I’ve never gotten deep into FE mods/hacks but I legit love this one. Part of this is likely because I love the Archanea saga/ FE 1 and 3, but the mod is honestly an incredible rendition of mashing Fates and Shadow Dragon into a cohesive hole.

On a base level, map wise and basic game wise, it mimics Shadow Dragon. It’s a faithful port of 11, and ports the Gaiden chapters as well though, thankfully, you auto get these chapters instead of it being based on losing too many army members.

It mixes and matches game aspects in fun ways. It manages to have in-game stores/armories, as My Castle is stripped out. It keeps Fates system of basic/bronze and iron weapons being unbreakable, but steel and up are breakable.

It doesn’t use forging, either from Shadow Dragon or Fates (although, at least in Hard mode and up, some enemies do have forged weapons). To make up for this, some specialist weapons are unbreakable, like sword catchers and axe breakers, along with the killer weapon line. I personally think making the killer weapons unbreakable is a bit OP, but I guess it’s

To make up for how you can’t forge and supposed to be balanced by killer weapons low natural mt.

They’ve converted every character into Fates engine from Shadow Dragon, and have taken advantage of this and messed with some character balance in interesting ways. Namely, they’ve adjusted some ability spreads for characters, as well as added skills to the game.

Because reclassing also isn’t a feature, they’ve given characters personal skill progressions instead of class based. The only class based skill I’ve seen is that Paladins naturally gain Shelter to give them even further utility, which is nice I guess since like regular Shadow Dragon you’ll be ass deep in Cavs/Paladins.

A lot of these class features can be based around units characterization - Marth has Charm, Caeda has Voice of Peace - or to give units a deeper sense of individuality and specialization - Darros for instance has Comraderie, incentivizing using him as a tank, while Ogma has Fire Blooded, increasing his combat ability.

The game also does a lot to help make trash units viable, which I guess could be controversial but I legit love.

Gordon, for instance, has insanely high defense and good strength, and comes with Seal Defense, which changes him from a chip dealer you’ll eventually bench to legitimately useful, because skills are locked to character and not class, so he both does decent damage and debuffs.

Characters who are frequently passed over are also given options to make them viable. Maria, who is a low level Cleric that’s foot locked and comes in a third of the way in the vanilla game has been class changed. She begins as a mounted troubador and is your only mounted healer.

Class promotions are also specialized. Units that are traditionally considered good still promote to their traditional promotions - Cain and Abel become Paladins, Ogma goes from Mercenary to Hero, etc.

However the mod rewards you for using lesser used characters with crazy and surprising promotions. Going back to Maria, she promotes from a troubador to a Malig Knight, making her a flying healer that also has access to magic and axes.

Radd, a trash unit in base FE1/3/11, has an ability (Underdog) that lets him take advantage of coming in at a lower level, and he promotes into a Dread Fighter, which makes him an insanely capable mage slayer.

The game also takes advantage of the pair up mechanics from Fates, as the enemies are programmed to take advantage of it. Enemies are also generally decent quality. They’re not super beefy, but they hit hard and eventually begin having very specialized and dangerous weapons frequently, such as killer weapons, ridersbanes to kill mounted units, and magic

Based weapons so they can attack in melee and at range.

The game is also hard and generally surprises/defeats expectations. Lena no longer starts with a Warp staff, but with Rescue, which is much more limited. You get a Mend staff for her at the end of chapter three, and in Chap 18 it’s still the only Mend I’ve seen.

Immensely fun mod, especially if you like Archanea/FE 1/3/11, which I do.