Xander and Ryoma.

[eclipse]

Thanks for letting me know how you all felt about this. I think now I'll say I prefer Xander as a character in personality but Ryoma as a unit. because you can never go wrong with a lightning katana wielding lobster am I right ?

. . .dude, shouldn't you form your own opinion, instead of making an opinion based on other people's opinions?

[GrySun]

In terms of gameplay? Xander is better. Having high defense is much more reliable than being dodge-happy like Ryoma, while still hitting hard at 1-2 range. And I always preferred Luna over Astra and Xander has it.

Personality wise... I'd say they're even. They are both really great "big-brother" types in both games, supporting their younger main character and giving them a hand when needed.

In terms of appearence, I'd call them even too. Lobster memes aside, Ryoma is just as dashing as Xander, although people may love Xander more because blond/short hair is often a favorite.

[WinterOkami]

. . .dude, shouldn't you form your own opinion, instead of making an opinion based on other people's opinions?

I can, yes. The matter is that when I don't know much I ask. Therefore if I get convinced. I can get to agree. Designs are cool though, I am not bad talking about Ryoma it's just that the Beach Brawl had sealed the deal for me {Xander put me to shame after seeing this and never was I the same after}

[Thor Odinson]

Also I guess if it wasn't incredibly obvious

I like Ryoma a lot.

I'm probably a fair bit more analytical of Ryoma as a person than most--the guy has some pretty deep-seated issues that he doesn't make immediately obvious. I think he's very interesting to dig deep into, and honestly he's pretty relatable as a person. Design-wise, I strongly prefer men with long hair. I find short hair on male designs fairly boring (with exceptions) since there's relatively less variation thereof and most male designs have short hair, and I grew up with Chinese wuxia where an attractive guy often had long flowing hair. In a ponytail. Ryoma's hair looks fucking amazing in a ponytail. I draw that a lot.

Both are good units, though I tend to use Ryoma's "place here to remove all enemies" abilities more often. Both are valuable members of my team whenever available, though.

And mind, I do like Xander, fates issues with calling out protag-side problematic behavior notwithstanding, but nowhere to the extent of Ryoma.

[Thunderstar]

Design wise I like both their designs but I prefer Xander's armor. The cavaliers in this game have a very good armor design.

Both Xander and Ryoma are very good units. I use Ryoma mainly in player phase so like that I am sure an enemy unit dies. For the enemy phase, I prefer Xander because tanking the enemy attacks is more reliable than just trying to avoid it.

Personality and story wise I prefer Ryoma. Even if he seems to be calm and "perfect" most of the time, he is quite flawed. He can be reckless since he doesn't hesitate to go to Cheve alone for example like Thor Odinson and Ownagepuffs said.

I prefer Xander's supports more but he is badly treated in the story for the same reasons Thane said.

I would like to add that I am not a fan of the "justice is an illusion" dialogue because it's quite hypocrite since he saves Rinkah and Kaze in the prologue, Kagero and the Hoshidan siblings later on. He also doesn't like Kotaro, Zola, Hans and Iago's actions (even though it's not that different from Garon's actions) so he decides to kill them and their troops who are allies even though it seems to be contradictory with that dialogue.

I also find very questionable that he is willing to invade Hoshido, thinking that Garon will be better after the war, hating Hans for being a murderer despite having a similar retainer and wanting to continue the fight in BR despite his sister's last wishes.

I prefer Ryoma in general.

I know nothing gets me going quite like a man in shining red armor that makes him look like seafood.

Maybe Hoshidans love seefoods and see Ryoma as a sports team mascot.

Edited September 13, 2016 by Thunderstar

[DragonFlames]

Thane put it best, I think.

But actually to me, both suck. Ryoma, too, does pretty questionable things on Conquest, like bribing Corrin to come back when Elise gets sick, for example. In what universe did that ever work, lobster? Or his reaction to Corrin's decision to join Nohr: immediately attacking him. Guess the 'family love' didn't count for much, huh?

Xander is just as stupid if you pick Birthright and both of them are really f*ing retarded when they immediately brand you a traitor on Revelations.

With a family like this, who needs enemies?

Edited September 13, 2016 by DragonFlames

[Ownagepuffs]

In terms of gameplay? Xander is better. Having high defense is much more reliable than being dodge-happy like Ryoma, while still hitting hard at 1-2 range. And I always preferred Luna over Astra and Xander has it.

It's funny since Ryoma's bulk actually isn't bad. Heck, part of what makes Ryoma (in Birthright, at least) so dumb is that he has above average bulk in addition to being near untouchable. So like, even if the RNG goes south, he can still take a few hits and that is discounting his innate +25 crit at base in conjunction with astra and 1-2 range. In addition, he has astra in his base class while Xander has to go through an even slower class to get luna. Thought experiment: In Birthright, let's say you give Ryoma the 3 seraph robes you get in the story (no one bats an eyelash with Xander hogging every speedwings, so don't call this favoritism), with tonics and a base Rinka support, he has 56 HP/19 Def. His personal reduces damage by 2 so that's an effective 21 def.. This is discounting any growths and that's already hard to take down. For a serious EP, you could even throw rally def on him and +def food. Best case scenario, that's bumped up to 27 def. So even if an enemy got lucky and whacked him, he's still not going down anytime soon.

Even if we take it to Rev where's there's less resources, Ryoma's staggering 10 base speed lead says everything that needs to be said. There's only 1 speedwings in Rev and Xander joins one chapter before enemies promote en masse (no time for that Charlotte support to kick in). So it's on a spectrum that the faster you play, the better Ryoma is and vice versa for Xander.

[WinterOkami]

Also I guess if it wasn't incredibly obvious

I like Ryoma a lot.

I'm probably a fair bit more analytical of Ryoma as a person than most--the guy has some pretty deep-seated issues that he doesn't make immediately obvious. I think he's very interesting to dig deep into, and honestly he's pretty relatable as a person. Design-wise, I strongly prefer men with long hair. I find short hair on male designs fairly boring (with exceptions) since there's relatively less variation thereof and most male designs have short hair, and I grew up with Chinese wuxia where an attractive guy often had long flowing hair. In a ponytail. Ryoma's hair looks fucking amazing in a ponytail. I draw that a lot.

Both are good units, though I tend to use Ryoma's "place here to remove all enemies" abilities more often. Both are valuable members of my team whenever available, though.

And mind, I do like Xander, fates issues with calling out protag-side problematic behavior notwithstanding, but nowhere to the extent of Ryoma.

L'Oréal Fort Jinya.

Because it makes your hair lobster.

[Anacybele]

Ryoma, no contest. I love him and I hate Xander. I don't even think Xander is attractive, I think he looks ridiculous and dumb. Meanwhile, Ryoma is a true hottie. <3

I only played through Birthright, but I doubt my opinion would change much if I played through all three paths.

I'd probably prefer Ryoma gameplay-wise too, even though Xander has a mount. In fact, the mount is a weakness for Xander too, it makes him vulnerable to horseslayers. Ryoma has no such weaknesses, he's really fast, and has a two-range sword. He's not a tank, but he dodges a lot to make up for it.

Edited September 13, 2016 by Anacybele

[shadowofchaos]

I only played through Birthright, but I doubt my opinion would change much if I played through all three paths.

I'd probably prefer Ryoma gameplay-wise too, even though Xander has a mount. In fact, the mount is a weakness for Xander too, it makes him vulnerable to horseslayers. Ryoma has no such weaknesses, he's really fast, and has a two-range sword. He's not a tank, but he dodges a lot to make up for it.

Umm... Ana. Why in the name of Naga are you making gameplay comparisons of the two in favor of Ryouma when you, yourself, just literally disqualified yourself from making said statements on the paragraph above it?

[Slyfox]

Edit: Misread something and reacted too strongly. Sorry!

Edited September 14, 2016 by Slyfox

[kcirrot]

1.) It isn't so much the lobster meme. I'm not even talking about that. And, again, this is personal opinion, so be aware of that when I'm explaining.

When looking at Ryoma's design, I got the impression that he was a hot-headed, impatient, eccentric and, yes, fierce individual. This is just going by looking at some of his official art and mainly by scrutinizing his hair and the colors used in his design. The red, in particular. Red is a very bold color that is meant to draw the eyes, especially when its contrasting color is white. However, this is opposite of what we know of Ryoma's personality.

In reality, Ryoma is a character that is quite calm and collected. He is surprisingly wise, level-headed and charismatic, able to get along with his soldiers well. He is also a person that takes his duty as high prince very seriously.

Now, that isn't to say his design is bad, it just sent off conflicting signals about his personality. That's why I prefer the Lobster design on his father. While we know little of Sumeragi, we can gather from the little we have that he was a grand, intimidating person that enjoyed battle; he comes off as the things I initially thought Ryoma would be.

Again, most of that is my personal interpretation. And, again, just going off of a design is in no way a surefire way to tell a character's personality.

I think the issue of Ryoma's red outfit is more of cultural issue. Red connotes different things in Japan than it does in Western society.

Personally, I much prefer Ryoma to Xander. As a character, Ryoma is significantly more believable as the crown prince than Xander. Xander, for no particularly good reason, will follow his father into madness until he just doesn't in Revelation. Furthermore, of all the Nohr siblings, he is the one that should be most accepting of Corrin's turn in BR and Revelation, but he's literally the last to come around. That just stupid when you consider his supports with various individuals including Corrin's.

Xander's characterization in all three paths just speaks poorly of him.

As units, I'll take my dodge tank lobster every day, TYVM.

[RedRob]

I think the issue of Ryoma's red outfit is more of cultural issue. Red connotes different things in Japan than it does in Western society.

I tried to look up the possible connotations. Here's what I found.

In Japan Red is considered a life-giving color associated with female reproduction. http://color-wheel-artist.com/meanings-of-red.html

According to Henry Dreyfus, the word for red and white, Kohaku, is pronounced as one word in Japanese. Ko means red, while haku translates as white. Their use together immediately signifies happiness and celebration to the Japanese viewer. The combination of red and white in the decorative ornaments used on wedding or engagement presents -noshi or kaishi- has a compelling quality that suggests man's urge to create a bond between his own life and that of the gods. Red and white are also the colors of the uniforms that shrine maidens wear (denoting these colors divine nature.)

Red and white are the colors of the Japanese flag; the red signifies the sun. http://www.three-musketeers.net/mike/colors.html#red

And everything else just repeated the same thing, red means joy and good luck.

[saisymbolic]

I think the issue of Ryoma's red outfit is more of cultural issue. Red connotes different things in Japan than it does in Western society.

Personally, I much prefer Ryoma to Xander. As a character, Ryoma is significantly more believable as the crown prince than Xander. Xander, for no particularly good reason, will follow his father into madness until he just doesn't in Revelation. Furthermore, of all the Nohr siblings, he is the one that should be most accepting of Corrin's turn in BR and Revelation, but he's literally the last to come around. That just stupid when you consider his supports with various individuals including Corrin's.

Xander's characterization in all three paths just speaks poorly of him.

As units, I'll take my dodge tank lobster every day, TYVM.

Hey, I'm not art major. Our resident Ryoma fanatic professor pointed out everything that can and could be said about Ryoma.

However, I just can't forgive him for fudging up against an outlaw. That moment brought me back to reality in terms of how the RNG is implemented.

As previously said by many people, both of the older brothers have their strengths and their weaknesses; it's just that they suffer considering how the narrative of the games is written.

I like both of them, but Xander edges out for me.

Edited September 14, 2016 by SaiSymbolic

[Anacybele]

Umm... Ana. Why in the name of Naga are you making gameplay comparisons of the two in favor of Ryouma when you, yourself, just literally disqualified yourself from making said statements on the paragraph above it?

Umm...SOC. That's exactly why I said "probably" not "definitely."

[shadowofchaos]

Umm...SOC. That's exactly why I said "probably" not "definitely."

You're still making comparisons in your tone in favor of Ryouma from gameplay.

The first paragraph isn't the problem it's the second.

You're favoring that he has no weakness to effectiveness as a point against Xander.

Ryouma's weakness in general is dodge tanking. There is also a swordslayer lance.

And it has super effectiveness against anyone equipped with a sword while also having ridiculous accuracy against swordies.

Marx/Xander takes roughly no damage at all with the exception of horse slayers and speed issues.

Now I didn't expect you to know that... but why are you making statements to compare two things at all if you have no experience using the other?

I prefer Ryouma of the two, but I am willing to defend Marx from an unfair comparison.

Edited September 14, 2016 by shadowofchaos

[Wayward Alchemist]

Character wise, Support!Xander is a human being with issues and a personality whereas Ryoma is just a perfected human with no real development necessary, and it makes his supports boring beyond belief. Xander had to train extremely hard to become great, but all sources indicate that Ryoma was practically born great.

Unit wise, they are both devastatingly powerful and trivialize the game, but I would prefer to use Ryoma over Xander because Ryoma is great at everything whereas Xander is really great at one thing.