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

[Interdimensional Observer]

28 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

The implications that Walhart 

Thats localization? Then I declare it good localization! Naysayers saying it neither is in the letter of the Japanese nor the spirit be darned!

 

24 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

But that’s why I think it’s good writing actually. It’s so absurd and so in character for him that it’s kind of funny.

True!😄

The reason I hesitate to embrace it because a simple question.- What if other people started following Walhart's explanation?

Even operating under the rule "only the strong/resolutely insistent can do it", I'm afraid of the consequences. Life would cease to be life as we understand it, death would be upturned. All the land would begin sinking into the sea, fire would devour the Mila Tree and every other evergreen, Morgan-turned Grima Jr. would float in the sky above, breathing an end to all existence. I cannot bear the thought!😱

-I'm being melodramatic here, but also to some degree serious.

As villains are oft to have strong wills, could time cease to feel so linear? If villains could force their own return, no ritual, no nothing, they would be active again and again. Though on the bright side, heroes have strong wills too, they could return over and over as well. Sure we already have this to an extent, Zelda of course as mentioned above, and some FE villains return one day or say they will. But what I'm thinking of, is where a villain's return from great defeat is not special anymore, their resurrection is ordinary, expected. If they were gone for good, that'd be the real surprise. What about what the heroes do then? Would their duty be so extraordinary, when the villains become so ordinary? Would heroes of tire of being heroes, would villains of villainy? Would life unceasing be ennui for both? Of course, then they could choose to go forever, but what if old habits died very very very hard?🤔

Edited January 6, 2021 by Interdimensional Observer

[Emperor Hardin]

1 minute ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Thats localization? Then I declare it good localization! Naysayers saying it neither is in the letter of the Japanese nor the spirit be darned!

It makes it a little more tolerable, but I'm not giving the Awakening writers any credit for it as they didn't write it.

Another spotpass localization change, 

Spoiler

Validar kidnapping Aversa for her magical talent/dark blessing is another localization change. In the Japanese version, there's no mention or even implication of Aversa having any magical talent as an ordinary villager and Validar just seemingly did it for no apparent reason.

 

[Alastor15243]

Awakening Day 18: Paralogue 18

Alright, let's do this I guess. People seem to want me to do Gangrel and Walhart, with fewer but still noticeable votes for Emmeryn and Aversa.

...Paralogue 18. Man, honestly, it's weird to think how many side-chapters modern Fire Emblem games have. Like, this game had the map-and-story budget to make a game twice as long as the average Fire Emblem campaign, and yet the main story still feels so rushed. Kinda makes me feel like the child paralogue system is a bit of a waste, and that those paralogues should've been devoted to a Bad Future story. Two main stories, rather than one main story and an entire main story worth of pointless sidequests. Though the game would've had to be modified drastically to allow more of the future children to be playable without grinding. Or just get rid of all the avatarsexuals and replace them with fixed units in the bad future. Shame that'd mean we'd lose Anna though.

Fuck it, I'm just wasting time shooting the shit. Time to recruit Gangrel.

...Frankly, seeing Gangrel still in his ridiculously gaudy king getup makes this even more ridiculous. He's been living as a nameless bandit for more than two years, and this is supposed to be a scene showing how far he's fallen, and yet he's still in his royal outfit and still has his crown on his head. It's utterly ridiculous. Same goes for Emmeryn. But we'll get to that later.

Basically, you have to talk to Gangrel 3 times to recruit him, if you somehow want to.

And I feel I'm kind of obligated to, even though I won't use him.

Speaking of... I've been thinking about it, and I might, might be able to recruit Walhart. It'd be dumb and cheesy, but I have a plan. But I won't spoil the surprise by talking about it now.

Let's just get through this, soloing it with the Alexandria family, and then talk to Gangrel.

Yeah, here at the end of the game, the enemies are finally strong enough that I have to be careful where I end my turn. Especially now that there are no forts in convenient range. But I'm managing.

Of course all I have to do is turn someone into a sorcerer and these issues end again forever.

Oh man. I just got an event tile pickup I wish I got way earlier. Aversa's Night. It's a powered up version of Nosferatu with way more might. Unfortunately it's super rare and only has 10 uses, but with armsthrift that isn't much of a problem.

Man, I wish Laurent's paralogue weren't such a pain with its ambush reinforcements.

...Of course I can always reclass Morgan to sorcerer...

...Anyway, we've poked the bear in the central mountain pass, and now the whole map is rushing us at once. My strategy here is to use melee weapons so that Gangrel attacks at range (hopefully) but we can still enemy-phase most of these guys piece by piece without having to risk death every single turn by jumping straight into the eye of the storm.

...Yep, that seems to be working. For a second I was worried Gangrel's AI might just be outright suicidal and intentionally attack in a range where he can be killed.

Okay, I managed it. Time to talk to him. But I better unequip Alexandria, just in case he doesn't feel like he's in a mood to reposition to attack at 2-range once we get close.

…

I don't know if it's just because unequipping meant it wouldn't matter, but yes, he did attack in melee. Of course I can't check if that was the reason without risking getting him killed, but... well, fun fact about the enemy AI: whenever you're facing an enemy with a 1-2 range weapon and counter, and you have a 1-2 range weapon yourself, they will always attack at 2 range whenever possible, even though melee would be better for using counter. So any mages with counter can be safely ignored on Lunatic+.

Yeah, hearing Gangrel say he scrubs chamber pots for brigands is just so ridiculous when he still has that outfit on.

OH SHIT.

I FORGOT ABOUT THIS BURN.

Gangrel: I scrub chamber pots for brigands. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Chrom: Ironic that you, of all people, are finally learning about long falls.

Ugh. And now they're talking about how the fact that Gangrel is even still alive is character development for Chrom, and... shut up, game. Just shut up.

I've stopped keeping score, but just for the record, we're well past 10 times the game has spoken of Emmeryn as some kind of saint, and... yeah, ignoring that one time I really stretched towards the beginning and what the bad guys say, nobody has said anything about how Emmeryn was even remotely flawed after her death.

Chrom says he has “no time for vendetta”, but... yeah, no. This is dumb. This isn't about grudges. True, “I want to save the galaxy because I'm one of the idiots who lives in it” logic applies here when the world is about to be destroyed, but... there are shitty things he can do that wouldn't endanger the mission. Like, he'd probably be a net loss in terms of how much you'd need to keep an eye on him, even assuming all that remains is the voyage from what used to be Grust to where Grima lies waiting.

...But anyway, I do like this third and final talk where Chrom calls him pathetic and tells him that if he's so eager to die, he should die fighting Grima, not him.

But yeah, with that, the chapter's over, and we can move on to Walhart. No need to discuss this chapter further, because there isn't even a dialogue change for when you recruit Gangrel.

 

Day 18 Bonus: Paralogue 19

Alright. So let's see if my plan works. I won't say what it is until I put it into action just to make things more fun, but I will make sure it'll work.

...Oh yeah.

...Ohhhhhhh yeah.

It'll work.

Now, we'll need to be careful here. I need to bring my staffbots for this strategy to work. Also, on a seemingly-unrelated tangent, I have decided that Lucina no longer needs veteran. Hmmm. Curious.

But with my staff-bots here, I have to be proactive in taking these enemies out. But I also have to be careful about where I place my units, because these enemies are strong.

But my biggest concern is that more risen might rise from those graves. I have a vague memory of that happening, and if it does, well... there are no forts to hunker down on, so I just have to keep my distance until it stops.

Alright, I've tonic'd up, and... surprisingly Gangrel's really useful. Being an endgame trickster prepromote means he's a high-mov staff bot with a great magic stat (better than Lissa's, actually, if just barely), so that gives him lots of options for a unit who can barely fight.

...Alright, let's do this.

So, before the fight, I forged Alexandria a new weapon. A +5 might, +15 hit Celica's Gale called Windy Gir (if it had been “Asbel's Gale” for something I'd have called it “Windy Boi”, so I tried to misspell it in a similarly meme-y way). It's really helping her secure kills here. But her offense isn't the problem, really, it's her defense. These guys just do so much damage and have so many accuracy bonuses by this point, between broken forges and skills. I'm gonna have to be smart about how she uses her galeforce.

Morgan and Lucina I'm not nearly as worried about. The Book of Naga is insanely useful for Morgan's survivability, especially with his capped defense and high resistance.

...Yep, just as I feared, reinforcements started showing up. Good thing I didn't rush in.

Problem: the reinforcements show no sign of stopping, but Walhart keeps charging closer. I'll need to put my plan into action next turn and then rescue Chrom out of the way so we can rout the rest. I'm hoping the Risen stop... rising... when Walhart's taken out.

...Alright.

Here goes.

Here's my strategy.

So, remember when I said I had Lucina drop veteran?

I replaced it...

...with rally spectrum.

I have her rally her parents up, and Lissa rallies them too with her rally magic she thankfully got at some point in her time as a staffbot. That's +8 magic, giving Alexandria enough magic power to do 26 damage per hit to Walhart... with Windy Gir.

Chrom goes up front. Equips Blue Death.

He has a 90% dual strike rate. Alexandria has a 100% hit rate. From the back row. I checked before pairing up. That means Alexandria's going to, dual strike procs permitting, attack for 26 damage four times, and one-round Walhart.

And Walhart can't even double Chrom thanks to rally spectrum and pair-up bonuses. The only way he can kill Chrom and end this ironman is if he gets a 50% hit and procs Luna at a 50% chance. So a 25% chance after dual strike failure.

Hopefully this will succeed, and then I'll rescue him away so he doesn't die to the enemies behind Walhart.

Walhart claims his heart doesn't beat anymore, but then Gangrel said he was dead too, so I'm guessing this is just metaphor, even though he's surrounded by Risen. Otherwise Walhart!Morgan is, like, a ghoul or something.

...Yep, he says “Defeat is death, and I must rise again!”, so that's why he said his heart wasn't beating. It was a metaphor. He considers himself dead for having been defeated.

...Mission accomplished. Walhart's down, technically at Chrom's hand.

...Unfortunately, I miscounted the number of rescue users I had, and now Libra can't be rescued out along with Chrom and Lissa. Oh well. He served his purpose and he's my worst staffbot at this point anyway. Aside from Maribelle I guess.

...Right, well, that ending dialogue had nothing beyond corn to offer. But we have Walhart now I guess. Sadly not with the ridiculously high stats he had when we fought him, but... like with Gangrel, I think we can find a use for him.

Now then...

 

Day 18 Bonus Bonus: Paralogue 20

...Emmeryn's paralogue.

…

…

...Before we start with this chapter... I'd just like to give this chapter some credit:

I love the name. “A Hard Miracle”. It's absolutely perfect for describing the premise of this chapter. Not to say that this chapter's premise was a good idea, but assuming we lived in a universe where it was, this would have basically the perfect chapter name.

…

Okay. So. It starts off with Frederick talking to a local about Grimleal activity, because they've apparently been kidnapping women in the area to use in sacrificial rites. Why? What's this for? Is this a new thing they're doing directly for Grima, or is this something Validar was having them do and they didn't get the memo that he's dead?

But anyway...

...Apparently “one of them” escaped.

And it's Emmeryn.

Still alive, but with horrible brain damage.

...Is that how they're explaining Emmeryn's survival? After her fall, she was found by Grimleal, discovered to still be alive, and then she was taken here and then she escaped? Why would they take her with them to this island village on a trip to kidnap other young women?

So, they're really unclear about why she's like this. I kinda assumed it was due to brain damage, but the way the villager talks about it makes it sound like he thinks her mind was shattered by the horrors she saw while captured. But whatever the case...

...Emmeryn is still alive.

...Now. Normally the fact that she's still suffered a horrible fate that makes her barely even the same person anymore would help matters, as it keeps the tragedy of earlier in the game from losing all meaning.

However...

Um...

...They describe her as having the mental capacity of a child.

And you can still romance her.

So not only does this game allow you to marry your best friend's worst enemy, a horrible murderer...

...not only does this game allow you to condemn a man to forced marriage to a perpetual twelve-year-old under threat of cannibalism...

...but this game allows you to romance, and have sex with, your best friend's mentally regressed, mentally impaired sister who can't even speak in complete sentences.

I... just... just one question.

Why?

What purpose does this serve? Does this enhance the story in any way? Does it make anyone happy? Does it satisfy the people who liked Emmeryn and wanted to romance her? What the fuck is the point of bringing this character back like this!?

Why did the writers feel the need to try to kill their cake and fuck it too!?

...Let's just rescue her, make our way to the boss, and get the hell out of here. I'm done. I'm just... no. No. Fuck this. They should've brought Phila back instead.

So I rescued her and found out you can talk to her with Chrom, but it doesn't recruit her. Looks like you have to keep her alive and beat the map with her as a green unit. Should be easy with rescue staves, since she doesn't have any weapons so I don't even have to worry about her fighting. I just have to rush around this mountain and take out the boss.

Mission accomplished.

And now suddenly Chrom's talking about Emmeryn like she's happier with her memory gone, now that she doesn't remember all the pain she's gone through in her life, and that it's entirely selfish for her loved ones to want her to get her memory back, and like... what? What kind of patronizing shit is this!?

Fuck this, not even responding.

Let's keep moving. I have more time than expected today.

 

Day 18 Bonus Bonus Bonus: Paralogue 22

Alright, let's do this. I know you can really, really easily cheese this by having units second seal back to tier 1, get to level 10, and then promote right after the start of the battle, but... I don't have time to do that, so let's do this normally. Or at least my version of “normally”.

So we show up in these ruins with a magical water pool whose reflection reveals your “true self”, and Aversa acts like she's the dang guardian of the place, spouting vague nonsense while telling the party to go deeper if they want answers, when in reality she's here to use the spring herself.

Yeah, so, we quickly get into battle, and for those of you who don't know, the gimmick of this battle is that you fight an exact clone of your army. The only difference is that it's AI controlled and thus can't take advantage of things like pair-up... and is also stupid. The thing is, it copies your army at the start of the map. So, like I insinuated earlier, if you have your units start out in tier 1 classes, the enemy will be stuck at tier 1 caps, and you can then promote and wipe the floor with them. I don't have that option, but I still have tricks to give myself the edge.

I'm going to deploy my main two combat pairs and also my staff bots, replacing the fallen Libra with Emmeryn. I'm gonna tonic my main pairs up just in case that isn't copied.

…

...I seem to have forgotten a particular gimmick of this map.

If you low-man it...

...It repeats the units you deployed so that it has a full army.

...And they have better stats as long as they aren't capped.

Well, thank goodness my main combat units were capped to begin with, and thank goodness they don't copy my tonics or my inventory.

...No, they do copy my tonics. Just not my inventory.

...Well fuck. Okay, this is going to require brave weapon and rescue abuse up the ass.

And I'm glad I brought some weak filler.

These guys are way too dangerous to be fought in any significant number on enemy-phase, but brave weapons rip them to shreds even with comparable stats to mine. So I just need to player-phase the shit out of the dangerous ones and rescue them to safety.

Okay, I managed to take out the first of the two Lucinas. That should make it harder for them to rally.

...Okay, wow, this was really scary. I thought I was going to fail the whole ironman because I misremembered the mechanics of this one map. I think this is the hardest I've had to think about this game in this entire run. But thanks to tons of brave weapon galeforcing and rescue staves... basically fundamental Apotheosis tactics... I managed to take everyone out before anything truly dangerous happened. And now... time to see the end of the chapter.

...Yeah, this just another Eremiah situation, except this time she survives. Basically... picture Nino, except Nergal was the one who killed her family personally, and then afterwards brainwashed her and raised her to become Sonia. That's Aversa's revealed backstory with Validar. She's turned completely into a blameless victim, and everything bad she did is now exclusively Validar's fault. She still feels like she needs to atone, but she's welcomed into Chrom's army with open arms. No bad blood.

Of course, her personality hasn't changed at all, so that everyone who wants to ship themselves with her can still ship themselves with her. It's just she's no longer doing evil things while being a vain, arrogant femme fatale. Which begs the question of why realizing she's been manipulated all of this time suddenly causes her to feel guilt for all of the horrible things she's done, when the personality that wasn't created by dark magic, just bad upbringing under false pretenses, is still there.

Yeah. My opinion on this hasn't changed. It's ridiculously patronizing and dumb that so many of this series' writers seem almost allergic to the idea of a female villain who is actually accountable for her actions. What few ones we get are so often brainwashed or created by bigger, eviler male villains. Pheros is technically a notable exception, and the narrative still shits on her by making her by far the least narratively important member of Walhart's inner circle.

This just makes Aversa less interesting. And she was barely interesting before.

...Fuck it, I've got time before it's time to order dinner. What else can I do before wrapping up and proofreading?

 

Day 18 Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus: Paralogue 21

Well whaddya know? For only the second time ever, and the first time since Mystery of the Emblem, you get a Bonus Bonus Bonus Bonus!

So apparently Chon'sin... is where Ram Village used to be. Either that or they just happen to have a tomb where the thief shrine used to be, far, far away from where they actually live.

The fuck happened in the last 2000 years?

Say'ri says the tomb is to honor “the warriors who built Chon'sin up from the earth”. Warriors built Chon'sin up from the earth. Are they implying that they used to live somewhere else and invaded Ram Village, or what used to be Ram Village, to steal it from the natives and claim it as their own?

...And I didn't even need to read between the lines there. One text box later and Say'ri is even more blunt:

“But not with stone or mortar did they work. They founded our country with steel!”

Yeah, uh... she makes that sound brave and noble, but that really just means they stole it from someone else by force. I mean it can't not mean that, can it?

So where did the people of Chon'sin originally come from?

...Questions for never. For now, we've got a paralogue to do.

The enemy's exclusively physical, and exclusively units who can use swords. Which is great for me, because most of my best units have significantly better defense than res, so enemy-phasing will be far less complicated.

Aversa looks like she'll actually be usable. She's got galeforce, for one thing, and enough speed to double with some help. So especially against these mostly-physical enemies, she'll be able to help Alexandria, Lucina and Morgan carve out an opening for my staff bots so we can get to Yen'fay safely.

Yes.

Because this is where we recruit Yen'fay.

And somehow they've decided they can't retcon his death, despite the countless other people retconned as having survived when they died in ways where their survival could not have possibly gone unnoticed...

...so we get an alternate timeline Yen'fay from a world where Say'ri was the one who died.

...Anyway, so, I rescue him over to our location, pair Say'ri up with Aversa, and then talk to him with Sayri before switching to Aversa to start using Forseti to galeforce these high-speed enemies. We need to kill a lot of them to make the coast clear.

Okay, so, Yen'fay runs off and leaves the conversation with Say'ri, but he's still recruited, thank goodness. Let's get to work.

There were 8 enemies near the bottom and only 7 galeforcer attacks at my disposal, but thankfully I managed to squeeze in that last kill with a coordinated effort between Walhart and Yen'fay.

And... that was the hardest part of this map. The royal family can handle the rest of this with ease.

I'll use this as an opportunity to train Lucina some more, because there's really no need for the Book of Naga here. Not when Lucina has capped defense and none of these enemies are particularly hard-hitting. They're all focused on speed. Speaking of which, Alexandria reaches the point with most of these enemies where she can't double without the help of Balmung, but the +2 speed mods that Lucina and Morgan got in comparison mean they can double anyone, even if they have the maximum enemy speed of 46.

...The Risen Chief has the Sol Katti for some reason. Can't imagine why.

Yeah, the closest thing to a complication that happened was when Lucina hit level 20 and thus couldn't gain any more exp unfortunately. She's capped everything but def and res like Morgan, but unlike Morgan, she hasn't had nearly as much success capping those remaining stats out since that happened a while back. Hardly matters though. Since she's capped everything else I can just have Morgan stay in the front and that really won't impact Lucina's performance at all.

So... let's see how this ends.

...Yep, so, this basically confirms that the game's trying to suggest that Yen'fay wasn't being an idiot believing Excellus, and that Say'ri died because he didn't give in to the blackmail. So Say'ri's literally just a glorified tour guide. That's the only thing of value she actually managed to accomplish, is being Ms. Exposition for her protectors after her little unknowingly-pretend romp as a freedom fighter.

FFFFFFFFFFFFuck this game.

...And Say'ri can't even support with Yen'fay.

...Okay, I think that's finally it for today.

So, with every spotpass paralogue but Priam's out of the way (no way in hell I'm doing that one in an ironman), let me know what you want me to do tomorrow. The answer will probably be DLC, given that's all that's left, but if I'm missing something, by all means, suggest it.

Stay safe, everyone!

[Samz707]

24 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Still alive, but with horrible brain damage.

...Is that how they're explaining Emmeryn's survival? After her fall, she was found by Grimleal, discovered to still be alive, and then she was taken here and then she escaped? Why would they take her with them to this island village on a trip to kidnap other young women?

...Emmeryn is still alive.

...Now. Normally the fact that she's still suffered a horrible fate that makes her barely even the same person anymore would help matters, as it keeps the tragedy of earlier in the game from losing all meaning.

However...

Um...

...They describe her as having the mental capacity of a child.

And you can still romance her.

So not only does this game allow you to marry your best friend's worst enemy, a horrible murderer...

...not only does this game allow you to condemn a man to forced marriage to a perpetual twelve-year-old under threat of cannibalism...

...but this game allows you to romance, and have sex with, your best friend's mentally regressed, mentally impaired sister who can't even speak in complete sentences.

I... just... just one question.

Why?

What purpose does this serve? Does this enhance the story in any way? Does it make anyone happy? Does it satisfy the people who liked Emmeryn and wanted to romance her? What the fuck is the point of bringing this character back like this!?

Why did the writers feel the need to try to kill their cake and fuck it too!?

And now suddenly Chrom's talking about Emmeryn like she's happier with her memory gone, now that she doesn't remember all the pain she's gone through in her life, and that it's entirely selfish for her loved ones to want her to get her memory back, and like... what? What kind of patronizing shit is this!?

...The Risen Chief has the Sol Katti for some reason. Can't imagine why.

 

 Good lord.

Quite frankly, I normally hate statements like these, since I always like to presume ignorance and such rather than the writer being a vile person but at least one of Awakening's writers has some severely messed up values, I just thought Emmeryn had Amnesia and was a little slow when I heard about this, not a full-on child-like state.

And of course Robin can have sex with her and I thought Byleth having most of their romances be students was the most messed up, this out-classes it by a mile.

The idea that this is some how a good thing is just... like I said, at least one of those writers is thoroughly messed up, now, I don't mind evil actions but this is being done by our self-insert hero and is portrayed as a good thing, the idea that a woman is better off as a brain-damaged mentally a child being potentially exploited sexually by a man is disgusting, the fact they can do actions like this is why Robin is one of the worst characters in the series for me, they're quite frankly scum for actions like this.

BUT IT'S A SWORD FROM A PAST GAME CLEARLY BY RANDOMLY INCLUDING IT WE ARE RESPECTING THE PAST GAMES!

Don't they randomly dig up the Deadlords from Jugdral during the main plot as well?

Edited January 6, 2021 by Samz707

[Alastor15243]

2 minutes ago, Samz707 said:

BUT IT'S A SWORD FROM A PAST GAME CLEARLY BY RANDOMLY INCLUDING IT WE ARE RESPECTING THE PAST GAMES!

Don't they randomly dig up the Deadlords from Jugdral during the main plot as well?

Yes, yes they do.

[Emperor Hardin]

37 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Walhart claims his heart doesn't beat anymore, but then Gangrel said he was dead too, so I'm guessing this is just metaphor, even though he's surrounded by Risen. Otherwise Walhart!Morgan is, like, a ghoul or something.

That line is also dub only.

37 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

...Yeah, this just another Eremiah situation, except this time she survives. Basically... picture Nino, except Nergal was the one who killed her family personally, and then afterwards brainwashed her and raised her to become Sonia. That's Aversa's revealed backstory with Validar. She's turned completely into a blameless victim, and everything bad she did is now exclusively Validar's fault. She still feels like she needs to atone, but she's welcomed into Chrom's army with open arms. No bad blood.

Get this, the Japanese version doesn't even explain why Fauder(Validar) did all this effort to brainwash this random ordinary villager.

Her having dark powers is a localization edit and doesn't explain why she's mainly for her persuasion skills anyhow.

In DLC maps, the game does further play up that Aversa isn't responsible for her actions unlike Gangrel.

37 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Yeah. My opinion on this hasn't changed. It's ridiculously patronizing and dumb that so many of this series' writers seem almost allergic to the idea of a female villain who is actually accountable for her actions. What few ones we get are so often brainwashed or created by bigger, eviler male villains. Pheros is technically a notable exception, and the narrative still shits on her by making her by far the least narratively important member of Walhart's inner circle.

Pheros is shown as honorable and pleasant, with the characters blaming her infatuation with Walhart leading her astray.

But at least she has some power rather then explicitly being a slave to men and having zero agency at all for her entire screentime.

37 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

This just makes Aversa less interesting. And she was barely interesting before.

I like how Aversa hates Validar now and bringing him up causes her trauma, but she still calls Robin big brother in the supports even though the spotpass retcon just said Validar was never even "almost like an adoptive father" anymore, but now just asshole that kidnapped and enslaved her that she always hated. But we gotta appeal to the "little sister" fetish according to Awakening.

I've seen someone who try to defend Awakening or say Ylisse is more gender progressive then Archanea, say Aversa was acting of her free will, but if you erase someone's mind, then magically rewrite their entire personality, sense of self and history to make them fanatically loyal to you with magic,  I'm calling that mind control.

Its also idiotic that Aversa was kept alive this long, consider the Wellspring of Truth is known to Aversa, if not common knowledge in  Ylisse, it'd be common sense to kill Aversa before she inevitably turns on the organization that killed her family and magically enslaved her.

Oh and Aversa's testimony proves Chrom's father right when he tried to kill all the Grimleal, no one could possibly care about a religion Ylisse hates, there's no way anyone on this wartorn continent would ever be adopted by this organization, Chrom hates it so no one in it can have any redeeming qualities whatsoever. 

And you thought the Loptyrians were bad

Edited January 6, 2021 by Emperor Hardin

[Alastor15243]

3 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Pheros is shown as honorable and pleasant, with the characters blaming her infatuation with Walhart leading her astray.

But at least she has some power rather then explicitly being a slave to men and having zero agency at all for her entire screentime.

Yeah, forgot about that line for a second. Still, she's better than most in this regard. As sad as that is.

 

4 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Oh and Aversa's testimony proves Chrom's father right when he tried to kill all the Grimleal, no one could possibly care about a religion Ylisse hates, there's no way anyone on this wartorn continent would ever be adopted by this organization, Chrom hates it so no one in it can have any redeeming qualities whatsoever. 

Is Henry a member of the Grimleal? Not that it would make much difference if he is, because 1: as lovable as he is he's completely psycho, and 2: even attempting a message of "not all practitioners of a religion are evil" when the god the religion is based around is inherently evil is kind of a waste of time, because any decent person would stop being a member of the religion upon gaining any awareness of how fucked up it is.

[Emperor Hardin]

Just now, Alastor15243 said:

Yeah, forgot about that line for a second. Still, she's better than most in this regard. As sad as that is.

Note how they didn't have a problem depicting Excellus as the scum of the Earth and even contrasted Pheros with her.

Just now, Alastor15243 said:

Is Henry a member of the Grimleal? Not that it would make much difference if he is, because 1: as lovable as he is he's completely psycho, and 2: even attempting a message of "not all practitioners of a religion are evil" when the god the religion is based around is inherently evil is kind of a waste of time, because any decent person would stop being a member of the religion upon gaining any awareness of how fucked up it is.

Henry is not a Grimleal as revealed in a conversation with Libra in a DLC Map and proclaims himself to be an atheist who doesn't believe in gods.

It is implied that the evil orphanage/school that abused him horribly was Grimleal in a DLC map, fitting with Awakening's stance that all Grimleal are horrible, horrible people that deserve nothing but death.

[Samz707]

9 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Is Henry a member of the Grimleal? Not that it would make much difference if he is, because 1: as lovable as he is he's completely psycho, and 2: even attempting a message of "not all practitioners of a religion are evil" when the god the religion is based around is inherently evil is kind of a waste of time, because any decent person would stop being a member of the religion upon gaining any awareness of how fucked up it is.

Not to mention Henry seems to be (from what I hear) mainly helping us since that means there's more bloodshed and while he's supposed to "get over" his crazyness, he offers to kill our entire playable cast in his Tharja S-rank, so that's all moot.

I dunno if Gaiden did it, but I seriously appreciate Echoes taking the time to sorta show how (until Jedah take over.) how Zofia/Rigel weren't actually that different now, at least that's how I took it. (Granted it made Celica look like even more of a brain-dead moron when her plot-stupidity kicked in.), Sure Alm and (I guess Biased at the start?) narrator talk about how Rigel is evil but then it turns out a few of your player cast are Rigellian and alot of the Rigellian villagers are friendly/innocent, meanwhile Grieth and bandits pop up in Zofia, meaning Zofia isn't quite as non-war like as Rigel when even it's occupants turn to violence as well. (and Grieth even, true to his final words, is replaced by another, it's just this another happens to direct his fighting towards people who presumably deserve it as a mercenary, which while good, is actually still making a living by war and probably more in-line with Duma's ideals, even if this is admittingly probably a complete accident on the writing's behalf.)

Meanwhile Awakening seemingly thinks Chrom's dad is in the wrong for wanting to genocide a religion of literally chaotic evil with practically no exceptions.

Edited January 6, 2021 by Samz707

[Emperor Hardin]

1 minute ago, Samz707 said:

Not to mention Henry seems to be (from what I hear) mainly helping us since that means there's more bloodshed and while he's supposed to "get over" his crazyness, he offers to kill our entire playable cast in his Tharja S-rank, so that's all moot.

I dunno if Gaiden did it, but I seriously appreciate Echoes taking the time to sorta show how (until Jedah take over.) how Zofia/Rigel weren't actually that different now, at least that's how I took it. (Granted it made Celica look like even more of a brain-dead moron when her plot-stupidity kicked in.), Sure Alm and (I guess Biased at the start?) narrator talk about how Rigel is evil but then it turns out a few of your player cast are Rigellian and alot of the Rigellian villagers are friendly/innocent, meanwhile Grieth and bandits pop up in Zofia, meaning Zofia isn't quite as non-war like as Rigel when even it's occupants turn to violence as well. (and Grieth even, true to his final words, is replaced by another, it's just this another happens to direct his fighting towards people who presumably deserve it as a mercenary.)

Henry's not a Grima worshipper, though it is implied he was abused by them.

That was all in Gaiden except for the nationality of some characters. Though the Lima IV starving Rigel was only on Kaga's timeline which was out of game, probably due to space.

1 minute ago, Samz707 said:

Meanwhile Awakening seemingly thinks Chrom's dad is in the wrong for wanting to genocide a religion of literally chaotic evil with practically no exceptions.

Notice they stop mentioning him after a brief comparison to Walhart, who is not only the most sympathetic villain in Awakening, but the one Chrom sympathizes with in his motivation and ultimately teams up with. He even regrets not teaming up with Walhart. 

[Samz707]

6 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Henry's not a Grima worshipper, though it is implied he was abused by them.

That was all in Gaiden except for the nationality of some characters. Though the Lima IV starving Rigel was only on Kaga's timeline which was out of game, probably due to space.

Notice they stop mentioning him after a brief comparison to Walhart, who is not only the most sympathetic villain in Awakening, but the one Chrom sympathizes with in his motivation and ultimately teams up with. He even regrets not teaming up with Walhart. 

Ah, so the Grimleal are even more just flat-out evil in every way.

 

[Emperor Hardin]

34 minutes ago, Samz707 said:

Ah, so the Grimleal are even more just flat-out evil in every way.

They should've just removed the mentions of Ylisse's crusade if everyone in the Grimleal were going to irredeemable badguys anyhow.

[Alastor15243]

5 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

They should've just removed the mentions of Ylisse's crusade if everyone in the Grimleal were going to irredeemable badguys anyhow.

Well I mean Grimleal != Plegian, but they're really, really ambiguous about what the makeup is.

[Emperor Hardin]

19 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Well I mean Grimleal != Plegian, but they're really, really ambiguous about what the makeup is.

The game does make a distinction between the two and the Art of Awakening says it only became a Grimleal theocracy recently under Gangrel.

[Alastor15243]

Just now, Emperor Hardin said:

The game does make a distinction between the two and the Art of Awakening says it only became a Grimleal theocracy recently under Gangrel.

I could've sworn it started as a Grimleal theocracy too, didn't it?

[Emperor Hardin]

10 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

I could've sworn it started as a Grimleal theocracy too, didn't it?

It makes little sense, but despite the Grimleal being implied to found the  country, the Art of Awakening says it took Gangrel coming to power, implied to be due to the Grimleal's help, for Plegia to become a Grimleal theocracy.

Just one of Awakening's inconsistencies I suppose.

[Jotari]

9 hours ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Offtopic, but why don't Nintendo/Zelda fans accept the idea of alternate continuity for some Zelda games such as the Four Swords titles?

Well the default assumption would be that they're all in alternate continuities, aside from the direct sequels. Timeline speculation was trying to put together the obvious alternate continuities together. And then around the 2010s Nintendo themselves thought they had to form some kind of continuity and started making games like Spirit Tracks, Skyward Sword and A Link Between Worlds that were intended distant sequels or prequels. Thankfully it seems they've started to buck that trend with Breath of the Wild's refusal to be placed anywhere.

9 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

That would make perfect sense to me, but noooo, Nintendo had to listen to those silly obsessive fans who must have one unified timeline. I can imagine they're the same fans who insist that Chrom's "oh I know X character from the Y tales" in the Awakening and Fates DLC are irrefutable evidence of everything being in a single world. I don't like that idea either if you can't tell.😏

 

Excuse moi? Walhart has the best explanation. 

  Hide contents

He is so great a man, the very pinnacle of our species, that he can will himself back to life! -But whatever you do, don't let a girl who looks a little like she could be from Hoshido perform the sending ritual, that will make Walhart (von Guado to use his full name) very angry.

It's so outlandish, so... problematic for the rules of reality and good writing, but I can't help but ...like it?

It's obviously the power of veganism.

  

4 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Walhart claims his heart doesn't beat anymore, but then Gangrel said he was dead too, so I'm guessing this is just metaphor, even though he's surrounded by Risen. Otherwise Walhart!Morgan is, like, a ghoul or something.

 

 

Well...maybe. I think he does make a reference again to his heart not beating in one of the DLC maps. I think it might be the Regalia chapter where he says he's like the Deadlords.

4 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Why did the writers feel the need to try to kill their cake and fuck it too!?

XDDDDDD

 

Edited January 7, 2021 by Jotari

[Venger_06]

14 hours ago, ping said:

But it's fully integrated into Terra's character arc and doesn't just suddenly pop up 5 seconds before it's relevant.

Except it does though? The revelation that

Spoiler

Terra might disappear

comes literally during the ending montage, while the reveal that Robin needs strong bonds to survives comes 1~2 chapters before the ending, and the importance of said bonds are highlighted some chapters before. Also, you can 100% ignore Terra's storyline in the WoR, making the whole thing fall flat.

In the end, it would be pretty shity if the devs locked the best ending behind acquiring all of Robin's supports, so its better this way.

[Acacia Sgt]

5 minutes ago, Maof06 said:

Except it does though? The revelation that

  Hide contents

Terra might disappear

comes literally during the ending montage, while the reveal that Robin needs strong bonds to survives comes 1~2 chapters before the ending, and the importance of said bonds are highlighted some chapters before. Also, you can 100% ignore Terra's storyline in the WoR, making the whole thing fall flat.

In the end, it would be pretty shity if the devs locked the best ending behind acquiring all of Robin's supports, so its better this way.

Spoiler

It gets brought up in the cutscene before entering Kefka's Tower, even if Terra wasn't re-recruited iirc. So not during the ending montage, considering you can trigger that cutscene as soon you get the Falcon.

 

[Venger_06]

3 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

  Reveal hidden contents

It gets brought up in the cutscene before entering Kefka's Tower, even if Terra wasn't re-recruited iirc. So not during the ending montage, considering you can trigger that cutscene as soon you get the Falcon.

 

Okay, I checked now. Here's the exchange:

Spoiler

 

EDGAR: It's time to break into Kefka's domain!

SETZER: What's wrong? Celes......

CELES: The Statues give the Espers the magical energy they need to live. If we destroy the Statues...

EDGAR: What'll happen?

CELES: I'm really not sure, but...

STRAGO: The Espers...and magic, too, will most definitely disappear from this world.

EDGAR: And then...

CELES: What will happen to ... Terra...?

 

Granted, it comes just before the final dungeon, but it's nothing concrete. They just share concerns about her safety.

[Jotari]

3 hours ago, Maof06 said:

Except it does though? The revelation that

  Hide contents

Terra might disappear

comes literally during the ending montage, while the reveal that Robin needs strong bonds to survives comes 1~2 chapters before the ending, and the importance of said bonds are highlighted some chapters before. Also, you can 100% ignore Terra's storyline in the WoR, making the whole thing fall flat.

In the end, it would be pretty shity if the devs locked the best ending behind acquiring all of Robin's supports, so its better this way.

All of Robin's supports? Not possible in a given playthrough considering there are mixed gendered and child supports. All of their available supports? Possible, but you'd have to grind up all of the units in your army you're not using. A single S support to save them, basically an expected requirement by that point in the game and anyone who accidentally doesn't do it probably doesn't care. An arbitrary number of A supports that seems generously reachable but not guaranteed, say 5, would probably be the best. But the point is they could have implemented the support system into this story element rather easily (no need to even write anything else, just don't show that last fmv). Besides if people were really unhappy with the fact that Robin dies at the end, the Chrom ending is always available (while we're at it, am I the only one who feels the ending would have been better left to who finishes off Grima in terms of gameplay instead of having a choice interjected right after you land the final hit of the chapter?).

[ping]

4 hours ago, Maof06 said:

Except it does though? The revelation that

  Reveal hidden contents

Terra might disappear

comes literally during the ending montage, while the reveal that Robin needs strong bonds to survives comes 1~2 chapters before the ending, and the importance of said bonds are highlighted some chapters before. Also, you can 100% ignore Terra's storyline in the WoR, making the whole thing fall flat.

In the end, it would be pretty shity if the devs locked the best ending behind acquiring all of Robin's supports, so its better this way.

But the pieces that it comes from have been around, and the revelation "makes sense" in that context.

Spoiler

Terra is half esper. The party is on its way to destroy the creators, and sources of power, of the esper. The risk of Terra disappearing results from that.

Terra is half human, but she has never been able to feel "human" emotion - until her love to her adopted children lets her embrace that part of her identity. Terra can remain in the world as an ordinary human, because her human aspect has been strengthened.

I would agree that Terra's character arc shouldn't have been skippable in the WoR, though.

With that, I'll shut up about non-FE stuff, though. Just one thing: If you disagree with me and still find that this part of FF6 has been an asspull, that doesn't reflect on Awakening's story. Something doesn't become "less wrong" because it has been done wrong elsewhere, as well.

Edited January 7, 2021 by ping

[Alastor15243]

Just a reminder that I still need requests for what to do today!

[Shotguner159]

8 hours ago, Jotari said:

Well the default assumption would be that they're all in alternate continuities, aside from the direct sequels. Timeline speculation was trying to put together the obvious alternate continuities together. And then around the 2010s Nintendo themselves thought they had to form some kind of continuity and started making games like Spirit Tracks, Skyward Sword and A Link Between Worlds that were intended distant sequels or prequels. Thankfully it seems they've started to buck that trend with Breath of the Wild's refusal to be placed anywhere.

Nintendo first mentioned the Zelda timeline splitting after Ocarina of Time in 2002. They called Four Swords the oldest game in the timeline in 2004. They placed literally every game except the Oracles in relation to another well before 2010. The only surprise in the Historia was that there was three timelines.

[Axie]

 

12 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Just a reminder that I still need requests for what to do today!

is future past at all feasible gameplay wise for you? because that sounds interesting for the playlog