Harb1ng3r

I played Radiant Dawn Hard mode and brought some fun units to Tower. I trained Lyre, which was not fun at all, but watching her Rend her way through Endgame was hilarious. I also trained Sanaki all the way up, capping her strength with BEXP to allow her to double Auras with Rexflame+White Pool. I used all three dragons to help Sanaki and Volke take out a single cover tile Aura, which was stupid and fun. Another classic was forking Silque over into the Cav line in Echoes and grinding her to cap all of her stats but Res. Watching her crush the game from there on out with Gradivus was awesome. Finally, everything that I have ever done with Tina in Thracia 776 could be considered stupid. The amount of memes that you can pull off with Thief Staff is ridiculous. She's my favorite unit to use in series history because of Thief and Movement Stars. Leg Ring Tina running around and killing things with tomes was also dumb and funny.

One of every class? Twenty unit teams? Oh boy this sounds like a place for me! This list is gonna be based mostly on character, but many of these guys are bonkers combat units anyway. Avatar: Harb, Master Knight (please give us this class back IntSys) --- Lord: Leif. I love Leif as a character, and his utility is kinda unique among Lords. Mercenary: Saber. Echoes made me fall in love with the guy as a character, and boy if he isn't a demon. Myrmidon: Mareeta. Wow this one's tough. Eyvel and Mareeta are two of favorite characters in the series, but while Eyvel has bases and gives you a huge power trip when available, Mareeta is my favorite growth unit in the series to train. Thief: Volke. I love this guy character-wise, and watching him slaughter red dragons in the tower with gamble-induced guaranteed double crits and adept chances will never get old for me. Fighter: Orsin. V O U G E. Also he's a cool dude, Tanya and Orsin are cute. Brigand/Pirate: Gonzales. The guy never fails to crack me up. Cavalier: Ares. Mystletainn makes him a nuclear bomb, and I love his character so much. He's both incredibly prideful and a good man, which you don't often see in the series. His edginess may be a bit of a meme, but I love it. Cavalier: Sirius. What, they come in pairs, so this isn't cheating, right? Camus is another one of my favorite characters ever, he really develops from persona to persona and has maybe the best character arc in the whole series. Armor Knight: Wendy. Winter can be very cold, and she is experienced and talented at warming the bench. Footlocked Lancer: Danved. Was thinking of choosing Devdan, but Devdan isn't nearly as strong as a bear, a tiger, or ten men. Danved is. Archer: Brigid. Eyvel is on the list now. Good stuff. Pegasus Knight: Palla. I adore Palla. She's kind, introspective, stern and powerful when she needs to be, and also one of two units that could arguably be called the best unit in multiple games in the series (alongside Marcus). Wyvern Rider: Haar. Disgustingly strong and also my spirit animal. Troubador/Mounted Staves: Nanna. Wrath Earth Sword is hax, Charisma+many supports is hax. Also I love her character and I had to bring her with Leif. Anima Mage: Soren. I like him as a character, and my army has not yet hit its angst quota, which makes him a good fit. Light Mage: Sarah. She's a fun character, I love her quirkiness and wanderlust, and boy can she do nutty things as a unit. Dark Mage: Canas. He's just a solid dude living his best life. Cleric: Tina. She is, bar none, my favorite unit to use in the series. She can screw with the enemy so many ways with Thief, Berserk, Sleep and Silence, and can slingshot people around the map with Warp, Rescue, and Rewarp, all on top of a twenty percent chance to do it again each turn. Also she's scared of bugs and is extremely adorable. Dancer: Lene. Lene is awesome, she really brings out the best in Ares. Alone, she's caring and much less shallow of a person than her mother, but she still does her job with pride and dignity, fending for herself. Her relationship with Ares is my favorite romantic relationship in the series. Trainee: Lysithea. I like her as a character, I like her dynamics with the rest of the cast. We all know what she does as a unit. Manakete: Tiki. I'm basing this off of her FE3/12 incarnation where she can collect dragonstones for different boosts and effects (thanos dragon thanos dragon). Also she's just a smol pure bean. Beast: Tibarn. That's the big man, the king of Phoenicis, pretty much the biggest chad in Tellius. Ballistician: Jake. The dimension-hopping time-traveling shop-keeping Anna-loving bolt-shooting sand-dwelling man of intrigue himself. Freelancer: Xane. TWO BALLISTICIANS!

Exactly. I think that part of why the idea popped into my head in the first place was the fact that I rewatched all of Pokemon Generations last week. And yeah, I'm not holding out hope either. This is some conspiracy-theory heavy speculation stuff, but part of me thinks that they would have had something to show for the 30th anniversary if Three Houses hadn't been hit with the last few delays. DLC just came out, and the game is still selling pretty well. It wouldn't make sense to snipe the sales and hype of the newest release. If Three Houses had originally released this time last year, it would make more sense for news to come out on a new release this time this year.

1) Eyvel 2) Ares 3) Camus 4) Tina (mostly here due to being my favorite character gameplay-wise in the series) 5) Palla 6) Volke 7) Mareeta 8) Leif 9) Galzus 10) Arvis 11) Marth 12) Jill 13) Bantu 14) Zelgius 15) Mist

I would love to see a BSFE-esque "short story collection" of backstory chapters and different perspectives from throughout the series, a true celebration of the franchise. You could start with a fully-updated BSFE remake, and then add on stuff like a chapter with Kurth as a Lord in the Grannvale-Issach War, a chapter with young Zelgius fighting alongside Greil for the first time, a chapter where Galzus and the innocent members of Rivough are escaping, a chapter based on the first ever mission of the Shepherds, a chapter about the rebellion of Duma and Mila against Naga, a chapter based on the sealing of Yune, a chapter where you get to play through The Scouring, and so on. Maybe call it "Fire Emblem Echoes: Fleeting Recollections". I would love that, and if it is done right and made with equal love for each game, I could see it really unifying the fanbase in a new way.

As many people here probably already know, the awful Meath over Manster FEH localization error on Ced's unit description has been fixed. However, with that came a sad new reality: that Manster has been officially localized as Munster. Many people have expressed a bittersweet feeling as some of the old iconic fan localizations of characters, places, and weapons. While it's great to see Thracia and Jugdral as a whole enter more of the spotlight, it comes with the loss of icons. Whether it be Orsin and the Pugi Axe becoming Osian and his Vouge or the Yied desert becoming the Aed, more and more fan names are falling to official localization. And this isn't a bad thing, obviously I'm grateful for the recognition of one of my favorite games ever made by the company that created it. It's just a sort of loss of things that I feel nostalgic for. Today we saw a change that hits me personally the hardest with this bittersweet feeling. The city of Manster is such an iconic part of Thracia's narrative, it's home to the endgame, it's home to the infamous escape sequence that is the most recognizable series of chapters in Thracia. It's home to some of the most emotionally charged scenes in the whole game. The Manster District, named for this city, is the country that all but three or four chapters of the game take place in. The Manster Escape Arc is the part of Thracia that makes people love the game for its story-gameplay interaction and unique set of challenges or hate the game for its brutality to blind players. The Manster escape sequence is Thracia. Almost the entire game takes place in the surrounding areas. It is my favorite country in any Fire Emblem game, it is the home of the game that got me into the online community after years of lurking. So goodbye Manster. I'll miss you. Alright, that's my soliloquy. I guess I also have to change my profile image from Super Meath Boy, I'm glad that they fixed it. Does anybody else have thoughts on this whole thing?

Very interesting topic! I'll pitch in the ones that I play the most, because I have a lot of games, and I'll avoid ports of games that I had already played before getting Switch, with a few exceptions. SSBU Assist Promote: The Black Knight FE3H: Lysithea Octopath Traveller: Tressa Rain World: Slugcat Breath of the Wild: BotW Bokoblin Crypt of the Necrodancer: Cadence Hollow Knight: Hornet Link's Awakening HD: Marin Dead Cells: The Prisoner

Haha, finally a thread for me and my generic tastes! Three Houses animations are a bit disappointing. After the really sick skill proc animations of Tellius and 3DS (looking at you, Lethality), Three Houses just feels a bit flat and generic. This is especially sad for the crest-locked weapon arts, which pretty much recycle crit animations. Stuff like Ruptured Heaven, Fallen Star, Atrocity, Raging Storm, and Beast Fang really deserved the same kind of skill activation cutscene as Scendscale and Ragnarok Omega from Echoes. Nanna is really cool. She's a fantastic unit in FE4 due to minor Hezul and great class, and she's among the best combat units in FE5 when given Wrath. Character-wise she grows from being timid and demure to an assertive, strong woman. She's absolutely adorable with Leif, and all-in-all she's one of my favorite Jugdral characters. Cats deserved better in Radiant Dawn. Fire Emblem 3's Dragonstone system was super cool, and it would be great to see variable boosts come back. Swordmasters are super fun even if they're not great, and the bad ones can sometimes be an absolute joy to train up into monsters (looking at you, Mareeta). Wyverns are dope. Not only are they often absolutely broken (Caeda/Palla/Catria after promo, Deen, Miledy, Jill, Haar, Camilla, everyone in FE3H), but they often (not always, ex:Camilla) have pretty cool character arcs and look really cool. It's a person in red or black armor riding a dragon into battle. That's sick. Rout maps are usually super boring. Same with defense maps. I'm pretty sick of the power of friendship. Binding Blade, Blazing Blade, Awakening, Fates, and Three Houses can be really annoying at points because of how often they fall back on the story/character trope of "We must succeed morally in every way, and follow our hearts to make decisions. Pragmatism is more-often-than-not a bad thing, because it prompts inaction, which is bad. Family is the most important thing. Go team!" Part of why I love Thracia's story is the fact that reckless idealism often gets punished with failure, and the reality of the war is much uglier and more complex. Echoes was really good as a remake, it was lovingly made and should be a template for all future remakes, but no amount of polish could totally save Gaiden. Buyable boots are epic and are part of why Binding Blade's lategame is one of my favorite in the series. We need buyable boots to come back.

Ok, whole lot to address here. I think that we agree that some combination of Laguz mechanics would be good, but I still have a bone to pick with some of your points about Mordecai. I fail to see how stat caps are relevant here, given how Mordecai will never hit his. The cavs and paladins will have higher stats by endgame than Mordecai and be more Tower-ready simply because he will virtually be at his bases due to low exp gain. I also fail to see how Jill's low base speed (with low being nearly twice Mordecai's) is bad but Mordecai's is good. Jill also has the privilege of growing out of her bases, unlike Mordecai, whose pitiful growths make that impossible. Also, you bring up movement. Mordecai has good movement and smite utility, but he also cannot leverage his good movement due to the fact that he cannot attack before turn 2 without being danced, and he cannot attack before turn 3 without burning a valuable Laguz Stone. Also, you seem to be heavily over-representing his bulk. While he looks amazing transformed, he actually gets 3RKO'd by enemies on his join chapter while untransformed, which isn't much better than Jill's 2RKO, especially when factoring in the fact that he is prone to being ambushed by many enemies due to fog of war. Jill also gets to patch her issues with a myriad of useful stat-boosters like a Seraph Robe, Dracoshield, and Energy Drop and become a much stronger and tankier unit. She also faces weaker enemies, uses stronger weapons (forged irons and then forged steels and then Brave Axe), and can boost her overall offense in several chapters with Beastfoe. While this is admittedly a large investment, she can actually use these boosts before you're already halfway done with the map, unlike a Laguz unit. I also think that you're severely downplaying the importance of one-rounding in Part 4, because again, Mordecai cannot eliminate a single enemy per turn, which is awful on rout maps where you face 60+ enemies apiece. Is Mordecai the worst unit in the game? Not even close. In a game with Lyre, Meg, Kyza, Astrid, and many other absolute stinkers, Mordecai at least has a few chapters of solid utility and fine combat. He's never the best unit you have, but he has two or three chapters of consistency, assuming that you use a lot of Olivi Grass and Laguz Stones on him. That said, it is important to note that using Mordecai takes resources from other, better Laguz units, like Ranulf and the Hawks.

I would say that they're actually pretty alright in Thracia. Or at least one of them is. Xavier can be a pretty decent combat filler due to access to Master Axes and Bows. On the indoor endgame maps his movement is less of an issue, and he can take on a few of the Deadlord rooms at base. He also has great con, which combined with his good physical combat makes him a decent unit for Chapter 24's right side, as he can kill the heroes and then start capturing the silenced Lopt Mages for their staves.

I know that the horse has been beaten a whole lot, but I think that the Laguz are not good in RD, and that they are much better implemented in PoR. While I love the idea of a gauge, they are so heavily crippled in RD by the fact that they lose time in transformed state simply for getting a javelin tossed at them. What's really unfortunate for most Laguz in RD is the fact that there are so many bad maps for them. If there was a warp staff, some non-royal Laguz units could be phenomenal bosskillers. If there were fewer rout maps, they wouldn't be nearly as bad in part four. They cannot contribute at all on those maps, as they just get straight-up torched when they have to revert. Wildheart does not solve the problem, as they are still only able to kill one enemy per turn at best on these later maps due to lack of 1-2 range. They will never be able to safely lock down and slaughter an entire quadrant of the map like Ike, Titania, Haar, Jill, and even Mia can with their strong 1-2 range and solid-to-great bulk. Mordecai having great physical bulk doesn't matter as long as other units have enough physical bulk to survive, which the aforementioned beorc can do. Halfshift completely removes Mordecai's capacity to even remove a single enemy, because even if you feed him multiple pairs of speedwings, he isn't doubling and one-rounding. Let's assume that you're heavily babying him and he winds up at a very generous 16 untransformed speed, 32 transformed. This looks great! It doubles some things! However, in Wildheart, even at a ridiculous 16 base speed, acquired through gimping every single other unit in the game, he ends up at 24 base speed. He is now doubled by a lot of the enemies in RD lategame that hover around 28 speed, and he fails to double even generals. He fails to pick up one-shots due to the ridiculous bulk of RD enemies; the obscene amount of generals on most maps really hurts units that aim for one-shots. I really like Path of Radiance's transformation mechanics, as using demiband only slightly hampers the stat boosts of transformed Laguz units. This lets them function from the word start, and it lets Mordecai, Muarim, and Ranulf do some significant damage. Having some units like Lethe start at full is also really cool, she's actually better than most of your guys in early-midgame. I do like the idea of units being able to do stuff while untransformed. However, I feel like this aspect has to be balanced too. In TRS, dragons have low movement and staves have great utility, so there is little reason to use the transformation rings given how good units like Zieg, Raffin, and Schramm Guy (forgot his name) are at combat. Ultimately, I like the idea of a meter, but I think that transformation bonuses should be half the untransformed bases or less, untransformed bases of transforming units should be at least in the ballpark of the beorc units, transforming units should not be punished for taking attacks that they cannot counter, transforming unit weapon ranks should be fixed at a high level or fast-growing, and transforming units should have untransformed utility but not utility that makes transforming undesirable.

That is actually a really good comparison, down to the pragmatic "we can't save everyone and everything's a trap" mentality

Eh, I think she's a fine mom. She left to find Dermott and reunite her family. It would be one thing if she just ran out on Finn, but she had a good reason to do it and left with Finn's blessing. I think that the fact that she was able to leave is a great symbol of the love and trust that Finn and Lachesis have for each other, and the faith that Lachesis has in Finn to raise their daughter well. Editing to avoid a double post. I think that some characters get written off way too quickly as memes. For instance, Dorcas is one of the kindest, most honest guys in Fire Emblem, he's doing everything for his sick wife, but all that he is known for is the mutton. I also sometimes see Merlinus get criticized for being an asshole in Binding Blade. I think that this stems from my biggest issue with Binding Blade's story: Roy always being right, and the emotional decision always being the best choice. Merlinus shows up in every cutscene to say "Are you sure Roy? This could be a trap." He provides sound and pragmatic advice, but because of the general tone of Elibe's stories he is always the cold-hearted loser who never trusts anything. I'd compare him to Augustus from Thracia, who has a similar set of views and strategies. However, Thracia paints Leif as impulsive, rash, and generally flawed, unlike Roy's, his choices and ideals can lead to failure. This leads to Augustus being a much more effective mentor character and a much more capable tactician. Merlinus is not bad, and Roy and Elphin are the source of all of the problems with him.

I've got two. I wish that Camus didn't have to drown in the jokes aimed at the archetype he spawned. He's more rebellious than most of the characters that take after him (he freed the heiress to the Archanean throne from execution for goodness' sake!) and he also shows in his Zeke and Sirius personas his growth as a person to incorporate more than just blind, meaningless loyalty. By the end he sees that the best thing that he can do for himself and his country is to walk away, which I think is an incredibly powerful message that runs counter to the majority of the criticisms aimed at him. Lachesis has been screwed over by her art in Cypher and Heroes into being a generic moeblob. That's all she is to new fans. She's a powerful and conflicted character who grows beyond just being in love with her half-brother. She is a genuine badass, and she doesn't get enough credit for being pretty well-written.

Heck yeah! I think that Three Houses in its route-choosing shenanigans really forgot to make a good villain. My least favorite thing about Byleth is how the students lose all free will and independent thought when they join your team, they just go along with your Lord's plan. Dorothea, for instance, has no place whatsoever fighting for Faerghus or serving an unstable noble who fights to instate a strong religious monarchical order. Ingrid has no reason to join the Black Eagles, she is fine with a stagnant social order and is fiercely loyal to her father and homeland. This is ignored because "I'll go wherever you lead, Professor!" The 'everyone is evil except for Claude' horse has been beaten to death, but I do think that your ability to side with each faction and have all of them besides Blue Lions have an easy, saccharine path to righteous victory really takes the oomph out of the emotional weight of most of the game. Byleth is a huge part of the issue with lord characterization too. Do you want me to sympathize with Edelgard? Show me her ideal world in postgame cutscenes, show me why she's right about the church, don't have her preach to the player about her beliefs and past hardships in an explicit and hyper-vulnerable way to make her "relatable" and "correct". Give me actual insight into Claude's political genius, or into any of the politics of Fodlan at all for that matter. If I had to keep Byleth, I would keep Jeralt around longer, kill Silver Snow and TWSITD, and make Rhea the antagonist of all routes (while somehow putting the kids in each others' way because they have to fight or whatever). I'd give the Knights of Seiros more early screentime and make some of them into Camus-esque unrecruitable tragically good enemies. Byleth would end up serving a role on par with that of the other professors, but would never be recruitable. Rhea would be trying to awaken Sothis through Byleth much more aggressively, and the end of part one would be the Black Eagles trying to get Byleth out of Rhea's clutches while the other houses defend Garreg Mach due to their lack of knowledge of the situation. Jeralt would die in a heart-rending cutscene of trying to wake up his mind-controlled son, who stabs him with the Sublime Creator Sword. It'd be very sad, everyone in real life would cry because the dad died to his son on some Han Solo waves (sorry for the spoilers for Force Awakens). Part two would be anti-Rhea and would have no Byleth except as a villain, but while the three lords all know that it is important to beat Rhea, they all have different ideals in how the church and political systems should wind up after her death. That's where you could factor in actual political intrigue and introduce important moral questions without a green-haired puppet just standing there nodding and forcing cheesy dialogue that takes the edge off of the main characters. Killing Byleth as a boss would be cathartic too. All moral questions about Rhea would be limited to Cindered Shadows.