How effective are the minor antagonists?

[JimmyBeans]

This is mainly for data that I'm collecting for a written work I am constructing, but it's also interesting to hear what people think of antagonists that go under the radar and what effect they can have on the plot. Of course there are more than these 4 but I only wanted to focus on these for now. (Good/Decent is together because minor antagonists almost never get enough progression and depth to be anything over decent, but that's all subjective).

My thoughts are.....

Fernand: Extremely underappreciated, the man had his entire family killed because a peasant insurrection accused him of hording food from them during the drought. He is a product of the conflicted state of the world, and you can honestly say he is yet another victim whos blood is on Rudolph's hands. (Also DLC characterizes him more, a shame it's locked behind DLC though.)

Desaix: Comes off as your common power hungry cartoony evil guy, but the more you look into him the more cunning and intelligent he becomes (never mind his ability to somehow know who Alm really is which never gets explained). Behind his Evil appearance is a man who is tired of relying on gods and wants man to be strong based off there own merits. This can be found in exposition with people in the castle/deliverance hideout and with the memory prism starring him and slayde (definitely some missed potential with him).

Grieth: Through exposition we learn how big of an impact Grieth has had on Zofia and even as far as Archanea, sad part is it's just greed and nothing more. What a shame....

Slayde: Right at the end he makes an interesting comment about his philosophy about survival and then proceeds to get roasted by clive, they were on to something with him at the end there but definitely missed potential yet again.

 

[Etrurian emperor]

I think Desaix, Slayde and Grieth are all fine. They aren't particularly complex or amazing but they all competently fulfill the role that was given to them. Desaix is a good early game villain because he's not competent enough to be a mayor threat while still being powerful enough that taking him down is an achievement. He's tied to the lore pretty nicely too. 

Slayde is pretter much the same as Desaix. He's an early game villain doing his early game villainy with a certain degree of competence. Later on he's a decent enough foil for Clive. 

Grieth is probably my favorite generic bandit boss because he's much more of a threat. He's the first bandit who's influence spans across multiple chapters and countries. No other bandit can boast of having influence over half a continent.  He even manages to be somewhat of a personal foe for Celica because its her daddy's neglect which made him so powerful and she seems aware of it. She's doing her duty as a princess by cleaning up her fathers mess.

Out of the minor villain its Fernand who I think is a failure. He's the case of a tragic backstory gone wrong. Yes his family was slaughtered by peasants, yes that's terrible and of course he could be affected by this. However I don't think it was ever the intention of the writers to make the Begnion senators look sane in comparison to Fernand. He's not just hating the poor or objecting a commoner to be made the commander, he's openly voicing the belief that anyone who's not a knight should just risk their lives without any sort of reward. That's not reasonable, that's something not even the Begnion Senators would say is reasonable. Fernant fails because he only has his backstory to garner sympathy while being utterly unsympathetic whenever he opens his mouth on screen. A good tragic villain has both a tragic backstory and behavior that garners sympathy on screen. His death is also incredibly awkward. Despite their close bond Berkut kills him for....entering the room. He didn't even have the chance to object much to what Berkut was doing. Fernand is actually really good in the DLC where you see him as a sane individual who gradually declines but that just makes it worse. Its not a point in a characters favor if he can only be decent if you pay more money. 

Edited August 16, 2018 by Etrurian emperor

[Zihark11]

I personally really liked Fernand's story. Grieth was whatever, he was just there. Desaix has a good role but i think his character design is pretty boring. Slayde is Slayde, Overall good character design with a believable drive for greed, a common appearance  in many games.

[KevinskyHaaz]

Compared to villains in *cough cough* certain previous games *cough cough FE13-14* I think we should give all four of these guys as much praise as we can throw out. Fernand was excellent if a bit one-dimensional for half the game. Grieth was very typical but still executed quite well as a tyrannical maniac. Desaix and Slayde were both extremely entertaining when on screen and I absolutely loved both of them. ALSO, how has nobody mentioned the voice acting yet? All four of these characters were portrayed BRILLIANTLY by their voice counterparts. Seriously, well done Echoes. This game definitely showed that Fire Emblem might go back to the days of Radiant Dawn level or even Genealogy level story-telling/world-building.

[Slyfox]

6 hours ago, KevinskyHaaz said:

Compared to villains in *cough cough* certain previous games *cough cough FE13-14* I think we should give all four of these guys as much praise as we can throw out. Fernand was excellent if a bit one-dimensional for half the game. Grieth was very typical but still executed quite well as a tyrannical maniac. Desaix and Slayde were both extremely entertaining when on screen and I absolutely loved both of them. ALSO, how has nobody mentioned the voice acting yet? All four of these characters were portrayed BRILLIANTLY by their voice counterparts. Seriously, well done Echoes. This game definitely showed that Fire Emblem might go back to the days of Radiant Dawn level or even Genealogy level story-telling/world-building.

I found most villains/antagonists in Echoes to be even less memorable than those in FE13 and FE14, as mediocre as many those ones were. Heck, Hans and Iago have done way more harm to Corrin and co. than any single antagonist in Echoes, besides Jedah. Yes, the voice acting in Echoes is amazing, even for the one-shot antagonists, and their personalities are enjoyable. BUT, without any meaningful actions that actually cause harm, or any kind of change, they fall flat.

 

Anyway, on to the characters on hand.

I do like Fernand, but he kind of just disappears from half the game and then suddenly dies. He had such a promising start and then nothing comes of it (like Berkut). Voted meh.

Slayde just screams slimy cowardly self-serving villain, a trope I do enjoy, but despite his multiple appearances he still doesn't actually have any palpable issues with our main cast. He's just kind of there, forgotten until convenient and even then it's the barest of acknowledgements. Voted meh.

Desaix and especially Grieth are huge letdowns for me. You can't just build antagonists up for so long and have them just sit on their butts and accomplish nothing at all. Anything of note that they've done is only in the backstory. Unfortunately, for characters as important as we were told they were, they are simply roadblocks in the actual game. Voted lame.

Edited August 17, 2018 by Slyfox

[KevinskyHaaz]

Hmmm, I understand what you mean. That definitely holds true for awesome villains like Alvis/Arvis. He, for example, has an EXTREME effect on the main characters and has always been one of the best villains in the series. However, for certain villains in FE13-14, I just don't think that is enough to cover up all of their other flaws. I really liked Awakening and I thought some of its villains were well done (Gangrel, Aversa, Mustafa, etc.). However, Excellus, Walhart, Yen'fay, and Validar were all extremely underwhelming for me. And to be honest, other than Walhart, none of them seemed like a threat to me at any point. Now Gangrel was a threat! He caused the massive spoilery thing :D

For Fates... I just... ugh.... Well. Anankos is by far the worst villain ever in the whole franchise... and he was the main villain!!! Iago was intimidating but boring. Garon was a bit too cartoony for me. Iago was probably the best of the villains in Fates, but I can't recall him really doing anything too serious. Then again, I found it very hard to take Fates seriously. It seemed like more of a Disney movie than a Fire Emblem game. I still appreciate it though for some things, just... not my cup of tea. 

[Erureido]

Fernand: I find him to be quite disappointing. Even if his entire family was killed in a peasant uprising, he comes across as too much of a douche to be considered sympathetic IMO. In fact, his betrayal happens to early into the story, and because of that, it makes him come across as unsympathetic. If his betrayal happened towards the middle of the game, I think he would be more sympathetic. That way, we would see more of his conflicted nature and a bit more of his sympathetic side. While the DLC does portray him in a much more favorable light and shows the early roots of his distrust with the Deliverance, I think it shouldn't have been locked behind the paywall, and more scenes in Echoes should've featured that version of Fernand.

Desaix: He serves his role as a major early game antagonist decently well, and he had justified reasons for overthrowing and killing Lima IV and taking the throne. However, his personality felt so cartoonishly evil that I ultimately didn't care for him all that much.

Slayde: Never found him to be appealing. He struck me as a generic Saturday morning cartoon villain with a rather dull personality, and his only bit of relevance was in Chapter 1. I don't know what was the point of bringing him back for the late game chapter either since there was very little buildup to it, with the only scene foreshadowing another battle with Slayde being his dialogue with that Cantor that tried to kill Celica at the end of Act 2. He just didn't really leave an impression compared to the other villains in this game.

Grieth: For a bandit villain, I think he was decent. In fact, I'd say he's the most memorable bandit villain that I've experienced in the series so far. He managed to create a criminal empire in Zofia because of Lima's negligence, and the effects of his empire as early as Act 2 with the death of Valbar's family and Est's kidnappng in the hands of Grieth's pirates. It also helps that he had a rather entertaining personality for a villain. I wish that his impact in the story would extend to even after his death. His death quote where he says "There will always be another me" struck me since it implies he could have a successor that might rise up and instill more chaos, but that ultimately didn't happen.

[vanguard333]

As characters, they're overall... meh.

• Fernand is interesting.
• Desaix is cartoonishly evil but at least had reasons for being disillusioned with the king and Mila.
• Slayde is a despicable coward villain but lacks any of the things that made other despicable coward villains like Metal Face interesting.
• Greith is a bandit boss. There's not much to him other than what he represents: the fact that a bandit boss could occupy so much of Zofia in the first place without knights or Mila herself stepping in.

However, there's more to a villain's effectiveness than just who they are as characters. A cartoonishly evil character can still be a really effective antagonist; just look at Ganondorf in Ocarina of Time for an example. So, how effective are these guys as antagonists? …They range from meh to not at all. The biggest problem that they share is that none of them succeed at anything; none of them ever pose a threat. They almost never actually do anything relevant. 

• Fernand is a traitor who knows many of the high-ranking members of the Deliverance personally, yet he never uses that at all. He does try to use the knowledge that Alm is not Mycen's grandson to intimidate Clive, but Clive decides not to tell Alm, so the damage that could be done with that knowledge is mitigated. His only other involvement is that he fights besides Berkut, but he and Berkut never succeed at even a minor victory, never have the heroes on the ropes, or any of that. You could remove Fernand entirely, not replace him with anything, and the story would play out exactly the same way.
• Desaix… gets points for controlling Zofia at the start of the game. But one victory from Alm and all that is uprooted instantly, with him barely holding out in a small outpost in northwest Zofia by the beginning of part 3. He has a hostage, but it means nothing as it doesn't affect the hero's decisions and that hostage is rescued in the very same mission in which Desaix is killed.
• Slayde… is a coward. Now, one could argue that it's hard for a coward to pose a threat to the heroes, but then I would respond with: Metal Face. He's an utterly despicable coward, yet he manages to be an effective antagonist. Slayde isn't; at all. When he reappeared in Part 4, I was like, "Oh; this guy. …Wait? You're alive? Oh; I guess I'll just defeat you again."
• Greith, like Desaix, gets points for holding control over eastern Zofia, and he actually is better at holding on to it than Desaix, but that's it. 

By the way, can someone please explain to me how it is that Desaix deduced that Alm is Rudolph's son? He went from, "Mycen's grandson? Impossible. Mycen never had kids" to "Damn you, Mycen… You think to…hand Zofia over to Rudolf’s pup…? T-traitorous dastard…!?" I'm sure he knew Mycen and Rudolph were old friends, but since the existence of Rudolph's son was kept a closely guarded secret, that deduction is a bit of a stretch.

Edited August 20, 2018 by vanguard333