Ranking System

[Kuro]

Really love the game but am I the only one who really hates the ranking system?

As far as I can tell it really is only about the speed at which you complete a mission rather than trying to keep your units alive. For example I kept my entire squad alive in a mission and finished it in 10 out of 20 turns, ended up with a D rank with no reward.

Next skirmish I just rushed the entire thing with a single scout, hopping from cover to cover and using orders just to rush capture their base. Ended up with an A rank without really using any tactics or without really killing much enemies. This kind of nags me because it makes slower units like the sniper or stormtrooper counter-productive when you want to get a higher grade.

[Cutlass Jack]

The ranking system doesn't bother me because I don't have OCD. I'm not required to get a perfect ranking, only win. If I can do that and find the hidden aces and steal their weapons from them, all the better.

Sure you get a little better rewards for finishing sooner, but you can make up the difference in skirmishes. But I can usually get a B or C on most maps by playing teams I enjoy and without scout rushing. Any A ratings I get are usually accidental.

[Suguri]

Yeah I think the ranking system is pretty silly as well, but thankfully I looked this up and is largely irrelevant to unlocking anything except for achievements.

[Moon Punisher]

Yes , all that matters is how fast can you finish the mission, I only care for the ranking because of the achiv myself lols.

[bloodraven43]

got a b rating for chapter 7 and i suck at gaming...doesnt tell me much about you...lol

[SundownKid]

Yeah, the rankings are a bit off. Only taking into account speed means it's far better to spam orders and make your scout into a supersoldier, and then have them cap the base.

Would probably have been better to remove rankings and just base rewards off of the amount of enemies killed, minus reinforcements - and give bonuses for completing certain special objectives during missions.

[Faint]

once you level everyone you can super sayan Alicia to get 1 turn victories even in hard mode on most skirmishes, i think the only reason its like this is because they wanted it to be more about the tactics that led to the base being captured instead of just killing things. thats probably also why every base has an area around it that needs to be emptied before you can capture the base

[Suguri]

Originally posted by lunarvida:

once you level everyone you can super sayan Alicia to get 1 turn victories even in hard mode on most skirmishes, i think the only reason its like this is because they wanted it to be more about the tactics that led to the base being captured instead of just killing things. thats probably also why every base has an area around it that needs to be emptied before you can capture the base

That's not even using tactics at all, it's just basically exploiting the imbalanced scout class as well as Alicia becoming OP late game. I'd say "killing everyone" is more of a strategy because you're more likely to use the whole squad to do so rather than use one member run around like its CoD1337MLG ctf mode.

Really breaks the immersion of this being a SRPG so no thanks, maybe for achievements though.

[Stoibs]

Yep, the biggest complaint I have about the game since the PS days. It's the reason the whole fun sucking, gamebreaking "Buff Alicia with orders, win in one round" came about anyway out of necessity. That you get more Experience points and there is an achievement tied to A ranks even more-so encourages this behaviour =(

Would have made a lot more sense and would have benefited the game greatly to have loss of teammates, number of optional camps captured, number of/All enemy units destroyed etc. play into the final rank. (I have no idea how rank works on VC 2 and 3 since they went handheld and I couldn't play them but if they kept the time limit criteria then I am very disappointed)

I'm kind of ignoring Ranks and the Scout rush tactic on my first re-run here at the moment for more fun gameplay, Will do the cheat '1 round rush' thing on the New Game+.

[TFJ]

Originally posted by Stoibs:

Yep, the biggest complaint I have about the game since the PS days. It's the reason the whole fun sucking, gamebreaking "Buff Alicia with orders, win in one round" came about anyway out of necessity. That you get more Experience points and there is an achievement tied to A ranks even more-so encourages this behaviour =(

Would have made a lot more sense and would have benefited the game greatly to have loss of teammates, number of optional camps captured, number of/All enemy units destroyed etc. play into the final rank. (I have no idea how rank works on VC 2 and 3 since they went handheld and I couldn't play them but if they kept the time limit criteria then I am very disappointed)

I'm kind of ignoring Ranks and the Scout rush tactic on my first re-run here at the moment for more fun gameplay, Will do the cheat '1 round rush' thing on the New Game+.

VC2 and VC3 have basically the same ranking system. The gameplay is more balanced though.

Regarding the ranking system itself, yes, it's very poorly designed. Not because having a ranking system based on speed completion is inherently bad. It's bad in this game because of OP scouts, the CP system allowing multiple activations of the same unit and most maps having the objective of capturing the enemy base.

Basically, if the game was designed in a way that to complete maps as fast as possible you had to use all tools at your disposal, it would be fine.

[Radene]

Playing at my own pace the first time, going for A rank OCD in new game plus.

[Vashe]

It's a single player game, it's up to you how you want to finish it.
I'm currently at chapter 13, got several "accidental" A (I snipped pretty much the whole ennemy army in a single turn). I did the skirmishes one time once unlocked and I don't feel underleveled at all. Just don't abuse the scouts (but still, scouts got destroyed by any tank or 2+ ennemies so...)

[busards]

Starting chapter 10, the number of royal weapons you get is based off conditions (all enemy leaders killed, no ally ko'd or killed and such). And you also have the ace imperial weapons for killing aces also.

There are rewards based off things different than just speed; they're just less obvious than rank/speed. And those rewards are also "missable" on a first playthrough (unlike exp/money which can be farmed in skirmishes).

[[FOX]]

Rank system is simple - less round - high rank. Most maps required only 3-4 round for A. Plus, you need a good weapons and master level for classes. If you really want A rank, you must be ready to use save-load process, after each good or bad move.

[Hunt3rXIII]

Most of JRPG ranking only depend on speed so VC is not an exception.

[Steph]

Imo the ranking system is fine how it is.

During my 1st playthrough I usually got B - D ranks on the missions and that sufficed to R&D every weapon-upgrade I wanted, learned every order there was and it also got my troops up to lvl 15 (and that without doing tons of skirmishes, I only did skirmish 1-5 each on normal once).

If you really want those A-Ranks for whatever reason you can simply use the "clear" save after your 1st playthrough and rush those missions since you may skip a lot of the story.