Alastor15243

Three Houses Day 46: Chapter 11 Mission I don't know why they even bother acting like there won't be a fight at the end of the month, seriously. It's not like the player's going to be surprised when they already know how the game mechanics work, and we can clearly see the mission labeled “Conflict in the holy tomb” whenever we go for free battles, because for some reason they put it on that list. Ingrid: If something happens to [Rhea], all of Fodlan will suffer. We must protect her at all costs! Friendly reminder that if you recruited her to Black Eagles and then sided against Rhea, this is what she'd be saying mere days after this moment in time, with the only thing different being which classmates she studied with, even if you recruited her literally that week: Ingrid: I may return to Galatea territory and try to convince my father to join our cause. It's possible that... No. In my heart, I know that my father won't listen. Still, I must get him to see reason. That this is the only way to ensure our family's future. Nobody's political statements mean anything. They are fluid, inconstant and fickle beyond measure, because almost nobody has any actual guiding principles. There's barely half a dozen playable characters in this game who won't blindly follow you into battle on behalf of literally any side of this conflict. This game should be called three barns, because this is a school full of nothing but fucking sheep. And then we get Sothis's ridiculously oversized throne. I had an argument with a friend about this; he seemed to think the ridiculous size of the throne was evidence that Sothis used to have an adult form that was huge. But personally I don't think it's remotely likely that Sothis was ever taller than a normal human. The throne may look oversized, but as a CG just showed, the seat is just barely elevated enough for the avatar's feet to touch the stairs beneath it when they sit on it. If an actual giant tried to sit in this thing, their legs would be stuck out in front of them in a really goofy way. He tried to argue that the throne's way too wide to be built for a normal human, but I don't buy that being proof either, because again, it was clearly built for human height. So unless Sothis was really, really fat, the throne can't have been made that wide just to fit her. Anyway, Rhea laments that her attempts to replace Professr with her mother haven't worked, and then... ...Flame Emperor shows up. And in every version of this, even in Black Eagles, she attacks you without giving you any chance to join her, even though she reveals herself as Edelgard in the Black Eagles version before the battle begins. You have to beat her and then join her. And of course, the Imperial Army got in here using teleportation tech that, unless I am very much mistaken, we never, ever use when we're on her side. Anyway, I don't know why, but I always find this map disorienting when viewed from its usual angle. I always flip it 180 degrees so we're moving up instead of down on the map. My number one priority here, aside from securing as many of the crest stones as I can with my fliers, is to get Flayn enough points in mage that she can become a dark flier as well next fight, and I'll have my full air force, except maybe Professr if I decide to make her a wyvern rider after all. So, the game says we'll get a reward for every crest stone we protect, and presumably this reward comes from the literal ether, just like the Aegis shield reward, because you still get it even if you side with Edelgard right after. Anyway, they start stealing the crest stones, and... what exactly can they do with them? I can only assume TWSITD research. Anyway, Rhea flips out, going “Do you even know what those stones are!?”, and... yeah, knowing what they are this is kinda fucked up. My fliers, and especially Constance with her bolting, make it pretty easy to assassinate all the crest stone thieves within the first few turns. And I have to say, the crest of Noa is super useful on Constance, especially when it procs on bolting. Which is has. Multiple times. Alright, the crest thieves and demonic beasts have been soundly dealt with, which means it's time to take out the rest of the map, and hopefully get Flayn maxed out in mage. Yep, Flayn's maxed out. Fourth dark flier ahoy! Mercedes is only a bit away from maxing out mage too, and Shamir's almost maxed out sniper! So I'm gonna have Shamir fight the bosses. Nah, that wasn't feasible in a timely manner, so I had Dimitri do it. Things were looking bad for a moment when FE... ...FE... ...Christ... ...When Flame Emperor used her gambit, but Shamir and Dimitri managed to finish her off together before she could attack any of the rattled fliers. Now then... for... the scene. I'm watching this mostly blind. I've just seen screenshots and brief snippets. Let's go. ...Uh... ...So... ...I'm not sure why, but he reacts to seeing Edelgard's big, wide-eyed face inside that huge helmet as if the only place he recognized that face from was watching her kill his family, even though that didn't actually happen. For some reason, despite already strongly suspecting Edelgard was the Flame Emperor, only now does he completely and totally snap. … And by “snap”, I mean he's implied to literally cave a man's face in with his fucking fingers like that poor fighter jet pilot from Invincible. And then the game picks this exact moment to hand me my crest rescue rewards: a rusted bow that can be turned into a silver bow, a knowledge gem, and an advanced seal. That little item jingle echoing in the awkward silence is just fucking hilarious. I mean really, to reiterate: Dimitri just caved a man's face in. WHAT THE FUCKMOTHERING MOTHERFUCK. “Dimitri's motivation is maxed out!” YEAH. YEAH, HE LOOKS VERY MOTIVATED RIGHT NOW. Edelgard continues to deny having any role in the Tragedy of Duscur, but Dimitri still seems convinced she's personally responsible because of that previous conversation he overheard with the allies who did. ...Wait, that means Dimitri never fights the people who actually killed his parents in-game, doesn't it? There's no fight in Shambhala in Blue Lions, right? But anyway, two absurdly brave but wimpy-sounding soldiers shield Edelgard with their bodies even though they must have just watched this guy fucking cave a man's face in I'm sorry I can't fucking get over the fact that this just happened in a fucking Fire Emblem game... and they almost instantly die offscreen apparently, but buy Edelgard enough time to teleport away. ...I'll be honest, despite how amused I am right now that this shit just happened, and despite the fact that I'm kind of having a blast with Dimitri going full-frontal stark raving mad... it is not a natural transition. At all. It's not a natural progression, it's just kinda awkwardly sprinkled in, and he goes back to normal just as quickly. So everyone's talking without Dimitri about what they just fucking watched him do, and I'm glad they did that, because of course they should have a reaction to that. And in the game's defense, maybe they'll explain what I've been witnessing better later, because the students themselves are pointing out how inconsistent his bloodthirsty rage has been. Edelgard delivers her antitheist manifesto to the masses, denounces the corrupt church, and declares war. The Monastery is in an awkward situation at this point, and I really wonder if my recruitment of anyone is gonna have a different tone to it, given what joining Professr's class implies at this point. I'm gonna keep playing a bit more to explore this a bit, and do some character customizing. Wow, there are barely any weeks in this month where we actually do stuff. It skips over basically half of it without comment. And then they freak out at the fact that they only have two weeks to prepare for Edelgard's invasion. The fuck were they doing with the last two weeks? There's a quick conversation where Rhea finally comes clean to Seteth about what Professr is, and then... Dimitri actually has a 67% chance of becoming a wyvern lord right now. Going for it. ...Nope, no luck. I'll try again next week. But I will also try to reclass Flayn now. ...Shit, only a 41% chance. Well, might as well anyway. No dice. Oh well. Oh! Looks like Seteth's joined us! Alright. Duly noted. Now then... time to buy some more smithing stones, buy some more flying battalions, recruit Leonie, some other stuff... let's go. Leonie says she can't fathom why Edelgard wants to destroy the church. And yet, when she sided with me in my first run in Crimson Flower, she said “well, Jeralt never trusted the church, so sure, let's take 'em down!” Anyway, she joins me with no different dialogue. Just for shits and giggles I'm gonna try to recruit Linhardt and see if someone from Black Eagles has anything with more gravitas to say. ...He doesn't join because I haven't tried to support with him and I don't have enough points in reason. Ah well. Guess no fancy brave bow, but I can forge one of those anyway. I got a quest from Anna, but I don't think I'll be completing it for another... oh, say... five years. Now then, I've motivated everyone up, so time to get some flying and axe training for Professr. Oh wait, also, better not forget the quests. Looks like Seteth has one. I'm recruiting the teachers not because I plan to use them, but because I want them in the school in case they don't automatically join in Blue Lions. I need them for training Professr. I've got a support with Seteth, which... feels like it should've happened a lot earlier and doesn't work much now. Right, now I'll just get Catherine, and then finish this week. ...She's... flirting with me. Given the stakes of the situation, this feels super weird. Also, a lot of these, despite me asking them, sound like they're asking me. It's kinda odd. And before I forget... greenhouse. Now then, let's see what we have to work with regarding Leonie... ...She's level 23 and has some really nice all-around physical stats, namely 23 strength, 21 speed, and 20 defense. Problem is she's put all of her training in lances and bows, barely has any skill in riding, and has no skill in anything else. Gotta put some work in to catch her up if I want her to be a bow knight. I'm making her focus on riding and authority for now. Shit, forgot to buy more battalions. Better buy those before I forget. Thankfully Annette reached B authority so she can start using the good flying battalions. Looking forward to it. Alright, my fliers all just barely have battalions now. Annette's using the Nuvelle one. Dimitri failed the wyvern lord test again despite good odds, and Flayn failed the 41% again. Alright then, I think we're done here for today. Tomorrow we'll do the next battle. Man, things are going much quicker now that the paralogues are complete. Stay safe, everyone. JesusFuckingChristDimitriCavedInASoldier'sFuckingFace

Oh he was warned they were all going to die. He just accepted it and didn't warn anyone except maybe his wife.

Honestly that's what I'm hoping for. Given the nonsense they had to pull to make anything bad happen in Three Houses, I'm hoping they learn their lesson and just use the old non-canon save-scumming mechanic the game already had. @ZeManaphy I think you're downplaying just how badly, and how frequently, things go horribly wrong in the story of Genealogy. It's a perfect storm of villainous conspiracies where every single victory Sigurd achieves comes at some horrible cost. Divine prophecy would already be hard enough to swallow. Actual literal time rewinding, like in Three Houses, would make the story into a laughable farce with the number of nonsensical excuses they'd have to pull out of their asses for why Sigurd does nothing to stop any of the tragedy that happens along the way.

That simply cannot happen unquestioned due to the nature of what happens in Genealogy of the Holy War. They can't give Sigurd and Seliph a magical amulet of divine prophecy from the gods and still have the story happen the way it does, unless something like this happens: As long as the turnwheel is a canon part of the story, there is no comfortable way to avoid the discussion about just how much goes horribly wrong in that story without any warning. So either they just make rewinds a gameplay mechanic that the protagonist can't canonically do in-story, or they address it in an honest and satisfying way.

Exactly.

It's not about 1RN or 2RN, it's about the multiplier put on your skill and speed to determine your hit and avoid. From 4-10 it was 2, but then Shadow Dragon gets remade where it's 1, and then suddenly when they're back to making new games it's 1.5. Then they remake Gaiden where it's 1, and now we get Three Houses where it's 1.

One thing I'm excited about for the Genealogy remake is that, if the pattern holds, then they'll stop nerfing hit rate calcs into oblivion. every time they remake an old game, they seem to get more and more confident that the hit formula of that game was genius, to the point that now we're back at 1 to 1. Remaking Genealogy might finally convince these people to go back to double. One thing I'm terrified of is that they'll remake Genealogy before they get it through their heads that making the turnwheel a canon concept is pointless and a plot-eating monster. If they give Sigurd the power to see the future or rewind time, the story is most likely going to become a hilarious shitshow.

No to the first, yes to the second.

Honestly that was an interesting scene in hindsight. Especially the fact that it's like towards the very beginning of the game, but now that he's gotten to know and respect the avatar, he genuinely sounds concerned for her, and that he might now be worried not that Professr is abusing Rhea's trust, but the other way around.

...Huh. that'll explain it.

Three Houses Day 45: Chapter 11 Pre-Battle weeks So Seteth is now visibly upset, knowing that Rhea has to be withholding massive amounts of information from him now that Professr's walking around rockin' light green hair, but Rhea says she refuses to explain anything until the end of the month. Seteth says he “happened” upon Jeralt's diary in his room. Either Professr completely forgot to hide it again after reading it last, or Seteth's lying his ass off and he literally ransacked Jeralt's room looking for it. Seteth: Jeralt realized that you had done something to the child and decided to flee. What did you do to that baby, Rhea? Nothing... questionable, I should hope? Yeah, uh, as if the “creeper Rhea” jokes didn't already write themselves. I'm not sure, but I think this is the point where Rhea expects Professr's consciousness to be obliterated and overwritten by Sothis's? I know there was some point where that was the plan. So they act like going to the tomb and receiving the revelation is the “mission” for the month. There's no explanation for why it can't happen now, and also they can't conceivably be counting on this being an actual battle (indeed it seems to be purely ceremonial), so yet again they're trying to fit a square story into a round game. Alright, this is my last opportunity to do the last two paralogues. … … … … OH MY GOD I FUCKING FORGOT ABOUT THIS. So... So... ...Due to getting to this point in the story, I just unlocked the “Enlightened One”. Professr's personal class. And it is a fucking fashion disaster. Like, I can't even describe this fucking monstrosity. It's bad enough on the male avatar, where it looks like the getup of a rejected Nintendo-era Final Fantasy villain, but then the female one adds back in the tube top, miniskirt and ripped leggings. Hell, it looks like she just changed her coat to one way less cool and way more gaudy! And without any fanfare, without any big music or magical lights, it just shows her reclassed to it, standing there with that blank look on her face in the dumbest outfit I've seen in a while, and I just couldn't help myself from laughing uncontrollably. ...Also, the sad, mellow music from before is still playing, which I really feel doesn't fit anymore. But anyway, let's move on. Ingrid failed to hit a 75% chance twice in a row (and by that I mean on two separate weeks; I know save-scumming doesn't work on the same week), so I'll have to try again after getting her those last points in mage. Also, I should take a skill off her so that she'll equip fiendish blow automatically. ...I should do that with the others too, since they each have a skill equipped that isn't that important. Alright, let's try a quick auxiliary battle and then the Balthus paralogue. BRB. ...Okay, so, quick thing: I accidentally clicked the Balthus/Hapi paralogue first, and when I turned it down after going through all of those pointless button presses, he's like “You're really going to abandon her? Didn't think you had it in ya.” And he, like... sounds impressed. Which I find pretty hilarious. Okay, so, I did two auxiliary battles, and I wound up just barely getting both Constance and Annette to master pegasus knight, meaning they're both ready for dark flier. Unfortunately, Annette didn't pass the test, though Ingrid did. So we've at least got two dark fliers. I'm gonna do a monastery visit to get motivation up and do quests, then use the last free week to do the paralogues once Annette is a dark flier too. Having three dark fliers flying around is gonna be awesome. SO! I did the tournament quest again, since it turned out there are no new ones, and this time I kicked its ass. And it turns out the ringleader of this bunch of women who are pissed off at Professr for being too close to the students... is Manuela. Of course. And I got a brave lance! Nice! Also, a random NPC confirms that next month is going to be graduation. Or it would be if not for what's about to go down. So I guess that confirms that thing I was wondering about since the beginning of this playlog. Also, I found something in the library and thus just barely managed to reach Professor Rank A. Which means we have more exploration and tutoring points now. Really, these things should just improve what can be done with a point, not give me more. It would make the game a lot more streamlined. ...Shit, I totally forgot to recruit Leonie. I'll have to recruit her next month. I'd do it now, but this is the deadline for doing these paralogues, so I'll just barely make it if I do them now. And now Annette's a dark flier! Awesome! Now with all of these fliers, the clusterfuck that is Balthus's paralogue should be a cakewalk. Time to do a paralogue at roughly double the recommended level. If I have any trouble at all, that will speak volumes about how fucked this level is. ...God damn it, it's so infuriating to not be able to skip this shit, even after the decision and scene change. So yeah, Baron Ochs isn't even with the bandits. He's just... here to grab the Vajra-Mushti for Those Who Slither to get his allegedly held-hostage daughter back, and... is trying to protect his treasure from the thieves. Despite not fighting them. And not running away. And not attacking anybody but us. ...Let's just do this. ...So yeah, honestly, by this point the battle is a cakewalk. It's just that initial “forced to split up” clusterfuck that's such an issue. With that fixed, I'm having a pretty easy time. I just need to focus on getting everyone together so I can defend Balthus and Hapi properly. Reinforcements are just showing up fucking wherever. On turn three. Man am I glad I didn't try to do this at the recommended level. Christ, imagine doing this on Maddening, when they're ambush spawns. I will concede there is a good amount of dumb fun to be had fucking around with this map with my new fliers. Very satisfying flying around and destroying things. ...Right, now we're at the end, but reinforcements keep coming in ridiculous numbers, which only makes it more obvious how fucking slow and cheap the reinforcement animation is. Seriously, this is pathetic. Instead of having groups all come in at once, they go in one at a time, and each individual one has to do their weapon flourish that makes it take longer than an entire group would in any other game. I sniped the boss from a distance with Constance's bolting so I wouldn't have to get close, because I remember that being nothing but pain last time. Let's see how this plays out. Aaaaand hovering over the boss doesn't highlight his movement range because he spawned in weirdly. Of course game, carry on with the glitches. I love how the baron's attendants see him turn into a horrible monster and they just assume, unfazed, that he's still on our side, because red is one big happy family regardless of canon, and literally everyone but the heroes and skirmish bandits knows how to control monsters. I got one umbral steel for breaking the barriers, which is lame, but Flayn kills the last HP bar with double 12% crits, so that's pretty cool. Okay, so this “Replica hero's relic” story is... kinda weird. Who the fuck would have the motivation to create this specific relic? The demographics who would consider it in good taste to model a weapon after the corpses of dragons and the people who would want to bind it to the specific crests that these two relics have... do not sound like they overlap at all. Anyway, I'll be giving it to Felix, because he's my brawler, and it's the strongest set of gauntlets in the game. The combat art isn't necessary, and he has a crest so it won't hurt him. Alright, I've got... an hour left, for another paralogue I'm overleveled for. ...Yeah, okay, I think I can manage this. Probably. Alright, I'll have Ashe on torch-spamming duty, and I'll try to sweep these guys quickly. ...That's weird, the visual effect for fog was a lot less... square... in the first chapter I saw it in. Now it's just like in the GBA games, a flat color tinting every square not in vision range. And yeah, the inability to move after using items is really annoying when it comes to torches and a bunch of mounted units. Yep, I'm rounding up the stragglers now that I've taken out the reinforcement sources hiding in the fog. One more batch of enemies left I think. Finally. And I get... shoes of the wind, a critical ring, and umbral steel. ...The shoes are nice. And Ashe... learns some stuff... that he doesn't share with us... from some papers he got. What's even the point of saying that he's learned something about his family if there's no opportunity other than this paralogue to reveal what it is? ...But that's it. That's all the paralogues. After more than two months of weekdays... We're nearly done with... the first half... of the game. In the time it took to beat Radiant Dawn. Holy shit am I ready for this to be over, but it's only just begun. See you next week, when we'll see... I dunno, something, I guess. Maybe some kind of twisted joke? Stay safe, everyone.

Three Houses Day 44: Chapter 10 Mission Let's do this. Yet again another one of those insufferable “everyone stands in a half circle and talks” things. Though one interesting thing they do is have the fact that they're fighting Tomas have Sylvain bring up how hard it might be to fight people they know, and Dimitri... is clearly using this subject to talk himself up to eventually fighting Edelgard, now that he knows, but hasn't revealed, that she's the Flame Emperor. I think it's time to start giving Felix battalions so he can gain more authority rank. Now that Professr isn't using Jeralt's Mercenaries anymore, they're a good fit for him because they give almost as much power as his personal. Also, since I haven't seen him in action with death blow yet, I don't even have to deal with witnessing a net loss to his DPS. ...I can't deploy Shamir, and both Constance and Annette are being adjutanted necessarily due to being mages in pegasus knight, so I'm a bit understaffed for this battle. No matter, this battle has never been that hard. Getting to “Monica” is very quick, and then I don't remember the second half being hard. ...So yeah, now that we're getting more acquainted with Those Who Slither In The Dark... ...I have to say that probably my single greatest gripe with the story is what they did to them. Long ago, this planet was home to the Agarthans. A proud civilization with highly advanced technology. But the beginning of the end of this civilization came when a fell star crashed into the earth, bearing an alien broodmother from beyond the farthest reaches of space, here to claim this planet as her new home. She immediately began presenting herself as a divine being to the people of Earth, and came into brutal conflict with Agartha. A conflict that the Agarthans lost. Brutally. Their cities were burned to ash to the point that there is no proof they ever existed. Their entire culture and history genocided into nothingness. The history of their planet completely rewritten, with the alien broodmother taking credit for the creation of both the planet she stole and the people she stole it from. All of humanity was bombed back into the middle ages and kept in perpetually stunted development by a corrupt church ruled by shapeshifting aliens from beyond the stars. But then... hope. With the help of an underground group of survivors hiding in the last Agarthan city, a lone thief went on a dangerous mission to reclaim their planet once and for all. He infiltrated the alien broodmother's secret base and assassinated the broodmother, bringing her corpse back to the Agarthan survivors for research, and they used that alien biology to reward this thief with fantastical powers and incredible weapons born from the broodmother's blood and bones. So armed, the former thief went back to wipe out the alien menace once and for all, he and his allies arming themselves further with the corpses of their slain enemies. It seemed for a moment that the freedom of the human race was inevitable. But tragedy struck. In a crucial moment at the height of the heroes' power, the King of Liberation was betrayed by one of his closest allies, and all the momentum they had gathered was crushed in an instant, the King and his champions slain, and the church's powerful propaganda had eventually taken even the bloodlines the Agarthan rebels had given the strength to rebel... and brought them under the control of the “church”. Fast forward to modern day. The Agarthan rebels are trying yet again, and it's their last chance. Because the surviving aliens are making multiple attempts to resurrect their broodmother queen, undoing what little the Agarthan rebels had managed to do over their centuries of underground oppression. And it sounds like the aliens just might be able to do it. But the Agarthans' last hope to exterminate the alien menace once and for all... is in a descendant of that hated traitor who sold out the human race. Three Houses... created that basic concept... and somehow decided the best thing to do with this amazingly fascinatingly tragic people... these people rich with potential to be anti-villains, anti-heroes, hell, even straight-out heroes... ...was to turn them into objectively, unsympathetically evil, mustache-twirling, puppy-raping demons. I don't think I'll ever quite be able to forgive the story for doing that. ...Fuck it, let's just get this over with. I open up with stride, which I've put on Flayn along with the march ring, and I took out the western demonic beast's shields... for one umbral steel. Yaaaay. Dimitri's attack power is now frankly psychotic. He's doing 46 damage to this dark mage. Per attack. Yeah, I think once I get people into advanced classes, the game is going to be a cakewalk for a whiiiiiiiile. The options you have in this game just snowball like crazy due to how powerful you can get. And I'm baiting in Kronya on turn 3. She's fast and has a high crit rate, but one, her attack is low enough that I have units who can tank it, and two, she uses a gambit instead of attacking anyway. I weaken her with Sylvain curved-shotting her, and then a combat art from Professr finishes it. And then we get the third cutscene of Professr being a complete and total dumbass for the sake of the plot. It starts with her chasing a fleeing Kronya through the woods, winding up back on the altar that she initially started on (they apparently assume you'll let her come to you like I did I guess), when Solon arrives and uses her as a human sacrifice to banish Professr to the shadow realm. I'm going to take a stopwatch and time exactly how long it takes between when Solon is doing the dark magic and when Professr's finally hit by it, to see how much time she had to rewind time, even if we assume, without any canon evidence, that Agarthan dark magic can negate divine pulse. ...Eighteen seconds. That's how long it took for her to get grabbed by the shadow tentacles once the dark magic started showing up. And not once did she think to use divine pulse. We don't even see her trying and failing, she just doesn't use it, like the game expects us to forget she can do it. But yeah, now Professr's banished to the shadow realm, necessitating Sothis fusing with Professr... which for some reason prevents them from being able to talk anymore. ...But before then... Solon and my students get into an argument, and then Dimitri has another sequence where his bloodlust just comes out from 0 to 100 in a single line. I won't deny Sothis yelling at Professr for her latest act of stupidity is satisfying. But now, the Sword of the Creator is upgraded to its true form (and fully repaired, which I took advantage of by using it until it broke earlier), and we can cut our way straight out of the Shadow Realm. Aaand the battle resumes, with my allies stuck in the forest. But I manage to get them out of there without even using the second stride gambit, and I manage to destroy the western of the remaining three demonic beasts' armor and get a crazy level up for Professr. I think that's enough for now, and I'm going to keep going ahead and rush the boss. There are too many enemies to the south since I kinda rushed Kronya. ...No wait, I have an opening to shatter another one's armor too with my stragglers who haven't had many opportunities to use gambits. I'll just have the main group of powerhouses go after Solon. My reward for this is one umbral steel. Yaaaaay. Alright, I'm positioned to kill the boss thanks to stride, but infuriatingly, Ingrid, after attacking, is one fight away from getting fiendish blow. Guess I'll have to do an auxiliary battle next month to get that sorted before any paralogues or the like. So yeah, after the battle, I explain my new Nowi-colored hair to Dimitri, and then I pass out again. ...I uh... can't remember if this is ever explained. ...But we wake up to the ungodly creepy sight of Rhea singing us a lullaby like we're her fucking daughter, and I'm super uncomfortable about this and fast-forwarding through the dialogue. And I am fucking cutting this here because the save screen just came up and I'm running short on time today. Man, I... I just do not say much about what happens in the battles in this game. Is that bothering people? I just find myself glossing over it because it rarely registers as something interesting anymore. Maybe that's just me having done this for too long, I dunno. Well, we'll finish up the story for this month tomorrow. Say safe, everyone.

Three Houses Day 43: Chapter 10 Week 4 Alright, time for some auxiliary battles. First, the quest one. I'm gonna try to get some more training in crucial classes while I'm at it. I'm taking Ingrid, Professr (adjutanting Annette) and Dimitri to fight most of these guys to get some class exp training done. It's mostly generic swordfighters, so it should be pretty mindless. ...You know, I don't think I've ever seen Dimitri's crest activate on combat arts. ...And that's the only observation that came to me in that whole fight. Alright, time for an auxiliary battle for level 23 with doubled gold rewards. I'm giving Professr the giant shell because at level 22 her defense is still 12, and that's... probably not good. I usually make a habit of throwing all of my stat boosters onto the avatar in 3H anyway, so I don't see any reason why not to at least give her the shell now. But again, it's annoying as hell that I can't use these straight from the convoy, especially when there are so many smaller, literally farmable stat boosters that can pile up too. ...I just checked out the battalions menu to see if Professr can equip anything better, and I just realized the Nuvelle battalions are all... mundane servants like maids. Honestly, their gambits sound pretty fucking hilarious. But I settled on some knights of Seiros. Anyway, there are a lot of brawlers, but they barely do any damage to Dimitri and they do nothing to Dedue, so I'm not really concerned at all. Aaaaand Dimitri has death blow! Awesome, now to focus on other people. ...For some fucking reason, the ending blast of thoron doesn't even show up when the enemy dodges. ...Aaaand I forgot to equip a bunch of these new skills on people, fuck. Damn it, the way this game handles new skills is still so disorienting. ...Alright, now it's the day of the mission. I'll do some class changes, update skills, do supports, and then I'll be done today. Dimitri: Professor, have you heard? They say we've finally located the enemy. Why are the house leaders always finding information like this out before the teachers? ...Okay, no, complaint withdrawn in this specific case, though I definitely remember similar issues happening before. They're specifically keeping Professr in the dark because, surprise surprise, people with raw, emotional, personal investments in a law enforcement case are generally expected to not involve themselves in that case. But [Insert House Leader Here] turns the church's reasoning for keeping them out of the fight right back around. The church says that this information is an obvious trap given that the knights are at their busiest right now, and that they hope to lure Professr out. But [Insert House Leader Here]... says that they can't afford to have Rhea and Seteth leave the monastery to deal with this when the castle's defenses are so thin... and also says that Professr's team is the only team that stands a chance against this foe of “unknown strength”... which makes no sense. [Insert House Leader Here] makes no argument for why Professr's group would be better at attacking than defending, or why the Knights of Seiros would be better at defending than attacking. If I were writing this, I'd have [Insert House Leader Here] argue that when our defenses are so thin, we need to send quality, rather than quantity, after the unknown enemy, because quantity can defend a large location like the Monastery better than quality can, so the standing army should stay behind and the Relic users should lead the assault. ...And now we're back at the sad “what to do” menu. Honestly, the song Anxiety (the “Mars Bringer of War”-aping one) should be playing right now, and Professr should look angry or determined. Though honestly that might look even funnier. But anyway, Dimitri's a wyvern rider, Sylvain's a sniper, but Ingrid can't get dark flier this week, so I'm keeping her in mage a bit longer. Now to give everyone their skills... Constance also has pegasus knight certification, so I'm putting her in that and adjutanting her until she masters it. So yeah, Felix was that crazy without death blow. Let's see how nuts he is with it. And finally... time for supports. First, Dedue and Mercedes's B. Mercedes saying the fact that there aren't many people left to pass on the legends of Duscur is “almost like when someone dies” is... kinda... hilariously insensitive. I get what she means, that the loss of the folklore is like another death itself, but to say that the fact that a ton of people are dead is “almost like when someone dies”... OH WOW, and then Mercedes says she doesn't hate Duscur because she doesn't know anyone they killed. Like, not that she doesn't believe in blaming all of Duscur for the actions of a few, or that she questions the official narrative, it's just “it didn't affect me personally”. Oh my god, this is actually pretty funny how out-of-touch she's being right now. It's a shame it's not on purpose. ...Though it is cute how she follows it up with something that helps bring context to why she feels that strongly about passing down knowledge, by offering to teach Dedue a pastry recipe that's been passed down through her now-extinct family line for generations, and that she's scared it'll be lost forever if anything happens to her. ...Ah yes. Ingrid and Dedue's B. Let's see how this goes. ...She's... completely apologetic, realizing that her impression of Duscur, fueled by propaganda and facilitated by the grief of losing someone precious to her, was completely and totally off-base given that Duscur's nothing like how she imagined the people of Duscur would have to be. But this is still really uncomfortable due to Dedue's... extremely low self-esteem about his people, and honestly, I think Three Houses' take on racism is... drastically inferior to what Tellius did, even though I have endless complaints about that as well. And now for Dedue's C supports with the relative newcomers, Flayn and Shamir. First, Flayn. Curious, Flayn's drooling over a meal that doesn't appear to have any fish. There's meat, but it's red and steak-like. ...And now Flayn's making muffled eating sounds... while visibly not moving her hands at all. Seriously, I want a free camera mode for this shit. I have a very strong suspicion that Dedue and Flayn are just positioned... both standing up, but floating different heights above the black abyss beyond the bedsheet background. So we've got yet another person asking to be taught how to cook by Dedue. The specifics of the other ones are a total blur, but I know this has happened a bare minimum of twice before. Yeah, beyond that basically nothing happens. Hopefully Shamir has more interesting stuff to say. So... uh... Shamir just threw a knife at a bug on Dedue's shoulder. I think. Again, it's hard to tell, but she did a waving gesture with her arm followed by an attack flourish and a whooshing sound effect. That might have been them trying to tell us she used a bow. Amusingly, throwing knives at bugs is something that I first saw in an UnassumingVenusaur patch support between Jakob and Keaton. ...This support... is basically just taking advantage of the fact that these are both people of few words, but not in the idiotic way the Fates localization did with Saizo and Beruka, literally removing an entire support for a “...” gag. It's... yeah, it's okay. Their dynamic is kinda cute. Now then, Dimitri and Sylvain. ...It sounds like Dimitri got in some trouble with women due to the promise he made to Sylvain to flirt with one and is now hiding in Sylvain's room. Sylvain: You didn't give her a dagger, did you? Is that why you're hiding? Does she have a dagger, Dimitri? Okay, I fucking love this line. It starts out as a call-back, but then with that added last sentence, it goes from “great job, you gave a woman a shitty present” to “great job, you simultaneously pissed a woman off and armed her.” ...Dimitri... is really vague about why the attempt to flirt went wrong, though Sylvain seems to think Dimitri used one of Sylvain's pickup lines, which would be taken completely differently coming from someone with an established reputation as having no sense of humor whatsoever. Now they're making it sound like it worked too well, and now this girl is chasing after him because she likes him way more than he likes her. And that's the end of that support chain. Honestly, I wish they went harder on the “noodle incident” angle and made it hilariously unclear just what kind of shit Dimitri got himself into, other than the fact that it's bad. ...Alright, C support with Flayn and Dimitri. ...Ah. So Flayn's a terrible cook. That should make her supports with Dedue... iiiiinteresting...? So, Dimitri didn't care, other than noticing some... “suspiciously crunchy bits”. Either he has no taste, or we're about to find out what he just ate. Or it's going to make him sick. ...Yeah, he's fine. Huh. I wonder what'll happen next. Now Felix and Flayn. ...She basically emotionally manipulates Felix into doing a chore by turning it into a training exercise and preying on his ego compared to the knights by saying she saw some knights doing it. ...And he tells her to throw them all at once. They'd have to be some pretty damned light logs, because she has absolutely no issues doing that. Unless she has crazy dragon strength. ...Oh yes. And now for Sylvain's support with Flayn. Where Flayn seems to believe some crazy outlandish rumors about him. Honestly, if this shit is what Dedue heard in their B support, that would be absolutely hilarious. Especially this line: Flayn: I've heard that you panic when there aren't women around to flirt with. That you've gone as far as flirting with horses and even chickens! It's the way she says “chickens” that brings it over the top. ...Alright, and that's all the supports for today. Tomorrow... we finish the first of the three big final chapters of Part 1. Stay safe, everyone.

Given my first playthrough was black eagles, I have to assume what happened was I didn't notice anything about it until my Verdant Wind run, then played Silver Snow a while later and assumed it got changed. Then misremembered it as happening in my first run or something? Wow, I could've sworn I misread those. But yeah, training gauntlets are all Felix needs, and there's barely any might bonus to upgrading.

Three Houses Day 42: Chapter 10 Week 2 Part 2 – Week 3 Alright, let's see if we can salvage this turn. Two demonic beasts, two enemies, cavalry coming in from the north... ...Alright, once I noticed one of the demonic beasts only had one bar left, that made the solution easy: send in Felix to obliterate him, then take out the remaining thieves, simultaneously set up to kill the cavalry with Felix and Professr's movements, and then deal with the demonic beast next turn when I have more elbow room. ...But the reinforcements are on me just as quickly next turn... Hm... ...But their stats are shit! Alright, awesome. That means I can use Shamir and Professr's gambits, combined with the crack I made with Ingrid last turn, to obliterate this last demonic beast's armor and get some more umbral steel before taking him out. Honestly, the Aegis shield is pretty good on brawler Felix. The light weight of gauntlets means that the shield is really the only way he can make use of his extra strength-based carrying capacity. At this point, with training gauntlets, it barely slows him down. And really, as if he needs stronger at the moment with his +16 damage stack. ...Alright, that's almost all of them. ...The duke seems programmed to follow Professr. I guess that makes sense, keep him closest to the strongest unit and not have him run in any given direction, right into where reinforcements might be programmed to show up. ...Okay, Felix having a couple of charges of recover is actually pretty damned handy, I won't deny. Right, only the boss left, unless the fact that he isn't moving means there's another nasty surprise. I'll give the kill to Dimitri, since he's the only one I deployed who's still below level 20, and I at least want the option to make him a wyvern rider next map, even though I plan to wait until he gets death blow before committing him to it full time. Aaaand... boss down. So yeah, turns out Duke Gerth is a pretty nice guy in spite of all that Constance was looking forward to giving him shit. Alright, so they do explain how the Fetters of Dromi got to Dagda. Clans who followed the 10 Elites fled across the sea. ...Though I think I'm gonna have to look at the DLC intro again, because I'm now very confused. I could've sworn the four DLC crests were from Nabateans who weren't massacred in the big war and were involved in the attempted resurrection of Sothis. Why are there Relics for two of them? Why were their bodies butchered? And how could they be butchered in a timeframe such that clans fleeing the continent due to their role on the losing side of the war would have the Relics made from them? ...Wait, uh... Constance didn't know about Yuri's crest? How is that... no, I'm almost certain that shit came up at the climax of the DLC! ...Alright, now that we're back at the Monastery, time for some promotions and class changing. ...After lessons. ...Shit, forgot that Ingrid hasn't learned fiendish blow yet. Damn it, I could've sworn she had, but I guess that was just mag+2. ...But Constance can get dark flier now. She'll go in that because there's little point in putting her in anything else until she unlocks pegasus knight. Alright, I've put it off long enough. Time to go exploring the Monastery. Whenever I see people praising how the game handles Jeralt's death, this almost invariably comes up. The fact that everyone on campus has something to say about Jeralt and his death, from Leonie to Rhea to the Gatekeeper. Make no mistake, that is a nice touch. But the trouble is it's icing on a terrible cake. I'm sure it would be great at bringing something already great over the top, which I'm sure is why the people who can manage to be emotionally invested in Jeralt's death praise it so much. But it does nothing for me. Nothing at all. Also, now that there are so many characters in actual tears, the subdued nature of the portrait sad faces is really becoming apparent. I really don't get it. Yes, I know that FE7 is the only game to avert this, but again, the “increased production values” only serve to make this more jarring. I'm talking to Leonie, who is clearly in tears judging by her vocal performance, but her portrait looks just mildly unhappy. ...Speaking of which, I just dumped a bunch of flowers and owl feathers on her, and she's ready to do her B support with me now. Which is gated behind this chapter. For some reason. Despite it involving her going off on Professr for not appreciating Jeralt enough... in a way that doesn't even get performed like Jeralt just died. Like, she's not even crying and lashing out in anger due to someone dear to her dying. Even knowing that she'd be lashing out at someone to whom he'd be more dear, that would at least be more understandable. But no, it just comes across as something that's not meant to be taken too seriously, and it's only in the next support where they bring up the fact that Jeralt's dead. It's like they got the chapter gate wrong. Oh, also, not sure if this is me just totally misremembering here, but I could've sworn on my first playthrough, before the updates, when you talk to Hubert, with the text tag “Never been much for condolences...” ...He said “I've never been much for condolences.” ...And then the entire conversation just ended. Which I found fucking hilarious. But no, either I'm misremembering horribly, or they added in the rest of that conversation later. ...PFFFF! IT'S STILL THERE! IT WASN'T TAKEN OUT IN AN UPDATE! THERE'S SOME CONDITION ON WHETHER OR NOT HE SAYS ANYTHING MORE THAT I APPARENTLY ONLY MET ONCE! THAT IS HILARIOUS! Alright, quest time. ...Ah, there don't seem to be many. Just a battle quest and... something in Jeralt's room. ...Ah yes. Right. The wedding ring I'm supposed to give to whoever I S-rank. First playthrough I S-ranked Leonie, and all I could think (aside from how clutch she was in the final battle) was “she's wearing Jeralt's wife's ring. Oh she's gotta be loving this.” ...Okay, so all Manuela says about the dagger that killed Jeralt was that “the wound it left wasn't normal”. Nothing about it having any supernatural properties that helped it pierce his armor and kill him in one blow. Right, now for that Leonie support. Professr: “How do you know my father?” Not “did”. “Do”. Yeah, I think this is a fuck-up, and this was supposed to be unlocked before Jeralt's death. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the coding was a botched effort to make it only obtainable before Jeralt's death, but they wound up doing the opposite. ...Alright, let's see if we can get some basic flying battalions too. ...Yep, that works. Okay. Now then, lesson time, and I'll finish up for today. Dimitri got alert stance, but not much else interesting happened. He's still level 19 unfortunately, so no wyvern rider yet. Tomorrow I'll probably do some battles to do that quest. Stay safe, everyone.