ping

Ol' squinty-eyes looks more constipated than evil, but yeah. Ugly people are evil and don't deserve to live, that is clearly the true message Fire Emblem propagates, not some trite about friendship 'n junk. Obligatory Katie Tiedrich. He already had plans for Eyvel and felt bad about killing the other twin? *shrug* And while I wouldn't actually want Aideen to be playable in gen2, the thought of her, after a rather under-the-radar first generation, turning up as a Lv.30 one-woman army in chapter 6 is rather amusing. I don't remember when I first read about jealousy, certainly before it was confirmed to be a bug, but at no point had I ever doubted that it's anything but a bug. The specifics are just way too random ("love growth is transferred along a line of girls, but only if they stand in order according to this list, oh, and the list changes if you never reset the game while playing...") to be deliberate. I'm not accusing Kaga of pushing incest memes (not in this specific case, anyway), but I would've preferred if the incest memers had one less meme to meme with. Obnoxious stuff. Interesting. I think I'll do as is probably intended and only get Nosferatu, then. I believe the straightforward method would be to recruit Johalvier (who's repping Sophara) and kill Johan (Isaach), which would also go along with Ruben's mild preference. So unless somebody has really strong feelings about this, that's probably how I'm going to go about it.

FE4 Chapter 6: Heirs to the Light Tirnanog -> Ganeishire How could you forgot this very memorable boss, Whatshisface? I can offer these - all done, I believe, when Toothpaste-chan was confirmed to be real.

Don't tell me I arrived at earlier than you did. Or, if you insist, this one: ...which is very distinct from the memorable ch.3 Dracoknight Butterfly: It does backpaddle a bit immediately, unfortunately - Lester and Lana are about to have a little chat about their mum staying behind in Tirnanog. I hope this doesn't become too much of a regular occasion, with Bridget and (I'm pretty sure) Raquesis also confirmed to have escaped, but we'll see.

THE AUTHOR IS DEAD! THE AUTHOR REMAINS DEAD! AND WE HAVE KILLED HIM!

To be honest, I didn't realise the very simple implication of Manfroy's response, that Arvis is fully aware that Deirdre is Sigurd's wife, because I just assumed that this is something Manfroy would keep hidden from him. And not just Deirdre's previous marriage, but also that her marriage with Arvis is part of Manfroy's plan, since Manfroy's own little breeding program is most certainly unknown to Arvis, and Manfroy would be a complete fool to give Arvis any material to figure it out with. However, since Arvis's legitimacy as Regent/Emperor comes entirely from his marriage to Deirdre, I'll have to concede that this reading of the situation doesn't hold up to scrutiny. However, I think I have to take my endless complaint that Sigurd has all pieces of the puzzle to figure out who Deirdre's parents are, and apply it to the court of Belhalla. It's a piece of court gossip that the reason why Kurth never married is that he had an affair with Arvis's mom and never got over her disappearance. "We know of one sexual relation that Kurth had, and this here is his daughter. I WONDER WHO THE MOTHER MIGHT BE?!?!?!?" I also agree with @Shanty Pete's 1st Mate that confronting Deirdre with Sigurd only could've had negative consequences for him. He's terrified that she might regain her memory - and then confronts her with a potentially trigger for exactly that? Why?! If I could rewrite the scene, I think I would change it so that Deirdre wasn't informed what is going on and just arrives at the scene to see what the hubbub is all about. Follow that with Arvis telling her that this is the man who conspired to have her father killed, but now he's going to be executed, it'll all be fine... followed by Deirdre feeling an odd familarity with Sigurd, maybe even recalling his name without knowing why. Same dramatic confrontation, but, in my opinion, without making Arvis look as bad. Tsk. 😛 More precisely, the children receive 1/5 (or 1/10) of the difference between [Actual Stat - class's Base Stat], but the only variable part of that equation is the number of procs for the given stat. Promotion has no impact, I'm pretty sure, because promo bonuses are equal to the difference in class base stats. So, rounding notwithstanding, a parent's level-up is worth 30% of a level-up in total, distributed between their children. Although, in practice, children have higher growth rates, so the effect of their parents' stats is relatively smaller. Dastardly evil King Desmond: Protects his dear daughter from contracting rabies by discreetly removing the baby fox that her brother gave him. *slams fist on the table* DEATH OF THE AUTHOR! ...I think this is applicable here? As in, Kaga might not have perceived Arvis as a villain, but ultimately it's what he wrote, not what he intended, what counts? And honestly, considering how Arvis is liberally getting innocent people killed to achieve his goals, I find it hard not to classify him as a villain, if a villain with a sympathetic backstory (his Loptyr blood which would get him killed, if revealed) and noble-ish goals (it's really just coincidence that they require Arvis to rule the world). Alec's genes are maybe the most difficult to evaluate without actually having played gen 2, since it depends so much on how many effective weapons the children will face. I can absolutely see the appeal of Alec!Fee, especially if Ballistae become more commonplace in gen 2, but I couldn't know how often we will face Horseslaying squads like the dracos in ch.5. Yeah, seizing not allowing Sigurd to canter on is one of these small, but annoying things. It encourages the "Sigurd charges ahead" gameplay, too, since everybody who might need to use the castle will have to wait until Sigurd has charged ahead. I've had Aideen move with (or, more realistically, behind) the main group most of the time, but honestly, just having her as a warp bot staying behind at the home castle (or getting Returned by Ethlyn or Raquesis when she starts falling behind) is probably the most useful skill she has, in some situations at least. Jamke does a similar thing when he sends Aideen and Dew eastwards and returns to his dad's castle himself. I assume he's staring at her butt. But yeah, Genealogy does a good job with these small map animations. Thanks! Luckily, unlike Dolphin when playing PoR, snes9x does have a speed-up button, which is definitely very appreciated for the longer enemy phases. But Genealogy still is a relatively slow FE game - although not compared to FE1-3, really. How noticable that was to me definitely varied, with ch.4-5 unfortunately being on the worse end of things, but I wonder how that would change when replaying it.

Turns out that the last part of ch.5 isn't that long, after all. FE4 Chapter 5: Threshold of Fate Phinora --> Velthomer It fits with his agenda of making the world a more just place, I suppose. Or it's just coincidence - which would be a postive, overall, since it means that a woman can just be an army officer in Jugdral without there having to be an explaination. Well. Or that. Considering that Arvis is taking part in the rampant kinslaying during the later parts of gen 1 by presumably killing Azel alongside Sigurd, he really doesn't come across as somebody who would spare anybody because they have some kind of connection to him. Getting some elite soldiers (I assume that Meteor isn't an everyday spell) killed just to uphold the illusion that he's still co-operating seems like something he would do. See, now you're ahead of the curve by... however long it'll be until Echoes: Flames of Belhalla is announced and released. Yeah, a small gesture like that wouldn't even have required any actual changes for how gen 1 unfolds, if Ares was a late addition to the gen 2 roster. I'll try to keep it as a surprise for myself what skills Ares got from his mom Lex is even durable enough to survive two hits - the Horseslayer crit has 50 Atk; Lex has 25 Def and more than 50 HP. But I can already hear Arthur laugh at any silly attempts of slaying his horse after he promotes.

It would be shocking to find a kidnapping trope in post-Thracia Fire Emblem that Kaga did not do first. Since he mentions Finn, I would guess that the implication is something along the lines of "I know you're actually super into Finn and only married me because I made a move and he didn't". Otherwise, I also don't see why Beowulf would tell her to go to Leonster, not to Isaach to join up with Oifey and Shannan. Ehhh, this has been a deathless string of runs thus far, with the only fallen character being getting revived before the end of Book 1. So if I can't get through the final stretch quickly enough, I suppose we'll have to do with what is probably one of the worst pairings possible for Sylvia. ...actually, the First Mate put it in B tier during the Matrimonial Mondays, because it gives Lene more oomph for the arena (Brave Sword!), and more HP to both of the kids. But since I've done virtually nothing to set up inheritance and I don't care that much about Lene leveling up, that still sounds like a bad trade for what the substitutes would bring to the table. https://joshuawright.net/slack-wyrm-111.html (Also not a SW quote. But funny.) Vaja is working for House Velthomer, though: Au revoir, little biscuit.

FE4 Chapter 5: Threshold of Fate Lübeck --> Phinora Yeah, I had the Gobi desert in the back of my mind, but as you say, there's a Himalaya nearby, which Silesse doesn't exactly sport. Agreed with Jotari that the desert makes for a good dramatic location for Travant's trap. Every Fire Emblem player knows the frustration of manoevering horsies through the desert, even if it's not entirely realistic. Well, it's a common thing in most FE games that you don't see a lot of the country, and mostly just the rulers and nobles duking it out. For Grannvale, we have to add the problem that the entire politicking happens off-screen because Kaga hadn't figured out that you can show stuff from outside the current location. That is not a Star Wars quote I was aware of. ...perhaps the archives are incomplete. (and apparently, imgur deleted that picture. I wonder if Lei(l)a's bikini triggered a porn filter, or if it was a copyright claim) I can't comment on gen 2, but... yes. The ch.3 Dracoknights were irrelevant and harmless. I know that it really helped that I happened to have Def Ring!Erin flying around, but they still made an awful first impression. Oh, I like that. Definitely a realistic scenario that Hezul didn't overrule inheritance laws, although one has to assume that some day, if Genealogy hadn't happened, one of Eldigan's descendents would've proclaimed that his holy blood clearly marks him (or her) as the more worthy king/queen.

You know it's "good" when a villain starts his speech with a variation of "As you already know". My irony detector's readings are inconclusive, so just for clarity's sake - he's Travant in the patch. I just slapped a "b" (well, a mirrored "d", I didn't find anybody with a b in their name or class) for the sake of the joke. Good to know. Considering that I didn't notice that Ava/Eva/Alva (or whatever their names were in this patch) technically have individual portraits, I doubt I would've noticed this. *tips forehead* Can't be accused of double-standards if your definitions are sufficiently precise. Depressed (not necessarily insane) old Azel sounds like a pretty good concept, honestly. Not only was he not able to save Sigurd, it was his own brother who killed him, and now Azel is entirely at the mercy of said brother, his wife (substitute with "his old crush Aideen" if he's unmarried) is dead or missing, he probably doesn't know anything about his own childrens' fate (if they exist)... Could make for a very bitter, jaded character, but ultimately sympathetic towards Seliph (so he might try to help from behind the scenes somehow), who could potentially be re-recruited as playable by one of his children. I don't expect that last part would've worked in the original FE4 (the conditional aspect of it), but it's still an interesting scenario to ponder. How do you double a Trabi's value? - You fill 'er up. The Agustrian succession seems to have set the precedent "ding-dong", or maybe seniority before Major Hezul blood. Hezul was the first king of Agustria, so presumably, Chagall is a distant cousin of Eldigan's, from a branch of the family where the Hezul blood has been "watered down". And that's what happens when you don't incest, kids Seasonal progression aside, I don't mind that Silesse isn't entirely a one-climate country. It would make sense that there is some arable in Silessia. What I find more odd is the proximity of the Yied desert to Silesse. I know that the Sahara isn't representive of all desert in the world, but I still associate the sandy terrain with a heat desert, which would be awfully close to the seemingly more arctic Silesse. With how little information we have at this moment, you could probably argue either way if fleeing to Isaach or staying with Sigurd is more safe. But I would assume that whatever risk assessment Sigurd has made for Seliph, that should more or less apply for Shanan, too. Sure, Grannvale would likely not want to have a claimant to Isaach's throne running around, but if Sigurd fails (fat chance, amiright?), chances are that the Powers That Be also wouldn't want a Chalphian heir to survive. It's about ethics in government, really. And Quan's mistake still comes across as believable, I find. He tunnel-visioned on the dangers posed to Leonster while he is away and his father is sick, so he left behind his most trusted knight, probably had all ballistae maintained and manned and Wingslayers distributed to the Sword Fighters... but he completely blanked on the fact that, if you split your army in two, both halves are going to be vulnerable. It's a huge mistake, for sure, but one I can sympathise with (minus the "getting yourself, your family, and half an army slaughtered as a result" part, of course).

(between 0:40 and 1:00, in case the timestamp doesn't work)

Silly Ruben. It is impossible for lefties to agree on anything - you know what they say, "lock five leftists into a room, and they will come up with seven mutually exclusive theories". It seems you have forced my hand to go against every suggestion you make. Indeed. The only thing more lethal would be a red shirt (a scientific law that even extends outside of Fire Emblem and into Star Trek!). That is a musical reference I wouldn't have gotten without Google Yeah, I made use of that with Aideen earlier, and maybe other characters as well, although I don't remember. But between repairing Tyrfing, repairing the Silver Sword (which I believe is at single-digit uses, too), and maybe buying the Renewal Band, overloading Sigurd with cash shouldn't hurt, especially because other characters aren't really wanting for money. That said, I might give Dew's haul to Taillte so that she can waste 20k and use Paragon during the next part. She and Lewyn (who hasn't done the arena yet) are the only parents that aren't at least Lv.29 already.

FE4 Chapter 5: Threshold of Fate Sachsen --> Lübeck okok, Zaxon --> Lubeck. *grumble* You're using this term to denigrate Pegasus Knights, but you fail to consider the musical implications: I feel increasingly encouraged to add Karin to the permanent roster (well, as permanent as the stamina system will allow) for Thracia.

In the first Pokemon generation, there is a rather obscure way of evolving Pokemon that normally require an Evolution Stone (like Staryu with a Water Stone or Clefary with a Moon Stone) via level-up: At the end of a fight during which the Pokemon levels up, your active Pokemon has to have an index number correspoding to the appropriate stone: Moon Stone - Exeggutor Thunderstone - Growlithe Water Stone - Onix Leaf Stone - Psyduck Fire Stone - some specific MissingNo. So basically, to evolve Staryu, send it into a fight and swap it out for Onix (or, in a trainer fight, have Onix defeat their last Pokemon). If Staryu got a level-up during the fight, it'll evolve into Starmie. Not very impactful for the elemental stones, since they're available for sale (so Growlithe doesn't have to be sad that it can cause, but not benefit from the glitch), but Moon Stones are technically a limited resource that this glitch can expand.

Yeah, I just did most of the arena runs (Lewyn is holding out a bit so that Bridget can grab extra XP in the fight vs. Lübeck), and money as a whole just wasn't that much of an issue anymore. I can probably just let Sigurd grab all the villages on this map and either buy the Renewal Ring for Seliph or fully repair Tyrfing, since nobody else is really lacking. Well, Midir had to do a no-Paragon run through the arena so that Aideen can afford all the staves that she and Lana will need, but he started the map at Lv.27. He should still cap easily. That is the problem with his generation. They spent all their money for avocado toast, so now they can't afford to gift their sons swords at a value of 50000 gold pieces. Probably thanks to the removal of the Hunter class, those association with Archers aren't as present in the post-Kaga series anymore. Wolt is still a soldier by trade, I suppose, but he does not have a bulky stat line (nor less movement than other unpromoted foot units). The other GBA archers are either mercenaries (Dorothy, Wil, Rolf if we count PoR as an honorary GBA title) or even civilians (Rebecca, Neimi). Not saying that you're wrong, since within Kaga Emblem, what you say certainly is correct, but I don't mind too much that Project Naga decided to call "The Class That Promotes Into Sniper" Archer, since that's what people coming to Genealogy from the newer games will expect. Similar-ish with the Forrest / Hero class - Merc=>Hero is well-established in most games since BinBla, so people will expect Mercenary to be an unpromoted class... although I also have to say that I associate Heroes with immoral moneygrabbing access to axes.

Grmph. The next time I ßee a ẞpaniard type out their laughter, I shall parße it at "yayayaya" aß retribution. Very nice I appreciate the commitment to beardmanliness. Possibly the second-best edit of that sort you ever did. (Sorry, Hawke, I have to give the nod to Mr Shannar still) Oh, that's funny. The one time the Shitty Earlygame Archer (if we can even call Jamke that, he's the 14th unit to join out of 24) has really good combat, it's because he's technically not an Archer archer. Right... It feels odd to consider all these kids as already born when they aren't acknowledged at all, with the exception of Seliph, Leaf, and Altenna (i.e. the kids without variable dads). But it's not like any of the pairings will retire to a lovely country mansion after ch.5. Crossover idea: Genealogy x Vampire: The Masquerade Very solid (weeb-)dad joke. Kudos. Oh my god! Has science gone too far...? *Noish!Fee procs Accost* Hmm.... (The question is more, "can Beowulf afford to buy it back? He's only Lv.25, so I'd prefer to paragon him through the arena, too." I suppose Scathach would appreciate +5 Str too, but the Power Ring would appreciate a wearer with a horse...) I might have forgotten to have Deirdre sell it. *whistle*

Don't tell me you're still saying "Meiben" in your head. To be fair, Langbalt could still be appalled by the kinslaying aspect of it, while being a-ok with murder in general. The "may you rest in peace" part is out of place, though. ...I should see if I can get Lex to kinslay him. Rough, because he only deals 2x2 dmg with Brave, and 8 with Silver, but maybe it'll work out. Hawke must be either really generic or have a really impressive beard if you like him so much. Well, come to think about it, you'd only have to find him barely tolerable in order to advocate for Pegasus Knight murder to make him exist. Project Naga renames Jamke's class back to Archer, actually. I think it tries to be a bit more consistent with the rest of the series with its class names - the "Forrest" class (according to the wiki) is simply "Hero", too. "Stabbing once is good and all, but have you tried stabbing twice?" - "She's a genius! She should write a book or something!" To a degree, you could rationalise the higher growths in gen 2 with their overall lower age, i.e. they still have more potential left to unlock than their parents did during their adventures. It's not universally true, of course, with the likes of Sylvia and Dew, but apart from Altenna, the kids are all at most 17 years old, right? The average gen 1 character strikes me more as in their early 20s.

Ah, but consider this: If it is very unlikely for Byron to survive for one year, how unlikely is it for him to survive for one year and 45 minutes? That's good to know. I swear I didn't plan to overstack Erin->Fee, I just underestimated the power of the initial money + Bargain injection for Erin.

FE4 Chapter 5: Threshold of Fate Zaxon (turn 0) Ah. I thought otherwise because the wiki has "default growths" for the children listed, but looking a bit closer, those are just 50% (for boys) or 100% (for girls) of the mothers' growths. Agreed with this conclusion to the Rescue discussion. Your explaination why Daccar is killing his future subjects makes sense, and so does Ruben's idea that moving the whole tutorial to Orgahil would've made more sense.

I do wonder about that name, too. Unfortunately, the .org wiki (which usually has some ethymology on names) doesn't have a page for the Cross Knights specifically, and I can't find how their name in Japanese is pronounced. I wouldn't be surprised if it was Kreuzritter, but changed to Cross Knights in the translation to avoid (or at least somewhat cover) the obvious religious connotation, but "Cross Knights" still seems like an odd name in a world without christianity. She has a blazing 0 AS with the Hand Axe, too! Honestly, it simply was the easiest 1-2 range available to her that isn't really expensive. And since the Pegasi weigh themselves down to negative AS with their Javelins (barely - they have 17 Spd and Javelins have 18 weight), Raquesis even doubled and one-rounds them. Well, apparently, the portrait of the king of Agustria is going to be reused for some generic boss, too, so Kinbaith is in good company. Always funny to have an underflow bug in the wild. And I guess Dew was a lot more unlucky than I thought. I assumed that they always proc, since I'm pretty sure that's how it goes in Thracia - I remember that this is a central piece in recruiting Xavier. Something that I definitely won't make any promises towards. 10 procs / 22 level-ups = 45%. Yeah, that's pretty speedy. I assume Erin's the fourth, considering that we don't have a fourth named Pegasus rider. ...and yeah, the wiki confirms that. Honestly, since she's pretty low-level when she joins Sigurd, she really does feel a bit out of place in that line-up. -- My impression is that for the real elitist elitist, every resource has the same endpoint. His name is "Seliph". But no, I get what you mean, Paragon ultimately being a financial skill. The kids still have their innate growths, right? I don't want to look up right now how exactly growth inheritance works (it's getting rather late ), but in theory, it should've been possible to just crank up his innate Str growth by another 10% or so. Your explaination is still entirely possible, too, of course, although I would like to think that Aideen and Bridget's high stats in the respective useless Atk stat is supposed to show that they both would've had the capabilities to be in their twin sister's class.

In Turkey, a turkey is called a 'hindi'.

To be fair, it's quite in line with Daccar's general characterisation (he is not very smart). I think this could've been used better if Silesse had indeed been behind Zaxon, as I suggested in the update. Daccar moves to Silesse after André conquers it and actually threatens to kill Rahna when you come near. Or Daccar remains in Zaxon and, after you conquer it, turns out to be alive and bargains to be exchanged for Rahna, just to flee to Grannvale and appear as a minor boss in ch.5 - basically a shorter version of those traiterous Etrurian nobles in BinBla. Ruben's waifu (no worries, I'm not going to accuse you of liking an anime girl): But yeah, I agree with what you say about Lamia. It's consistently rare to find a woman in Fire Emblem that is allowed to be a villain instead of being vaguely Camüh-shaped. Petrine in PoR comes to mind, if you remember her. She even has some flirtatous lines with Greil as an additional parallel to Lamia, although Petrine of course has a much bigger role in her game, and is more brutish in her behaviour. Clearly, that is foreshadowing for just how disappointing Jahn's Long March is going to be as the last (real) map. And since I was just thinking about PoR - the Defend map right after Greil's death is another example, unless you're playing on Lunatic. On Hard, the challenge is to rout the map, ideally with non-Titania characters getting good XP. Staying alive is a simple matter. But still, the fight is followed by a cutscene of Ike almost fainting from exhaustion before Lethe and Mordecai arrive to save the day.

FE4 Chapter 4: Dance in the Skies [Thove/Sailane] --> Silesse --> Zaxon

For the narrative, the general layout of the map does make sense. Not-Bordeaux (I should call him Marseille) starts attacking once he gets word that Sigurd has beaten Maios, since that means that Sigurd is now much further away from the capital. It's nice that the villains are on the receiving end of some teleport bullshit for a change, too. I dunno, I find that ch.2 made a similar concept work much better. The long distances Sigurd has to travel are much less annoying when you can move your horsies a full screen worth of tiles every turn, as opposed to the frustrated movement in the Silessian forests, and I don't think it had ch.4's problem where there's literally zero pressure on you while you're only halfway to your destination. There are forcefields preventing her to actually move onto the land tiles, but the game is very charitable when it comes to Erin helping Claude and Taillte. This is right when they spawn, so Erin is able to immediately act as a frontline tank for them. Broadly agree with your points. I think the forcefield are particularly annoying in ch.4 because they linger for at least one extra turn (I haven't continued playing yet, so I don't know how this will work exactly) and I obviously can't say anything about the rest of the game, but I don't have a fundamental problem with them existing. I'm in two minds about the Critical skill - I do enjoy that you don't have the constant low% crit chances potentially screwing you over, like in the Akaneia games, but I don't like the multiple proc-based damage-increasing skills like Accost, Adept, Astra, which Critical in practise becomes one of. They add to the variance in Genealogy's combat, where almost every fight has like five potential outcomes with non-marginal probabilities, which I think is a weakness of the game. Wait a second... Why did I have Dew attack in melee-- Oh fuck, I'm an idiot. Turns out that when I reloaded the last turn of ch.3 to sell Ethlyn's Mend staff, I forgot that I had also picked up the Wind Sword on that same last turn. ...welp, minus one magic sword. That's annoying. The Wind Sword will only be available in ch.10, too. Good thing I didn't let Ethlyn take a magic sword with her, I suppose. It's pretty insane just how much micromanagement one can do with the arena Sigurd, Beowulf, and Erin could all go to 30-ish Def with the Shield Sword plus Shield Band. Definitely impressive, although I suspect that there's too many enemies that would ignore them to make that a good play. To be fair, christmas dinner can't really get much more awkward than Lewyn already makes it by being Lewyn. Nordion not being a warp spot is a bit annoying, yes. But as I said, moving units about is much less of a hassle if their movement isn't slowed down as much. If I recall, even Quan riding all the way from Anphony and Azel walking from Heirhein both managed to contribute vs. Mackily and Agusty. Seriously. He's making progress, evidenced by his realisation that some people might not enjoy being invaded, but he still can't overcome his instincts. But it really is a running theme that Sigurd achieves what he set out to do... and then just keeps on a-conquerin' for no good reason. Happened in Verdane, happened in Agustria, and now it's happening in Silesse. Dew is just a very fast swimmer