I guess I was basing that more of how you play the game more than the tier list follows.

The only problem with this is that any character who joins after Chapter 14 would be automatically bottom tier. Thats not really a fair representation of their abilities. I was fine with skipping the ridiculous chapters, but its a little too much to assume we're skipping half the game.

On one hand I'd like the tier list to reflect which characters will help you clear the game the fastest.

On the other, I don't want to auto-bottom Catria/Palla/Ymir/Etzel/Beck/Elice
/Gato, et cetera just because they come at the time we start warp skipping, and yet, that's where they have to be on the list, because they will contribute basically nothing.

So it's complicated.

Plus, call it on a personal note, it's just plain effing boring to only take the first fifteen chapters into serious consideration, this gives us less to work with than FE8 FFS.



And Darth, the only example of C22 hype I remember is Jeorge using Partia to blick Dracos. Or something like that.

It could be treated like FE10 fastforward characters. It doesn't get assumed to happen, but the sooner you can actually use Warp, the greater benefit it is to that character.

Only problem with that is that it could be assumed that anyone reclassed to a staff class could do this (eventually), otherwise it would jsut consider Rena, Wendell, Boah and Wrys. Etzel has no C (a rank off), and I don't think Maria does quite either.

So personally, it looks like what FE3 Player said...Well, that's pretty much how it's gonna happen.

Though hell, you could skip through at least 3 chapters of earlygame since Wrys could pull off C rank by any relevent time, and Rena comes with the warp staff.

Grandjackal wrote:
Though hell, you could skip through at least 3 chapters of earlygame since Wrys could pull off C rank by any relevent time, and Rena comes with the warp staff.

Why would you?

Chapter 4: Oh boy, we miss 2 characters, one of which has Excalibur, and we miss a village with gold.

Chapter 5: No Wendell if we skip it, we're stuck with 5 characters that we have no chance of suiciding with if you don't want them, and I'm pretty sure that nobody but Sheeda (maybe Barst with a Hammer or something) can one-round the boss, and Sheedia is ORKO'd, iirc.

Chapter 6: Let's miss a bunch of treasure! Yeah!

Chapter 7: No Bantu, which means no Tiki, which makes Endgame and Manaketes lategame just that much harder.

Chapter 8: You could have a case for skipping this, but you could just fly up with Sheeda and have Marth hightail it without starting the reinforcement rush. You get Roger this way, too.

Chapter 9: ... Why bother?

Chapter 10: No Maria, no Minerva, no Master Seal.

Chapter 11: No Aura, no Jake, no stat boosters.

That's already at the midgame and I don't see a single chapter worth wasting a warp on.

I won't auto-bottom characters because of warp. That definitely won't happen. What will happen is that none of the enemies within these chapters will be considered such huge gigantic threats that we end up revolving characters' lives around them.

And Darth, the only example of C22 hype I remember is Jeorge using Partia to blick Dracos. Or something like that.

More like every setup intended to exploit bow weaknesses of flyers, when in reality only two or three chapters they are a major threat in reinforcements, not accounting that we want to avoid fighting reinforcements anyway.

FE3_Player wrote:https://fegenesis.forummotion.com/shadow-dragon-f8/stop-sandbagging-warp-t171.htm

We are currently already assuming that we're warping past chapters via Warp, because everyone voted on it. I assume when I said "stop sandbagging warp", people thought "lolz Rena for top tier" and didn't think about how it would affect characters other than her.

I personally think the tier list has gotten far better off ever since this change. It stops putting massive amounts of weight solely on C22, and it kills class setups I never thought were efficient. My stance on being good at combat immediately or quickly > needing to be babied is reflected much more heavily (Barts anyone?) and we have actual playthrough data to go by thanks to Interceptor, IOS, and at times Mekkah.

I would rather not have a dual tier list because it'll be a terrible, horrible tier list, and it'll be less discussion aimed at the better tier list.

Ok, so, are you in favor of assuming this amount of Warp skipping (i.e. basically game over at Ch 15), or not? Obviously this much skipping has absolutely not been voted on or seriously considered, if it was accepted and its implications fully reflected in the tier list, then the list would be quite different (for another example, Lena is upper mid at worst just because of Hammerne).

I'm still in favor of limiting it or even doing away with it entirely, since not skipping just gives us alot more material to work with. It's basically a choice between having half the game or the entire game to discuss, and the latter seems like it would be better for discussion (for starters, there's actually something to discuss when it comes to mid-late joining units, instead of auto-bottom-tier-no-questions-asked).

FE3_Player wrote:I won't auto-bottom characters because of warp. That definitely won't happen. What will happen is that none of the enemies within these chapters will be considered such huge gigantic threats that we end up revolving characters' lives around them.

And Darth, the only example of C22 hype I remember is Jeorge using Partia to blick Dracos. Or something like that.

More like every setup intended to exploit bow weaknesses of flyers, when in reality only two or three chapters they are a major threat in reinforcements, not accounting that we want to avoid fighting reinforcements anyway.

Add in C24 and the whole Longbow ordeal on top of this.

No, I wouldn't go so far as to arge auto-bottom any character joining past C14 myself. Then again, I don't exactly like the idea of half the game being warp skipped anyhow, but I might be the only one in this boat. :/

Hey, I just said that I'm against it too >_>

Auto-bottom for certain characters is absolutely undeniable if you start skipping at Ch 15. Ymir will not be recruited on this sort of playthrough, period. Catria and Palla will be about the same as Est, or possibly even worse, as they'd have even less than time to not suck than Est does on a not-skipping playthrough. Est herself is another one that isn't recruited. etc

Ok, so, are you in favor of assuming this amount of Warp skipping (i.e. basically game over at Ch 15), or not? Obviously this much skipping has absolutely not been voted on or seriously considered, if it was accepted and its implications fully reflected in the tier list, then the list would be quite different (for another example, Lena is upper mid at worst just because of Hammerne).

Yes, I am in favor of assuming warp use. Maybe not to such an extreme because Warp can still be argued for uses other than chapter skipping.

I'm still in favor of limiting it or even doing away with it entirely, since not skipping just gives us alot more material to work with. It's basically a choice between having half the game or the entire game to discuss, and the latter seems like it would be better for discussion (for starters, there's actually something to discuss when it comes to mid-late joining units, instead of auto-bottom-tier-no-questions-asked).

We've already discussed lower tiers to death, and people still find ways to discuss them. Low tier discussion was always among the worst pre-warp, because it became more about "how do I save this piece of crap" instead of "how does this character contribute efficiently" without the realization that some characters simply can't play efficiently.

Auto-bottom for certain characters is absolutely undeniable if you start skipping at Ch 15. Ymir will not be recruited on this sort of playthrough, period. Catria and Palla will be about the same as Est, or possibly even worse, as they'd have even less than time to not suck than Est does on a not-skipping playthrough. Est herself is another one that isn't recruited. etc

These are realities that would be true even without Warp. Apparently you can clear C14 fast enough that Paola and Katua can't catch up, and most people kill Est for EXP. This doesn't stop people from assuming they're recruited and trying to contribute efficiently.

Yes, I am in favor of assuming warp use. Maybe not to such an extreme because Warp can still be argued for uses other than chapter skipping.

How much it's being used needs to be clearly defined, then. Since as you said yourself, unless there is a clear and consistent standard, people will manipulate assumptions about Warp on the fly to boost or sandbag certain characters.

These are realities that would be true even without Warp. Apparently you can clear C14 fast enough that Paola and Katua can't catch up, and most people kill Est for EXP. This doesn't stop people from assuming they're recruited and trying to contribute efficiently.

And on a normal run, Catria and Palla can be trained up a bit and promoted and then they can do something.

On the game-over-at-15 run, they do nothing, end of story. Anyone who does anything is higher than they are. You can't have them "trying to contribute efficiently" on a run that starts skipping at 15, it's difficult or impossible to have them do anything at all. Again, for starters, the thieves would be ahead of them for sure.

As for someone like Ymir, Warp skipping all the time adds alot to how much it costs to recruit him. Now you need at least 2 Warp uses and 1 extra turn to recruit him without wasting more turns; 1 Warp use to get Marth to him, another use to get a Warp user over to Ymir, and a turn for Marth to talk to Ymir before seizing. Considering that after recruitment Ymir will literally do nothing and not contribute anything at all, it's not worth your time to recruit him in the first place. He's bottom tier, along with probably Dolph/Mac/Tomas and then everyone from Ch 14 onwards.

The difference is that, even if you have a gross system sort of deal where the unit in question is deployed constantly after recruitment just for the sake of comparison, units recruited from Ch 14 onwards still do nothing. You can go ahead and field Catria in Ch 15-final, but with every chapter ending in 1-2 turns, and Catria having nothing to do with how fast you finish the chapter, her contributions remain completely negligible. On a "normal" playthrough this is not the case.

The only solution I can see for both me and those that don't like characters auto-bottomed is if the chapters can be played efficiently without warp that people can't just assume any character is viable.

Otherwise, the tier list will continue to work the way it's working now, warp only puts less weight on the significance of the enemies (no longer a big deal to need 20 AS to double Paladins), as opposed to denying characters being able to contribute.

The only solution I can see for both me and those that don't like characters auto-bottomed is if the chapters can be played efficiently without warp that people can't just assume any character is viable.

Huh? I don't see what you're proposing or trying to say here.

Btw, it's not that I'm unwilling to accept skipping from Ch 15-final; I'd rather not, but if most people favor that, it's cool. What really needs to happen is just for something to be clearly decided about it.

Huh? I don't see what you're proposing or trying to say here.

Can you tell me what's confusing about it?

Btw, it's not that I'm unwilling to accept skipping from Ch 15-final; I'd rather not, but if most people favor that, it's cool. What really needs to happen is just for something to be clearly decided about it.

I *can* clearly decide. It's not a matter of clear decision, it's a matter of people disagreeing with it that may cause me to change it.

Since I'm using my phone...

Erm CATS, read that Palla and Catria comparison where Catria doesn't "win" until C20, and beforehand they're semicomparable w/pretty hefty favoritism (I assumed 8 Catria in 16 which is suggesting 3-5 levels in just one chapter). After C20 Catria can only "win" if she's ~10/7, NA version at least. Subtract 2 levels for JAP, and that's because Catria is doubling Paladins.

Palla isn't very good after C20. Heck even in 19 she's a little meek as Heroes have Killing Edges.

I just think the only changes should be that

1) Late game wins become less important (As mentioned before, 20 AS by C20 isn't as essential)
2) Characters with access to C staves with little effort move up (Boa for example, somebody like Curate Vyland is still pretty much out of luck)

I *can* clearly decide. It's not a matter of clear decision, it's a matter of people disagreeing with it that may cause me to change it.

That's the thing, we need to decide whether it's going to be changed or not. Although really, something should change no matter what, as the current state of affairs simply seems to be a general sense of "lategame wins are less important," which isn't clearly defined at all. At the minimum, we should pick a certain chapter and say that from that chapter on, the game is skipped.

Maybe we should hold a poll or something.

Erm CATS, read that Palla and Catria comparison where Catria doesn't "win" until C20, and beforehand they're semicomparable w/pretty hefty favoritism (I assumed 8 Catria in 16 which is suggesting 3-5 levels in just one chapter). After C20 Catria can only "win" if she's ~10/7, NA version at least. Subtract 2 levels for JAP, and that's because Catria is doubling Paladins.

Palla isn't very good after C20. Heck even in 19 she's a little meek as Heroes have Killing Edges.

I'm pretty sure I've said nothing at all about Catria vs Palla, and I don't know what you're talking about.

Characters with access to C staves with little effort move up (Boa for example, somebody like Curate Vyland is still pretty much out of luck)

Curate Vyland should be able to get C Staves before Ch 15, while still being helpful beforehand if you're using a small team (which seems to be favored by most people).

Erm CATS, read that Palla and Catria comparison where Catria doesn't "win" until C20, and beforehand they're semicomparable w/pretty hefty favoritism (I assumed 8 Catria in 16 which is suggesting 3-5 levels in just one chapter). After C20 Catria can only "win" if she's ~10/7, NA version at least. Subtract 2 levels for JAP, and that's because Catria is doubling Paladins.

Palla isn't very good after C20. Heck even in 19 she's a little meek as Heroes have Killing Edges.

I'm pretty sure I've said nothing at all about Catria vs Palla, and I don't know what you're talking about.

And on a normal run, Catria and Palla can be trained up a bit and promoted and then they can do something.

Yeah, stating that the two can "do something" on a normal run, not comparing them against each other in any way, which is what you seemed to be doing. If you have a point, could you explain it a bit better?

Can you tell me what's confusing about it?

if the chapters can be played efficiently without warp that people can't just assume any character is viable.

First off, what do you mean by "if the chapters can be played efficiently without warp?" As in, if the chapter can be completed in the same number of turns with or without warp? I'm fairly sure that never occurs starting from about the time that Int began warp-skipping on his run. Other than that, I don't see what you could possibly mean by that phrase; efficiency is defined as low turncounts, so any chapter that can warp-skipped requires warp in order to produce the lowest turncount for that chapter.

I just think the only changes should be that

1) Late game wins become less important (As mentioned before, 20 AS by C20 isn't as essential)
2) Characters with access to C staves with little effort move up (Boa for example,

Pretty much this, and this will how it'll be.

I don't see how this is confusing at all. There's no possible way to get a specific kind of definition you're asking for, and there will always be conflict over said definition.

Except for......

At the minimum, we should pick a certain chapter and say that from that chapter on, the game is skipped.

Do I see Zagaro/Wolf dropping? If lategame is now less important, then Zagaro and Wolf lose a lot of what makes them great. They only get 9-10 chapters (not counting Gaidens) and for quite a bit of it, they're really pretty poor. I'm not going to write up anything huge, but I thought I'd bring this up since them being at the top of the list is already being called into question.

Lategame enemies having less emphasis is easy enough to figure out because the kinds of enemies you see in lategame are ones that are very uncommon in early and mid game: Paladins and Generals.

Warp shouldn't affect emphasis on any other kind of enemy except Dragon Knights to an extent.

This way, characters that are good in the late game (Katua) are not auto-failed, but having a better early/mid game is still better.

Do I see Zagaro/Wolf dropping? If lategame is now less important, then Zagaro and Wolf lose a lot of what makes them great. They only get 9-10 chapters (not counting Gaidens) and for quite a bit of it, they're really pretty poor. I'm not going to write up anything huge, but I thought I'd bring this up since them being at the top of the list is already being called into question.

Yeah, it's already become obvious that Barst > Zag, FE3 just hasn't made the change yet for whatever reason. Shiida > Zag will also be passed if Interceptor makes a topic about it, but regardless of whether FE3 "approves" it or not, I think that's one also pretty clear.

Lategame enemies having less emphasis is easy enough to figure out because the kinds of enemies you see in lategame are ones that are very uncommon in early and mid game: Paladins and Generals.

Warp shouldn't affect emphasis on any other kind of enemy except Dragon Knights to an extent.

This way, characters that are good in the late game (Katua) are not auto-failed, but having a better early/mid game is still better.

So basically, you want to maintain the status quo, and not change anything in spite of the fact that this is new and clearly significant information. I must disagree; either you're warp-skipping lategame chapters, or you aren't. I don't see any justification for some sort of in-between.

Technically you could play a chapter for 5-6 turns and then warp-skip from however far you got into the map, but that seems nonsensical and inconsistent. If you start fixing how many turns you'll play the chapter until you end it, while having the power to end it well before that point, then you are clearly no longer playing with the goal of minimal turncounts in mind. More like the goal of trying to provide a justification for inconsistencies in the tier list, such as Catria being above Julian because Catria is good lategame, while still maintaining "Late game wins become less important." Obviously lategame wins did not actually become less important if the position of a unit who is only good lategame does not change.

Fine. We will assume warp skipping with no in-betweens.

However,

More like the goal of trying to provide a justification for inconsistencies in the tier list, such as Catria being above Julian because Catria is good lategame, while still maintaining "Late game wins become less important."

This is a separate issue entirely, and the warp issue is a terrible excuse to nitpick at me for.

It wasn't a nitpick, it was an example of inconsistency used to illustrate a point. You said "Late game wins will become less important," yet showed no inclination to drop the position of a unit like Catria. With full-blown warp-skipping assumed, Catria drops a tier at the very least.

Or you could have made a thread to argue such a point, because such an issue has little to do with Warp on its own.

Regardless, Katua no longer exists. Congrats.

I feel as though we shouldn't assume warp skipping for the sake of having interesting arguments, similarly to how we don't assume that all Lyre does is shove people. Cutting out half the game is pretty lame, really.

I agree; the most basic purpose of a tier list is simply to create discussion, and this is a clear choice between having more to discuss or having less to discuss.

But it seems that FE3 favors the other side of the coin (though strangely, he seems somewhat bitter about it), and it also seems that whoever creates the tier list topic gets to decide what goes. So meh. At least Barst > Zag is finally undeniable and obvious.

I don't like how changes are being suggested (and made without even talking it over) people are still discussing how to interpret this ~* new discovery *~. Can we stop jumping the gun on things before we have some kind of concensus?

The way I see it, we have the following options.

1) Ignore the whole deal, or pretty close to. Suggested arbitrary limits to make the list discussion-worthy again are:
- Marth cannot be Warped (must walk to seize) (Int's idea)
- less emphasis on lategame, but not completely insignificant
2) Just make the list assume we warpskip the latter half of the game. Btw, even if this is done, put Ymir and friends back on, just in Bottom, and make other changes like Boa up, and thieves down, blahblah.
3) Dual list (SDS' idea). One list where we skip, and one list where we don't. Probably my favourite because it doesn't insta-flatten several months worth of weighing and discussing, while still taking into account the ultra-efficient way properly.

chatted with mekkah on irc tonight, remember him saying "why not do a double list for fesd"

posting for posterity, as well as offering to run the warpless list

also what the fuck is up with simply removing ymir/samson/aran/catria/paola from existence before any of this is decided zzzzz

trolling cats, etc.

Anyway, Darth will complain like usual, but I personally think it's a good idea. One list that focusing on a "full" completion run while getting all/as many items and going to all gaidens whilst maintaining a low turncount, and one list that just focuses on getting turncount as low as possible.

I advocate two lists because the two of them are drastically different, btw. I don't think Dolph is absolute rubbish on a completion tier list like he is on a warp tier list, et cetera.

trolling cats, etc.

I don't see how I could possibly be blamed for what FE3 Player did.

Nobody was blaming you for anything.

He just mentioned over messenger he was half trolling and that you were irritating him. I.e, he did that to troll YOU.

At least that's the impression I got.

Oh, indeed. I thought you were saying that I was trolling. Nvm then.