"To this day, historians look back and question how these incomprehensible strategies ever led to victory."

Im too attached to my units so i cant ironman

The first 30 seconds of this was a true emotional rollercoaster of "wait now how did you get Duessel killed so quickly" to "oh it's Forde, that explains that"

One compromise between "hard" and "soft" ironman that I like to play with is something I call the "Look Out, Sir!" rule. You can still play after a Game Over much like a soft ironman, but there's a consequence - I randomly select one of the units that was deployed that map and have them "die" instead (either by choosing not to deploy them in the future or intentionally getting them killed whenever it's inconsequential). The idea is that they heroically leapt in the way of whatever would have killed my lord, and the end result is that you don't have to give up a run because of a game over, but the tension of moments when your lord is in danger are still present.

My FE Conquest Ironman led to the most memorable experience I've had with the series. As I started the invasion of Hoshido, I found my run suddenly possessed by an evil Hoshidan curse. First Elise got assassinated via an unforeseen use of Pass in the Ninja Tunnel, then Xander got taken out due to me underestimating some Armor Knights in the fight against Zola, and Camilla got overwhelmed by the Kitsunes. When we reached Fuga's wind tunnel, I was determined to break the chain, as it almost seemed scripted how the Nohrian royals were getting taken out one chapter at a time, right before we reach the Eternal Stairway. Sure enough, after taking out every unit on the map except Fuga and his bodyguards with zero casualties, I got caught off-guard by his final trick of the maids lunge-chaining a unit right to Fuga, and it just so happened to be Leo. Fuga was able to both double and one-shot Leo, so I immediately lost all hope in saving him. Luckily, the attack from the maid gave Leo a guaranteed block from the first hit thanks to Guard Stance, so he'd at least be able to deal one last attack as a parting gift. Leo then proceeded to roll a 6% crit, one-shot Fuga before the second attack could connect, and pose dramatically while saying "failure is no option."

I've never much cared for the Conquest storyline, but the new narrative of my siblings being fated to die as a consequence for our war against Hoshido only for Leo to survive thanks to the mercy of a Hoshidan (Kaze) saving him from certain death elevated it to a new level. Factor in that it was a single continuous storyline with no resets or do-overs, and it became the most satisfying narrative experience I've had with a Fire Emblem game. Leo and I proceeded to storm Hoshido and demolish their forces. I was able to leverage my remaining troops to take out the enemies with minimal casualties. And then, on the final chapter the run came to an abrupt end due to Corrin being taken out, as I've never been able to beat that map on my first try. Though it was an unfortunate loss, it was an oddly satisfying one. The curse eventually came for Corrin, and the rivalry between Leo and Takumi finally came to a head. How fitting it was that the final two royals to square off in the throne room were the two younger brothers who cheated death. My headcanon is that the spirit of the curse left Takumi after eliminating his final target, leaving Leo as the only living Nohrian royal to work with Hinoka and Sakura to establish some semblance of a brighter future.

It's an extremely bittersweet ending, but it manages to avoid being a shaggy dog story due to how it all played out. All the main villains were defeated, and peace was restored at great personal cost. The protagonist not living to see that peace gave it that extra bite that you don't really get in a Fire Emblem game. It felt more fitting to the Conquest route than the canonical ending, and the Ironman ruleset definitely played a crucial role. Great stuff.

Regular playthrough: "My unit died so I will reset the chapter"
Ironman playthrough: "My unit died so I will reset the game"

Love to see someone praising Engage for being a good Ironman game.

As someone who doesn't play FE a ton, I started playing FE6 for the first time recently, and I thought I'd do it in a soft Iron Man. I knew you got a lot of units, and that there were some punishing maps that would be a big pain to have to reset. If anything, I think not having to worry about resets has made this one of my favorite FE playthroughs in recent memory. I've lost some important units along the way, like Lance and Shanna, but it's just made me think outside the box, and - I think - get better at Fire Emblem.

I've been streaming it to my friends in Discord as well, and the bit about making up your own storylines rings very true. There was a point where Lot and Wade had to keep a bunch of ambushes from getting through a chokepoint, and my friends were cheering intently for the axe bros, and felt genuinely bad when Wade didn't make it. In another map, I had set up my units poorly against one boss, and we were absolutely sure someone was going to die, but Allen ended up getting a lucky dodge and a lucky crit on Enemy Phase, and now my friends regale Allen as this gigachad despite never seeing a single of his Support Convos. It's super fun.

In terms of ironmanning FE1, there's also the different enemy AI to consider. Being the first game in the series, it doesn't have the enemies try to inflict maximum casualties, but instead has them attack Marth whenever possible. This may be a boon as it allows Marth's quality as a combat unit to carry enemy phases that in other games would result in unit deaths.

Can confirm (it fulfills my masochism)

Real talk, I like the stakes that it provides. A Game Over actually feels impactful, and I find character deaths add a certain uniqueness to playthroughs.

I once got the vast majority of my army massacred in ch.7 and 8 of an FE6 ironman. Popping the knight crest on Barth ASAP and sticking him in choke points managed to hold off the reinforcements and save the run, but I left chapter 8 with like 6 useful units. Resulted in a dreadfully slow run where I would turtle and/or choke a point every map in order to not get overrun, but Barth somehow carried my team of squishies all the way through the western isles and arcadia before finally hitting a game over on the Miledy chapter (not his fault, I goofed positioning Roy). Gained a new respect for Barth, and is still my favorite Ironman memory to this day

My favourite way to play FE games on a first playthrough is with a soft Iron Man, not because of the challenge, but because the permanent loss of units makes me more invested in everyone's story, the fact that I could lose them makes everything more tense, and I'm sad when I lose a unit not because I lost their function but because their life and story was cut short

4:12 YES. This is why I only play soft Ironman. I struggle with perfectionism IRL, so I don’t want that in my video gaming experience

A note: Awakening's reason for adding the parallel worlds lore is to just really hammer in that everything that happens in YOUR run is as canon as the main story. Tragedy and triumph naturally rise out of a no reset run, and overlooked characters can suddenly shine in a new light for your run when they can suddenly what your usuals just can't. Honestly I've reached a point where doing reset runs creates a tiring and unrewarding cycle that burns me out, I basically only iron man now. It makes its own story, it's great

When I first played FE, I started with 7, and I just accepted the game at face value since I was like 11 and had no clue what FE even was. My first experience with the game was a soft iron man. Every single character besides the lords died and I still managed to finish the game, albeit with some difficulty 😅

The next playthrough I did, I told myself that I was going to do better and not let my army get killed like before, and I had FAR less casualties. Soft iron manning it actually made me a BETTER play overall, because it allowed me to make mistakes and learn from it in a more meaningful way.

Resetting whenever you lose a unit is kind of like removing the consequences of your mistakes, and I feel that makes it more difficult to learn from them, because you don't have any reason to - "if I mess up, I can always just reset the chapter".

I generally play what you classify as a "soft ironman", but if I get a game over/reset, I put all my characters on a "wheel of death" and spin it to decide who I will 'sacrifice' to continue the run. It alleviates some concern with soft ironman runs where you sometimes feel incentivized to throw the run just to reset when it isn't necessary.
I like how you mention the difficulty of Radiant Dawn, as I have done both these soft resets and full restarted many iron man runs to it. Shout outs to the Brom and Nephenee chapter in part 2, and 3-13 for being my most notorious run killers to arbitrary game overs (brom or neph dying, or a hawk flying into the defend zone in 3-13). Despite its difficulties, it is my favorite game to replay and ironman.

I recently started my first soft Ironman in H1 shadow dragon. It's very easy to overpower most enemies once you start promoting, and I've lost surprisingly few units. The only death that really hit me was losing Minerva after overextending her too much. It does make you look at things differently, being scared of low crit chances and reclassing fliers on maps with lots of bow units.

Ironman is what Kaga had in mind when he made FE in the first place. He simply told everyone not to attempt to save everyone and just forge forward in completing the game, while dealing with the consequences of your own actions. For which is why the Gaiden Chapters in FE11 are behind a threshold wall  in order for the player to access, complete and 100% the game if they are in pursuit of that.

"Soft Ironman" was never a term that particularly felt correct to me, so I started referring to those kinds of runs as "Copperman" runs!

Haven't done an ironman (since I suck) but I will never forget when Ross lost Garcia to a siege tome in Ephraim 13 and went on the warpath, eventually dodging a lethal attack and taking out Selena with an unnecessary crit.