Fire Emblem Awakening: Which difficulty should I start on?

[ecoho]

So I've never played a Fire Emblem game before, but I have played games that are similar to it, such as Valkyria Chronicles and the Disgaea series.

So my question is, what's a good difficulty setting I should start the game on? I've heard Normal mode is kinda easy while Hard is more challenging but not to a ridiculous degree, But I want to see some input from people on this site.

And also, I read something about how characters that you lose in battle are still in the story for some reason despite dying. Is this true? If so, that sounds kinda weird.

casual/normal youll have more fun and none of the BS ambushes. now im not against perma-death but at times it just screws you out of good characters because the random number generator puts an archer just close enough to down your Pegasus knight you've been romancing for half the game....... yeah you get bitter after a while.

 

[General Twinkletoes]

I play hard/perma death, granted I have played... quite a few fire emblem games, don't know how many cause the GBA ones kinda blend together. At the very least 3, probably more.

I don't find hard to be that much bad, however yeah the reinforcements are annoying, almost requiring you go through levels with them more than once. I am used to fire emblem being that way though, so I might be biased.

I'd say hard/perma death is the best way to play, but that's for me. From replies here, it sounds like normal is the best for new players.

 

[AdrianCeltigar]

I ran into that plot-hole with a character dying back in Sacred Stones, but never again. I let Seth die and didn't care because he was just the "Jiegan" of that game (the over-powered unit you get in the beginning that is actually really bad for his level and has terrible growths.) He still showed up in cut-scenes, and it was odd (this was before plot-relevant characters got 'injured' instead of dying.)

As for which difficulty you should choose? I've played almost every Fire Emblem game, and the newest iterations of the series have a weird concept of what 'Hard' difficulty should mean. Go with Normal.