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

[Alastor15243]

Conquest Day 12: Chapter 14

...It occurs to me when I see Dwyer in 3D at the treehouse that his hairstyle is awfully similar to the one my avatar had in Awakening. Especially with those little things at the sides.

Alright. Let's do Chapter 14 for real this time.

I've decided that after the scare with last map, I really can't afford to keep Odin, my highest-level non-prepromote, in his useless samurai form for long enough to not spend any time lacking heart seals. I'm using the second heart seal to bring him back now that he has vantage. And with that, he should be damned near invincible, because vantage covers one of the biggest weaknesses of the nostank: the fact that you're bound to be fighting wounded enemies you can't get enough HP back from. But with vantage, when that starts becoming a problem, you're suddenly one-shotting them before they can even touch you until you're healthy again. Now the only issue is the danger of not hitting your targets.

I got a great meal, str/spd/def, and it went to Effie, Elise, Dakota, Camilla, Odin, Niles, Silas and Arthur. That's a lot of my units!

Pity I can't bring everyone I want to.

I'm forging a +1 iron bow for Niles since he needs a better weapon, and I had the best name for a weapon for him while I was doing some stuff this morning and I completely forgot about it by the time it came time to use it.

NOPE! I REMEMBER NOW!

Quivering Lust.

Which is apparently acceptable for wireless communication!

Anyway, this map's... really claustrophobic, what with all the fliers and the narrow terrain for my foot units. Thankfully I have plenty of archers and some fliers of my own.

Number one priority is disabling that hexing rod. That's gonna be Odin's job. He's gonna fly up north with Elise, nostank the oni savages from outside the hexing rod's range, then have Elise fly him in while risking a hexing rod herself in order to give Odin the opportunity for the kill. After that, the rest of the status staves, with the notable exception of the entrap staff, can be disabled via the waiting game.

I've gotta decide who gets the shaft in favor of Dwyer. I don't want to drop any of these guys, but I can't well go into this map without a healer. I'm thinking it's gonna have to be Selena. I'll have Laslow train up his support ranks with Keaton instead. Selena's doing pretty okay now, so I think she can afford to sit out a map. I can't afford to drop Niles, Effie, Mozu or Arthur, because they all really need to get their support ranks up ASAP. Effie in particular with Mozu and Niles. Effie's only gained 2 speed by this point when she's supposed to have gained 4. That's only a difference of 2, but it's going to put the point where she eventually doubles as a sniper even further off. Especially since archer only has 2 more base speed than knight what the flaming fuck-

This is gonna be pretty rough for my attack stance team at any rate. They're gonna have to be efficient, because these narrow platforms leave almost no room for crowding enemies. It also allows bottlenecking, thankfully, except against the fliers.

Well, no point fussing about this further.

Let's go.

Ah yes, so, as I mentioned, this is where we get Keaton, who was my first partner in Nohr. The idea of making a werewolf-dragon hybrid appealed to me so much (and was such an amusing motivation for Dakota) that I just went with it. While obviously I've made other life decisions this time, I've got plenty planned for him anyway. Not the least of which being getting Laslow rally strength.

Effie may be slow, but she can one-shot samurai and pegasus knights with a little help, so holy shit am I still excited to get her moving.

Man, Keaton's recruitment still makes me laugh.

“Wh-why does that man have a tail!?”

...Thankfully I moved Dakota so Keaton would recruit himself, because we're in a pretty sticky situation now. Enemies with pass and fliers are everywhere. It seems like they really had the mechanics of how flight and pass work in mind when making this, because it's still possible to wall off your units due to the edges of the ships forming walls against fliers if you put units behind them. I relied extensively on that this turn to keep from getting overwhelmed. Effie should take care of the samurai and some of the fliers (good thing she can still take one damage from them when I remove def+2), and then we can deal with the archers and remaining fliers with player-phase attacks next turn. Meanwhile, Odin's arrived to deal with the oni savages before he can prep for the hexing rod deal.

Effie gained 2 levels on enemy phase, and she got a strength, speed and defense level up just in time for the drawbacks of that defense boost to not matter.

Elise switched to the front with the last few oni savages so that she can gain some experience and more efficiently prepare to fly across the water, and upon noticing there was a status staff not covered by the hexing rod's range, I had Leo get to work wasting freeze charges.

Unfortunately the hexing rod hit Elise with a 40-ish percent chance, but it doesn't matter, I planned for that outcome.

Alright, every shrine maiden has been waited out except for the last freeze rod. But she refuses to act until her allies can take advantage of it.

Clever girl.

Let's see if we can do a bit to make this less crazy though, hm? Because this is an obvious trap. Even if I didn't know about the kinshi knights coming from behind when certain conditions are met... the fliers lying in wait juuuuuust behind this area would already make me super suspicious about this shrine maiden's time-biding.

Ah, so she'll do it as long as someone gets in range of her and someone gets in range of one of her archer buddies... even if it's two different people. Glad I tried exploiting that one space where that one lunge-archer could be baited in without getting into freeze range. And Dakota may be frozen, but she's right next to Jakob so it barely matters.

Yep, and just as I thought, cue the kinshi knights. Christ, three of them. In guard stance with the sky knights in front. Thankfully, I've got archers so I can just bait two of them in since the edges of their ranges go over land. The third one is gonna have to be player-phased, but good thing they don't have air superiority! Also, the fliers in back apparently weren't part of the trap. They still haven't budged. Good to know.

...Okay, now they move, a turn later. Along with everyone else. Weird.

But yeah, they weren't too tough to deal with. The fliers flew ahead but my own fliers and archers could take them out. The rest could be walled off with Odin so Arthur and Mozu could get some cheap kills against the wounded to boost their support rank. With any luck they'll hit S today.

Thank goodness, 10,000 gold just when I was running out of the last supply. And yeah, people made a good point, I probably don't need Azura that much to tackle the second island in Chapter 15, so I might be able to get a lot of the treasure there too. We'll see though. Let's get the other chest first then finish up.

I'll deal with the entrap shrine maiden by flying in with Elise and switching to Odin. Odin can take two archers without nosferatu.

Right, the other chest had a seraph robe. Awesome. I'll have Dakota take the boss kill. She's not behind, but I'm used to her being at level 20 pretty early into Chapter 15, so I'll want her as strong as I can get her.

Dakota: Who even has the kind of power to curse Father with a song?

DAKOTA YOU PHENOMENAL DUMBFUCK.

And then we get our newest orders from Garon.

“Kill every last one of them”.

...The singers in Nestra, I mean. “Every last one of them”.

Dakota gets into an argument with Garon, and Leo saves her ass because she's still somehow not convinced that Garon can't be reasoned with.

So yeah, this scene was probably where I got my hopes up the most that there would be a secret rebellion plot among the Nohrian siblings. Leo outright says he doesn't agree with Garon's methods and only disapproves of Dakota saying what she said because saying it is an amazing way to get executed without hesitation. And Leo reveals the siblings are going to do everything in their power to buy the singers as much time as possible to escape while appearing to follow orders. I feel like this is some kind of fucking turning point in the story. This is the last moment where I can imagine the story eventually “getting good”. The moment that could have led into a plot behind the scenes to get more and more of the Nohrian siblings on Dakota's side to outright depose Garon. Maybe a story that mentions the political consequences of militarily occupying a neutral country and committing job-genocide against the nation's singers.

But then Chapter 15 happens.

And it all goes straight to hell, slathered in barbecue sauce.

But anyway, Leo rather unconvincingly says he's only doing this because Camilla and Elise get upset seeing Dakota upset, and that it's fun to do sneaky stuff behind Garon's back, and “it's not like I'm a hero or anything”, and then Brynhildr promptly resonates.

And we get the Grim Yato. The Nohrian Yato is probably my favorite of the two incomplete Yato versions because it just flat-out makes you bulkier. You get +2 defense and +2 res simply for having it in your inventory, and in the endgame that upgrades to +4. It may not be 1-2 range, but that's still super useful.

Alright, I upgraded some stuff, most notably the smithy (though forges are probably gonna get too expensive to bother with beyond +2), and now it's time for supports!

Effie didn't get a support with Niles, but she did get a support with Mozu! Awesome!

It's kind of amusing how Effie's ability to crush fruit in her fist actually shows up more than once not just in the game, but in this playthrough. And now she's only one rank away from getting archer. Sweet.

But more importantly, Mozu and Arthur just got S rank!

Oh god, these are so cheesy. And yet, as dumb as I find them, I can't help smiling like an idiot to myself reading them because they're so amusingly corny. I'd prefer something more emotionally engaging, but... I mean, this is Fates. Cheese is pretty much the only flavor of entertainment on offer.

Honestly, yeah, I kinda consider this canon. As several people in the thread pointed out, it adds a rather amusing context to how Percy wound up getting Ace.

Now then... Oh good! Laslow and Keaton. I was hoping that would happen! That's one more support Laslow needs out of the way.

It's some dumb slapstick about Keaton's treasure obsession causing Laslow a ton of grief. I mean, it was kinda funny.

Well...

...tomorrow we face Chapter 15.

I can just fucking see the alternate timelines stretching out in front of me where this ends the ironman. Probably because I'm getting flashbacks of its Revelation counterpart.

Well, we'll know soon enough.

Stay safe, everyone.

[Shadow Mir]

22 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Ah yes. Selena and Laslow's infamous B support. Oh god. I've seen this once and I'm already bracing myself for cringe.

Selena basically gets so pissed off at Laslow... that she shows him what he's doing by... hitting on him right back.

But while she does at least admit this to be true in the A support, so it's not infuriating like it is with Soleil... Selena's efforts are far more overt, bordering on sexual harassment, especially the “lemme feel those arms” comment.

This sounds corny as hell, and yet I can't help but laugh, largely because it's so blatantly out of character for her.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Honestly, yeah, I kinda consider this canon. As several people in the thread pointed out, it adds a rather amusing context to how Percy wound up getting Ace

 

If we're talking most likely parents for the Fates kids, then I'd be remiss not to point out that Midori seems more like she was designed to be Mozu's daughter than Kaze's.

[Alastor15243]

Conquest Day 13: Chapter 15

Alright, let's do this.

There won't be much to do for battle prep besides buying a ton of healing items, but it'll also be important to take a look at the map and the enemy stats, and see how Dakota fares. I got a rainbow tonic the other day and I'm almost assuredly going to be using that just in case, but still, best to know what other preparations would be ideal.

But first, we'll have to do castle maintenance, and then...

...look at the story.

Oh goodness is this one gonna be a doozy.

Mozu got a strength surge. Shame, it's useless unless we do a paralogue, and that's not my intention today.

Anyway, Dakota's out on her own, sorely regretting her life choices and no longer thinking reforming Nohr from within is even possible. Then she runs into Azura by the lake... and follows her through a portal she makes in the water... straight into Valla.

Oh no, I was jumping the gun a bit. First Azura sings, and Dakota finally realizes that the song she's heard multiple times canonically in this timeline is “just like the one that performer sang in Nestra”.

Azura's “going into Valla” animation is comically low-budget and doesn't even attempt to convey what actually goes on according to the cutscene.

And the place she winds up isn't even anywhere near water. What the hell?

Speaking of which... it's funny how literally the only reason why they can't escape at the lake in the middle of the map is because of Gunter. So what's going on? Has Azura decided that now that Dakota's here, they finally have the manpower to fight their way to the bottomless canyon and set Gunter free? Is that why leaving Gunter behind is suddenly completely unacceptable when she's been doing it herself for ages?

Alright, so, I bought four vulneraries and a concoction. That should be plenty for healing if I'm careful. Especially since the enemies here drop two more vulneraries. I also bought a levin sword and four fire tomes for a +2 forge called Elfire, the latter in anticipation of Dakota's promotion.

I got a +def+mag meal and Dakota was one of the people who got it. The only one who matters today.

Alright, not much more I can do now, besides press start.

Buckle up, boys and girls.

Let's do this.

So, for those of you unfamiliar, and in case I haven't made this clear: this is that map in Revelation where you use the dragon vein to replicate your entire party on a second flying island on the southern half of the map and either escape or defeat the boss on the southern half within 20 turns. Except this time, “your entire party” is just your avatar, Azura if she's still alive, and Gunter.

Thankfully, the enemies are also a lot weaker here than in Revelation, though par for the Conquest course, they have some rather nasty skills on some of them, namely seal skills.

...It always feels weird referring to the seal skills collectively like that, given that one of them is seal skill.

...Uh... wait... no? I say that but I can't actually think of ever coming across it in this game. I mean I guess that simplifies things, and it'd be almost totally worthless if it were a skill, but it still feels weird in principle.

One excruciatingly annoying thing about the replica gimmick is that Dakota's replica... doesn't count as Dakota. And thus she doesn't get Gunter's attack and accuracy bonus from his personal skill.

Having only two units is kind of daunting, even against such weak enemies. Mostly because I'm frantically trying to avoid getting debuffed by the ninja. That's looking unavoidable though, so I'll just have to be clever about who fights them.

Thankfully Dakota's making good progress with great levels!

I had to figure out how to take out a ninja on player phase and two other enemies on enemy phase without the fighter being able to proc seal strength on replica Gunter, which would've been disastrous. I wound up actually using the dragonstone again for this purpose, because it still manages to do more single-hit damage to some of these enemies than the Grim Yato does, allowing Dakota to help finish off enemies Gunter can't double. It's just barely enough.

Up north, meanwhile, Dakota's strong enough with Gunter's pair-up bonuses and personal skill to one-shot ninja, which is coming in really handy now.

Turn 8 and I've managed to break through the ninja, the hard part of the map. And with that, I'm pretty much at the boss of the southern side!

And Gunter's managed to have both of his level ups improve strength, which is awesome, though his utility as an actual combat unit is limited beyond this map. He does have some really handy uses though, like flying shelter utility if you've got a heart seal to spare. I, however, do not have a heart seal. Or a free unit slot. Or a songstress to make the most use out of shelter.

10 turns in and I'm just cleaning up at this point. This was unexpectedly easy. I remembered this being harder, and that was on hard mode.

...There was one minor embarrassment where I forgot that changing the equipped weapon on Replica Dakota also changed the equipped weapon on Dakota, but thankfully this didn't even remotely endanger any strategies.

And Dakota promotes just in time to finish off the boss! Sweet!

OH YEAH BABY.

NOHR NOBLE TIME.

I'll be honest, Nohr Noble is one of my favorite classes in the series. The weapon triangle thing makes swords and tomes a bit unfortunate, but I adore the aesthetics and the access to 1-2 range. It's like a vampire, and honestly the sexual elements of the female one only add to the charm for me. Reminds me of some old-school comic book supervillainess. She wears it well, I feel. It's not degrading like the pointless gratuitous assless riders, it's just generally hot.

...My only real complaint is that the female avatar doesn't strike me as the sort of person who would enjoy wearing it, or feel confident wearing it. And honestly, if I had any emotional investment in the writing at all, that would be a big issue for me, because I hate that. But I don't, so I find it easier to enjoy.

Speaking of having no emotional investment in the writing...

...Oh wow, yeah, it's time.

“We are no longer in Nohr”

We were in Cyrkensia, Azura. That's not a part of Nohr. And the way she talks about being in some place wholly apart from Nohr or Hoshido, it's like the neutral territories don't even exist to her.

So yeah, blah blah blah, Azura warns Dakota about the curse, but notably doesn't say what the place is. I'm actually fine with this. As I had Azura explain in Dakota's War Journal Book 3 when she does finally tell Dakota the name of the place Dakota first learned about in Book 2: “Well there wasn't much point in giving you a word that would melt you if you said it.”

However, what I do take issue with is Azura's refusal to explain why only she and Dakota can travel between worlds using water.

Dakota: Just the two of us can travel by water? But why? Why us?

Azura: That's...

And you can almost feel the executives handing her a note reminding her of her contractual obligations...

Azura: ...I'm sorry, but that's not something I can talk about right now.

But yeah... here comes the big doozy.

This, uh...

...I'm gonna have to quote most of this conversation verbatim.

Azura: I've heard you say numerous times that you'd stop at nothing to end this war. If that's true, there's something you must do. It won't be easy, though... I'm afraid if we're ever to obtain peace, you must... dethrone King Garon.

Dakota: Dethrone Father? Are you mad?!

Azura: I'm sorry, but it's the only way. All he does is spread hate and evil. He's a cruel and heartless man, even to his own children. It's despicable.

Dakota: Sadly, I can't disagree with any of that. But Azura... He's still my father, and the father of my siblings. Must we shame and defeat him?

Why the fuck does Dakota have this irrational emotional attachment to Garon that her siblings have? Not only has she never spent time with Garon as an actual good person, but she's barely spent time with Garon period. She spent nearly her whole life in the Northern Fortress, and of the encounters we've seen between them since she's gotten out, he's ordered her execution in something approaching 50% of them. She doesn't have a single happy memory of being with this man, and she can't possibly have many memories of being with him at all. Do you think he visited her much in the Northern Fortress? Personally!? And she knows full well this man murdered her real father (I'm not putting air quotes around “real” because Sumeragi's damned well earned saying that unironically), and her mother! How the flaming fuck can this girl be in an emotional mindset to defend this guy!?

Also, “Must we shame and defeat him”? Really!? “Shame” him!? That's a concern of yours!? You were planning on ending the war without even damaging his ego!? That's such a stupid and embarrassing line, regardless of what the fuck she meant by it.

Anyway...

Azura: I wished to shield you from this knowledge, Dakota, but it's time you knew.

Why did you “[wish] to shield [her] from this knowledge”, Azura? Why?

Ah yes, and now the magical truth crystal arrives. The one that can only be used once, and only by people with highly potent dragon blood, or by highly gifted mages.

Also, lemme just quote:

“This is a crystal from that other world we just returned from”.

You can say “that other world we just returned from” without melting. As the next chapter demonstrates, you can talk about things that happened in that world without melting. And as this route has also demonstrated, you can talk about goddamned Anankos without melting.

WHAT IS THIS CURSE, AND WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO DO TO ACTIVATE IT!?

Seriously, what the fuck is stopping Azura and Dakota from going to the Nohrian royal family with Gunter, going “We found Gunter! He's alive! And he has quite the story to tell about how he survived!”, and then explaining there's an alternate dimension at the bottom of the bottomless canyon, telling them you've seen it, and then asking for more of their help to get more of those damned crystals!?

Nothing. Nothing except that the writers didn't think about that, because they didn't want to think about that, because they have a very particular course of action that they want the avatar to be “forced” to do, because, we come back again to the unholy trinity of plot demands:

1: Make Nohr objectively in the wrong.

2: Make the avatar side with Nohr and fight Hoshido.

3: Make the avatar not evil.

As I said before, any two of these could have been done without any serious logical missteps, but the self-inflicted marketing demands for Conquest's plot require that all three of these have to be true at the same time.

Which means, of course, that they have to find some comically grotesque plot contrivance to magically transform the act of siding with an evil dictator and fighting the good guys... into an act that will save the world from said evil dictator.

And this is what they come up with.

The only way to get the Nohrian siblings truly on board with dethroning King Garon... is to prove to them that it's not really Garon. And the “only” way to do that...

...is to help Garon conquer Hoshido, completely decimate the Hoshidan army, perpetually appease a psychotic, merciless bloodthirsty tyrant, and then let him sit on a magical throne which will expose him as a slime monster.

…

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…

THAT ISN'T STOPPING GARON, AZURA. THAT IS LITERALLY LETTING HIM DO 90% OF THE AWFUL THINGS THAT ARE AT STAKE WITH HIM BEING IN POWER IN THE FIRST PLACE.

AND WHY THE FUCK IS THIS YOUR IDEA, AZURA!? YOU'RE THE ONE WHO GREW UP WITH THE HOSHIDAN ROYAL FAMILY! THEY'RE THE ONES YOU CARE ABOUT! I CAN ALMOST UNDERSTAND SOMEONE BEING PSYCHOTIC ENOUGH TO DESTROY AN ENTIRE COUNTRY JUST TO AVOID HAVING TO FIGHT THE PEOPLE YOU LOVE, BUT WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU CONSIDER THIS THE BEST OPTION!? DO YOU GENUINELY THINK THIS IS THE BEST WAY TO END THIS WAR!?

NO, DAKOTA, YOU ARE NOT SOME GODDAMNED HEROIC MARTYR DESTROYING HER REPUTATION WITH THE WORLD IN ORDER TO SAVE IT! YOU ARE SENTENCING THOUSANDS OF INNOCENT PEOPLE TO SUFFERING AND AGONY AND DEATH WITHOUT EVEN TRYING TO WEIGH YOUR OTHER OPTIONS! IT ISN'T YOUR HAPPINESS YOU'RE SACRIFICING, ASSHOLE! IN FACT, THE FACT THAT YOU'RE CHOOSING TO END THE WAR THIS WAY INSTEAD OF BY SIDING WITH HOSHIDO MEANS YOU'RE CHOOSING THE OPTION THAT WOULD MAKE YOU HAPPIER!

(INHALE)

(EXHALE)

(Inhale)

(Exhale)

...Hoooooooooly shit.

Yeah.

This is the moment that kills Conquest's story for me.

This is the moment where this story becomes completely and totally beyond irredeemable. The moment when the writers make it nakedly plain that they think you're an idiot. Nearly every attempt at an emotional moment from here on out uses this premise as the foundation for why it's happening.

This is what we've got to look forward to storywise for the rest of the game, folks.

...Let's just check supports.

Apparently Gunter has supports unlocked with both Dakota and Jakob.

Ah, Dakota and Gunter's C support, another conversation that prompts reactions of “this would be absolutely adorable if it weren't for the fact that you can fuck this man”.

As for with Jakob...

...It's too short for me to dignify talking about it.

Ah yes, also, we got Felicia. I usually use her as a pair-up bot for Leo (he really appreciates the speed), but I'm not sure if I'll be using Leo this time. I've got so many new units I'm not used to using by this point in the game. I'll keep him around as a backup, since he's really easy to catch up later in the game thanks to his high magic power and accuracy, but for now, he's getting the bench, and that means Felicia gets the bench too.

We've upgraded the arena, Keaton found Effie's lance (which is a psychotically powerful but slow and inaccurate lance that I guess I'll keep around on her just in case), and... there is no third thing! We're done for today!

Stay safe, everyone.

Stay safer than my confidence in the plot.

[Sunwoo]

On 3/26/2021 at 9:30 AM, Alastor15243 said:

Ah, so Takumi was “kind” even though he “never accepted [Azura] as his sister like the others”. As much as that would give credence to his explanation for his behavior in Takumi and Azura's S support, I call bullshit. we saw him act like a complete douchenozzle to Azura even before Mikoto died or he got possessed.

Hello, late response is late (because getting vaccinated over the weekend is "fun") but I think that judging Takumi's behavior towards Azura by chapter 3 alone is slightly unfair to him. Even before what happened with Mikoto, it's pretty important to note that it's a high stress situation for Takumi. From his perspective, his long lost sibling comes back from Nohr as a prince/princess of the enemy country. They could be up to something, but everyone else is just "oh Kamui-sama, we all love you!" and doesn't appear to suspect a thing. They're all connecting with good ol' Kamui-sama much better than they ever connected with him, and the jealousy along with frustration and suspicion and even a bit of sadness that he can't connect with Kamui-sama in the same way is probably getting to Takumi ...

... and Azura being there probably isn't helping the situation. I might be remembering this wrong because it's been literal years since I picked up this game, but didn't Takumi only snap at Azura after she interrupted him taking out his frustrations on Corrin? Because as much as that's not okay behavior, it's completely logical and happens in real life. Being mad at some person, but someone else interrupts you and tells you not to be mad at that person and then suddenly your ire is directed at THEM for getting involved in things that aren't their business and/or because they're acting like your feelings aren't justified. So, I mean ... we need more information on how Takumi and Azura interacted outside of one of his worst days to get an idea of how they interacted.

[Alastor15243]

11 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Hello, late response is late (because getting vaccinated over the weekend is "fun") but I think that judging Takumi's behavior towards Azura by chapter 3 alone is slightly unfair to him. Even before what happened with Mikoto, it's pretty important to note that it's a high stress situation for Takumi. From his perspective, his long lost sibling comes back from Nohr as a prince/princess of the enemy country. They could be up to something, but everyone else is just "oh Kamui-sama, we all love you!" and doesn't appear to suspect a thing. They're all connecting with good ol' Kamui-sama much better than they ever connected with him, and the jealousy along with frustration and suspicion and even a bit of sadness that he can't connect with Kamui-sama in the same way is probably getting to Takumi ...

... and Azura being there probably isn't helping the situation. I might be remembering this wrong because it's been literal years since I picked up this game, but didn't Takumi only snap at Azura after she interrupted him taking out his frustrations on Corrin? Because as much as that's not okay behavior, it's completely logical and happens in real life. Being mad at some person, but someone else interrupts you and tells you not to be mad at that person and then suddenly your ire is directed at THEM for getting involved in things that aren't their business and/or because they're acting like your feelings aren't justified. So, I mean ... we need more information on how Takumi and Azura interacted outside of one of his worst days to get an idea of how they interacted.

That's understandable to a degree, but when the thing he says in response to Azura defending Corrin is that she hasn't earned the privilege of calling him by name, that really stretches the lengths of that excuse far beyond breaking point.

[Sunwoo]

1 minute ago, Alastor15243 said:

That's understandable to a degree, but when the thing he says in response to Azura defending Corrin is that she hasn't earned the privilege of calling him by name, that really stretches the lengths of that excuse far beyond breaking point.

Yeah, although like I said it's been a really long time and I don't remember what the context of the Japanese version they were trying to translate even was. Maybe the "privilege of calling him by his name" thing was a weird translation thing that didn't work out or something. Or maybe this is a story Xander vs. support Xander issue all over again.

Takumi for some reason got kind of screwed over in the translations. He's always been kinda petty and immature about stuff, but he came off as less juvenile and he was definitely angry at Corrin for specific reasons, such as Mikoto getting killed and invading his country. And he's one of the few to bring up that Nohr killed Sumeragi back in chapter 3. Don't know why translation felt the need to cut out things that actually made him more complex and replace it with "stupid Nohrian doodoo heads!" level of insults.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

15 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

We are no longer in Nohr”

We were in Cyrkensia, Azura. That's not a part of Nohr. And the way she talks about being in some place wholly apart from Nohr or Hoshido, it's like the neutral territories don't even exist to her.

To offer the writers a scrap of charity - these lines make perfect sense, if we interpret "Nohr" and "Hoshido" as referring not only to the two major nations in Fates, but also to the continents, divided by the Bottomless Canyon, upon which they sit. In this vision, Cyrkensia and Cheve can be considered part of the Nohrian continent, while Mokushu and Izumo are part of the Hoshidan continent. It would hardly be the first time that a continent ahares its name with a country - consider Archanea or Ylisse.

19 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Thankfully, the enemies are also a lot weaker here than in Revelation, though par for the Conquest course, they have some rather nasty skills on some of them, namely seal skills.

...It always feels weird referring to the seal skills collectively like that, given that one of them is seal skill.

...Uh... wait... no? I say that but I can't actually think of ever coming across it in this game. I mean I guess that simplifies things, and it'd be almost totally worthless if it were a skill, but it still feels weird in principle.

TFW Three Houses finally corrects the long-standing "Skill" overlap, by making the stat "Dexterity" and the stuff learned by being in classes "Abilities". If you can't learn to share the word, then neither of you get to use it.

25 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Oh no, I was jumping the gun a bit. First Azura sings, and Dakota finally realizes that the song she's heard multiple times canonically in this timeline is “just like the one that performer sang in Nestra”.

And Conquest never even reveals the identity of the mysterious dancer in Nestra! So many abandoned plot threads, SMH my head.

26 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

THAT ISN'T STOPPING GARON, AZURA. THAT IS LITERALLY LETTING HIM DO 90% OF THE AWFUL THINGS THAT ARE AT STAKE WITH HIM BEING IN POWER IN THE FIRST PLACE.

The ethics of "helping my abusive, comically evil adoptive father take over the world and kill my birth family so that I can expose him as secretly a bad guy if this one unconfirmed legend turns out to be correct, and then deposing him on the assumption that the ethical and practical willpower that put him on the throne will turn against him and his ideology upon seeing him turned into a pile of slime" is certainly a relatable gray area, at the very least.

[Jotari]

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

To offer the writers a scrap of charity - these lines make perfect sense, if we interpret "Nohr" and "Hoshido" as referring not only to the two major nations in Fates, but also to the continents, divided by the Bottomless Canyon, upon which they sit. In this vision, Cyrkensia and Cheve can be considered part of the Nohrian continent, while Mokushu and Izumo are part of the Hoshidan continent. It would hardly be the first time that a continent ahares its name with a country - consider Archanea or Ylisse.

TFW Three Houses finally corrects the long-standing "Skill" overlap, by making the stat "Dexterity" and the stuff learned by being in classes "Abilities". If you can't learn to share the word, then neither of you get to use it.

And Conquest never even reveals the identity of the mysterious dancer in Nestra! So many abandoned plot threads, SMH my head.

The ethics of "helping my abusive, comically evil adoptive father take over the world and kill my birth family so that I can expose him as secretly a bad guy if this one unconfirmed legend turns out to be correct, and then deposing him on the assumption that the ethical and practical willpower that put him on the throne will turn against him and his ideology upon seeing him turned into a pile of slime" is certainly a relatable gray area, at the very least.

They're just banking on everyone being really racist towards slime people. Poor Slime!Garon being judged by his appearance and not by his (horrific) deeds.

[Sunwoo]

17 minutes ago, Jotari said:

They're just banking on everyone being really racist towards slime people. Poor Slime!Garon being judged by his appearance and not by his (horrific) deeds.

I know this is a joke, but it's kind of sad how Garon apparently needs to be exposed as a literal monster instead of just a metaphorical monster for the Nohrian siblings to get their asses in gear ... except not really because even after Garon's revealed to be made of slime the three younger ones are still too loyal to do anything and only come around because Xander Sue.

[Jotari]

21 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

I know this is a joke, but it's kind of sad how Garon apparently needs to be exposed as a literal monster instead of just a metaphorical monster for the Nohrian siblings to get their asses in gear ... except not really because even after Garon's revealed to be made of slime the three younger ones are still too loyal to do anything and only come around because Xander Sue.

It is a joke, but I meant exactly that. It's pretty ridiculous. They don't decide to depose Garon because of what he does, but because he's not Garon. It's like everything up until now would have been fine if he just wasn't a pile of goop. And while we're at it (I've talked about this recently but I'm not sure if it was here) why even is he goop? Would the same thing happen to Sumeragi or Mikoto if they sat on the Hoshidon throne?

[Alastor15243]

2 minutes ago, Jotari said:

It is a joke, but I meant exactly that. It's pretty ridiculous. They don't decide to depose Garon because of what he does, but because he's not Garon. It's like everything up until now would have been fine if he just wasn't a pile of goop.

This makes Revelation even more infuriating because there, Corrin just gets their allegiance for free because Fake Garon is just that psychotically incompetent and crazy that he says something that overrides even Xander's loyalty.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

It is a joke, but I meant exactly that. It's pretty ridiculous. They don't decide to depose Garon because of what he does, but because he's not Garon. It's like everything up until now would have been fine if he just wasn't a pile of goop. And while we're at it (I've talked about this recently but I'm not sure if it was here) why even is he goop? Would the same thing happen to Sumeragi or Mikoto if they sat on the Hoshidon throne?

I don't imagine so, but... wait, we never see anyone else sit on the throne, do we? It's supposed to reveal the sitter's "true form", but per the Endgame of Birthright, isn't Garon's "true form" a big ol' Dragon?

1 hour ago, Sunwoo said:

I know this is a joke, but it's kind of sad how Garon apparently needs to be exposed as a literal monster instead of just a metaphorical monster for the Nohrian siblings to get their asses in gear ... except not really because even after Garon's revealed to be made of slime the three younger ones are still too loyal to do anything and only come around because Xander Sue.

Garon could have even claimed, after the transformation (wait, can he still talk?), that those darn Hoshidans booby-trapped the throne to transform him. It doesn't even necessarily reveal that he's not truly their father.

[Venger_06]

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

wait, can he still talk?

Yes.

Edited March 31, 2021 by Maof06

[Jotari]

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

This makes Revelation even more infuriating because there, Corrin just gets their allegiance for free because Fake Garon is just that psychotically incompetent and crazy that he says something that overrides even Xander's loyalty.

Which of course happens because Xander just happens to overhear him mumbling to himself in an event which has absolutely no direct prompting from Corrin's route altering decision. It really is comically bad.

1 hour ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

I don't imagine so, but... wait, we never see anyone else sit on the throne, do we? It's supposed to reveal the sitter's "true form", but per the Endgame of Birthright, isn't Garon's "true form" a big ol' Dragon?

Garon could have even claimed, after the transformation (wait, can he still talk?), that those darn Hoshidans booby-trapped the throne to transform him. It doesn't even necessarily reveal that he's not truly their father.

Nah, I don't think his true form is a dragon, at least no more than Corrin's true form being a dragon. He can just turn into a dragon because he also has dragon blood (with I assume some extra help from Anankos since Xander and Ryoma aren't ever transforming into dragons). I remember being amused on my first playthrough at how distinctly not out of nowhere that transformation came. It felt like a giant space flea from nowhere transformation, but was perfectly justified. Lot's of things are not ass pulls in writing, but for something be distinctly not-an-ass-pull is probably hard to pull off.

Edited March 31, 2021 by Jotari

[lenticular]

  

On 3/30/2021 at 2:38 PM, Jotari said:

Course another option would always be to leave the song in Japanese. Doubt anyone would really complain about that.

I'm sure some people would complain, because there are always some people who will complain about anything. And there is definitely a subset of English speakers who will flatly refuse to engage with any media that isn't entirely in English. I wonder if NoA (or NoE) have ever done market research to try to figure out what sort of audience share they'd lose by leaving something like a song untranslated. I'd hope it wouldn't be much, but I would definitely be interested in seeing that research if it exists.

Of course, TMS was left with the audio entirely in Japanese and translation only as a dub, but TMS is a sufficiently odd duck of a game that it's probably not good to use as a case study for anything.

4 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

“This is a crystal from that other world we just returned from”.

That. That right there is the single line in all of Fates that brought me the most joy. Breaking their own ridiculous "you can't talk about this place" rule literal seconds after making it was enough to break through the so-bad-it's-good barrier and make me laugh at its sheer absurdity. And then it immediately goes back to being awful in a way that comes close to provoking rage but actually fails to break through indifference. As is par for the course. But congratulations, Fates, for a brief second there you inadvertantly managed to solicit a positive emotion.

[Jotari]

39 minutes ago, lenticular said:

  

I'm sure some people would complain, because there are always some people who will complain about anything. And there is definitely a subset of English speakers who will flatly refuse to engage with any media that isn't entirely in English. I wonder if NoA (or NoE) have ever done market research to try to figure out what sort of audience share they'd lose by leaving something like a song untranslated. I'd hope it wouldn't be much, but I would definitely be interested in seeing that research if it exists.

Of course, TMS was left with the audio entirely in Japanese and translation only as a dub, but TMS is a sufficiently odd duck of a game that it's probably not good to use as a case study for anything.

I just played the two Digimon Cyber Sleuth games and they didn't bother to translate them at all either (probably hopes that much like TMS the story takes place in Tokyo). And I'm sure I've heard Japanese songs in localized games before, though the only example I can think of off the top of my head is Mystical Ninja Starring Goeman for the Nintendo 64 (and as a market research case I absolutely loved the Japanese songs in it as a kid, course it's also a pretty Japanesey game already for them to get away with it, then again Fates is more Japanesey than typical Fire Emblem so they would be more easily able to do it for this specific song compared to others). In another area of the same topic you have many games with songs that weren't even in Japanese to begin with, usually Latin but some occasional French and German (and of course English) stuff that have never been considered needed to translate. Which is sensible if it's meant to be incomprehensible to the Japanese audience there's no need to translate it for foreign audiences since it's achieving the same purpose, but the fact that it's incomprehensible for a monlingual speaker hasn't been enough to dissuade any substantial group of people that can be measured from something because they don't know what the lyrics of One Winged Angel is about.

Edited March 31, 2021 by Jotari

[Ottservia]

4 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

Maybe the "privilege of calling him by his name" thing was a weird translation thing that didn't work out or something.

Well like the thing about Japanese is that usually you refer to someone by their family name unless there’s a level of familiarity between you. Or it could’ve been an honorifics thing which doesn’t translate well into English. I would assume in Japanese she referred to him with the honorific “kun” or even “niichan” which would make his outburst a lot more understandable considering those honorifics are really only used with people you are close to and are pretty rude(or just weirdly fetishistic in the case of the latter) otherwise.

Edited March 31, 2021 by Ottservia

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Ottservia said:

Well like the thing about Japanese is that usually you refer to someone by their family name unless there’s a level of familiarity between you. Or it could’ve been an honorifics thing which doesn’t translate well into English. I would assume in Japanese she referred to him with the honorific “kun” or even “niichan” which would make his outburst a lot more understandable considering those honorifics are really only used with people you are close to and are pretty rude(or just weirdly fetishistic in the case of the latter) otherwise.

Makes a lot of sense. Let's check it out.

Takumi's original Japanese dialogue is

Quote

[タクミ]
気安く呼ぶなって言ってるだろ。▼
あんたは、父上を殺した暗夜王国の王女なんだ。
信用できるはずがない。▼
カムイ、
あんたも同じさ。▼
その年まで暗夜王国の
王子だったんだ、今さら…▼

Wow. Quite a bit longer than the English's

Quote

Takumi: Hey, who said you could call me by name? You haven’t earned that privilege either.

Rendered in romanji, Takumi's Japanese is
 

Quote

 

[Takumi]

kiyasuku yobu natte itterudaro. ▼

Anta wa, chichiue o koroshita an'ya ōkoku no ōjona nda.

Shin'yō dekiru hazu ga nai. ▼

Kamui, anta mo onaji sa. ▼

Sono-nen made an'ya ōkoku no ōjidatta nda, imasara…▼

 

So just at a glance I don't see any him referring to any honorifics, he doesn't use his own name at all like I'd expect if it were something like you suggest. Though what is he actually saying? Well the second line is something I think someone mentioned already, he's talking about how Nohr killed Sumeragi and Azura is the princess of Nohr. Though he doesn't reference Sumeragi by name, he calls him chichiue which is a very formal word for father. The third and fourth lines are about how Corrin is the same as Azura since they've lived so long in Nohr, which leads into the following text where Corrin disagrees in both the English and the Japanese. So yeah, it seems Takumi was more open with his grievances in the Japanese version. Was the name thing completely made up then? Well I'm not sure as I can't quite find a translation for the first line. But it seems Takumi is angry because Azura is talking to him casually. In the previous sentence Azura literally just said his name without any honorifics at all. Just Takumi with ellipses. So she wasn't being overly casual using kun or something, but I guess Takumi expects her to use formal honorifics when addressing him. Azura is older than Takumi though so I'm not sure what precise honorific he's expecting.

As far as translation goes saying she doesn't have the right to use his name is kind of sort of accurate. Just saying she shouldn't be casual with him wouldn't work since Azura's not being casual in any sense of mood or tone since she's literally just saying his name, with, judging by the ellipses, something like pity? Well not quite pity, but regret that he's angry with her. So yeah, saying English "You're being too casual with me" wouldn't really work. The most accurate translation would probably be "I'm Mr Takumi to you!", but that would just sound ridiculous in English (would work a little better if he actually had a surname). Honestly I'm really surprised they didn't just drop that line and keep the entire rest of the text which is far more important. Is hard to translate and not as useful for his characterization as the stuff they actually did drop. And the way they did translate it makes it seem like Takumi has basically never let Azura speak to him, when in reality he more expects her to treat him as if he were the prince and she was outside the family entirely.

 

Edited March 31, 2021 by Jotari

[AnonymousSpeed]

4 hours ago, Jotari said:

pity

"Do not pity me, WENCH. I am a prince, I do not need sympathy for Nohrian scum like you!"

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

The most accurate translation would probably be "I'm Mr Takumi to you!", but that would just sound ridiculous in English (would work a little better if he actually had a surname).

Surnames? In my Fire Emblem? Where do you think we are, Fódlan?

[Acacia Sgt]

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

Surnames? In my Fire Emblem? Where do you think we are, Fódlan?

Ah yes, because Brendan Reed and his family were totally from Fódlan...

Though seriously, it's not that much of a rarity.

Shiharam and Jill Fizzart
Elincia Ridell Crimea
Sanaki Kirsch Altina
Albein Alm Rudolf
Seliph Baldr Chalphy (and his family by extension)
Leif Faris Claus (and his family by extension)
Pent and his family Reglay
Since she's adopted, technically Priscilla carries the surname Caerleon

And though non-canon, you also have Marth Lowell

May be missing some...

Edited April 1, 2021 by Acacia Sgt

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

7 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Ah yes, because Brendan Reed and his family were totally from Fódlan...

Though seriously, it's not that much of a rarity.

Shiharam and Jill Fizzart
Elincia Ridell Crimea
Sanaki Kirsch Altina
Albein Alm Rudolf
Seliph Baldr Chalphy (and his family by extension)
Leif Faris Claus (and his family by extension)
Pent and his family Reglay
Since she's adopted, technically Priscilla carries the surname Caerleon

And though non-canon, you also have Marth Lowell

May be missing some...

I never denied that surnames existed in older FE titles. But Three Houses was the first in the series to distribute them systematically, and near-universally.

That said, it'd be cool if the next game has fun with surnames. Different countries, or cultural groups, could have different surname standards. Like, the child inheriting a last name from each parent (like in Spanish-speaking countries), or a tribe that forgoes surnames for patronyms (a la Iceland).

[Punished Dayni]

5 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Since she's adopted, technically Priscilla carries the surname Caerleon

She is also of house Cornwell.

Though we don't get any indication Lycian lands are also used as surnames by their respective lords.

[Eltosian Kadath]

17 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

AND WHY THE FUCK IS THIS YOUR IDEA, AZURA!? YOU'RE THE ONE WHO GREW UP WITH THE HOSHIDAN ROYAL FAMILY! THEY'RE THE ONES YOU CARE ABOUT! I CAN ALMOST UNDERSTAND SOMEONE BEING PSYCHOTIC ENOUGH TO DESTROY AN ENTIRE COUNTRY JUST TO AVOID HAVING TO FIGHT THE PEOPLE YOU LOVE, BUT WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU CONSIDER THIS THE BEST OPTION!? DO YOU GENUINELY THINK THIS IS THE BEST WAY TO END THIS WAR!?

The manipulative and vindictive Azura interpretation is much more interesting. With Azura conveniently breaking the illusion orb she used to show Corrin the "truth" and convinced them that the only way to get their Nohrian family to help depose Garon would be to conquer Hoshido. That way the family that abandoned her to Hoshidan captivity for more than a decade, and the "loving" family that betrayed her by leaving her fate to vindictive Hoshidans after Corrin proved a traitor, will both tear each-other apart in their fight. Not to mention Corrin being convinced that talking about Azura's real homeland will totally trigger a curse...