Aircalipoor
-
Posts
338 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Posts posted by Aircalipoor
-
-
#36
Syrene
Syrene the Falcon Knight is the latest character to join the party, having only around five chapters of availability. While this is mostly a gameplay issue, there is less opportunity for her to grow build up her supports and she was absent from the story until now.
Similar characters who join late are often referred to being part of the Gotoh archetype. They can be introduced earlier, are hyped as some savior of legendary proportions and when they finally join, it can be quite rewarding to have the team blessed with their presence. Syrene doesn’t fulfill this. She is said to be an extremely capable flightleader, likely one of the higher ranking generals of the Frelia army and yet, she doesn’t do anything notable. Her squadron gets slaughtered by the enemy army upon her introduction. While she is cool headed enough to keep the civilians in check, she needs to be rescued and is taking the role of a damsel in distress. She can't ward off the enemies and needs to be saved by the player and his army. Vanessa and Tana have caught up with her and probably even better now.
To give an example of a better executed character like her, I gush a bit over her FE9 equivalent, Tanith. Tanith was introduced a few chapter before her recruitment as a capable commander and in a few scenes she was warding of the ravens. Later on she accompanies Ike and Elincia to Sanaki, serving as some kind of mediator and supporting character together with Sigrun in the foreign Begnion. When she is finally recruited in chapter 18, having this known and established character is a proper reward and part of the number of the rewards the player gets at this part of the game. (Chapter 18 is the start of the endgame and many factors establish this to differentiate itself from the mid game: Ike's promotion, many BEXP points from the long chapter 17, the recruitment of the useful characters Tanith and Reyson.)
In FE8, the player is actually around this point in time in the game as well, just like in FE9: Eirika and Ephraim just got promoted and got their personal S-Weapons, they got their Manakete and they liberated their homeland and are taking on the endgame. But Syrene is just a disappointing reward, because she wasn't introduced earlier.
Syrene could have been introduced earlier, perhaps being one of the reasons why the Frelian forces were able to withstand Grado. In the story, this was due the efforts of Innes, who managed to do that due to his skill and spy network. Introducing Syrene earlier and giving her a few scenes to display her skill and competence could have made her late appearance rewarding. Why couldn't she rescue our heroes at one time, perhaps how Cecilia and Percival did in FE6? Or serve as a mediator to the foreign Frelia, like it was done with Tanith in FE9?
With that said, her personality isn’t excelling either. She is a competent loyal knight, a role model for the less experienced knights like Vanessa. Overall, she matches the Palla archetype, being a bit motherly or like an older sister to her comrades and being humble. Like Gilliam, her choices of support partners are even more restricted to native characters she already knows and doesn’t have anything new to say.
Gilliam
The support points out how similar those characters are in their behavior and specifically how they are regarded by others as older role-models. Syrene likes to keep that responsibility and Gilliam isn't questioning it either. The closest thing that shook the support is that Syrene suspects that Gilliam is probing her for her problems, bu Gilliam just refutes it and Syrene doesn't press this. It could change their relationship, implying that Gilliam is too overprotective, but the support just doesn't try anything remotely interesting.
Moulder
Just like in Gilliam's support, in each conversation a potential problem is tackled at the start (Syrene doesn't have familiar faces around her, she isn't aware about the current situation), but Syrene just states her competence and how the matter is already solved. In the A support she is complimenting Moulder and surprising him with his own birthday he forgot.
Vanessa
The sisters are opposites in some way, which does play out a bit more entertaining compared to Moulder and Gilliam. Vanessa is overly formal, less confident, stiff, easily flustered and Syrene manages to bring out her strengths. It a decent display how a "Palla" and "Catria" usually work, if going by archetypes. She teases Vanessa about her secret love, but it isn't really going anywhere. They reveal each other to be their respective inspiration: Vanessa admires her skill and beauty while Syrene compliments her levelheadedness. Her anecdote of how Vanessa kept her cool during their fathers sudden collapse, while everyone else freaked out, is one of the strongest moments... for Vanessa's character. While Vanessa is usually regarded as mediocre and this anecdote made her shine, Syrene is usually described as being amazing, without having really flaws. By comparison, Forde is also an older sibling and sort of role model for his younger brother Franz, but Forde actually has flaws and issues that are shown.
Tana
This is a Tana-centric support and Syrene isn't even revealing anything controversial. Mostly it shows how Tana is sheltered and protected by anyone and in the end, Syrene admits how she grow up became more in-dependable. Once again, we are told that Syrene is this amazing aspiring role model, but there isn't a direct example of her actions why she is supposed to be so grand.
Kyle
An actual romance with a bit more going on, comparing the one with Gilliam. Both knew each other from a meeting years ago. She manages to get the stiff Kyle to open up. In the A-Support Kyle manages to point out how her pegasus is injured, which she oversaw because her animal hid the injury from her. It seems like an attempt to put on a character flaw on Syrene, though I'm not convinced by it. She considers Kyle being her savior because of it and he just gushes how she rescued his life years ago. So much for a character flaw for her, when all it does is lead to a character strength. She rescued him from some bandits and also inspired him to collect wooden figures.
Conclusion
Of the ensemble of boring dutiful knights, Syrene isn't well developed and her personality excels rarely beyond being an amazing pegasus knight who is supposed to be so much better than anyone else. She has a bit more to offer in her supports than Gilliam, especially with her sister and her romance with Kyle has more going agency than hers with Gilliam. I easily consider her the least interesting woman in the army.
Bottom Tier is complete. I use one tier for each round for an overview.
Round 2
First, we had to nominate the characters that will be ranked #35 to #31.
Player 1 nominated Ross and Kyle
Player 2 nominated Saleh and Marisa
Player 3 nominated Cormag and Valter
Player 4 nominated Moulder and Dozla
Player 5 nominated Garcia and Natasha
The popularity poll for this round:
Cormag: 12 votes
Saleh: 9
Valter: 7
Moulder: 5
Ross: 5
Marisa: 5
Natasha: 4
Garcia: 3
Kyle: 3
Dozla: 3
Cormag, Saleh and Valter were saved and won't be cut this round. 7 characters are left and 5 of them will be cut this round: Moulder, Ross, Garcia, Natasha, Kyle, Marisa and Dozla.
2 Characters will survive this round as well, but who will it be? And who is going to be the first to be cut next time? And was Syrene's placement fair? Thanks for reading and feel free to comment.
-
#37
Gilliam
Gilliam is the dependable knight we get in the early-game. He doesn’t have a negative character, not even an annoying gimmick. In fact, he is more realistic than the many child soldiers and Shounen protagonists. He is a middle-aged knight who is doing his job, competently.
During the events of chapter 1, he is confronted with the young, slightly overwhelmed cavalier Franz and Gilliam takes matters in his own hands. Together with Franz they both try to rescue the ones they are sworn to serve, their respective princess of their countries, Tana and Eirika. The more experienced Gilliam is cool headed, gets a quick grasp of the situation and goes at the front, asking Franz to cover for him.
After saving Tana, she thanks Gilliam, though he refuses to be thanked in any personal matter. After all, he was just fulfilling his duty.
A bit later, his king orders him to accompany the foreign princess on her risky mission. He comments on the mission, but doesn’t complain, it's his duty, after all.
He does his job without any complain. In chapter 7, Eirika summons her army around the fortress Rigwall that they are trying to seize. All characters affirm their fervor, Gilliam doesn’t have to.
"There is nothing to discuss. We will fight."
His last two lines of dialog are in the final chapter and in the epilogue.
“We can’t let our guard down.”
“Exactly.“
…Exactly! His ending points out that he keeps serving Frelia as a loyal knight. It even mentions his characteristic of being a strict commander who chastises defiant recruits.
Loyal knights are among my favorite characters in the franchise, as they have a chivalry and code to follow. A code and mindset that can clash with the complex reality and outbreak of war, often resulting in conflicts and dilemma’s, who to serve and to protect. Knights and soldiers are some sort of necessities you wouldn’t have in an utopia. They do the less pleasant work, are partly respected and partly envied, have a certain degree of authority and power, but are also asked to be totally loyal. If their lords become tyrants or powerless, it extends to their underlings and many knights question their loyalty. We don’t have to use the traitorous Orson as an example, even the loyal Forde prefers painting over killing. The young knights Franz and Amelia aren't in for slaughtering their enemies either, but they want to serve their country and considering their orphaned state, they have additional reasons to go for this stable and honorable position.
Gilliam doesn’t seem to have any of these worries. He is either well situated and if he isn’t, then the game doesn’t tell us anything about his background or family. He has a just king who is lucky enough to not have his land be seized or corrupted (an exception in this game). Whenever Frelia's heirs of the throne need to be rescued, Gilliam has no opportunity to comment on that. A character like him wouldn’t despair anyway, instead he would follow the will of his lord unshakable. There wouldn’t be the dilemma of leaving Ephraim to save Prince Innes. He may have saved Tana a second time and the game wouldn’t comment on that.
So, even what little we have of Gilliam, his servitude to his king and country, is something that isn't further elaborated on to enhance his character.
Gilliam has still some opportunities to prove his worth, five supports are waiting.
Though the choice of his partners is as predictable as Gilliam himself. They include two of his comrades in Frelia as well as three sociable characters of the neighbor country Renais. All of them are or were part of the army, excluding Neimi.
Franz
Both characters aren’t too familiar with each other, coming from different countries and cultures. A potential for a rising conflict? Gilliam is having none of any exciting development. While he does scoff Franz once, Franz isn’t a fool, keeps his act together and trains on Gilliam's orders. Both lean different training methods, both are slightly surprised by each other’s conviction and willingness to learn about the other one, but it’s not like they disliked each other earlier. In the end, both connect by their love for their respective country.
To be blunt, their interaction with chapter 1 already showed as much chemistry as in those three supports together, they don’t offer anything new. Both were thrown in a conflict, had similar goals and acted on them while trusting each other. Next.
Moulder
An infamously bad support in the entire series, it is almost unintentionally funny in its meaninglessness. In case you haven’t had the luxury to read it yourself: In C, Moulder hears a melody. In B, he hears it again. Only the A support gives us some scraps to learn something new. Moulder was nervous during a crowning ceremony and Gilliam was chastising him. That way, both of them met for the first time. They consider themselves good friends and don’t have to to talk to each other much because of it. That may be true, good friends don’t necessarily have to teach each other new stuff, but they can still argue. Perhaps Gilliam grew cold because of his duty as a knight and the peaceful priest tries to ease his struggles, remembering him of his humanity? Kyle and Forde questioned their duty an path in live, rather than just being content with being best buddies.
Garcia
Both tough veterans’ are kindred spirits and they have an arm-wrestling. The support gets even more exciting when they note during the B support, that one of them didn’t use his strongest arm. Yikes.
The A support takes a step in the right direction. Garcia is only a former knight who left his duties and spend time with his wife and child. Gilliam is forced to reconsider his future path, if he really wants to keep being a dutiful knight or if he want so find some happiness of his own. But for now, they are at war and he doesn’t have an opportunity to reflect and change.
Neimi
The grim man has to deal with a sweet young girl, surely his heart will melt just a bit? Well, he scars her and almost brings her to tears. She impresses him with her bow skills and in the end, Gilliam has the epiphany, that everyone should focus on their own unique strengths. The support also points out that Gilliam has a scary face and that Wyvern riders like Cormag are scared of bows. Maybe the writers were left of ideas? The support with Moulder suggest that.
By comparison, Neimis support with the similar gruff Garcia is much better executed, as Garcia actually opens up to hear and gives her the hair comb of his late wife. He moves on while encouraging Neimi to lead a fulfilling live. She isn't getting nearly as much out of Gilliam, though.
Syrene
After all those four early game characters, late in the game we met Gilliam's potential wife! Gilliam can flirt and marry, certainly there is some development to be found! He actually is nervous, but deals with it by being level-headed and collected, rather than making a fool out of himself. It is a quite practical and sensible approach, but we spectators want just a bit of drama, a back and forth, teasing, flirting and sweet-talk. Syrene accuses Gilliam of using psychology, which is a psychological move in itself. It may be the best moment in this boring romance. Or the highlight is Gilliam’s absolutely dry proposal/order/ to marry her. It might as well be the least spectacular pairing in the game, even their shared ending doesn’t mention anything interesting, not even a special child.
Conclusion
While my nomination of Ewan shows that I’m not a fan of gimmicky overbearing characters, even the silent and reserved characters should have opportunities to show their depth. With Gilliam, not one of those chances is used. He is almost stubbornly one-dimensional. A video game is mostly about entertainment and Gilliam is the exact opposite of being entertaining, he is b-o-r-i-n-g.
The next entry is the last of this first round. One of Colm, Amelia, Dozla and Syrene will get cut, the other three characters survive this round and new characters will be nominated in the following round. The three left characters can be nominated again, but not necessarily.
You can speculate for now who will be the next cut. And is Gilliam being boring that much of an issue, or should he be higher? Thanks for reading and feel free to comment.
-
@ping: I'm curious how your list turns out. The Rankdown list won't end up being my list by any means, occasionally I will point out if a character should get be significantly lower or higher.
#38
Ewan
I nominated him in this first round of this Rankdown and after the two disappointing antagonists were cut, he was picked up to be the worst of the controllable FE8 characters. Is he truly that bad? Let’s take a closer look.
Ewan doesn’t have a large role in the plot of FE8 on his own, he joins Eirika/Ephraim by being connected to two other characters, who have a much larger agency to join them. He is the younger brother of Tethys, who is part of a mercenary group that joins the protagonist army either way. He is also the student of the traveling mage Saleh, though Saleh is too busy to teach him when the conflict starts. Ewan still leads Eirika to Saleh on her route. On Ephraims route, Ewan merely says farewell to his teacher, who only joins at the end of the route with Eirika and Innes. Ewan keeps accompanying them, even though they voiced their concerns of tagging along a child, but it would be too dangerous to let him stay or something like that.
Children characters are always a mixed bag. They are even less grown than the already young teenage knights and lords, who the franchise deemed fit to lead through a war in each game. They are often too carefree and consider the war as a game and the battlefield a place to play around. Ewan fits this type and he is characterized as fairly cheeky and impertinent.
To his defense I point out that he can lay off and be quite kind and charming. Though whether he decides to delight or annoy his comrades depends on his whims.
The support with his older sister Tethys shows him pretty straight as the younger annoying brother. He is trying to impress her, pouts for being chastised and denies that he is jealous of the other men around her. According to him, they don't deserve her attention so he plays tricks of them to ward them off. He shows a bit of growth in the last support. One can argue that Ewan will indeed grow out of this phase and become a decent human being, but that is the problem: We read and watch how Ewan behaves presently and he is pretty much the embodiment of an annoying brat. The other kids like Ross and Neimi are more polite, if not reserved, but Ewan lacks this or, to be more specific, he doesn't care that he is a pest to others. Another character that irritates most of her comrades is Lute, but allow me to hold off that can of worms for now.
The support with Ross isn’t showing a sympathetic Ewan either. He insults and makes fun of the slower thinking Ross. Ewan mocks how Ross has trouble solving a puzzle (neat brainteaser I guess) before Ewan explains it. He also brags about having a bunch of girlfriends, teasing the insecure Ross. Ross is kind enough to let those insults slide and Ewan isn’t cruel by any means, but he can be quite grating.
With Amelia, it is mostly about cheering up and teasing the girl that shares his age. He charms her with magic, but is also scarring her, teasing her and making fun of outfit. Like with Ross, she lets some of them slide and Ewan isn’t a total douche and means well, but half of his attempts to impress her have the opposite result.
The support with Dozla is mainly about Ewan musing about different possible inventions. Dozla is astonished by the child’s imagination, curiosity and knowledge. Since Dozla is fairly simple minded, he is easy to impress and Ewan likes the attention. At the very least Ewan isn’t too rude and making fun of the old oaf.
As for his last supports with his teacher, Saleh, the writers reuse bits of the teacher student relationship back in FE7 between Athos-Pent-Erk. Ewan is overeager to learn while Saleh berates him of the dangers of magic. This theme will continue in FE9 with Calill and Tormod, who inherits some of the looks and attitude of Ewan, though Tormod has a unique role as being part of a resistance.
A lost opportunity to let Ewan show humility and gratefulness how his life turned out, is the fact that he is an orphan of a poor country. Tethys got a decent scene when she was describing her sad childhood to Gerik and how she escaped starvation. Apparently, Ewan was too young to notice anything about it and seems totally carefree, as if he never had a rough life. He got quite lucky in his life, having a sister and a teacher that enable a promising future for him, yet he still pesters them. Saleh complains about the many times Ewan screwed things up, mentioning a story where Ewan was carelessly stealing a tome and letting it fall in the water, making it worthless. Even now, Ewan doesn’t even feel truly sorry about it. Like in the other supports, this is meant to be comedic and funny, I merely notice how Ewan gets away with his behavior and isn't reflecting on it. At the very least, the last support suggest that Ewan becomes his equal.
Conclusion
Ewan CAN be charming and reasonable. But despite of his strengths and the fact that he is aware of his flaws, he decides to keeps being a brat, making him even more infuriating and less respectable. He may grow out of it and get better in the future. Presently in-game he seems to be at his worst and is FE8s embodiment of the annoying child soldier that shouldn’t be send into the war.
The next entry will belong to one of Gilliam, Colm, Amelia, Dozla or Syrene. But who? You can speculate for now. Was Ewan’s placement justified or was I too harsh with him? Thanks for reading and feel free to comment.
-
6 hours ago, Dayni said:
(I'm going to guess one of Dozla or Syrene is next)
A small hint: One of them is going to be cut this current round (#40 to #36)
4 hours ago, Axie said:one of the other fandoms i (used to?) follow used to be all about rankdowns and they are a glorious mess.
Indeed, occasionally there were lot of questionable decisions. Polarizing characters went down too quickly or too late, there was even a bit of scheming, forcing the other player to cut their favorite characters and so on.
#39
Riev
One of the main antagonists with plenty of scenes and opportunities to prove his worth, but Riev fails to deliver.
On the positive side, this wretched old creep behaves and looks just like one expects him to. Cackling, taking pleasure in the suffering of others, his character design perfectly conveys the image of a fallen priest. Having the bishop class and using light magic rather than the class of a dark magic wielding foe is a welcome change in the formula and adds to his corruption and fall. He still uses light magic with the utmost faith of his god, this one just isn't a benevolent one.
Riev is essentially a servant of the Demon King and by extension of Lyon, the possessed prince of Grado. When recruited and installed as one of the new generals to keep the war going and to destroy the other countries stones to release the Demon King, Riev is the only other person aware of this plan. He is only pretending to be loyal to Grado and Vigarde, his true master is the Demon King.
Riev's performance is… shaky. Rather than a physical imposing general like most of Grado's top, he takes more of a strategic role, having fairly high information across the continent and prefers working as a tactician behind the scenes, rather than engaging in battle at the front. His underling Novala preferred blackmail as well and Riev was attacking Rausten at night at surprise. He does know that one of Eirikas guardians survived Valters attack when talking about her army in chapter 6, further hinting to be well informed. No one likes to work with the old man. His subordinate intends to betray him and to steal his position, even Valter and Caellach are disgusted. Valter even refuses his help, which may or may not result in his defeat.
Riev is able to control and lead the army of monsters. He blocks the shipping routes of the continent and has a phantom ship of monsters roaming the ocean, which is a rather neat example of warfare, considering that trade and control of trade routes is important for the countries survival. FE8 does have some slight mentions of the ramifications of economy (especially Grado and Jehanna get the short stick compared to the rich Frelia, Renais, Rausten and the growing mercantile republic Carcino).
Still, the chapters often start with him cackling maniacally about the protagonists incoming doom, just to have his plans be crossed and him disappearing for the next time. FE8 is no exception of having plot convenience and cut scene incompetence to keep the villains and heroes alive.
A personal goal of him is to take revenge on Rausten and its ruler Mansel, as he was exiled for his heresy. He is ordered with the task to conquer the country fairly early, but it isn’t mention for a long time in the game and only within the last chapters, he tries a coup, but it simply fails. He retreats in the Darkwoods, where is is unceremoniously encountered and killed for good. Or he is simply ignored, as he isn’t even a main boss anymore. Even his one special battle conversation with L’Arachel doesn’t really have much of an impact and she cares about him as much as we do. If he would be responsible for her parents death and made up to be the big counterpart of Rausten, it may have a stronger impact, but in in the end, he is little more than a glorified evil priest with little personality and agency.
While his strengths and intellect appear to be high, all of it is to serve pure evil. He mocks everyone around him, gloats about death, compliments the cruel Valter and tricks and mocks the mad Orson. There may be a slight build up to his convictions that humanity at its worst evolves in true power and evil, but the end goal is merely the revival of a big bad demon king. Whose motivation aren't explored beyond "humans are my enemies, I’m evil." Rievs long term goal and his musings over the weakness of humanity (that he somehow isn’t part of anymore) comes off flat. It is entirely possible that the Demon King would just squash him seconds after he was revived, as Riev is just a pesky human. I question this with other worshipers of dark creators in the series like the Grima cult. At least the Lopto sect builds a culture and leadership among it's followers to raise a new society they rule over. There is a certain hierarchy, assignment of roles and political connections to the ruler of the countries. There is even rivalry along the high ranking priests, shown with Manfroy and Veldt, making this sect much more plausible. We don’t get this with Riev, him worshiping the demon king is the culmination of his stupid evilness. Maybe the Demon King could accept humans along his reign and give them positions of powers, so Rievs devotion would actually pay off, but this is also a huge speculation, we have no indicators to believe that.
Ultimately, I consider Riev to be the culmination of the worst aspects of the Gharnef archetype. He is an insane, over the top evil madman that no ones likes and who is working towards his own destruction. He shares none of the good aspects of the Gharnef archetype: Being a manipulating, resourceful schemer who revives the dark creature for his own benefits, who even temps the protagonist and other country's ruler to do his bidding like Gharnef, Manfroy and even Sephiran. Gharnef has even made precautions against Medius like the Falchion, Elice and her ability to revive someone with Aum (maybe a potential user of the Falchion he also has against Medeus), has his own spell book that makes him nearly invincible and he also has blackmail against Camus. At first Riev may appear to be this sort of scheming manipulative person, being able to corrupt and control the prince of the empire, but it is revealed that Lyon or to be more precise the Demon King is in control and Riev is just content tagging along and taking orders. In the end, he is little more than a good little lamb for his new god, pretty much as weak-willed as the people of his old religion he so despises.
Conclusion
Good antagonist have certain roles to fulfill and standards to met and Riev has - beyond his good evil looks and behavior- neither the competence nor the charisma to make a large impact. All of his scheming and manipulative behavior doesn’t reaches any depth or brilliance that change or move along the plot significantly. He could easily be replaced by random evil sorcerers. Being so absurdly loyal, almost dependent to the Demon King also means that he lacks a personal agency, everything potential interesting about him could be attributed to the Demon King instead. So he gets the #39 spot as one of the worst and disappointing villains in the game.
Current Tier List (Give it some time to grow!)
The next entry will belong to one of Gilliam, Colm, Amelia, Dozla, Ewan or Syrene. But who? You can speculate for now. And is there anything to add about Riev? Is his placement reasonable or is there more to him? Was he even rated too low? Thanks for reading and feel free to comment.
-
This new series is about character discussions and ratings of the FE8 cast. Mainly about their supports, personalities, importance in the plot and so on. There is almost no gameplay discussion.
Introduction
A few months ago, I made a Rankdown with four other guys on a german forum. What is a Rankdown? Essentially, we nominate each round a couple of characters, then take turns and everyone removes a character that another player nominated. We justify each of our cuts with a lengthy post, arguing why the character should be removed. We go from worst to best. There was also a popularity poll each round and the 1-3 characters with the most votes were saved and couldn’t get cut that round.
We also had a number of limited skills to force other players to nominate or cut characters according to our own wish. And we had the ability to remove two characters at once. Most importantly, each player could revive one single cut character in the Rankdown, so that the character could get cut later to get a better ranking score and/or a better written cut.
Because of the many rules, restrictions, skills and popularity polls, a Rankdown isn’t about rating all characters objectively, like a Tier List would. There is huge amount of randomness and favoritism. Still, it is difficult to force one’s own preference. The ratings were a reflection of how the five players agreed and disagreed with each other’s nominations, often we could argue, convince each other and form a consensus.
Of course, judging the personality of a character can be much vaguer than rating their gameplay performance. It may be much more subjectively, and there are less facts and no numbers to have clear proof that Character A is better than Character B.
Choosing the characters
We didn’t rank all FE8 characters, we only chose the ones that we felt are relevant discussing. Since we were five players, we wanted an even number like 35, 40 or 45.
The main cast includes 33 characters. Additional characters that have a certain impact and role in the story were the antagonists Orson, Selena, Caellach, Valter, Riev and Lyon. With a total of 39 characters, we either had to add one or six additional characters. While there are many NPCs like Glen, Hayden, Vigarde, Ismaire, Fado, Morva and so on with a slight role in the plot, they didn’t contribute too much. Even the main antagonist, the Demon King, doesn’t have too much of a personality to write and judge about! Even then, the Demon King and characters like Glen could be seen as additions to other characters like Lyon and Cormag. In the end, I added Carlyle as the fortieth character to get an even number. He may not deserve it, but we found ourselves short of one worthy character and just dealt with it.
The 40 characters we rated were:
Eirika
Seth
Franz
Gilliam
Vanessa
Moulder
Ross
Garcia
Neimi
Colm
Artur
Lute
Natasha
Joshua
Ephraim
Forde
Kyle
Orson
Tana
Amelia
Innes
Gerik
Tethys
Marisa
L’Arachel
Dozla
Saleh
Ewan
Cormag
Rennac
Duessel
Knoll
Myrrh
Syrene
Selena
Carlyle
Caellach
Valter
Riev
Lyon
So without further due, let's begin with #40.
Round 1
First we had to nominate the characters that will be ranked #40 to #36.
Player 4 nominated Riev and Ewan
Player 3 nominated Colm and Joshua
Player 1 nominated Gilliam and Dozla
Player 5 nominated Lute and Amelia
Player 2 nominated Syrene and Carlyle
The player order is irrelevant in the nominations, but is used when cutting characters. Each round, the order went up and the first player became the last player. I’m player 4, so I'm expected to cut #37, #33, #29 and so on.
The popularity poll for this round:
Joshua: 12 votes
Lute: 11
Colm: 6
Amelia: 6
Ewan: 4
Syrene: 4
Gilliam: 3
Dozla: 3
Carlyle: 1
Riev: 1
This meant that Joshua and Lute were saved this round and couldn’t be cut.
Now each of the five players cut one of the eight left characters, though a player couldn’t cut the characters they nominated themself. So, five characters out of the eight characters (Gilliam, Colm, Amelia, Dozla, Ewan, Syrene, Carlyle, Riev) were cut and took rank #40 to #36, but three survived this round and don’t necessarily had to be nominated and cut in the next round either!
#40 Carlyle
As it was said earlier, Carlyle isn’t a full-fledged character of the main FE8 cast. There is room for discussion if characters like Glen or Hayden or other villains like Tirado or Pablo are more important and memorable than him. But we had to pick one extra character to get an even number, so one player just had to be generous and write a few words about a less known character.
Carlyle serves as the final antagonist in the Eirika route before the two lords and their armies merge. He seizes Jehanna castle, making him the equivalent of Emperor Vigarde in the Ephraim route.
There is a bit of melodrama around him and queen Ismaire, that is hinted in the Ephraim route by Caellach. Though with just one chapter of exposure, this subplot won’t take too much interest for the player. If anything, Carlyle strengthens the characters of other already well-established characters like Joshua and Caellach (who plays him like a fiddle) through his actions, rather than making a huge impact on his own.
Jehanna is ruled by Queen Ismaire and she always had trouble ruling the poor desert country, even more so with her husband death and her son missing for years. Her general Carlyle has a hidden love for her that he kept secret. In the end, he succumbs to his desires and helps Grado seizing the castle in exchange for the queen. The outcome of his plan is already nonsensical, as his beloved queen wouldn’t return his feelings in any way, considering he just surrendered her country to the enemy. And if he didn’t mind spending the rest of his days with an unwilling woman and was just after her body, he just loses whatever is left to feel pity for his mad love. A shame, as his desperation is fairly decently executed. The chapter starts with him seemingly being victorious, just to get rejected by his love. It further escalates with Caellach taking Ismaire hostage and leaving Carlyle to the incoming army that is about to retake the castle. The sad somber sound of the Eirikas Route leitmotiv takes it course, while the player progresses forward the castle. Carlyle with his grim portrait is in the center of it, lonely waiting on his throne for his doom. Optionally he has a last, awkward meeting with his student Joshua, who may or may not be just like a son to him in the distant past. Though currently, it is Carlyle who gambled poorly, risked everything and is about to lose all of it.
In contrast to Ephraim marching straight towards the evil empire to conquer it, the Eirika route always had the character drama, betrayal and intrigue at its focus. Not unlike Lyon and Orson, Carlyle cared a little too obsessively and couldn’t give up on his feelings for his beloved, instead succumbing to despair and selling his soul to the devil. A meager comparison for sure, as the former two had to deal with the death of their loved ones, while Carlyle was merely so pathetic to not accept a no for an answer.
And this concludes the introduction to the FE8 Rankdown and the #40 rank.
Next time, I get to the actual cast of characters that have much more presence in the game. But who? Well, it will be one of the seven remaining nominated characters in the current round: Gilliam, Colm, Amelia, Dozla, Ewan, Syrene or Riev.
Post your guess and speculate about the further progress of this Rankdown. Who will get in the Top 5? Is there anything further to add to the character of Carlyle?
I see you next time with character #39. -
-
The game is slow but it isn't easy if you play on Maniac difficulty. Because it is Japanese only, it requires something like patching to play it and far less people can or want to do that.
-
-
-
Yeah, unpromoted units suck forever. The promotion usually grants the necessary benchmarks to double and take some hits. If a couple of your units can tank, the few weaker ones that have to be trained can usually hide behind them.
Spreading out a large team of many unpromoted units and leveling them all at the same time ends bad. It is better to focus on one unit at once.
I usually horde all the bexp for Oscar and promote him in the middle of chapter 9. Eases things a lot. It is also possible to rush Marcia to promotion, especially if you stealth chapter 10. Getting the desert BEXP and chilling in all but the last part of chapter 17 should allow almost everyone to reach promotion. Obviously, Forges are necessary to 2HKO and hit with ease. Though it is difficult to ORKO Paladins, Warriors and Wyvernlords regulary. Still possible!
Clash is just bad, as there is almost no terrain that would usually regulate the stream of enemy units.
-
-
#20
Wendy/Ogier
C-A Support
S-Support
Art -
#19
Ninian/Hawkye
C-A Support
S-Support
Art -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
FE8 Character Rankdown
in Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones
Posted