How many of you play "Iron Man"

I played couple of Iron Man but annoying number of bugs forces me to save frequently, not to mention crushes on late game ....

Game is nothing but easy on ridiculous up, though some exploits make it plausible to win.

I have never played any game with multiple save files, and I have never played any game by save/reloading if things don't go well for me.  The fact that this is introduced into some games as an Ironman mode is quite humorous to me, because it's how I have played every game I have ever played.  But then again, there is also a large number of games I have never completed or finished.

Because of the save-load bug on my machine (it's AMD.) I am forced to play this game as Iron Man.

Well, at this point with now you can buy potions to heal wounds from champions, 'Iron Man' is kinda pointless as long as you know each monster lair type in great detail.

I don't.  I rarely reload, but I don't consider myself playing Ironman.  But If something like a dragon wonders into my land early in the game, eating my cities, I might reload battles until I am able to beat it.  But, I never claim the game is easy or that I am some great player.  The problem with people is that they believe everything in absolutes, so we tend to believe that only the people who play ironman really know what they are talking about or the people that don't are cheaters and their knowledge is flawed.  This makes a scenario where people tend to lie about how they play to make themselves credible.  But I don't lie, I occasionally reload.  And if a drake attacks my city on turn 39 like it did a few games ago, I will reload like a mother fucker to kill it.  But most of the time, I will take my loss.  

A couple games back, I decided to rush my first neighbor, we had similar power scores, and I figured he would be long gone and I was boxed in with one city, so my situation was going to get worse if I didn't do something quick.  I had my sov, a low level champ with fire 1 and an axe, and 3 units of regular guys with clubs, standard militia soldiers.  It was enough to take one of his three cities.  But he showed up real quick to take it back with an army of quest troops, the Panca archers, the Krax spearman brothers, a sand golem and he was decked out in a lot of rusty armor and a greatsword.  I met him battle, he kicked my ass, but I killed the golem.  Next battle, he took back his city, but I used Silver tongue and stole his spearmen, which he killed too.  So As I recovered in my capital, he gathered his panca archers and a couple of scout troops and came toward me.  He attacked my city and I silver tongued his archers, and beat him and kept his archers.  After that I moved quick to take him out.  I won the war and made my enemy join me.  At any time I could have reloaded those battles, but losing them and then finding a way to win was extremely satisfying.  

I don't feel that reloading is cheating, but I think you could cheat yourself out of some fun if you do it too much and cheating yourself out of the chance to learn the game more.  It's those moments that really lets you learn what skills, abilities, strategies are really good or crap. 

Quoting Wizaerd, reply 2

I have never played any game with multiple save files, and I have never played any game by save/reloading if things don't go well for me.  The fact that this is introduced into some games as an Ironman mode is quite humorous to me, because it's how I have played every game I have ever played.

This.

I'll add that the fact that some devs have used that idea that some people constantly reload in their design decisions is probably a part of what ruins the game for me.Losing due to  Randomness /= fun, but for people who constantly reload they just load the game until they win. Problem solved right?

Disclaimer: I haven't loaded it up in a few weeks so it may have gotten better with 1.01 But I didn't see anything in the changelog to make me think it would so haven't bothered to even download the update.

See me  I just rage quit and say F this stupid game, I don't feel I should have to reload due to random stupid shit like that. But thats just me.

I save and reload a lot.  But mostly on loot - especially since I modded in so much (very balanced, I might add) loot - I like seing my stuff more.

I will rarely save & reload a battle.  That's too much work.

As I'm still learning the game, I'm re-loading a lot. I think it will take a good couple of playthroughs before I get a good handle on relative power levels.

I'd like to see an Ironman mode added to the game. Knowing you can't go back an undo your daft mistakes is different from choosing not to go back. It gives games a similar edge to boardgames/multiplayer.

When I get a new game, I save and reload constantly on my first playthrough.  Afterwards, I play Ironman, only reloading for slowdowns (I still get these on my XP laptop) and crashes - never for mis-clicks and stupid pathing, let alone for battles that go wrong.

In GalCiv2 I played Ironman in every game. I haven't played ironman in FE yet though. I just am not very good at it yet (well I wasnt very good at it, but I seem to be getting better pretty quickly.)  Actually, now that you mention it, I think I will start playing Ironman from now on. I already do once I get my place settled, but I understand the game well enough now that I should play ironman from the beginning.

I agree. Playing XCOM in Ironman made the game more meaningful, even with the bugs that caused a few important deaths. As long as the game is relatively stable and is good about saving properly, I would love to have a proper Ironman mode in FE.

I can and will cheese the absolute knickers off the game when I feel like it. In fact, before the latest patch stopped the majority of the excessive wandering of wildlands monsters and other massively powerful things that were ruining my game (like the piss poor AI settling next to some huge elemental or dragon....which literally walks halfway across a large map to shit on my cities), I just outright loaded up with cheats enabled and deleted them. Scrapyard stack inexplicably walking around my best city by turn 50 on an Epic game? Eat my ass, deleted.

Games are supposed to be fun. I save constantly and if something I don't like happens....it didn't happen. This is why I like mechanics and AI to be intuitive; I don't have to reload games if I can realistically plan for stuff. Don't want a huge monster smashing down your shit? Well I'm perfectly happy not to settle there. You have that spot. Good for you. We can both be happy. Oh no wait, so it's coming after me now because someone else settled on top of its face? Great. That's...yeah, just great. Monster suddenly rips me a new butthole because, frankly, I don't feel I've been properly informed that was likely? Yeah, that didn't happen either.

Oh and the hilarious start positions are usually subject to a damn good cheesing as well. I once started in a location with no settlement sites, and upon trying to leave the peninsula, found the Gilden capital blocking the land route. GG, Enchantress. GG.

<- never load unless it crashes. Got the turns between auto-save set to 20. Bad starting position? Doesn't matter, those ususally become the greatest games.

I never save and reload, not even bad starts.  I agree with Heavenfall, sometimes the worst beginnings make the best games.  I do think if someone plants an outpost or city next to a high level monster that it should be mad at the ones that invaded its space.  My last game it seemed like a Drake and 3 pack drakes wondered half away across the map to find one of my cities.  The part still seems odd to me, but thats the way it goes.

I typically play on challenging with sparse resources and dense monsters--bad starts happen almost everytime I start a game.  I also just played a game with no champions.  I actually liked that quite a bit.  I would like them to add champions that do not have magic, or the ability to turn it off.

worst beat down ever--

Champion (weaponsmith guy--I think), with two grey march spearman (redesigned with the charge ability) vs. one cave bear.

I missed my first 6 attacks combined.  Ended up winning, with one troop figure remaining in one of my units.  Champion ended up with gangrene or something.  I know it effected every unit that he was with.  I think I got a rusty helm, or 10 gold or something to that effect.  Play on.

I'm a perfectionist... so I will usually go back and play the same turn over and over again... lots of saving/reloading here.  It helps me hone strategy.  Eventually, I might try to Ironman the game or maybe not. 

P.S.  If I start bragging or complaining too much, somebody remind me to play Ironman and then pop off. 

I'll reload for a few things- unfair random bad luck losses (Wandering t30 Drake issue), crippling misclicks, and before the "recover injury" bottle I'd sometimes reload battles to receive different wounds on champs- getting "blinded in one eye" in the early game is a death-sentence for any champ which depends on accuracy and hasn't leveled enough to make up the hit with + accuracy traits.  

no reload ever

I'm on my first playthrough and I'll save before any battle I think might go poorly so I can reload if it does.  Losing a bunch of troops, time, resources, etc. is bad if you simply get beat, but that's life.  When you're still learning about the things you could potentially walk into, though, giving myself that leeway allows me to experiment.

Would I play something closer to Ironman on a second playthrough?  Possibly, but the main thing working against it is how long it takes to train new units, especially stronger ones with chain mail (playing as Tarth).  I hate seeing my champions get wounded, and losing those resources is a pain in the ass too, but it's mostly just annoying to have another set of troops take 10, 12, 14 turns to pop.

If I discover that I've been playing incredibly poorly- which, in at least one respect I know I have- that may change.

I only reload when I do something by accident (in FE or any game like it) or feel like I was cheated. If I lose a fight or something that's never cause to reload for me

I would like the option but once the game is stable and we have a better idea of how everything works. I am in kind of my 5th game now with a couple of quick ones in there and am just finally getting a feel for the game.

I play Ironman once I have an idea that I might be successful. I only play HC in Diablo II for example.

Nope, never seen the sense in frustrating myself that way. It's a single player game. If I screw something up, I reload. I can't do that in real life, but often wish I could.