Branche of fate, best choice?

[mariogamer]

Just got to that moment...

If it was only me, I would choose to not pick a side, but then the game says that I shouldn't do that on a first playthrought.

Also, the beginning really wants to tell you that Nohr are... bad guys, and Hoshido are... ok? (I don't trust the game at this point)

Which side has the best story? As long as the gameplay is fine, I'd probably take the worst story first (which is Conquest, if I trust the early chapters)

Or do something different and play both at the same time (which I'm considering at this point)

[Michelaar]

Neither story is anything to write home about, just go with the one you like most at this point.

[Eltosian Kadath]

25 minutes ago, mariogamer said:

Which side has the best story?

Its clear that story took a back seat to gameplay with this entry, so none of them are considered particularly good. I will give a very rough idea of what you are getting into but its hard to compare.

Birthright (The Hoshidan side) has a far more traditional by the books Fire Emblem story, and is nominally the least bad, but also most boring.

Conquest (The Nohrian side) tries something more interesting, but clashes with expectation and quality by forcing Corrin to always be the pure, righteous, and naive good guy, plus some story beats that were shoehorned  into the two main routes fall particularly flat in this entry

Revelations (Don't take a side) is a mess. It has to carry the burden of multiple nonsensical plot contrivances that are needed for this route to exist without unraveling the other two and they come across very poorly. Perhaps these feel less awful and egregiously bad without the context of the other routes, so playing it first might mitigate the poor quality of the story a little, but otherwise it is the worst of the three.

 

42 minutes ago, mariogamer said:

As long as the gameplay is fine, I'd probably take the worst story first (which is Conquest, if I trust the early chapters) 

Conquest has the best gameplay of the three, especially on hard and lunatic. Birthright has this odd habit of chapters that can be hard if you don't go straight for the objective (in which case they are trivial), and has a bit of a difficulty spike around chapter 23 (although two of the chapters afterwards are trivial if you go straight for the boss). Revelations is famous for its gimmick maps, which gives it incredibly inconsistent gameplay that could be awful or amazing depending on how you like the maps gimmick,  the next map could be the opposite.

 

41 minutes ago, mariogamer said:

Or do something different and play both at the same time (which I'm considering at this point)

This is an interesting idea, I've done something similar with Sacred Stones when I finally went back to tackle their hard difficulties, and seeing how the stories interlaced was interesting to see. If you do this I would be kinda curious what your take on the story is seeing them side by side like that.

 

[Zihark11]

The story in this game is bad so dont base your choice on that. Either go off characters or do revelations so you basically get everyone. Conquest is a little harder then brithright as well so depending how long youve played FE id go birthright to start. 

If you really plan on doing all 3 playthroughs i would do it like this

Birthright then Conquest and then Revelations. 

[mariogamer]

It was clear that birthright was more classic, especially after the early events. Going to try and do both , see afterwards if revelation fits in somewhere.

Also, are pair ups still busted in this game? (in awakening, I had the same characters during the whole game, and they were slaughtering everything the whole game) And in the same way, can I focus on some characters from the beginning? (the only reason why I could regret that was that I missed a lot of supports in Awakening, I might even replay the game for these)

On the same note, is the 'I come from the future' thingy still a thing? Cause I hated that in Awakening (surprisingly not because of the game itself, more because I hate time travelling with all the paradoxical stuff it comes with, oh and forced marriage too (forcing a feature cause of plot, at least I knew that lucina was Chrom's daughter, so I suspected that would be forced) -- is that still a thing, too?)

[Interdimensional Observer]

33 minutes ago, mariogamer said:

Also, are pair ups still busted in this game? (in awakening, I had the same characters during the whole game, and they were slaughtering everything the whole game)

It's been toned down.

If you combine two units, now called Defensive Stance, you no longer can do Dual Attacks, and Dual Guards only, automatically, activate if you have a full set of blue shield icons. Units with any level of support rank have a generation rate of 2 shields per action in battle, unsupported units have 1 per action in battle. So for two unsupported units, attack-counterattack-attack would generate 3 total. Stat boosts from Defensive Stance are class bonuses + support bonuses (what stats each characters boosts based on support level differs, C Subaki could be +1 Skl, C Arthur could be +1 Str), no +3 for having a stat at or over 30.

If two units are adjacent but unpaired, it's called Offensive Stance. Dual Attacks are now guaranteed to activate, but it'll only activate after the first ally attack, and the Dual Attacks deal half their normal damage. Dual Attacks are negated if the enemy is using Defensive Stance. Yes, enemies in this game use Offensive Stance, and sometimes Defensive Stance, but they'll never go into Defensive Stance mid-fight, they have to start the chapter that way.

 

33 minutes ago, mariogamer said:

And in the same way, can I focus on some characters from the beginning? (the only reason why I could regret that was that I missed a lot of supports in Awakening, I might even replay the game for these)

You get almost all characters by Chapter 14 on Birthright, and most characters by Chapter 16 on Conquest.

You can infinitely grind for experience on Birthright, but not on Conquest, unless you buy the EXP DLC.

 

33 minutes ago, mariogamer said:

On the same note, is the 'I come from the future' thingy still a thing? Cause I hated that in Awakening (surprisingly not because of the game itself, more because I hate time travelling with all the paradoxical stuff it comes with, oh and forced marriage too (forcing a feature cause of plot, at least I knew that lucina was Chrom's daughter, so I suspected that would be forced) -- is that still a thing, too?)

No more time travel. Nor forced marriage.

However, playable children characters are still a thing in Fates. The logic behind them this time is that the parents are concerned about their children's safety, so they send them to "Deeprealms", which are other dimensions of sorts. The thing is, the parents don't realize right away time moves faster in Deeprealms than in the world where Fates's plot happens. So when you play a child's recruitment paralogue, they've already matured into teenagers who can fight.

Edited July 19, 2019 by Interdimensional Observer

[Eltosian Kadath]

1 hour ago, mariogamer said:

Also, are pair ups still busted in this game?

Not as much. Pairup gives you extra stats based on the class, person, and support level of the partner, and can get perfect blocks whenever their gauage fills and enemies attack (note that 0 hit or 0 damage attacks can still waste your perfect block), and they get an extra 5 crit dodge. Not being paired gives you access to attack stance which gives lets an adjacent ally get a half damage attack immediately after your first attack (note if they have a brave weapon this effects the attack stance too), additionally you gain hit, avoid, crit, and crit dodge based on support levels with adjacent characters (no support is +10 hit, and supports improve this). Generally being paired up improves your ability to take hits, and not being paired lets you use attack stances to dish out more damage (and simply get more actions). A lot of places online will advise you always be paired, but often attack stance is better, it just depends on the situation.

1 hour ago, mariogamer said:

And in the same way, can I focus on some characters from the beginning? (the only reason why I could regret that was that I missed a lot of supports in Awakening, I might even replay the game for these)

Sure, you get a lot of great units early on (except in Revelations), and while child characters can be good, they don't necessarily outshine your first gen units. In Conquest you are far more restricted with how much xp you can get, so focusing on a core team from the start can be a good idea. If you are worried about supports, you can grind those up even in vanilla Conquest (using castle battles), and Revelations is probably the best route to grind up supports in anyway.

1 hour ago, mariogamer said:

On the same note, is the 'I come from the future' thingy still a thing?

No, but their excuse for child characters is nonsense, this time involving them being sent to these baby growing hyperbolic time chambers called the deep realms.

Edited July 19, 2019 by Eltosian Kadath

[eclipse]

1. Stop posting.
2. Pick something.

None of the choices are so ridiculously hard that it's impossible to clear.  None of them are so groundbreaking that picking it first ruins everything.  And none of the choices are going to ruin your finances or burn down your house. It's a game, so treat it like one.

[Zoran]

13 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Units with any level of support rank have a generation rate of 2 shields per action in battle, unsupported units have 1 per action in battle. So for two unsupported units, attack-counterattack-attack would generate 3 total.

This is not true.