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

[Alastor15243]

1 minute ago, Sunwoo said:

PoR would be the first part, of course, and part 1 of RD should be its own game.

While part 2 of RD is a bit disconnected from the rest of the story, it is still very well-written and does something that no other game really ever bothers to tackle. So I think that it should stay ... as a prologue/tutorial to the last part of the Tellius trilogy. Parts 3 and 4 can be expanded more to form the rest of the game proper. Also, the game should either give the player the choice to side with Ike or Micaiah solely throughout the part 3 chapters, or it should give Micaiah the same number of chapters as Ike so you play as them equally.

It'd have to do the latter even if it did the former. Especially if it did the former.

[Sunwoo]

8 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

It'd have to do the latter even if it did the former. Especially if it did the former.

Oh yeah, I'm not arguing that. Micaiah would need more chapters focused on her regardless of the option that they go with. But depending on whether we can choose to side with Micaiah or Ike exclusively, or we still play as both armies, it'll determine HOW many new chapters they'll need to make. Since if we're playing as only Ike's army, we'd need an Ike version of 3-13, and so on.

[Alastor15243]

4 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Oh yeah, I'm not arguing that. Micaiah would need more chapters focused on her regardless of the option that they go with. But depending on whether we can choose to side with Micaiah or Ike exclusively, or we still play as both armies, it'll determine HOW many new chapters they'll need to make. Since if we're playing as only Ike's army, we'd need an Ike version of 3-13, and so on.

Ohh. That makes sense.

Honestly, it feels like there would be a massive narrative value disparity in which side you play as, since Micaiah's side is the only one with a big secret the other one doesn't learn about until the end. And would any explanation during the equivalent of part 4 really satisfy the viewer if they didn't see their struggles firsthand? I kinda like the alternating sides way that Part 3 already works.

Edited August 7, 2020 by Alastor15243

[Sunwoo]

7 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Ohh. That makes sense.

Honestly, it feels like there would be a massive narrative value disparity in which side you play as, since Micaiah's side is the only one with a big secret the other one doesn't learn about until the end. And would any explanation during the equivalent of part 4 really satisfy the viewer if they didn't see their struggles firsthand? I kinda like the alternating sides way that Part 3 already works.

Yeah, I do think the way part 3 is written is all right, aside from giving Micaiah less attention than Ike. Even if IS seems to be obsessed with making us pick a path nowadays, doesn't mean it'll be the best way to remake RD.

[Icelerate]

13 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Yeah, I do think the way part 3 is written is all right, aside from giving Micaiah less attention than Ike. Even if IS seems to be obsessed with making us pick a path nowadays, doesn't mean it'll be the best way to remake RD.

I think in the maps where both DB and GM clash, you can be given the choice which army to support such as chapter 3-7, chapter 3-13 and chapter 3F without making many narrative changes. 

[Alastor15243]

2 minutes ago, Icelerate said:

I think in the maps where both DB and GM clash, you can be given the choice which army to support such as chapter 3-7, chapter 3-13 and chapter 3F without making many narrative changes. 

But that would raise questions about experience balancing. Does the side you don't pick get free exp so that it doesn't just become a question of whichever side you want to train?

[Icelerate]

Just now, Alastor15243 said:

But that would raise questions about experience balancing. Does the side you don't pick get free exp so that it doesn't just become a question of whichever side you want to train?

I think it would be cool if opposing units can gain EXP in battle despite the player not controlling them. It's not like the GM really need the EXP and the DB only lose chapter 3-13. 

[Jotari]

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

That's the issue: I'm not actually sure a genuinely strategically engaging version of this chapter could exist. Having a chapter with only two characters be interesting is already hard enough, but then they went and made it so that one of those two characters is flat-out invincible and instantly slaughters everything he fights, while the other is so weak that she can barely accomplish anything on their own. You basically only have, at best, one and a half meaningful decisions to make every turn. And the worst part is that Micaiah isn't even guaranteed to be able to do any fighting of her own, or even to survive a single hit, what with it not being a mandatory player action to train her. I don't think it would be the worst thing in the world if this were just a short, fun, dumb power trip though. Certainly better than being purely trial and error.

If Micaiah had a torch staff (and could use staves at base) it would probably do a lot to make her feel useful and have meaningful decisions for the player to make.

[Alastor15243]

3 minutes ago, Icelerate said:

I think it would be cool if opposing units can gain EXP in battle despite the player not controlling them. It's not like the GM really need the EXP and the DB only lose chapter 3-13. 

Of course, then it would be the question of how they keep you from just choosing the easier one.

  

Just now, Jotari said:

If Micaiah had a torch staff (and could use staves at base) it would probably do a lot to make her feel useful and have meaningful decisions for the player to make.

If Micaiah could use staves at base, she'd need a new branded witchcraft parlor trick to unwillingly impress the peasants with.

Edited August 7, 2020 by Alastor15243

[Icelerate]

1 minute ago, Jotari said:

If Micaiah had a torch staff (and could use staves at base) it would probably do a lot to make her feel useful and have meaningful decisions for the player to make.

I also think Micaiah should have brought torches. From a story perspective it makes her look more prepared/less stupid. Or allow her to use light tomes as torches. 

1 minute ago, Alastor15243 said:

Of course, then it would be the question of how they keep you from just choosing the easier one.

Some people like challenges and also for completion sake, people will eventually choose them all. 

[Jotari]

3 hours ago, Icelerate said:

A counter argument to part one being its own game would be that it would end up being less epic than PoR. Consider how in PoR you go from Crimea, to Galia, to the sea, to Begnion, to Daein and back to Crimea, the entire world is explored while in part one, only Daein gets explored. 

You can argue that Thracia is also this to Geneology but Thracia is also a lot less popular than Geneology. 

I was thinking you were going to go on about how idiotic Micaiah is and how it makes you angry because that's what a lot of people do but I actually agree with your thoughts. 

Jarod is a victim blamer which makes him easy to hate so he does a good job at being the villain towards the end of part one. 

Thracia's lower popularity than Genealogy comes partially from it being a game that hates the people who play it, but mostly from being a bloody SNES game that came out in September of 19Goddamn99. But anyway Thracia popularity aside, I would say if we had a full Part 1 it would give us ample oppertunity to visit Hatari first hand and find out its deal rather than it being left as this bizarre aside that exists just to retcon wolves into the setting.

7 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Of course, then it would be the question of how they keep you from just choosing the easier one.

  

If Micaiah could use staves at base, she'd need a new branded witchcraft parlor trick to unwillingly impress the peasants with.

Sacrifice isn't that great a skill anyway (aside from EXP grinding). I think the best thing for her miracle skill would have been passive healing. That would have worked for gameplay much better and a bit better for the plot. Because as pointed out, the way we're meant to understand how Sacrifice works, her healing a bunch of people messiah style doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. If it was passive healing though then people would feel better merely being in her presence which would really contribute to the cultish theme. Though that might be a bit too on the nose about her heron relation if she has literally the exact same skill as them. 

 

[Icelerate]

8 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Alright, so, now that it's safe, I check the dialogue for attempting to rescue her, and she just says “Don't fear for me, Sir Knight. I will fight beside you”, and I have to say, having her say that with that big-anime-eyed look on her face gave me Eirika flashbacks of screaming “You suicidal dumbfuck”.

 

Do you think this was forced writing for game-play convenience or do you think her wanting to fight beside him is justified from a character perspective? 

Considering she has no problems being rescued in the other chapters, the only plausible explanation is that Micaiah doesn't completely trust the BK at this point, but everything  else suggests she does from the get go. 

I do think Micaiah would rather fight than be rescued regardless so I'm not ready to say it is OoC for her to do that. 

A second explanation for why Micaiah doesn't let the BK rescue her is that it would mean there is no deployed unit who is not rescuing someone so it'd be too much of a burden to put on a single individual. 

Also, since you compared Micaiah to Eirika, do you think she is similar to her? 

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Sunwoo said:

PoR would be the first part, of course, and part 1 of RD should be its own game.

While part 2 of RD is a bit disconnected from the rest of the story, it is still very well-written and does something that no other game really ever bothers to tackle. So I think that it should stay ... as a prologue/tutorial to the last part of the Tellius trilogy. Parts 3 and 4 can be expanded more to form the rest of the game proper. Also, the game should either give the player the choice to side with Ike or Micaiah solely throughout the part 3 chapters, or it should give Micaiah the same number of chapters as Ike so you play as them equally.

As it is we do spend slightly more chapters with Micaiah in Radiant Dawn, and there's no reason at all that the Dawn Brigade should be under leveled. They just made the bizarre choice of not resetting the levels when we changed armies. Hence we get almost everyone in the game technically being a prepromote. If Ike and company started off at tier 1 then there would be no issue of comparative level scaling at all. But instead Ike's army starts off already even stronger than the Dawn Brigade is at the end of Part 1 and has way more chapters than them to grow from there. I guess the only justification is that narratively it makes sense, all these people fought in the previous war so they didn't want them tier 1 as if that never happened (even though that was perfectly fine in Mystery of the Emblem) and it does serve to show how desperate the Dawn Brigade when they start losing later, but hooray for narrative and all, but when it nerfs a large portion of the cast that much, I think things should be reconsidered.

[Alastor15243]

1 minute ago, Icelerate said:

Do you think this was forced writing for game-play convenience or do you think her wanting to fight beside him is justified from a character perspective? 

Considering she has no problems being rescued in the other chapters, the only plausible explanation is that Micaiah doesn't completely trust the BK at this point, but everything  else suggests she does from the get go. 

I do think Micaiah would rather fight than be rescued regardless so I'm not ready to say it is OoC for her to do that. 

A second explanation for why Micaiah doesn't let the BK rescue her is that it would mean there is no deployed unit who is not rescuing someone so it'd be too much of a burden to put on a single individual. 

Also, since you compared Micaiah to Eirika, do you think she is similar to her? 

It was pretty clearly done for gameplay reasons, since without Micaiah on the field it's impossible to lose. And yeah, I don't think it's in character. Well actually I guess that depends on what rescuing is literally supposed to be in-story. We know what happens mechanically, but what happens when a foot unit rescues another foot unit? Is he just slinging her over his back?

As for Micaiah vs Eirika, the similarities are mostly just visual. She's got that same sort of look on her face that just kind of puts a visual cherry on top of moments of stupidity. But those moments are considerably more rare with Micaiah, so I don't really consider that a problem.

Micaiah is guarded, but clearly expressive, albeit in a more subtle way than usual, and she also is more than acceptably proactive and involved in the story usually. That sad, this chapter as a whole is probably the closest to Eirikahood that she's ever gotten so far.

[Jotari]

45 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Of course, then it would be the question of how they keep you from just choosing the easier one.

  

If Micaiah could use staves at base, she'd need a new branded witchcraft parlor trick to unwillingly impress the peasants with.

Actually thinking on this (though I standby what I said on the matter of Sacrifice), we could have easily had a torch tome introduced in this game. Not only would it allow Micaiah to be more useful in this chapter (though maybe only this chapter, I don't think the Dawn Brigade face fog of war outside of this chapter), but it would also tie back into the blinding light attack she uses during her introduction at the start of the game.

19 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

It was pretty clearly done for gameplay reasons, since without Micaiah on the field it's impossible to lose. And yeah, I don't think it's in character. Well actually I guess that depends on what rescuing is literally supposed to be in-story. We know what happens mechanically, but what happens when a foot unit rescues another foot unit? Is he just slinging her over his back?

 

Funnily enough there actually is an answer to this since Ike does Rescue Leanne in the plot of Path of Radiance. Janaff literally says he's carrying her on his back. So yeah, Rescued units are getting a piggyback ride. I am now imaging Micaiah climbing up on the Black Knight's armour who's twice her size and clinging onto his helmet while he fights.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

3 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

PoR would be the first part, of course, and part 1 of RD should be its own game.

While part 2 of RD is a bit disconnected from the rest of the story, it is still very well-written and does something that no other game really ever bothers to tackle. So I think that it should stay ... as a prologue/tutorial to the last part of the Tellius trilogy. Parts 3 and 4 can be expanded more to form the rest of the game proper. Also, the game should either give the player the choice to side with Ike or Micaiah solely throughout the part 3 chapters, or it should give Micaiah the same number of chapters as Ike so you play as them equally.

So I've been a skeptic of the "Part I should be its own game" approach, but honestly? I could see this working. Say, if the Tellius games get remade in an "FF7" kinda way.

"Path of Radiance" is the same, but with some of the mechanics changed to make Tellius feel more unified.

Part I of RD gets expanded; in the new Prologue, Micaiah saves a young Sothe, before the Mad King's War. The new game also shows the Dawn Brigade forming, some of the "skirmishes" that were glossed over, and at least one "Tormod and the Gang" map. Most of your team, including Micaiah, should be tier-2 before game's end. Maybe let us kill Numida, too, if Jarod'd not enough of a final boss. Call it "Priestess of Dawn".

Parts II, III, and IV get folded into the new "Radiant Dawn" (possibly losing their "Part" designation, and just switching to chapter numbers). I would add an extra map for the Crimeans and the Dawn Brigade - plus a "Laguz Emancipation Army (feat. Rafiel and Nailah)" paralogue in each Part. Also, consider making Ranulf a Lord over some of the previously-Ike maps. Personally I'd not like to see "you choose which side you're on" happen - I love Part III for shifting between multiple affiliations. Part IV could use something of a rewrite, and a change to the map victory conditions - and the Tower should be designated either as "Part V" (or "VI", if PoR is the new "Part I"), or just the only "Endgame". Potentially with an extra floor that has us fight a Tellius version of the Deadlords - but that's a stretch wish.

Even if each is their own game, ideally you could do a "transfer" system from one to the next. If you miss one game, though, they could just come with their base stats and ranks. In the new version of III-6, for instance, everyone could start out promoted (i.e. Bishop Laura, General Meg), regardless of how much you used them, or even if you played "Priestess of Dawn".

Also, owning and beating all the games should unlock the Trial Maps. And not just the "Path of Radiance" ones, but also a new one where you get to use Altina, Soan, and Dheginsea, in their battle against Yune.

[Alastor15243]

2 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Also, owning and beating all the games should unlock the Trial Maps. And not just the "Path of Radiance" ones, but also a new one where you get to use Altina, Soan, and Dheginsea, in their battle against Yune.

Playable Altina would be a fucking dream come true. I am so pissed off that they added Altina to Heroes only after I washed my hands of it for good, and regardless, Heroes should not be the only opportunity we have to play as such a badass character.

[Icelerate]

How do you plan to play through Fates and Three Houses? That will take forever. 

3 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Playable Altina would be a fucking dream come true. I am so pissed off that they added Altina to Heroes only after I washed my hands of it for good, and regardless, Heroes should not be the only opportunity we have to play as such a badass character.

When did you stop playing Heroes and why?

[Alastor15243]

5 hours ago, Icelerate said:

How do you plan to play through Fates and Three Houses? That will take forever. 

When did you stop playing Heroes and why?

1: Fates will be all three games because they are three different games that will have wildly different scores in various fields, so I need to. And also want to. Three Houses will just be Blue Lions after I beat all the others on my own time (very very slowly). It seems to he unanimous that nobody wants to watch me play Three Houses four times.

2: Around the time 3H came out I think. Mostly because I utterly despise the Gacha model and I let it sink its claws into me way more than I should have when I wasn't actually enjoying myself. My constant playing was more of an obsession than actual fun.

Edited August 8, 2020 by Alastor15243

[Alastor15243]

Radiant Dawn Day 11: Chapter 1-E

Happy 8/8 everyone!

...What's so special about 8/8?

Why, the fact that exactly 1 year ago today, I made this thread! The anniversary of the day I announced my intention to undertake this play 'n' rank and first opened Dark Dragon! And the very next day, I beat Chapter 1 of the first Fire Emblem game ever!

Holy shit. Yeah, remember when I actually entertained the possibility that I'd be done by now?

It's been a whole fucking year, and if you count the Kaga spinoff games into the end goal, we're not even halfway there.

And there's no way in hell I would have been able to bring myself to get even this far if this had simply been me shouting into the void for 366 consecutive days. I owe my continued persistence with this to each and every one of you. Yes, all of you, whether you're a regular, whether you're that guy who posted that one time when that one topic you were interested in came up, or even if you're a 100% lurker whose name I just happened to see on the “viewing the thread” list at the bottom of the page a couple of times. You are all what keeps me going. What reminds me that people are actually reading this psychotically gargantuan wall of text, and that what I'm doing matters to people.

And to celebrate this momentous occasion (and also to make sure a story finale isn't anticlimactically happening on a fucking Monday), I've decided to do a bonus weekend update!

Let's finish Radiant Dawn Part 1!

So the narration tells us that Jarod has officially gone off the deep end, murdered the emissary we saw at the beginning of last chapter, and just started launching catapult barrages at the castle town from atop the summit. That is... a really cool mental image that I wish we got to see. Honestly, if Part 1 were a full game, this would need to be a map, actually storming the city like I mentioned previously, but now also with the catapult barrages raining down on us. Like, either Micaiah's farsight or some generic soldiers watching the skies could give warnings represented by highlighted spaces where the next shots will land, and you'd have to do the fight while avoiding standing on those spaces or else you take massive damage.

Shit, that sounds like the sort of thing Conquest would do, except Conquest would probably add some limited dragon veins to make temporary shields probably.

And now we get the chapter title: “Daein, Arise!”

Kickass title, really.

But yeah, it's... I dunno, I've kinda become disillusioned with this narrator. His voice is great and all, but his job seems to mostly be to tell us either shit we already know, or shit that would be infinitely more interesting to see firsthand. Like, I wanted to see that shit. Jarod losing it. Jarod killing the emissary. Jarod going full apeshit and rallying his army of soldiers with nothing left to lose.

A critical character moment for the ultimate enemy of this entire part... just happened completely offscreen.

This moment deserved a cutscene. Just picture it. Jarod looking down on the people of Nevassa with one foot perched on one of Nevassa's highest walls, a bunch of trebuchets and catapults behind him.

He makes his speech.

He rallies his army of cornered wolves.

And with a snap and a point of his fingers... the boulders fly.

And the people below scream in terror.

...But we don't get that, we get that same distant CG shot of Nevassa we got before, just this time with dust coming from it in key places and a bit of damage.

...Which suddenly makes me realize that Jarod and his men probably don't even care if they wind up compromising the structural integrity of Nevassa with them in it.

But yeah, we get a bunch of faceless Daein soldiers and some rather corny lines of them panicking about their families that... don't really feel worded quite right.

But then we get to the war tent and Micaiah is talking to Pelleas. She's planning on rushing off with her own allies yet again, and that's when Izuka points out the consequences of her actions she's been completely unaware of:

Izuka: You've already been far too impulsive, acting without the prince's consent. And do you think I do not see what has happened? Your name has been raised to lavish heights among the Daein people—your name, and yours alone! Why, even our own soldiers heap their praise on you like sugar on berries, sparing not a thought for their prince!

(Cue Micaiah having a flashback of Jarod talking shit about the prince and talking about how Micaiah is the one he really needs to kill to crush Daein's future, all over visuals of a hypothetical fight between Micaiah and Jarod that most likely did not happen on your playthrough)

Izuka: And then, even once their rightful king is crowned, the people will still await the approval of their precious Priestess of Dawn. Why, if we are not careful, some calculating wretches might decide they would rather see a priestess on the throne instead of a king! And once again, this country will be torn apart, all because of your glory-hounding disregard for our prince's command! Come to think of it... perhaps our “Priestess” here has been planning this all along! Pretending to help the prince... when in truth she seeks to wear the crown herself!

Yeah, this... this is a very interesting topic of discussion, one I'm still not sure what to think of.

For those who haven't religiously been keeping up with the non-update posts of the thread, here's the deal of why this is interesting:

This didn't happen with Elincia.

Elincia was still incredibly respected and admired by her people, beyond even Ike, despite Ike doing all of the proper work of liberating their country. And yet here, the opposite is the case. Micaiah is the one praised as the hero of the nation, while the prince who has been mostly staying on the sidelines and letting other people win his country back has become something of an un-respected joke among the people of Daein.

This... could be the result of bad writing disproportionately propping up Micaiah compared to Ike in defiance of previous convention, but... I'm not really sure. And I'm certainly not confident enough that that is the case to simply condemn it.

First off, there's a level of religious fanaticism at play in Micaiah's popularity that was not the case with Ike, which could definitely help explain the sheer difference in how these two protagonists are treated. As for the differing levels of respect the two rulers enjoy, though...

...As Icelerate has pointed out, it could simply be a cultural difference in how Daein and Crimea view and respect royalty. ...Plausible, but if it's going to become this much of a plot point, I'd honestly have liked it to be foreshadowed like, even a little? By showing how the Daein people feel about the concept of nobility in general and how much praise it inherently warrants?

And as I've mentioned before, a pet theory I have is that, whether in universe or out... it might have to do with Pelleas being a man. There's very little denying that we can have very different instinctual emotional responses to someone doing something depending entirely on the appearance of the person doing it, and that the appearance of a person doing something can make an uncomfortable amount of difference in whether we see certain qualities as sympathetic... or just plain pathetic. And I get the feeling the writers might have gotten a gut feeling that Pelleas had a lot more to prove than Elincia did when it came to earning audience sympathy and respect.

Let's look at Elincia. Elincia being passive and needing Ike to protect her and do all the hard work for her... is never really held against her, by characters or by the general narrative. She's seen as brave merely for emotionally enduring and surviving the journey everyone else fights for their lives to see her through, and her joining the field of battle is seen as an admirable move above and beyond what she needed to do to earn anyone's respect.

Contrast that with Pelleas. Pelleas's passivity and weakness are focal flaws of his character, flaws he suffers the consequences of constantly and spends his entire character arc working to overcome. An arc that ultimately ends with him demonstrating the courage to literally give his own life for the sake of his country, ordering his own execution in the mistaken belief that it will free his people from the consequences of his own spinelessness and naivete.

While Pellas's weakness is more significant than Elincia's (especially since there are definitely moments of Ike deferring to orders from Elincia, few and far between though said orders may be), the degree to which they are viewed differently by the narrative as a result is clearly disproportionate, and Pelleas is treated as someone in far greater need of earning our respect than the differences in their demeanor would indicate.

However, as interesting as this might be (as Sunwoo said, potentially exploring Pelleas's categorical failure to live up to the legendary impressiveness of his father), I've come to have some issues with this theory too, and a resulting new theory, and these issues mostly have to do with thinking more about what's going to happen in Part 2.

In Part 2, Elincia absolutely is seen as a weak ruler severely in need of proving herself, just like Pelleas is in Part 1. Her inability to unite her people in confidence of her ability to rule is what gives the villain of the arc his entire opening to form his plan. Not only that, but Ike's status has been significantly buffed, and he's clearly revered as a war hero among the people, if some lines I remember are any indication.

So now it almost feels to me like Elincia's treatment by the plot in PoR was viewed by the writers of this game as... basically a mistake. An overly-simplistic and optimistic outlook of how someone like Elincia would actually be received as ruler. An outlook they're trying to deconstruct the narrative consequences of, and show just how much farther Elincia has to go to prove herself a worthy ruler, and how that's a journey she barely even started to take in Path of Radiance.

That's potentially going to be interesting to examine, but I'll have to play Part 2 more to get a better idea of this, so I think I'm just gonna keep moving and play the damned chapter.

Pelleas resolves to start taking the initiative right now to earn his people's respect by actually taking charge, and...

...he makes a speech to his soldiers in iambic pentameter.

...Oh goodness.

I'm bracing myself.

But anyway, he starts his speech by announcing who he is, which causes one of the soldiers to say “Yes, we know who you are, milord! We ought to by now!”, followed by a quick outburst of laughter from the crowd, really demonstrating the lack of respect people really have for him in a way that I wish we got to see foreshadowed in anything other than Pelleas's behavior before now.

But then the Black Knight slams Alondite into the ground and instantly silences everyone and gets everyone's attention so Pelleas can speak. No doubt this would be impressive in-universe, but the sound is so hilariously tiny and unimpressive that it makes me laugh a bit.

Also, Micaiah calls the Black Knight “Sir Knight”, which I find strangely adorable despite the reality of what BK's “loyalty” to Daein really looks like.

Fun fact: Daein is now pronounced as two syllables in iambic pentameter, as opposed to the one syllable it was pronounced as in PoR, further supporting my theory that Daein was originally pronounced something like Dain.

But actually, Pelleas's iambic pentameter was pretty good! And the second he did flub his verse, he actually just went “fuck it” and started speaking normally!

This moment seems... kind of silly in the sense that it's acting like it's solved all of Pelleas's respect problems, even though it's one tiny gesture right before a battle he's not actually doing anything to lead, and when the rest of the game demonstrates he still has a lot of room to grow.

Anyway, we get two info conversations with Fiona and Volug. Fiona talks a bit about the speech Pelleas gave, but nothing noteworthy, and she gives us a second Thani tome, when our first one isn't even halfway gone yet.

...I'm noticing that the ratio of three star conversations to other star conversation types seems to be... much higher in this game so far compared to Path of Radiance. On one hand, it feels like this means I'm actually getting more shit out of these talks, but part of me suspects that's just because the game doesn't have as many “story” info conversations as PoR did.

Micaiah can apparently speak enough of the ancient tongue to perfectly understand Volug when he says he got something from the ruins of the desert and apparently went back there at some point to grab it for her, which... I don't know why they specifically clarified he went back. This thing we're getting better be damned useful to justify him deciding arbitrarily to go back there between battles.

...It's just a blue gem.

We got steel “blade” weapons, and the convention is holding. Steel greatlances are still 5 points more accurate than steel blades, not less, in addition to being stronger and cheaper.

...I apparently got my hands on another seraph robe somehow. I forget how.

Oh, it looks like Rafiel came with it.

I don't need to think twice about who's getting that. I'm doing an ironman. Micaiah needs all the HP she can get.

Jill is apparently very slightly screwed in every stat but luck and resistance, but is still above average in these stats due to her seraph robe and transfer bonuses.

This makes me finally decide to give her the dracoshield and energy drop, just to make sure she can do serious enemy phasing more effectively and sooner.

But with that, we're heading out.

I like this thing they do where they have Micaiah and Sothe charge out of the base, and very time they pass the two lines of people they're running between, they build on to the line of charging units. Nice effect for the limitations they're working with.

Honestly, as much of an issue as I have with the game not properly explaining why Jarod's situation is so hopeless and how he can't bring Numida down...

...If you get past that and accept that his situation is hopeless...

...Christ. This fucking speech. Man.

Jarod: Listen up, all of you. This is our last chance to die as we've lived. As proud soldiers of the empire. If we survive this fight, imprisonment and a hushed-up execution awaits us. If we run from this fight, dishonor and pursuit will dog our miserable days. So I say, let's give those Daein curs a fight to remember, and let the glory of our deaths light the way! We've lived as proud soldiers of the empire! Let us die as proud soldiers of the empire!! Now GO!

Yeah, this is a fascinating situation for Jarod to be put in, and it makes a really cool enemy motivation, even if, as has been said before in this thread by others, it doesn't really have a good “final boss” feel to it. That said... if they did more to milk his complete and total breakdown and showed more of his actions in this chapter... I think they could sell it if this were expanded out to a whole game.

But yeah, now we get the endgame preparation theme! The theme we get whenever we're preparing for the final battle of a part! And I love the ominous deep choir that shows up in it.

I'm gonna try to get up to the top of the map as quickly as possible so I can get the treasures, but I also want to make sure to use my actual long-term units as much as possible too, so it's a tricky balance. But I'm gonna try and hedge my bets at least and have Nailah rush up these steps with the help of the Black Knight so she's at least positioned to rush in and take out everyone but the 1-2 range enemies if I need to in order to take out the thieves.

...Failing to double a soldier made me realize that Nolan is apparently 2 points behind in both strength and speed.

...Also, biorhythms can be ridiculous. Zihark has a 50% hit rate with a steel sword on this soldier, and a 30% hit rate with a wind edge. Zihark has 24 skill. Enemy evasion rates in this game can be ridiculously high.

But despite my absolutely terrible starting lineup of biorhythms, I managed to make sufficiently good time in rushing the eastern stairs that I managed to kill at least on of the thieves the turn they spawned.

And the BK managed to take out the second one from climbing up the ledges, without needing to get too involved in the battle at the top of these “steps”.

After that... honestly, things are pretty calm. I like the design and setup of this map, though not knowing how the enemy AI is gonna behave when the ledges make me in range of them way before I'm likely to fight them... makes me as uneasy as it has before.

A killing edge myrmidon attacks Aran, and does two consecutive 0 damage criticals. That is hilarious.

I found a fun trick for using Rafiel to do the sacrifice-heal chain two times in a turn. Move a wounded unit, then have Micaiah and Laura form a 3 square line with the wounded unit with their sacrifice and heal actions. Then have somebody go to a free side of Micaiah and shove her. Presto, you've got a perfect empty space for Rafiel to refresh all four of these units from!

So we get a talk with BK and Micaiah where BK reacts to Micaiah's determination to fight on the front lines by saying “You...are much...like her.”

It took me a second to realize he was talking about Sanaki.

At any rate, I'm making good time, and I'm hoping to make even better time by having Nailah assassinate the meteor mage. Most of the enemies up there are 1-2 range, so it's a great way to get them moving and scatter them for individual defeat without risking just killing them all with an overpowered unit.

Also, the game decided it wanted to be a total dick... and put in Three-Houses style proximity-based player-phase reinforcements the second Nailah reached the final tier. Damn it.

Also, I fucked up slightly. I forgot that Nailah doesn't have enough breathing room here to make it past these enemies if they surround her even at 2 range, so I have to kill this enemy now if I want to take out the meteor mage.

...And I miscalculated how many move points it takes to climb up a ledge, meaning that my gambit to take out the meteor mage early has left Jill hopelessly exposed.

If I lose her, I basically lose the ironman. I can't afford to lose that much of my viable fighting force once basically every single new unit I've gotten since Chapter 6 leaves my army in Part 3. So I did something desperate and stupid.

I rushed Sothe in to plug up the square the reinforcement steel blade general could have attacked Jill from, had Micaiah bait in one of the archers, and had Aran break down the front door. Sothe is holding a knife, which mans he can counter at 1-2 range, which I'm hoping is going to help to make him a less viable target in the enemies' eyes compared to Jill (who is now safe and can't die), Micaiah (main character and fragile as tissue paper) and Aran (who's pretty much invincible when he isn't near mages).

Here's hoping it works. Because if it doesn't, the ironman is over.

THANK GOODNESS, Sothe dodged the steel blade knight. I think that means we're clear, but who knows what could happen...

...We're good. Turns out the archer didn't go for Micaiah... he went for Volug, apparently because the archer could do more raw damage to him. Jill survives with 13 HP to spare.

That was a heart attack and a half. Thank goodness the enemy AI is open to some abuse.

Ooh! Thank goodness! Resolve still activates at 50% HP! I forgot that was a typo that they say 20% now!

Unfortunately, despite making good time, things slow to a crawl at the end. I'm on turn 14 and I've still got 3 treasures to get because I was an idiot and sent all the chest keys to convoy thinking I wouldn't need them and that I should save them.

I don't think the Dawn Brigade even has any more indoor maps.

Oh well. It's gonna be ages until anyone who needs bonus experience is actually in a position to use it again, so taking too long isn't the worst thing in the world.

...Those last three chests were the lamest of all. A coin, a parity scroll, and a vantage scroll. Damn it. All of that panic to secure those chests quickly, and it was for that?

Well at least nobody died.

At any rate, I wound up killing Jarod with Nolan, but everyone else has some really fun conversations with him. He really cements himself as a sack of shit with some entertainingly evil lines.

...And I just realized I did all of those sacrifice-heal shenanigans... when Micaiah's capped at 20 and there was literally no point.

And then, something else just occurred to me...

...So, this is treated as Daein reclaiming their capital and getting their sovereignty back, but... like, they're still occupied, right? Sanaki's mission wasn't specifically to end the occupation, it was to investigate the abuses her officials were accused of committing against a country that she felt should be occupied in the first place. There was no scene where she just outright stated that Begnion occupying Daein is no longer needed, or that it was a mistake to begin with, or anything to indicate that she's simply going to have her country's troops withdraw entirely. Are they going to explain this?

In the meantime... Micaiah gets her promotion, in-universe and out, and... gains +1s across the board except for +2 HP, +3 strength, and +3 defense. Yaaaaaay. At least she gets proper staves now, thereby rendering her cute little blood magic parlor trick irrelevant both in story and out forever, except maybe if she needs to heal and restore someone at once.

And now she gets her new, nicer outfit on her waist-up portrait too, just like Ike did. I kinda miss this brief period where they did this for lords. I get that doing it after class changing became a thing would be weird, but it was still nice to see.

Okay, so, looks like I was mistaken about Jill not having an idle animation when not mounted. She moves a tiny bit, it just wasn't visible from the angle I saw her at. You can really see it if you look at her ponytail.

So, there's this big official-looking coronation ceremony... which basically seems to be implying... that Pelleas is officially king now... and Sanaki just allowed that to happen. So... no. Doesn't look like we're getting any clarification of the nature of Sanaki's intervention in Begnion.

Anyway, Tormod, Muarim and Vika bail because now that the war's over, Daein's starting to give dirty looks to their laguz allies again, which is... kind of fucked up.

Okay, now Micaiah reveals to the audience through a conversation with Muarim that she's a branded, and... yeah, now I know I wan't imagining things. I'm suddenly reminded of a conversation I know took place where someone, I think Stefan, talks about how much easier it is to hide in Beorc society than Laguz. I'll have to be on the lookout for that, and also make sure to recruit Stefan, as much as I have soured on the man after seeing his supports.

And now Nailah and company confirm that they never went to Gallia in all of this time, and now they're going with Tormod and friends to Gallia instead, since Micaiah and company have become sort of tied down.

But Volug's sticking with us. Hopefully I'll be able to make him useful again by letting him do full transformations now that halfshifting isn't mandatory for him, but I can't be sure.

And then we get a funny moment where Sothe gets annoyed at the number of animal companions Micaiah has, as if Yune wasn't enough, and then Yune flies out and starts circling Sothe's head and pecking him.

Alright, we just got the end of Part 1. And...

...There's no ending scene, it's just a “next time on Radiant Dawn” scene for Part 2. No sum-up narration, no miniature “where are they now” scene like in Lyn Mode... nothing.

So we're just left to assume, with no actual scene to base it on, that Sanaki saw what Begnion did with Daein and threw her hands up and gave it back to the people. That's... believable and all, but the fact that we literally do not see it, and yet everyone has been acting the whole time like that would be the inevitable, nay, the only conceivable result of Sanaki arriving... is so goddamned weird to me.

But that's the end of Part 1! It was... okay. A fun concept, marred by extremely rushed execution, trying to do way too much in way too little time. And I won't deny that the execution and the extremely rushed pacing... did a pretty hefty job at taking me out of the experience. I felt kinda disconnected from it at times.

The gameplay though, was pretty good! I wouldn't say it's gotten quite to the level of Binding Blade yet, and the fact that so few of the units I've been given are actually available for keeps (something I think is a major mark against this game's ironmannability) makes gameplay kind of feel like perpetual training rather than a proper fight, but hey, I'm definitely more awake playing this than I was playing PoR!

Which means that on Monday... we start with Part 2, and Elincia's story.

Stay safe, everyone!

[Shadow Mir]

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

In Part 2, Elincia absolutely is seen as a weak ruler severely in need of proving herself, just like Pelleas is in Part 1. Her inability to unite her people in confidence of her ability to rule is what gives the villain of the arc his entire opening to form his plan. Not only that, but Ike's status has been significantly buffed, and he's clearly revered as a war hero among the people, if some lines I remember are any indication.

So now it almost feels to me like Elincia's treatment by the plot in PoR was viewed by the writers of this game as... basically a mistake. An overly-simplistic and optimistic outlook of how someone like Elincia would actually be received as ruler. An outlook they're trying to deconstruct the narrative consequences of, and show just how much farther Elincia has to go to prove herself a worthy ruler, and how that's a journey she barely even started to take in Path of Radiance.

To be fair, Crimea's win in Path of Radiance pretty much went like a fairy tale. Part 2 is throwing the cold water that is reality on the events of Path of Radiance, as a Let's Play of RD puts it.

[Sunwoo]

3 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

In Part 2, Elincia absolutely is seen as a weak ruler severely in need of proving herself, just like Pelleas is in Part 1. Her inability to unite her people in confidence of her ability to rule is what gives the villain of the arc his entire opening to form his plan. Not only that, but Ike's status has been significantly buffed, and he's clearly revered as a war hero among the people, if some lines I remember are any indication.

So now it almost feels to me like Elincia's treatment by the plot in PoR was viewed by the writers of this game as... basically a mistake. An overly-simplistic and optimistic outlook of how someone like Elincia would actually be received as ruler. An outlook they're trying to deconstruct the narrative consequences of, and show just how much farther Elincia has to go to prove herself a worthy ruler, and how that's a journey she barely even started to take in Path of Radiance.

That's potentially going to be interesting to examine, but I'll have to play Part 2 more to get a better idea of this, so I think I'm just gonna keep moving and play the damned chapter.

That's an interesting way of thinking it, and I suppose it is possible that the writers regretted how the townspeople were happy to see Elincia. Although my interpretation of it was a bit different.

In PoR, Crimea as a country stands united against a common foe, in a war that's completely justified on their side because Daein was 100% the aggressors. And when the people learned that their king had a secret daughter who was coming to reclaim her throne, they probably were just happy to have someone (or something) concrete to rally around. And as cool as Ike is, the Greil Mercenaries seem like they weren't SUPER famous around Crimea, just known to the locals, so it's possible that the princess was more interesting than a random mercenary group.

In RD, Elincia is now a leader and ... well, you know how quickly people forget once they get back to "normal". While Elincia was a weak leader in the beginning of her part, I feel like high-up nobles like senators will always grumble about their rulers for one reason or another (justified or not), and the more devious ones will want to put themselves on the throne if they think the ruler in charge is weak enough to be deposed. And if you know well about a certain country's current politics you know how corrupt senators or otherwise powerful and influential people can sway the common people against their own interests and make them believe parties that are not fully in control of things are fully at fault nonetheless. It is actually kind of scary how accurate that is.

And in regards to Ike being regarded as a war hero and stuff ... well, it's possible that he was always respected after he helped Elincia regain Crimea, but because he left the nobility and hasn't been seen in years his status just sort of ... froze. Like, it's easy to blame things on the queen who is in charge and you know she's in charge, but as long as there is no external warfare the hero Ike who helped the queen take back Crimea but isn't present in politics or court can remain unsullied because he's not a political figure who's responsible for stuff going on internally. I interpreted it less as a message on Ike and Elincia, but more on the "sheep-ness" of the common folk.

[Alastor15243]

34 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

That's an interesting way of thinking it, and I suppose it is possible that the writers regretted how the townspeople were happy to see Elincia. Although my interpretation of it was a bit different.

In PoR, Crimea as a country stands united against a common foe, in a war that's completely justified on their side because Daein was 100% the aggressors. And when the people learned that their king had a secret daughter who was coming to reclaim her throne, they probably were just happy to have someone (or something) concrete to rally around. And as cool as Ike is, the Greil Mercenaries seem like they weren't SUPER famous around Crimea, just known to the locals, so it's possible that the princess was more interesting than a random mercenary group.

In RD, Elincia is now a leader and ... well, you know how quickly people forget once they get back to "normal". While Elincia was a weak leader in the beginning of her part, I feel like high-up nobles like senators will always grumble about their rulers for one reason or another (justified or not), and the more devious ones will want to put themselves on the throne if they think the ruler in charge is weak enough to be deposed. And if you know well about a certain country's current politics you know how corrupt senators or otherwise powerful and influential people can sway the common people against their own interests and make them believe parties that are not fully in control of things are fully at fault nonetheless. It is actually kind of scary how accurate that is.

And in regards to Ike being regarded as a war hero and stuff ... well, it's possible that he was always respected after he helped Elincia regain Crimea, but because he left the nobility and hasn't been seen in years his status just sort of ... froze. Like, it's easy to blame things on the queen who is in charge and you know she's in charge, but as long as there is no external warfare the hero Ike who helped the queen take back Crimea but isn't present in politics or court can remain unsullied because he's not a political figure who's responsible for stuff going on internally. I interpreted it less as a message on Ike and Elincia, but more on the "sheep-ness" of the common folk.

I'm interested to see how I wind up interpreting it when I actually start playing it on Monday. The play 'n' rank style seems to change my perception of basically every story in this series.

[Jotari]

So on the subject of Pelleas Vs Micaiah I'd like to say this is another thing that is losing out from the rushed execution. In that I feel it might be more Micaiah Vs Ike. The prologue is not the start of Micaiah's story. She's already a renowned and established rebel when the story begins with messianic whisperings surrounding her. While Ike came out of nowhere and was only ever this guy who was really good at fighting, not silver haired Jesus. As beloved as Ike is universe he does not have anything resembling a cult following. Elincia might well have been seen similar to Pelleas if Micaiah had been at her side.

[Icelerate]

9 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

And there's no way in hell I would have been able to bring myself to get even this far if this had simply been me shouting into the void for 366 consecutive days. I owe my continued persistence with this to each and every one of you. Yes, all of you, whether you're a regular, whether you're that guy who posted that one time when that one topic you were interested in came up, or even if you're a 100% lurker whose name I just happened to see on the “viewing the thread” list at the bottom of the page a couple of times. You are all what keeps me going. What reminds me that people are actually reading this psychotically gargantuan wall of text, and that what I'm doing matters to people.

Does this mean you thank me for giving you a hard time?