Alastor plays and ranks the whole series! Mission Complete! ...For now.

[Alastor15243]

Birthright Day 10: Chapter 16

Oh goodie, we've got a speed and res boost for Silas! Not that he needs it to be awesome, but that's gonna be great if shit hits the fan.

...Especially since we've got some issues with deployment to deal with.

I'm in a hurry since it's a Friday, so no castle visits today. Sorry! Let's check out the map and see what our deployment's looking like...

But first, of course... the “story”.

I'm sorry, when I hear the music “Obsidian Ruler” and then see the camera pan down on Castle Krakenburg... this is all I can think of:

“Gentlemen... BEHOLD! I have written my novella's third chapter on the wall... in my own excrement! I HAVE LITERALLY PULLED PLOT POINTS OUT OF MY ASS! AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”

Anyway, Garon all but explicitly says that Iago was responsible for the explosion both this time and... fucking... somehow with Ganglari in Hoshido? How the fuck was Iago involved there? And if he wasn't, who is Garon lying to here?

But yeah, Iago's in deep shit with Garon now for his repeated failures.

...Oh right, the “we need medicine” plot point. Takumi caught something off the wolfskin and the object of today's map is to get him medicine to save his life.

That also means he's out of commission for this battle when I literally just promoted him.

Christ, this is gonna be a shitshow. Let's hope I can fill all the slots.

This CG with the sick Takumi looks... weird. The 3D models used here, particularly the facial expressions, feel completely unnatural somehow. I'm vaguely reminded of amateur 3D comics.

It's weird that both times someone gets sick, it happens in Macarath. I don't see them saying anything here about Macarath being famous for its medicine or anything, so surely raiding any apothecary would do for this plot point?

Whatever, I guess I'll learn more when I see the corresponding chapter in Conquest.

Ryoma yet again mentions his highly detailed intelligence reports that somehow didn't inform him that Nohr is in the middle of a fucking food crisis.

God, I just never get used to seeing Corrin's assless cavalry uniform in story scenes. Every damned time I see it, it takes me off guard and makes me burst out laughing.

Interesting. They're using the Conquest map for the scene here, not the totally-indoor Birthright one we're about to play.

Right, and now we reunite with Flora, a reunion that is going to be comically short-lived. Or should I say... short-fused.

Right, now Iago shows up, time to fight, yada yada.

I do like that they have some semblance of an excuse why Flora isn't helping you fight in this battle: she's been... knocked out.

...By... fire.

Aside from choking them with smoke (which clearly isn't what happened), how the fuck do you knock somebody out with fire?

Anyway, on to the map.

...Christ, I am not ready for this fucking first turn. The place is so overloaded with enemies that there's no way I can do any kind of player-phase shit with my current army. I may need to use Ryoma as a panic button starting out, and getting Dakota wounded for vow of friendship would probably be a very good use of my time as well. I should also get a defense boost meal and maybe some tonics as well, because I need Ryoma and Silas to tank a lot of stuff.

Alright, I gave both Ryoma and Silas HP, defense and resistance tonics. Probably overkill, but I don't want to risk losing anyone after what happened last map. And while the numbers say I should be able to activate vow of friendship on turn one, I want a backup plan just in case.

I thankfully have enough people to bring, if just barely. I've got Felicia with me now, not sure how long that'll last. Though I might be able to train her up to reclass her to strategist so I can have, like, at least one magic user. Assuming her stats work out. I mean, they did last time.

Alright. I managed to get through the first two turns. The first was just setting up vow of friendship, dancing Dakota so she could hop over to Ryoma, and having Ryoma and Silas wait in front of the knights guarding the hall and brace for impact. The second was taking out the trash and giving Ryoma the opening to run like hell straight down the network of hallways after the outlaw.

Ryoma got hit by a silver dagger, which is unfortunate but not dangerous. He still has more than enough speed to double everything and more than enough defensive stats to tank the enemies he has to charge headlong into. Man, Dakota might not be a good unit this run, but she sure as hell knows how to buff 'em up.

But no sooner did Ryoma catch up to the first outlaw heading after the southeast chests than a second one showed up even closer to them, which always struck me as a massive troll on the devs' part. Still, we're making good progress, even though Ryoma's left most of my army in the dust and made them resort to picking up scraps.

Reina's nice to have around. She's got a pretty low internal level so she's gaining some nice exp even from unpromoted enemies, and she's putting in some pretty good player-phase work when necessary. I'd definitely be happier if she came from archer though. Quick draw and bowfaire access would be amazing for her.

Alright, the chests are finally secure.

...The door unlocking animation is really, really slow for who-the-fuck-knows-why.

While Ryoma's cleared basically the entire map, it's nice that there are still rear reinforcements for my other units to take care of. So I've at least managed to make some promotions, like Saizo and Mozu. Incidentally, archers actually lose one strength when promoting to kinshi knight, annoyingly. Kinshi knights have pretty shitty stats, but their flight and weapon access really makes up for it. I'm glad I have a really, really solid flier now.

I just did my first instance of shelter song shenanigans, and it was pretty cool. I didn't do it for anything particularly advanced, but it was nice to be able to get Mozu that last level up, promote her, and then put Saizo back in there to take out an incoming outlaw when I realized I wasn't actually too late to do that. It's the nice thing about having filler units. You can convert their actions into main fighter actions, albeit at a pretty steep exchange rate. Shame I only have one shelter user right now. But that's gonna change soon.

Ugh. This is probably my biggest of the nitpicks I have about the usability in this game. Siege towers. They really should've made it so you can highlight them separately by clicking on them like they're an enemy unit. Instead, they just added the siege tower's attack range to every unit in range of it, so it becomes really annoying to work out the attack ranges of nearby ranged weapon users if you don't care about the siege weapon damage.

Right, I just busted into the siege tower room and killed everyone but the dark mage in back. Let's take bets whether he uses the siege tome uselessly or suicides onto Ryoma!

If you guessed the former, you're right!

Alright, so, we win, but Iago pulls a “You think this is the real Quaid!?” and reveals it was illusion magic. Then another would-be dramatic scene hilariously undermined by Dakota's asscheeks being on full display almost the entire time.

And then they head back to Flora, who apparently is still lying there on the floor, because we apparently just abandoned her there.

Weird how Takumi is the one who finds the idea most ridiculous that there's a traitor among the group. Usually unknowing sleeper agents are the most suspicious of the others.

Then they have Sakura say she'll go with Flora, but Flora runs off and... the scene fades on Sakura still kneeling by Takumi.

...Flora, who the fuck says “yay” at hearing that somebody's narrowly escaped death?

Takumi says some weird shit about “looking behind the curtain” in his fever, and... even now I have no idea what he means by that.

But yeah, Flora says we should all go to the ice tribe village wink wink nudge nudge, and so that's what we're doing next chapter.

Which will be on Monday.

So let's do the supports and then wrap up here.

Amazingly, I only have one support today. Saizo and Mozu somehow didn't get enough support points despite doing so many dual strikes together.

Well then, let's check out Ryoma and Dakota's B support.

…Well that was boring. It was just random shit about each sibling, and the only one that even came close to being fileable under “shit that isn't blatantly obvious” was that Hinoka used to be a crybaby as a kid.

Well, that's it. Tomorrow we'll be “visiting” the ice tribe.

Which, yes, somehow isn't in the frozen northern tundras.

Stay safe, everyone.

[Jotari]

15 hours ago, lenticular said:

I don't find the cultural differences that unbelievable. There's a huge geographic barrier to travel between the two kingdoms, plus the whole thing with Nohr always being dark would probably do something weird to the culture.

Ultimately, this is Fates worldbuilding we're tlaking about though. There are always going to be holes in it that need all sorts of mental gymnastics to try to rationalise. It's going to be a matter of personal preference which interpretation has the holes and nonsensities that are less headache-inducing.

I have no clue what point you're trying to make here and I've had way too much of a Day for an argument about skill viability to sound fun so I'm just going to say that I'm going to agree to disagree on this one.

But that's just the point, if we're talking about a landmass comparable to Ireland, that geographical barrier isn't that major a barrier. The Himalayas, that's a true to life geographical barrier that has resulted in quite significant cultural differences on either side (though Buddhism managed to permeate it), but to think the bottomless canyon is anywhere close to the Himalayas in scale when you can traverse the entirety of one of these countries in a matter of hours at worst and days at best makes it pretty absurd.

14 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

I don't consider old polls credible, because opinions change with time. Anyway, for me to consider it useful, I'd have to ignore the 15 weight and the 60 base hit (along with the fact that with the magic hit formula, the user's accuracy is likely going to be down there), which is asking way too much. Anyway, I'm not going to get any real mileage out of it by having, say, Hilda use it.

Not the Bolt Axe's fault you don't know how to play Three Houses. Have you ever considered for a second that if everyone else says something is good and you alone says it's bad, that maybe you're doing something wrong?

36 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Anyway, Garon all but explicitly says that Iago was responsible for the explosion both this time and... fucking... somehow with Ganglari in Hoshido? How the fuck was Iago involved there? And if he wasn't, who is Garon lying to here?

 

More evidence Revalation wasn't initially planned. Hmm?

Edited February 26, 2021 by Jotari

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

49 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

do like that they have some semblance of an excuse why Flora isn't helping you fight in this battle: she's been... knocked out.

...By... fire.

Aside from choking them with smoke (which clearly isn't what happened), how the fuck do you knock somebody out with fire?

It's anime fire. Per established convention, it doesn't cause burns - rather, it knocks the target down. And potentially unconscious.

52 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

That also means he's out of commission for this battle when I literally just promoted him.

Big oof. Something about Macarath, and taking one of your younger royal siblings out of commission. 

18 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Not the Bolt Axe's fault you don't know how to play Three Houses. Have you ever considered for a second that if everyone else says something is good and you alone says it's bad, that maybe you're doing something wrong?

Must we resurrect this Sothis-damned argument? It has nothing to do with Birthright, or anything Alastor has posted. You and @Shadow Mir should probably bury the bolt axe... I mean, hatchet, for the time being.

[lenticular]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

But that's just the point, if we're talking about a landmass comparable to Ireland, that geographical barrier isn't that major a barrier. The Himalayas, that's a true to life geographical barrier that has resulted in quite significant cultural differences on either side (though Buddhism managed to permeate it), but to think the bottomless canyon is anywhere close to the Himalayas in scale when you can traverse the entirety of one of these countries in a matter of hours at worst and days at best makes it pretty absurd.

I think I would probably disagree with this for three main reasons.

1. I don't see the cultural differences between Nohr and Hoshido as being all that huge. They speak the same language, have basically the same political structure, and have very closely related religions which differ primarily on which member of their pantheon is primarily worshipped.

2. There are real life regions of earth which have substantial cultural, linguistic and ethnic diversity in small geographic areas. The Caucasus and the New Guinea Highlands being two obvious examples that come to mind.

3. Real life analogy can only go so far because real life doesn't have magic, or dragons, or places at the same latitude where one sees lots of daylight and the other lies in near-permanent darkness, or bottomless canyon surrounded by never-ending lightning storms that are actually portals to other kingdoms that are cursed so you can never talk about them. It's pretty much impossible to know for sure how these things would actually affect the spread of culture, so I don't find it too much of a stretch to imagine that it would make things weird.

[Jotari]

After ignoring it for a bit, I finally finished my Revalation playthrough. Man, it's easy to forget how underwhelming that final map is.  It's really quite small and the reinforcements come basically one at a time (though with high enough movement that they could potentially screw you over). The Heirs of Fates version of this map is so much better. It's much more difficult to just charge it and the enemy units being characters from the first Gen even adds some moment to moment drama for the chapter (I mean not a whole lot given this is a sort of contrived DLC, but it's still appreciated compared to nothing happening in Revalation). And the final approach to Anankos has a lot more Gravitas to it. You also get a tonne of units to use at once, which as has been noted, is a pretty major weakness of Reavalation.

9 hours ago, lenticular said:

I think I would probably disagree with this for three main reasons.

1. I don't see the cultural differences between Nohr and Hoshido as being all that huge. They speak the same language, have basically the same political structure, and have very closely related religions which differ primarily on which member of their pantheon is primarily worshipped.

2. There are real life regions of earth which have substantial cultural, linguistic and ethnic diversity in small geographic areas. The Caucasus and the New Guinea Highlands being two obvious examples that come to mind.

3. Real life analogy can only go so far because real life doesn't have magic, or dragons, or places at the same latitude where one sees lots of daylight and the other lies in near-permanent darkness, or bottomless canyon surrounded by never-ending lightning storms that are actually portals to other kingdoms that are cursed so you can never talk about them. It's pretty much impossible to know for sure how these things would actually affect the spread of culture, so I don't find it too much of a stretch to imagine that it would make things weird.

I think language is a bit of an unreality ball that can't be used as a point either way. Because every continent in Fire Emblem (and most other fantasy works) have a single language being used exclusively throughout the main setting (and even beyond, apperantly Valentia and Archanea have the same language despite being cut off from each other given the lack of difficulty Zeke and the Pegasus Sisters have communicating with everyone else). And religion is so underplayed in the story Im not sure what you're even referring to. Garon worshipd Anankos and that's as far as I can recall the religion of either country. We certainly don't see any monk classes making up the ranks of Nohrs army though (uh, discounting the facts that monks were never really deployed soldiers in reality).

What they do have differences are, obviously, the style of their dress and architecture, but beyond that there's the weapons they manufacture, the food they eat, the animals they raise, and even the ore they have access to. Which along with the weather, suggests there's a rather massive geographical divide between them that their relative sizes don't suggest.

11 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

It's anime fire. Per established convention, it doesn't cause burns - rather, it knocks the target down. And potentially unconscious.

Big oof. Something about Macarath, and taking one of your younger royal siblings out of commission. 

Must we resurrect this Sothis-damned argument? It has nothing to do with Birthright, or anything Alastor has posted. You and @Shadow Mir should probably bury the bolt axe... I mean, hatchet, for the time being.

Saved until the Three Houses playthrough then.

 

Edited February 27, 2021 by Jotari

[Interdimensional Observer]

40 minutes ago, Jotari said:

I think language is a bit of an unreality ball that can't be used as a point either way. Because every continent in Fire Emblem (and most other fantasy works) have a single language being used exclusively throughout the main setting

Not to forget in movies set in the real world. Isn't it always the case the important foreigners in the country the movie takes place speak the native tongue perfectly, or the important natives the foreigner's tongue without the slightest issue? Language in art and entertainment is convenience, except when the creator doesn't want it to be that.

Reality has had until the ~1800s in a lot of places, so many spoken languages -or regional dialects so thick they might as well be a language- that the premise of easy verbal communication would've been quite difficult. (Written language, as the realm of a learned elite alongside certain spoken forms of language, is a different matter.) Could Donnel understand Chrom and vice versa IRL if IRL = 1200AD, to pick a random year? I wouldn't think so. -I picked the first bumpkin and monarch from a shared FE country that came to mind.

 

40 minutes ago, Jotari said:

We certainly don't see any monk classes making up the ranks of Nohrs army though (uh, discounting the facts that monks were never really deployed soldiers in reality).

Japanese sohei?

Also, religious orders like the Templars and Teutonics have existed. As have Sikhism's Nihang. 

Edited February 27, 2021 by Interdimensional Observer

[Eltosian Kadath]

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

And if he wasn't, who is Garon lying to here?

My first thought is Camilla, I mean she did return to Nohr and some of Corrin's convincing arguments were about Garon setting off that exploding sword to kill Corrin, but if it were actually the vindictive Iago. Although that was a few chapters ago, and I honestly don't remember who is in the scene...

[Jotari]

6 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Not to forget in movies set in the real world. Isn't it always the case the important foreigners in the country the movie takes place speak the native tongue perfectly, or the important natives the foreigner's tongue without the slightest issue? Language in art and entertainment is convenience, except when the creator doesn't want it to be that.

Reality has had until the ~1800s in a lot of places, so many spoken languages -or regional dialects so thick they might as well be a language- that the premise of easy verbal communication would've been quite difficult. (Written language, as the realm of a learned elite alongside certain spoken forms of language, is a different matter.) Could Donnel understand Chrom and vice versa IRL if IRL = 1200AD, to pick a random year? I wouldn't think so. -I picked the first bumpkin and monarch from a shared FE country that came to mind.

Well to be unnecessarily pedantic, Chrom would probably be the best example of a lord that might speak the same language as Donnel given that Chrom has been roaming the countryside interacting with the peasantry. Awakening also has only three defined nations, compared to Marth's time when there was like a dozen (hmm, let's scount, Khaden, Gra, Grust, Macedonia, Doluna, Altea, Archanea, Pyrathi, Aurelis, Talys and the disunited tribes = 11ish, 12 I guess if we count Furio Harbour as some kind of city state and not an extension of the tribal lands). So Awakening seems to exist in a more unitary world. Course there's no way to tell for sure exactly how culturally diverse Ylisse is as it treats every paralogue as happening in vague Awkaeningland no matter where it's physically located on the world map (and the main story doesn't do much better, having only some mild Plegian flare, even much of what we're told about Regna Ferox is quickly forgotten).

6 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Japanese sohei?

Also, religious orders like the Templars and Teutonics have existed. As have Sikhism's Nihang. 

Ya, there is some truth there.

[Alastor15243]

2 hours ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

My first thought is Camilla, I mean she did return to Nohr and some of Corrin's convincing arguments were about Garon setting off that exploding sword to kill Corrin, but if it were actually the vindictive Iago. Although that was a few chapters ago, and I honestly don't remember who is in the scene...

Nobody but Iago and Garon. Also Garon didn't remotely act like he disapproved of Iago's actions in Hoshido if that's the case.

Edited February 27, 2021 by Alastor15243

[Alastor15243]

Birthright Day 11: Chapter 17

Alright! Halfway point! Let's do this!

Yep, I'm feeling restless on the weekend. Birthright's gotten to be more fun than any other game I can think of playing at the moment. The part where everyone starts promoting is when things really hit their stride for me in any Fire Emblem game, honestly. Typically my least favorite chapters in any Fire Emblem game have a tendency to be the ones that get really involved before that point.

Everyone's getting a royal feather today, since I recently got one. Hope you all enjoy!

Azura and Dakota just got to A support due to an accessory I gave her.

...Yeah, absolutely nothing in that absurdly short conversation warranted a response.

I've forged Saizo a +2 iron shuriken that I suspect will eventually go to Silas, and I dubbed this new spinning bladed weapon... the Buzzy Boi.

Alright, I think that's all the prep I can do for now. Let's grab a strength-speed meal and then head out to the ice tribe!

...Because I sure as hell know they ain't feeding us there. I mean there's gonna be a BBQ later, but... it ain't for us.

I got one that affected Silas, Takumi, Reina and Mozu. That should be fine for now. There's gonna be a lot of player-phase action this map for reasons I'll explain when we get there.

Yet again Dakota's being given advice to have blind faith in her comrades and not suspect anyone because that's what makes her such a great leader and I'm just like fucking what? Ugh.

Anyway, yeah, this is all a trap, and Flora comes back during a map scene... as a red unit. With enemy ice tribe members.

So yeah, this is... probably my least favorite gimmick in Birthright. The map is, save for Flora, entirely empty at the start of the battle. But if you visit any of the villages except for one of them, enemies will spawn.

On your turn.

Yep, Birthright has tripwire reinforcements. In the game's defense, in terms of actions units are likely to do first, visiting a village literally right next to them in a map that has no enemies on it is pretty high up there. But it's still an unacceptable design choice that's no better than ambush spawns. Which is why this game is also going in the same tier as Revelation, unfortunately, for ironmannability. Only Conquest is getting the perfect score.

But knowing it's coming, it is a fun thought exercise in player phase combat, especially now that I have a bunch of high-movement units adept at fighting in attack stance. It's kinda cool, I only have two dedicated guard stance fighters: Ryoma and Silas. Everyone else has been mostly using attack stance.

Speaking of, I got Dakota to activate Silas's vow of friendship again. Not sure how much longer I can keep this up. The second enemies start reliably doubling against her terrible speed, I think it's game over for that strategy, but we'll see.

Mozu's started training up her lance rank, since I've been binging a lot of Zoran's Fates videos, and he pointed out that kinshi knights, between their lance and bow ranks, have access to three different slayer weapon types: flying, beast, and monster. That's an interesting thing to be able to take advantage of.

Shortly after taking out the second village, the lake freezes over automatically without the need of the dragon vein, and the western half of the map and the northeast corner are now filled up with enemies.

Scarlet just brought out her notorious crit line “I'm gonna get Nohrian on your butt”, and that is simultaneously so lame but also perfect.

Right, okay, so I'm down to the last few enemies. There's a group of promoted sorcerers and maids, but I've worked out a direction from which to isolate the sorcerer so I don't have to feed all of these kills to Ryoma.

Alright, that's it. I've just cleared out all the enemies. Honestly, getting everyone placed around the village so I can player-phase the tripwire spawns is... kind of a nuisance. Yeah, I'd say this is my least favorite chapter in Birthright so far. Still miles better than my least favorite in Revelation though.

But yeah, time for... the scene.

For those of you who haven't played this game...

I don't know if I can possibly do this scene justice.

Just... try to imagine Emmeryn's death scene... except it was done in-engine. With her jumping off the cliff... and then hitting the floor face-first and bouncing with that big echoing death thud.

...Nope, doesn't work. This is even dumber than that.

Okay, so, Flora reveals she betrayed Dakota due to Garon threatening her entire village with genocide if she didn't defeat her. The second Dakota hears this, she tells Flora that she needs to fight together with them in order to stop Garon. All is forgiven.

FUCKIN' NOPE!

Flora's so fucking ashamed of her decision to betray Dakota in order to protect her village... that she fucking kills herself.

And not by stabbing herself or leaping into a frozen lake or anything, oh no.

She decides the best way to off herself is to raise her hand to the sky, snap her fingers, and magically set herself on fire.

What follows is this utterly surreal scene that, may I remind you, is being done in-fucking-engine, where everyone begs Flora to stop using her inexplicable and unexplained power to set herself on fire (okay, Felicia's Dakota support kind of implies it could happen, but only as an offshoot of powers she clearly was not using in that moment), and all the while she's just standing there as tranquil and motionless as Thich Quang Duc, talking to everyone calmly about how at peace she feels, while standing in her neutral pose completely engulfed in 3DS-graphics-tier flames. All while the extraordinarily ironically-named “Warmth Is Gone” plays in a profoundly hubristic attempt to add anything but bathos to the scene.

The very idea that this is something anyone would do in this situation, even if they could, is so outrageously laughable. Gee, Flora, you couldn't find a better way to kill yourself than by traumatizing your sister by burning yourself alive while she watches?

“Urgh... the end is near”, she says, like she'd even remotely be in a condition to use her face muscles mere seconds before she actually expires.

And Jakob temporarily becomes my spirit animal when he says:

“What a foolish and terrible waste of life. I think I am going to be sick.”

AND THEN THE LAST CAMERA ANGLE BEFORE IT DRAMATICALLY FADES TO BLACK IS ANOTHER DAKOTA ASS SHOT! OH MY GOD! I CAN'T FUCKING BREATHE I'M LAUGHING SO HARD!

THIS IS WHY I WANTED TO GIVE FATES BONUS WRITING POINTS FOR BEING SO BAD IT'S GOOD, PEOPLE! THIS SHIT RIGHT HERE!

...I'm still coming down from my laughing fits as I'm doing East Dakota maintenance. Holy shit. We can't stop here for the day. We just can't. I wanna keep going. I'm not gonna be able to put the game down after that shit.

Alright, so, we've got three supports! Dakota/Ryoma and Mozu/Saizo are hitting rank A, and Silas and Kagero finally get our first S support of the game! Awesome! Let's do those in order.

...The present Ryoma had for Dakota was a ring the whole family made for her to give to her upon her eventual return.

If that doesn't get brought up in the S support I will be beyond surprised.

Hahahaha, Saizo doesn't like sweet things. Oh the irony. I'm pretty sure that was deliberate. But yeah, Mozu vows to replicate Saizo's favorite food, boiled riverfish, which is apparently usually bland but there was a special preparation involving spices and mushrooms that he loved.

We don't see the results though, and since this is the A support, if this has any closure at all, it's gonna be when they get married.

Speaking of marriage:

Oh my god.

Kagero: Wha do you want? Don't tell me you've asked me here to offer more criticism of my art...

That line. That one fucking line.

That implies this is literally the next fucking conversation they've had together since that day.

This is like the fourth time they've interacted with each other, and Silas is proposing to her.

And apparently Silas has been writing to his family after each of these three encounters and I'm like fucking what!?

Oh my god this is beyond forced.

But yeah, my next priority is to get Silas to level 5 so he can get sol, and then turn him into a master ninja. And probably get Kagero into paladin for defensive bonuses instead of speed ones since Silas's growths and needs will have shifted.

 

Day 11 Bonus: Chapter 18

Invasion 2 is open, but it's all promoted enemies, and I'll probably be feeding a ton of kills into Ryoma if I do it now. I need an alternate enemy-phase sweeper, and Silas is probably the best bet for that. I'm hoping to get him prepped for that right away.

I made a forged brass shuriken called the training wheel, and Silas will be using that to get out of E rank shuriken immediately.

Alright, let's do Chapter 18. This is a pretty straightforward and mindless enemy-phase fest, if I remember correctly.

So, Felicia mentions how used to the darkness of this forest she is by mentioning how she and Flora used to camp here in the summers, and as a result she immediately triggers herself about the bullshit that happened at the end of last chapter.

Ryoma talks about Iago's “optical illusions”, and I'm like bitch that's not what optical illusions are.

So there's a graveyard in the middle of this forsaken, toxic forest. Who the fuck would bury their dead here? Who the fuck would bury their worst enemies here?

So yeah, this bog hurts anyone from Hoshido. Inexplicably it's not that it hurts anyone not from Nohr, because Dakota is a Vallite. And it can't be being raised in Nohr, because I'm pretty sure Azura is immune to this too.

UGH.

The game doesn't even show you the faceless on the prep screen because they spawn after you start the map.

Now, originally when I did this map for the first time, I walled off everyone at the starting location. But I'm gonna try to be more aggressive this time probably... depending on where the enemies are, because the game doesn't tell me. Seriously, as petty as this complaint is compared to the shit other games have pulled, it still pisses me off.

Also, this map is ridiculously tiny, and the range of the boss you have to kill to beat it covers something like 60% of it, so this map is really, really easily cheesable, especially since Leo's stats suck. But I wanna see what I can do with this.

So right out of nowhere, the game spawns twenty fucking faceless from the bogs, all within immediate range of me.

Right, so I wasn't just being lazy when I made a human wall at my starting point. They're numerous, but also weak enough that I have three units who can perfectly tank them and one unit who can take minimal damage with aura assistance. Bunching everyone up in guard stance means only those four pairs have to take damage.

Okay, so Azura is poisoned by the Nohrian swamp. Alright, good to know. Anyway, after that first turn, I moved out of the central area in the hopes of getting some more player-phase action. Still waiting to see if that was a good call.

Well, the thick woods surrounding the level can be flown over, and I have enough fliers in my army to take everyone but Silas/Kagero and Ryoma/Dakota, pair them up with fliers and fly them where nobody can reach them.

So now Silas is just ripping through these guys in the hopes of getting as much exp as possible. I think if I give him the boss kill, he should level up to level 5 by the end of this. He's only getting 1 exp per kill, but there is a ridiculous amount of enemy spam here, and it's really adding up.

I'm honestly skipping the battle scenes. This is a really dumb map. None of these guys can even touch Silas.

Alright, even just killing Odin was enough to get that final level up. Awesome. Ryoma kills Niles for the silver bow, leaving just Leo. This will be over next turn, and then it's time to begin the reign of Sol Ninja Silas.

I really don't even feel like commenting on the story here, except that it's an excuse to give us a ridiculous detour all the way back to Notre Sagesse in order to upgrade the Yato. What, did they not want to give us this back in Chapter 12 ish?

PFFT. Pussies. Conquest gives us Camilla in Chapter 10, and they weren't afraid the game would be too easy!

Oh right, also, the magical crystal ball that Azura gives Leo, which only works on Dakota and Leo and can only be used once. Yay for utterly idiotic plot contrivances to make Leo realize what's going on with Garon. Oh yeah. We'll be getting to that.

Oh, one more thing: Apparently Leo's constant whining about Camilla liking Dakota more than she liked him... was... uh...

...Apparently Leo has actual incestuous feelings for Camilla. I don't know what the source is for that, but I could've sworn it was an official source that said it.

Okay, back to East Dakota, and it's finally time to make Silas a master ninja.

We've gotten a bunch of miscellaneous random supports I wasn't trying to get. Mozu and Dakota, which I've already done, and then Ryoma with Azura and Silas.

...Apparently Azura is still kinda cold to Ryoma. I hate these cliffhangers.

As you'd probably expect, Ryoma and Silas's support is largely a vehicle for Ryoma to ask questions about Dakota's childhood in Nohr.

Right, now to make a speed and defense boosting meal for Silas and do Invasion 2 with him fighting the horde of lower enemies in the hopes of getting his shuriken weapon rank up to D so he can use sol with shuriken.

 

Day 11 Bonus Bonus: Invasion 2

I never have much to say about these things, so I don't even know why I'm labeling it. It's almost always the same. A bit of stress when enemies don't go where you think they'll go due to their obsession with property damage, but everything's always resolved quickly regardless.

...Though we'll see if that holds in Conquest.

Silas got to D rank shuriken just barely before the battle ended. Awesome. Now he's basically as invincible as Ryoma, if not quite as overwhelmingly strong.

Ryoma and Dakota also hit S support from this, as did Mozu and Saizo, so let's check that out.

Let's start with Ryoma and Dakota.

Okay.

Brace yourselves.

Basically, Ryoma confesses that Sumeragi told him the truth of Dakota's birth, or at least the part Mikoto was willing to tell: that Dakota isn't from Hoshido at all, and isn't in any way related to Sumeragi or the others.

This is... the game's idiotic solution to reconciling the game's themes of family with the game's marketing obligation to make every playable character fuckable. SURPRISE! THEY AREN'T YOUR BLOOD FAMILY AFTER ALL!

Jesus Christ game, if you're gonna be this shameless, just face the degeneracy like a man and let the player fuck their actual blood siblings. This isn't any less disturbing.

But it's even more hilarious in the other sibling supports, because since none of them were told like Ryoma was, the reveal this time is thanks to a note Mikoto gave to the sibling you romanced, because she used her powers of foresight to determine this would happen and went “read this if you ever feel worried about who you love”.

Yes. That's right.

Mikoto handed her kids an “IN CASE OF INCEST BREAK GLASS” note.

Though, props to the game, this line is pretty great:

Dakota: So... [Sumeragi] took care of me – died protecting me – knowing I was another man's child? Then... he WAS my father. Whatever my blood.

Also, I was totally expecting a line like “that present from earlier wasn't the sort of ring I've been dreaming of giving you”, and we got nothing like that. I don't know whether I'm disappointed or relieved.

Oh come on, Ryoma! “Our future is stronger than iron”, really? “Stronger than steel” is simultaneously more poetic, more badass, and more factually impressive.

Right, onto Saizo and Mozu.

Okay, this is cute. All S supports are naturally awkward and abrupt, but this is one of the least so. Their encounters before kind of evolved into something resembling dates anyway, so sure, I buy this.

Awwww!

Saizo: When we [go to visit my hometown], I invite you to think of it as your home – and my people as your people. You may have lost one home, but I would be honored to provide another for you.

That is absolutely adorable. Okay, props to the game, this one is pretty okay.

Huh. So I just went to the treehouse. I didn't expect Ryoma to be the sort of person to call his wife “Dear”. I was kinda expecting “my love” or something.

Okay, so, we've got another gimmicky chapter up next. It'd probably be more interesting if I trained up more mages, but... I mean, in Birthright, what are my options? Orochi, Hayato, Sakura, certain avatars, and you can't really even call those first two options at all. Birthright doesn't have nearly as many good mages as Conquest does. Conquest has Odin, Elise, Ophelia, Leo, Camilla with the right builds, even Nyx was pretty good the one time I used her... there are just so many more good options.

...Before that... we just got Shiro. Let's see if his paralogue's less ridiculously strict only a couple of chapters after the promotion point.

...I think if we do it now we can just barely get Shiro to survive the first turn.

...But it's still really ridiculous. I don't like the pressure to move forward so quickly with so many enemies, and even though I have plenty of fliers, I don't have enough to really do the kind of turn-one strats I need to to get this guy without rescuing. So I think I'm just gonna give up on getting Shiro unless I have a ton of spare rescue rods by the end of the game and can spare the three or so I'd need.

 

Day 11 Bonus Bonus Bonus: Chapter 19

Nothing much of interest or value happens in the story, so let's get straight to the battle.

So, the major gimmick of this map is that every enemy is an illusion who's capped one stat and has basically nothing in another. And for the first half of the map or so, it's split into two paths, one with all def and no res, and one with all res and no def. Obviously we'll be sending most of our units down the latter. Ryoma and Silas will be handling the former since we have no magic users who could rip them to shreds and they're the strongest and toughest guys we've got. Activating vow of friendship is gonna be hilariously trivial, so I don't think Silas and Ryoma will have any problems. I will bring a healer with them though, probably Felicia.

Alright, let's get a meal set up and get started.

Subaki's finally leveled up to level 20, and my reward for waiting for that last level was a single point of skill. Yay. Anyway, time to make him a falcon knight. I'd like to have a second one of those at least, and everyone else who can become a kinshi knight has better combat skills. Besides, he's probably gonna wind up as a support unit anyway. Pity I don't have any wives left for him. Well, aside from Felicia or a pair-up bot. Whatever, I've got plenty of child paralogues available now for if units start dropping.

The enemies on this map are very unaggressive, making this another mediocre map. Bear in mind while I say this, none of these hit the level of anything in Revelation.

...I'm sorry, I kinda breezed through this thing without much to talk about. This is a map that only Conquest really managed to make work due to the whole “enemies having skills” thing. Locking all of the enemies to singular tiny rooms tends to give the player too much control over the situation and get rid of all pressure. The stat thing was a cute gimmick, but it really wasn't enough to make things too worth talking about.

As I'm finishing up, I'm mostly focused on training up Azura and Takumi's support rank. I think this might finally be the chapter where they S rank.

Yeah, and rather anticlimactically, we're told that the real ultimate power was the muscles we built along the way, except no, we get the Yato upgraded at long last. Alas, all it's good for in this run is keeping Dakota from getting doubled when she goes in to trigger vow of friendship.

...Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that the 3D backdrop being used for the scenes in Notre Sagesse, a place we never actually have a fight in, is actually just Conquest Chapter 10. The walkways overlooking water really seem to look identical.

Alright, I think that's finally enough for today. Let's read the supports and get this finished up.

Sakura and Saizo episode 2: This weirdly adorable scene where Saizo gives Sakura sweets from Hoshido castle town as a thanks for saving him, and then... uses a smoke bomb to get away when he starts getting flustered, complete with an actual *poof* in the dialogue box.

As for Subaki and Azura, which probably happened due to the singing I did to grind up Subaki's new staff rank, Subaki saves Azura's life from an assailant. Azura seems to have her own theory about what the assailant was there for, a theory apart from the idea that they just wanted to kidnap her to have a Hoshidan royal hostage.

We'll see what she means if this happens again I guess.

But yeah, now for Azura and Takumi.

UUUUGGGGGGHHHHHHH. JESUS CHRIST. The game's trying to paint Takumi as one of the worst tsunderes in history by contextualizing Takumi's refusal to acknowledge Azura's family status and continuously being rude to her... as Takumi being in love with her at first sight and hating the idea of them being brother and sister.

Yeah, Takumi. That totally explains why you'd have the audacity to tell the girl you have a fucking crush on that she hasn't “earned the privilege” of calling you by name a fucking decade into knowing you.

That was horrifying.

Alright, now Takumi and Mozu rank B.

...Just basic farming mishaps and Takumi getting a grasp of just how brutal farming can be.

Saizo and Subaki is...

...well Saizo basically has his issues with Subaki and thinks his politeness is a mask for something nasty, and challenges him to a duel.

Okay, that settles it, I'm making Saizo a kinshi knight. Not only do I want Saizo to be around Subaki more so I can see more of this, but his defense isn't quite working out, he doesn't have a chance of tanking as well as Silas or Ryoma, and he has no dedicated guard stance partner anyway, so sure, I'll make him a kinshi knight to add to my air force. It's fun having an air force!

...It just occurs to me that I might be able to get Mozu and Saizo to slip into mechanist for replicate by the endgame. That might be interesting to see.

I'm probably not going to do anything tomorrow, but we'll see. But whenever next time is, we'll be taking on Chapter 20, Fort Dragonfall.

Stay safe, everyone!

Edited February 28, 2021 by Alastor15243

[Shadow Mir]

On 2/24/2021 at 11:58 PM, Jotari said:

Unreliable makes it sound bad. It's a 10% chance of activating Lethality and Jugdral style Pavise at the same time, at base, between his growths and pair up you could probably get it up to 20% which is really high when paired with his crit rate. Most of the time he'll be blowing away enemies in one hit (and if they survive, he's always doubling to get a second one in there). And if they do manage to hit him, then they've just given him vantage letting him kill most enemies before they even have a chance to attack him (or if he fails to kill, that's two more shields to the guard guage to defend against the incoming attack). Ryoma is a ridiculous unit, and it's not purely because of Ranjito (though it is largely because of it). Astra is a bonkers good skill as far as procs go. His crit rate also easily gets into the 40% with his personal skill and the unseen 10% from being a swordmaster. That's 25% crit at base with Ranjito so long as he's paired up, and if he's paired up, before you even factor in his skill stat. His evasion is also crazy too, especially on player phase with duelist blow. They really should have made dodges fill up the shield gauge at half the rate, because Ryoma dodge tanking get's to be ridiculously good. Dodge tanking is meant to come with a risk, but that risk is sevrelly mitigated when doubling and dodging means you get to outright ignore at least every third attack that's launched at you. Every second attack if you make Ryoma's partner a loedstar for Duals Guardsman (though not possible for you since you've made Corrin a girl, and obviously an S support would be better over all).

Uhhh, I think calling Astra Lethality + Jugdral Pavise is laying it on rather thick; the question is, just how many hits of Astra does an enemy manage to survive? Unless it's a defensive enemy type (like a general), they're probably gonna drop before the fifth attack, barring some insane luck (speaking of, crits are still a factor, too); I mean, enemies rarely live long enough for me to see the full thing from Hana, so why would I expect them to not get splatted midway when Ryoma activates it? Considering every attack fills the dual guard gauge by 2, it means I wouldn't expect to go from zero to having a dual guard ready in most cases. I'll grant, though, it may not always be at zero.

43 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Yep, Birthright has tripwire reinforcements. In the game's defense, in terms of actions units are likely to do first, visiting a village literally right next to them in a map that has no enemies on it is pretty high up there. But it's still an unacceptable design choice that's no better than ambush spawns. Which is why this game is also going in the same tier as Revelation, unfortunately, for ironmannability. Only Conquest is getting the perfect score.

I would hard disagree - the wind map is bad enough to knock Conquest's ironmannability down HARD. 

45 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Okay, so, we've got another gimmicky chapter up next. It'd probably be more interesting if I trained up more mages, but... I mean, in Birthright, what are my options? Orochi, Hayato, Sakura, certain avatars, and you can't really even call those first two options at all. Birthright doesn't have nearly as many good mages as Conquest does. Conquest has Odin, Elise, Ophelia, Leo, Camilla with the right builds, even Nyx was pretty good the one time I used her... there are just so many more good options.

I don't know about this - I found mages to struggle just as much as, if not even harder than on Birthright (Nyx and Odin both want to make me throw my 3DS into a wall...).

[Alastor15243]

1 minute ago, Shadow Mir said:

I don't know about this - I found mages to struggle just as much as, if not even harder than on Birthright (Nyx and Odin both want to make me throw my 3DS into a wall...).

I would go as far as to say you are objectively wrong about Odin. Have you even watched the videos about the shit he can do? Even one of them? Check out any video about Odin in this playlist.

 

4 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

I would hard disagree - the wind map is bad enough to knock Conquest's ironmannability down HARD. 

The game explains how the gimmick works and gives you a turn advance warning for every gust. I don't see how this is a problem for ironmannability.

[Shadow Mir]

7 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

I would go as far as to say you are objectively wrong about Odin. Have you even watched the videos about the shit he can do? Even one of them? Check out any video about Odin in this playlist.

 

The game explains how the gimmick works and gives you a turn advance warning for every gust. I don't see how this is a problem for ironmannability.

How many resources did Odin need to get thrown his way to do that? Because those are likely resources that could've been spent on a better unit.

Doesn't make it any less awful to play. Then again, gimmicks that move the player's units against their will tend to be the worst of the worst.

[Alastor15243]

Just now, Shadow Mir said:

How many resources did Odin need to get thrown his way to do that? Because those are likely resources that could've been spent on a better unit.

I mean just watch. The biggest investment I've seen him talk about is nosferatu.

[Jotari]

 

Quote

 

What follows is this utterly surreal scene that, may I remind you, is being done in-fucking-engine, where everyone begs Flora to stop using her inexplicable and unexplained power to set herself on fire (okay, Felicia's Dakota support kind of implies it could happen, but only as an offshoot of powers she clearly was not using in that moment), and all the while she's just standing there as tranquil and motionless as Thich Quang Duc, talking to everyone calmly about how at peace she feels, while standing in her neutral pose completely engulfed in 3DS-graphics-tier flames. All while the extraordinarily ironically-named “Warmth Is Gone” plays in a profoundly hubristic attempt to add anything but bathos to the scene.

 

 

Looks like she took suicide lessons form Archanea!Lorenz.

Quote

 

 

So yeah, this bog hurts anyone from Hoshido. Inexplicably it's not that it hurts anyone not from Nohr, because Dakota is a Vallite. And it can't be being raised in Nohr, because I'm pretty sure Azura is immune to this too.

 

 

Here's the kicker to that, if it's based on where one was raised, then why are the child units of Nhorian charcters such as Dwyer and Sophie not affected too (and maybe Kana? I'm not sure)? They were raised in the outrealms so have no personal connection to Nohr at all beyond one (maybe both if you're marrying Felicia to Jacob or Silas) of their parents being born there. Only real explanation is that it's based on where you spiritually feel you're from, so I guess Dwyer and Sophie are major Nohrian enthusiasts who identify with Nohr despite being separated from their parents at birth and raised in the wilderness specifically because they were at war with Nohr.

Quote

 

 

Mikoto handed her kids an “IN CASE OF INCEST BREAK GLASS” note.

 

Hold on a second, Ryoma is missing for a good portion of the plot before recruitment. And in Revealation he's actively an enemy againsnt Corrin for a certain point of the game. What happens if you grind up supports to get an S rank way earlier than the game is expecting? Does Ryoma just take a little detour from defending Cheve to pop into existence and tell Corrin about the letter? Or does the game bar you from getting Hoshido royals S supports until after Ryoma shows up?

1 hour ago, Shadow Mir said:

Uhhh, I think calling Astra Lethality + Jugdral Pavise is laying it on rather thick; the question is, just how many hits of Astra does an enemy manage to survive? Unless it's a defensive enemy type (like a general), they're probably gonna drop before the fifth attack, barring some insane luck (speaking of, crits are still a factor, too); I mean, enemies rarely live long enough for me to see the full thing from Hana, so why would I expect them to not get splatted midway when Ryoma activates it? Considering every attack fills the dual guard gauge by 2, it means I wouldn't expect to go from zero to having a dual guard ready in most cases. I'll grant, though, it may not always be at zero.

I would hard disagree - the wind map is bad enough to knock Conquest's ironmannability down HARD. 

I don't know about this - I found mages to struggle just as much as, if not even harder than on Birthright (Nyx and Odin both want to make me throw my 3DS into a wall...).

True, but as you said, a situation wherein you're starting from absolute 0% isn't always likely. Commonly you will have probably at least two shields if the enemy has just attacked you on enemy phase, either that or you've iniated the attack on player phase, which means if you've managed to kill the enemy meaning you didn't eat a counter attack at all. As for how many hits you are likely to kill an enemy with Astra, it depends on wether you've hit them already, but three seems like a likely average, and even if it's not, you're still likely to get two hits out of astra meaning it is almost always filling your guage more than a regular attack would be. In otherwords, I think a guaranteed kill isn't a major down side. It's still provoding significant advantages. As for why it doesn't seem as useful on Hana, I'd put that down to Hana just not seeing nearly as much combat as Ryoma typically would. Makes me wonder how good a Swordmaster build for Corrin would be. Course Corrin is missing the very useful 1-2 range that stops Ryoma being potshotted, so maybe a cross  promotion to Master Ninja or Dread Fighter for Shuriken use to replicate the default Ryoma build might be necessary.

59 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

How many resources did Odin need to get thrown his way to do that? Because those are likely resources that could've been spent on a better unit.

Doesn't make it any less awful to play. Then again, gimmicks that move the player's units against their will tend to be the worst of the worst.

58 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

I mean just watch. The biggest investment I've seen him talk about is nosferatu.

Is Serenes bugging out or something? Because for me that Video isn't remotely about Odin at all. It's covering the chapter before he joins.

Edited February 28, 2021 by Jotari

[Alastor15243]

28 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Hold on a second, Ryoma is missing for a good portion of the plot before recruitment. And in Revealation he's actively an enemy againsnt Corrin for a certain point of the game. What happens if you grind up supports to get an S rank way earlier than the game is expecting? Does Ryoma just take a little detour from defending Cheve to pop into existence and tell Corrin about the letter? Or does the game bar you from getting Hoshido royals S supports until after Ryoma shows up?

I don't quite understand. Shortly after Corrin arrived, Mikoto handed whichever kid you S-supported with the "in case of incest break glass" letter so that they'd know when the time is right. It's dumb as hell, but I don't think it contradicts anything here.

29 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Is Serenes bugging out or something? Because for me that Video isn't remotely about Odin at all. It's covering the chapter before he joins.

It's a playlist. Copying the link to the playlist apparently gets embedded less than ideally, but if you go to youtube it should show the full playlist.

[Eltosian Kadath]

Wow, you really did a lot of chapters on this bonus Saturday...

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Mozu's started training up her lance rank, since I've been binging a lot of Zolan's fates videos, and he pointed out that kinshi knights, between their lance and bow ranks, have access to three different slayer weapon types: flying, beast, and monster. That's an interesting thing to be able to take advantage of.

That is an interesting point, although I don't think you get a blessed lance in Birthright at all (unless there is one in the bonus boxes or something...)

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Hahahaha, Saizo doesn't like sweet things. Oh the irony. I'm pretty sure that was deliberate. But yeah, Mozu vows to replicate Saizo's favorite food, boiled riverfish, which is apparently usually bland but there was a special preparation involving spices and mushrooms that he loved.

Ah, setting up the gimmick between father and son already...

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

I'm honestly skipping the battle scenes. This is a really dumb map. None of these guys can even touch Silas.

God this map is so tedious... its ones like these that really make Birthright boring...

 

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

I really don't even feel like commenting on the story here, except that it's an excuse to give us a ridiculous detour all the way back to Notre Sagesse in order to upgrade the Yato. What, did they not want to give us this back in Chapter 12 ish?

Don't want to comment on the horribly convenient magic teleporting book that has just enough magic to warp the whole party there and back, and is never seen, nor heard of again, no matter how convenient it would be to use...

 

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Oh right, also, the magical crystal ball that Azura gives Leo, which only works on Dakota and Leo and can only be used once. Yay for utterly idiotic plot contrivances to make Leo realize what's going on with Garon. Oh yeah. We'll be getting to that.

God this chapter really is the worst...

 

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

...I think if we do it now we can just barely get Shiro to survive the first turn.

...But it's still really ridiculous. I don't like the pressure to move forward so quickly with so many enemies, and even though I have plenty of fliers, I don't have enough to really do the kind of turn-one strats I need to to get this guy without rescuing. So I think I'm just gonna give up on getting Shiro unless I have a ton of spare rescue rods by the end of the game and can spare the three or so I'd need.

Eventually you can buy three of them from the fully upgraded Rod shop, so that should be doable. Shame you didn't get there just a little bit sooner...

 

5 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

It's a playlist. Copying the link to the playlist apparently gets embedded less than ideally, but if you go to youtube it should show the full playlist.

Its still is a playlist, if you let it keep playing in the embedded video it will move onto the next one, it just is a hassle to switch videos in embedded form...

[Shadow Mir]

35 minutes ago, Jotari said:

True, but as you said, a situation wherein you're starting from absolute 0% isn't always likely. Commonly you will have probably at least two shields if the enemy has just attacked you on enemy phase, either that or you've iniated the attack on player phase, which means if you've managed to kill the enemy meaning you didn't eat a counter attack at all. As for how many hits you are likely to kill an enemy with Astra, it depends on wether you've hit them already, but three seems like a likely average, and even if it's not, you're still likely to get two hits out of astra meaning it is almost always filling your guage more than a regular attack would be. In otherwords, I think a guaranteed kill isn't a major down side. It's still provoding significant advantages. As for why it doesn't seem as useful on Hana, I'd put that down to Hana just not seeing nearly as much combat as Ryoma typically would. Makes me wonder how good a Swordmaster build for Corrin would be. Course Corrin is missing the very useful 1-2 range that stops Ryoma being potshotted, so maybe a cross  promotion to Master Ninja or Dread Fighter for Shuriken use to replicate the default Ryoma build might be necessary.

I forgot to mention, but I was assuming full health for the enemy. Anyway, my point with bringing up Hana was that most enemies tend to die halfway through when she activates it, meaning that Ryoma, who has +4 strength from his sword and even more strength (while she has a higher growth than he does in the stat, I'm not sure Hana would ever pass Ryoma up in strength), would be even more likely to take out the poor schmuck that's facing him before landing all 5 hits. Fair enough on everything else.

[Alastor15243]

3 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Don't want to comment on the horribly convenient magic teleporting book that has just enough magic to warp the whole party there and back, and is never seen, nor heard of again, no matter how convenient it would be to use...

I don't know why, but I just did not have the energy to roast that shit at the moment. But yes. Indeed. It is beyond contrived.

[Jotari]

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

I don't quite understand. Shortly after Corrin arrived, Mikoto handed whichever kid you S-supported with the "in case of incest break glass" letter so that they'd know when the time is right. It's dumb as hell, but I don't think it contradicts anything here.

It's a playlist. Copying the link to the playlist apparently gets embedded less than ideally, but if you go to youtube it should show the full playlist.

Oh. For some reason I thought Ryoma showed up to hand out the letter. I guess because I knew he knew and assumed that's how others were informed. I don't think I've ever actually S supported any of the Hoshido royals. And if I did I was probably skipping the dialogue. Hmm, now I wonder why they even decided to have Ryoma know all along and make it so he's not absolutely gaslighting Corrin during the prologue. Hmm, maybe they thought they couldn't get away with it due to Ryoma's age. Course Sumeragi did claim he had slept with Mikoto at a time frame before he married her that would make Corrin's birth plausible with him as the father, and presumably that's the public story too. So they easily could have had Ryoma be as ignorant as his siblings on the matter.

7 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

I forgot to mention, but I was assuming full health for the enemy. Anyway, my point with bringing up Hana was that most enemies tend to die halfway through when she activates it, meaning that Ryoma, who has +4 strength from his sword and even more strength (while she has a higher growth than he does in the stat, I'm not sure Hana would ever pass Ryoma up in strength), would be even more likely to take out the poor schmuck that's facing him before landing all 5 hits. Fair enough on everything else.

Actually Ryoma and Hana's strength is pretty much on par, even when you factor in Ranjito. At a level 20/4 (Ryoma's starting level) Swordmaster Hana has 23.35 average strength, while Ryoma has 20+4. So he has less than a single point lead. It takes until level 11 promoted to actually outstrip him, but then she quickly hits her cap and Ryoma will have caught up to her (though never actually surpass her base stat as he's relying on Ranjito). Hana doesn't have a whole lot going for her, but she does have strength. Course that's assuming Birthright Hana and not Revalation Hana who arbitrarily gets two points of strength knocked off of her.

Edited February 28, 2021 by Jotari

[lenticular]

3 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

...I'm sorry, I kinda breezed through this thing without much to talk about. This is a map that only Conquest really managed to make work due to the whole “enemies having skills” thing. Locking all of the enemies to singular tiny rooms tends to give the player too much control over the situation and get rid of all pressure. The stat thing was a cute gimmick, but it really wasn't enough to make things too worth talking about.

I think the stat thing actually made the level worse, honestly. I get what they were going for, but with the complete lack of pressure, having all the units having a terrible stat was basically just saying "here is my glaring weakness that you should exploit to kill me with no thought or effort".

 

3 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

I would go as far as to say you are objectively wrong about Odin. Have you even watched the videos about the shit he can do? Even one of them? Check out any video about Odin in this playlist.

I watched the first Odin video in the playlist (the one on his recruitment chapter), and I don't think it's really a particularly strong argument in his favour. In order to get him off the ground, the video creator is using very intricate game knowledge that 99.9% of players won't have (eg, knowing exactly how the AI prioritises who to attack) and he also acknowledged the possible need to save scum for getting magic on his first level up. None of which is an argument against Odin -- I've never used him so have no opinion either way -- but that particular video wasn't a strong argument in his favour.

(My big problem with Odin is his personal skill. When I read that, I basically thought "Hmm, I could name a weapon 'aaaaaaaaaaaa' or I could name it 'FuckYouFates'... oh, or I could just not use him at all and not have to worry about it. Yeah, I think I'll do that." I'll give them credit for gameply/stroy integration, except that's only a positive when the story that's being integrated isn't terrible. Still less bad than Sophie's personal, mind.)

3 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

I would hard disagree - the wind map is bad enough to knock Conquest's ironmannability down HARD.

I hate that level with a passion (it's definitely in my top three least favourite maps in all of Fire Emblem), but I don't think it should ding the ironmannability score. It's not unfair; it's just unfun. No, the levels that I count against Conquest's ironmannability are the Kitsune level (insufficiently explained gimmick), the defend chapter (changing the rules mid-map without warning) and to a lesser extent the Fort Dragonfall chapter (unfair reinforcements with unclear spawn conditions).

 

23 hours ago, Jotari said:

I think language is a bit of an unreality ball that can't be used as a point either way. Because every continent in Fire Emblem (and most other fantasy works) have a single language being used exclusively throughout the main setting (and even beyond, apperantly Valentia and Archanea have the same language despite being cut off from each other given the lack of difficulty Zeke and the Pegasus Sisters have communicating with everyone else). And religion is so underplayed in the story Im not sure what you're even referring to. Garon worshipd Anankos and that's as far as I can recall the religion of either country. We certainly don't see any monk classes making up the ranks of Nohrs army though (uh, discounting the facts that monks were never really deployed soldiers in reality).

What they do have differences are, obviously, the style of their dress and architecture, but beyond that there's the weapons they manufacture, the food they eat, the animals they raise, and even the ore they have access to. Which along with the weather, suggests there's a rather massive geographical divide between them that their relative sizes don't suggest.

The impression I had about religion was that both countries basically revered dragons but one was the dawn dragon and the other was the dusk dragon. Basically different members of the same pantheon. Of course, I haven't paid all that much attention to the lore and can't remember where or why I have that impression, so I might be completely misremembering this, or it might be something that my brain entirely invented. And fair point well made with regards language.

Ultimately, Fates worldbuilding has holes big enough to drive a tank through. It's up to everyone individually to decide how to rationalise it to make it marginally less stupid. Whenever you try to make sense of one part, it just makes two other parts seem dumber. Sort of like a whack-a-mole of terrible writing. And I am going to stop thinking about it before my brain explodes.

[Shadow Mir]

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

Actually Ryoma and Hana's strength is pretty much on par, even when you factor in Ranjito. At a level 20/4 (Ryoma's starting level) Swordmaster Hana has 23.35 average strength, while Ryoma has 20+4. So he has less than a single point lead. It takes until level 11 promoted to actually outstrip him, but then she quickly hits her cap and Ryoma will have caught up to her (though never actually surpass her base stat as he's relying on Ranjito). Hana doesn't have a whole lot going for her, but she does have strength. Course that's assuming Birthright Hana and not Revalation Hana who arbitrarily gets two points of speed knocked off of her.

Well... That's... Insane. I mean, I knew Hana had an insane strength growth for her class, but I didn't think it was that insane.

4 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

I mean just watch. The biggest investment I've seen him talk about is nosferatu.

 Nosferatu is 4000 gold - in the context of early in the game, that's not peanuts. Knowing that, I think "Is that really worth it, or would I rather use that 4000 gold Nosferatu costs for something else, like staves and healing items... oh, I think I'll do that and only use Odin long enough to unlock his daughter's paralogue".

54 minutes ago, lenticular said:

(My big problem with Odin is his personal skill. When I read that, I basically thought "Hmm, I could name a weapon 'aaaaaaaaaaaa' or I could name it 'FuckYouFates'... oh, or I could just not use him at all and not have to worry about it. Yeah, I think I'll do that." I'll give them credit for gameply/stroy integration, except that's only a positive when the story that's being integrated isn't terrible. Still less bad than Sophie's personal, mind.)

I have an issue with it as well, all because of the randomness of resources, and the fact that it practically mandates the use of social features for it to be relevant. Speaking of, I could say the same of Arthur; the gameplay and story integration they were going for with his personal skill is neat, except it makes him a detriment to the team, so it's a negative.

[Alastor15243]

3 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Nosferatu is 4000 gold - in the context of early in the game, that's not peanuts. Knowing that, I think "Is that really worth it, or would I rather use that 4000 gold Nosferatu costs for something else, like staves and healing items... oh, I think I'll do that and only use Odin long enough to unlock his daughter's paralogue".

Look, just watch some of the damned videos. In high level play Odin is a monster.

[Jotari]

5 hours ago, lenticular said:

The impression I had about religion was that both countries basically revered dragons but one was the dawn dragon and the other was the dusk dragon. Basically different members of the same pantheon. Of course, I haven't paid all that much attention to the lore and can't remember where or why I have that impression, so I might be completely misremembering this, or it might be something that my brain entirely invented. And fair point well made with regards language.

Ultimately, Fates worldbuilding has holes big enough to drive a tank through. It's up to everyone individually to decide how to rationalise it to make it marginally less stupid. Whenever you try to make sense of one part, it just makes two other parts seem dumber. Sort of like a whack-a-mole of terrible writing. And I am going to stop thinking about it before my brain explodes.

Ah, yes, there is something about the Dawn and Dusk Dragons alright. But the thing about that is that it's less about culture and more because, well it's probably true that these two nations had some involvement of two dragons upon their founding. Saying they have a similar culture because they both worship dragons is a bit like saying ancient Greece and Japan have the same culture because they were both polytheistic. Culture would be how their worship of dragons manifests. Which is (much to Edelgard's chagrin) enshrining the people who have blood of the dragon and those statues you can place in your castle that are palette swaps of each other. Both are indeed similar, but one is quite practical and the other is incredible minor. In other words, I think saying they have a similar culture because they both worship dragons is an aspect of the game's world building that is so under developed, I don't think we can say with certain whether it's actually true or not.

[Punished Dayni]

12 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

...Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that the 3D backdrop being used for the scenes in Notre Sagesse, a place we never actually have a fight in, is actually just Conquest Chapter 10. The walkways overlooking water really seem to look identical.

Pretty sure that's correct.

I think that was also the case with Rev's.