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Shadows of Valentia Day 21: Let's Try This Again

Okay, so... the main reason this became a shitshow was because I let the archers get onto the sand. If I thought fighting archers in the fort was bad, fighting them out of it proved to be ten times worse due to the fact that sand cripples movement, but not range. Making it a ridiculous advantage for anyone with a bow.

So before I get into any of the archers' ranges, I'm going to rush to plug up the entryway so they can't escape. I should have exactly enough time and space to do that, provided I take out all of the enemies outside without provoking them. Because it'll take two turns of being provoked for any of the archers to get clear of the building. Just barely though. The archers can make it just to the last stair tile.

...Problem being that if you try that, you need pretty dang high defense. Atlas, with his 7 defense and 32 HP, was slaughtered by the enemies inside when I attempted this strategy just now because I forgot to give him a leather shield. So I did that, and now I'm gonna try again. Shame, I got a nice speed level for Leon...

...Okay, in fairness, I got a way better level up for Palla when I tried this again. Everything but luck and res, which for SoV is... crazy. Let's hope I get to keep this one.

...Especially since this time Atlas managed to get attack and defense.

Damage is getting split between Atlas and Saber, mostly onto Saber except some of the enemies can't attack him, but I'm managing to keep both of them healthy between Genny's physic and Saber's gold dagger plenitude. Also, I'm bringing Kamui in to eat a few stray blows while Atlas and Saber do their best to take out these archers one by one.

We get a cell key from one of the enemies, because I guess Celica needs to get her hands on one of these things too. I hardly see the point of making this a key item, considering it didn't stop us from doing anything earlier.

And now Saber's gotten a defense level 2, bringing them both to 11 (when Atlas has a leather shield at least). I think that means we're golden as long as I don't do anything monumentally reckless and stupid.

Aaaaand Atlas took Wolff out with a lucky crit!

Atlas got another defense proc! He's now at 9 defense without the shield! Sweeeeet!

...For a second I thought I had just ruined everything by accidentally putting Palla in range of two of the bowmen instead of one, but thankfully I forgot just how relatively low anti-flier bonuses are with most bows.

And now thanks to accidentally luring them all there, I've got all the remaining archers and snipers cornered between Atlas and Saber so that nobody can run off to heal!

Atlas gets HP, skill, speed and defense again. Okay, I think that tears it, Atlas is officially my best swordfighter. I am loving this outcome here, even if getting here was really frustrating and boring.

Alright. So now we get to see Grieth, who's got an eyepatch and a green beret, which is a curious choice for a dread fighter, but on its own as a portrait it looks good.

I love how freaked out Grieth is that “Wolff lost to a girl and some CHILDREN”. Like, just hearing the lackey describe Celica's group, and the fact that it's literally just the guys we're playing as, reminds me how hilariously tiny Celica's fighting force is. It makes it kinda jarring when juxtaposed with Alm's route, where the enemies are on a larger scale than they appear, but not to the same degree that Alm's army is. Remember the stuff where I mentioned how hypocritical it is of Celica to call Alm reckless? Yeah, I'm being reminded more of that. Celica is, comparatively, going up against way longer odds than Alm is without batting an eye.

Also, Grieth seems to know about what the mark on Celica's right hand means. Is that because of the woman from the royal family that he captured? Did she talk?

...Oh no, apparently he's heard that Desaix was looking for her.

...I always find it hilarious how much creative license voice actors always seem to take with laughter. Whenever it's anything other than “hahahahahaha”, it sounds nothing like the actual “line” suggests it should sound.

Grieth: Working with Desaix was good business for a while, but he's finished now.

Does that line change if you didn't kill him yet, or is “finished” just supposed to be interpreted in the other case as “he's doomed and has no chance of surviving”?

Grieth: ...But if I serve that girl up to Rigel on a silver platter... then even if they take over all of Zofia, we'll still be sittin' pretty.

...And yet again I find myself randomly made to think about a random fact that I always technically acknowledged as true without ever once thinking about it enough to notice the blindingly obvious implications of it.

This desert... is a part of Zofia.

It's in Mila's territory. It's below the Duma-Mila parallel.

Mila's domain is a land of blessings and plenty and bountiful harvests. And yet something like a fifth to a quarter of Zofia's landmass is a scorching barren desert. What's going on there?

But yeah, Deen and Sonya come up, and now I have to choose which one of them to fight, and which one to later recruit. But not right now. I'm heading into this fort and calling that a checkpoint for now.

Boey makes a comment about how his little house was so crowded with five people in it that he couldn't really wrap his head around Zofia Castle being anyone's “home”. He didn't outright say it, but it gave an impression of Celica's life in that castle being big and lonely and empty.

I'm talking to Saber, and I wonder why the stubble on the shaved sides of his head is a different color than both his top hair and his beard. Does he dye both his head hair and his beard?

...No, that can't be right, because unless his little sister (who he amusingly literally just mentioned after I noticed this) dyes her hair too, Saber's comment that his little sister “kinda looks like [Celica]” would be weird. So, what, is it the stubble that he dyes black? That's gotta be profoundly tedious and exhausting work.

Who is this young woman I'm talking to? Was she a forced servant of Wolff's? Is there some sort of castle town in this fort that's essentially run by the mafia?

Alright, found the Rion shield. Awesome.

And a splitting axe! Awesome! I've never found this thing before, and I see why, it really blends in to the supply room here.

Now for the dungeon.

Jesse's here. He's our third mercenary (fourth if you count Atlas), and... he shows up a biiiit late to be all that useful.

But yeah, he apparently got himself thrown in the dungeon here for trying to help out Est.

Funny how Jesse says “no sir” when talking to a woman.

...I find it even more hilarious that Jesse seems to consider Grieth so dangerous that it would be crazy even for Alm's canonically much-larger group to go after them. He doesn't suggest the Deliverance because he thinks they could do it, he suggests the Deliverance because he thinks they'd be up for it, because they're crazy. Even more evidence that Celica is even more reckless than Alm is for taking this on with her even smaller group.

Also, Jesse talks like this is some optional side-quest, when if you go to the Temple of Mila now, it'll become clear that you need to do this stuff to progress. What's the intended order of doing things here, exactly? Narratively, canonically I guess, how is this route split intended to be tackled? Logically it would make sense for her to make a beeline for the Temple of Mila when it's just over the hill. If she refused to make a detour that would protect the lives of herself and her friends due to the fate of the country just being that at stake, it feels weird that Celica would go on this massive desert-bound campaign against Grieth when the temple of Mila is just a couple of battles away.

And yet gameplaywise, the encounter balancing seems to indicate you're supposed to tackle Grieth's stuff first. The enemy encounter and dungeon leading up to the Temple of Mila are a pretty huge jump from the stuff adjacent to them.

Anyway, back to Alm. Time to take out this sorcerer reinforcement again and then fight this bow knight troop.

I'm gonna have Kliff take care of this again, mostly to get him some training to unlock hunter's volley. Also, uh, nobody else in my army is really properly equipped to deal with an army of mages, so...

...Skillsauce level for Kliff. At this point, I'm kinda past caring. Like with FE12 Dakota, despite his routinely disappointing level ups, he wound up being amazing in the end.

Also, Kliff looks really cool in black. I'm glad that's his color for his armor. At least in the cav and archery lines. Dunno about mage.

Tobin gets HP and speed, which is fine, that'll help him double a little longer. He only needs one more level and I'll get another physic user.

Alright, proper bow knight battle time.

...And... it's a mess of archers and witches! Groovy, another one where the most sensible option is to have Kliff steamroll everything, because this is a map full of nothing but units I hate to deal with using anyone else. Honestly, this is kinda cathartic after the shit in the desert.

HP and speed for Kliff. I'm fine with that at the moment.

Speaking of the contrast between that last map, instead of a boss named after a predator... we get a boss named after prey. Fitting.

And now Kliff has hunter's volley! Awesome, it only took one and a half maps! ...One and a half maps fed entirely to him, but one and a half maps nonetheless.

Anyway, with the boss dead and hunter's volley obtained, I used a bunch of warp shenanigans (including having Faye rescue Silque closer to the warpee) in order to get Tobin some kills on the retreating archers. Bonus exp topped him off. One more heal and he'll be a physic user.

Now then... time for a cutscene at Rigel castle. And Rudolf is giving Berkut shit for his idiotic battle with Alm. But Rudolf and Jedah seem to be genuinely surprised that Berkut lost, like that was the shameful thing, and not attempting the battle in the first place.

But yeah, he gets a second chance to redeem himself, and...

...Honestly, I would love to get, like, any insight to what's going through Rudolf's head right now. A huge part of why Berkut is so messed up is because he's been brought up thinking that he's going to be king of Rigel, a position that Rudolf is essentially leading him on about, and now he's making Berkut feel like he's an immense disappointment for failing at a task that Rudolf doesn't want anyone to succeed at. Does he feel guilty about this? Did he have opportunities to make Berkut a more well-adjusted person, or be less of a shit to him, that he felt forced to knowingly pass up on because the Duma Faithful were watching him like a hawk during his convoluted and idiotically roundabout plans for deicide? Does he feel torn up later about making what he knows are his last words to Berkut essentially a denouncement of him as a worthless failure? I wish we had literally any insight into this.

...That said, I don't really see Berkut as a tragic figure. I'm quite certain his vocal performance is the only reason anyone likes him at all. A lot of this lines are so wangsty and dumb that I could easily picture Prequel Anakin Skywalker saying them. And Rinea doesn't help, because, well... like people have said, I don't really get any impression of why she likes him. No sense of what human elements of him she sees that charm her so, and why she forgives him for doing... that thing he does at the end. I think it doesn't help that she literally gets absolutely no scenes where she isn't in his presence and talking to him, so we never hear her talking about Berkut to someone else.

Yes, I am genuinely suggesting that a character is so shallow and worthless that adding in a type of scene that has been memed to death and immortalized by the concept of the Bechdel Test... would have been a significant improvement to her character. Those are the levels of “satellite love interest” that we are dealing with here, people.

Anyway...

Nuibaba comes in, who is significantly hotter this time around than she was in Gaiden, amusingly. Doesn't “baba” mean something like “old witch”? I imagine she wasn't born with that name, so it feels like a weird name for her to take on, given that she literally does human sacrifice to preserve her youth.

...Honestly, I'm finding Nuibaba's overtly flirtatious dialogue... weirdly charming. Like she has a rather amusing way with words that I don't get from other characters of the type. Also, it feels like she's using it to mock people even while she's flirting with them, like, in the sense that she's demonstrating she's so unintimidated by Berkut that she's just making sex jokes in response to everything this guy says. She knows she's getting under Berkut's skin, and she loves it.

Also, I like Berkut's line that points out that the “Duma Faithful” are basically in complete violation of everything that the sane Duma originally stood for, given that they're borrowing power from someone else by kissing Duma's ass and depending on him. “He wished for men to be strong! Not a pack of supplicating fools.”

But Berkut's pride has been wounded enough to just barely coax him into taking Nuibaba's magic mirror along. “Just in case”.

Aaaand that's it for today. I've gotta finish up and proofread this quickly, I'm out of time.

Tomorrow we storm the sluice gate.

Stay safe, everyone!

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3 hours ago, lenticular said:

That's my point, though. They're not that great if you're doubling. They're considerably better if you're not doubling. Let's say you're Lukas and your speed is garbage. You go to attack something but because you are so slow, you aren't able to double. In fact, you're probably going to get doubled. You have the option of doing a regular attack or using Tempest Lance with the steel lance that you're holding. Provided that you can afford the hp cost, Tempest Lance is just plain better and will do more damage. Now let's say that you're Clair and you have really great speed. You also have a steel lance and the option of using Tempest Lance, but because you're fast you can just do a regular double attack instead. Now, sometimes you will want to use Tempest Lance because the numbers line up better but most of the time you're going to want to double attack instead. That is to say, the existence of combat arts gives a bigger buff to slow units than it does to fast units. This narrows the gap between slow units and fast units, which I consider a good thing. Fast units are still better, but they're not as much better than they would be without combat arts.

Well yeah, but unless you're going up against a Dread Fighter or using Lukas (who has, I think, the worst class in the game by a pretty large margin), you probably are going to be doubling the enemy. I have no issue with combat arts in general, like I said I thought they worked excellently in Three Houses where I feel the stat lines work out better. Because rarely will the extra damage from combat art in Shadows of Valentia actually matter, as it's not about how much damage you do in any given attack, it's really about how many attacks you need to take down an enemy. There are of course exceptions with some combat arts that are so crazy good they probably will make a difference, like Tigerstance. Tempest Lance is a pretty good middle of the road combat art, but it still has the issues I've mentioned before with how it's tied into the weapon system. By the time you get Tempest Lance on a Steel Lance you're probably about ready to upgrade to a Silver Lance for permanent increase to attack and hit on every attack, and not just certain player phase ones. I think combat arts are great and a better mechanic than proc skills in most cases, but I do think there are some issues without how they were designed and implemented into Shadows of Valentia.

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30 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

...And yet again I find myself randomly made to think about a random fact that I always technically acknowledged as true without ever once thinking about it enough to notice the blindingly obvious implications of it.

This desert... is a part of Zofia.

It's in Mila's territory. It's below the Duma-Mila parallel.

Mila's domain is a land of blessings and plenty and bountiful harvests. And yet something like a fifth to a quarter of Zofia's landmass is a scorching barren desert. What's going on there?

Don't know if it's said in-game, but the Valentia Accordion says the desert is expanding precisely because Mila is no longer blessing the land. Normally it'd be much smaller and likely a non-issue.

There's no indication the desert was larger before Mila arrived, so it's likely the desertification is simply backslash of the land being blessed for centuries then it suddenly got cut off. So it's not the land returning to its original state.

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12 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Don't know if it's said in-game, but the Valentia Accordion says the desert is expanding precisely because Mila is no longer blessing the land. Normally it'd be much smaller and likely a non-issue.

There's no indication the desert was larger before Mila arrived, so it's likely the desertification is simply backslash of the land being blessed for centuries then it suddenly got cut off. So it's not the land returning to its original state.

I haven't seen that said in game, which is a shame because it's an interesting concept.

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9 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

I haven't seen that said in game, which is a shame because it's an interesting concept.

There's alotta stuff I wish they went into.

Hell they even introduce a new powerful seemingly evil character with Medusa (Who Nuibaba actually gave her soul to) and they're just dropped right away. (Who knows maybe they were setting up Awakening 2 or something.)

And I've said before how much I wish we got an epilogue about how Valentia/Archanea interacted after the war. (I'd much prefer that to what we actually got.)

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2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

...I find it even more hilarious that Jesse seems to consider Grieth so dangerous that it would be crazy even for Alm's canonically much-larger group to go after them. He doesn't suggest the Deliverance because he thinks they could do it, he suggests the Deliverance because he thinks they'd be up for it, because they're crazy. Even more evidence that Celica is even more reckless than Alm is for taking this on with her even smaller group.

This is pretty hilarious considering he went after them alone (which, of course, went about as well as you'd expect).

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30 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

...And yet again I find myself randomly made to think about a random fact that I always technically acknowledged as true without ever once thinking about it enough to notice the blindingly obvious implications of it.

This desert... is a part of Zofia.

It's in Mila's territory. It's below the Duma-Mila parallel.

Mila's domain is a land of blessings and plenty and bountiful harvests. And yet something like a fifth to a quarter of Zofia's landmass is a scorching barren desert. What's going on there?

 

That is a really odd design choice now that you point it out. It's even really close to Mila's Temple. The desert is practically her own backgarden. Maybe she's...fond of sand? Or maybe it's a byproduct of the massive sluice going across the country? Does that make geological sense (I mean in a world in which we can conceive of a sluice that big spanning across an entire continent, seriously that's such a massive industrial endevour it puts the Panama Canal to shame if Valentia is meant to be anything other than a remote island *cough* *cough*)

30 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

 

Boey makes a comment about how his little house was so crowded with five people in it that he couldn't really wrap his head around Zofia Castle being anyone's “home”. He didn't outright say it, but it gave an impression of Celica's life in that castle being big and lonely and empty.

I'm talking to Saber, and I wonder why the stubble on the shaved sides of his head is a different color than both his top hair and his beard. Does he dye both his head hair and his beard?

...No, that can't be right, because unless his little sister (who he amusingly literally just mentioned after I noticed this) dyes her hair too, Saber's comment that his little sister “kinda looks like [Celica]” would be weird. So, what, is it the stubble that he dyes black? That's gotta be profoundly tedious and exhausting work.

 

People have streaks. It's not common, but it's possible. Though makes one wonder what he'd look like if he grew his hair out. Really though I think it's just meant to be stubble colour. His heroes artwork has it a bit longer and a bit more maroon.

 

30 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Also, Kliff looks really cool in black. I'm glad that's his color for his armor. At least in the cav and archery lines. Dunno about mage.

 

This reminds me, I have a vague recollection of someone saying there's a pink pegasus in the game for some female's class change that's only possible with the Pitchfork. Can anyone confirm if this is true? I guess Mae would make the most sense, but it is possible my brain just conjured this idea up randomly.

30 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

Tobin gets HP and speed, which is fine, that'll help him double a little longer. He only needs one more level and I'll get another physic user.

Alright, proper bow knight battle time.

...And... it's a mess of archers and witches! Groovy, another one where the most sensible option is to have Kliff steamroll everything, because this is a map full of nothing but units I hate to deal with using anyone else. Honestly, this is kinda cathartic after the shit in the desert.

HP and speed for Kliff. I'm fine with that at the moment.

Speaking of the contrast between that last map, instead of a boss named after a predator... we get a boss named after prey. Fitting.

And now Kliff has hunter's volley! Awesome, it only took one and a half maps! ...One and a half maps fed entirely to him, but one and a half maps nonetheless.

Anyway, with the boss dead and hunter's volley obtained, I used a bunch of warp shenanigans (including having Faye rescue Silque closer to the warpee) in order to get Tobin some kills on the retreating archers. Bonus exp topped him off. One more heal and he'll be a physic user.

 

With all the back and forth between the two characters and this game not having traditional chapter numbers, I think you're going to have to drop a reminder of which map you're on, because I really can't remember now. You fought Desaix last time with Alm, right?

30 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

...That said, I don't really see Berkut as a tragic figure. I'm quite certain his vocal performance is the only reason anyone likes him at all. A lot of this lines are so wangsty and dumb that I could easily picture Prequel Anakin Skywalker saying them. And Rinea doesn't help, because, well... like people have said, I don't really get any impression of why she likes him. No sense of what human elements of him she sees that charm her so, and why she forgives him for doing... that thing he does at the end. I think it doesn't help that she literally gets absolutely no scenes where she isn't in his presence and talking to him, so we never hear her talking about Berkut to someone else.

Yes, I am genuinely suggesting that a character is so shallow and worthless that adding in a type of scene that has been memed to death and immortalized by the concept of the Bechdel Test... would have been a significant improvement to her character. Those are the levels of “satellite love interest” that we are dealing with here, people.

 

Yeah, honestly while I don't hate her (because there's sod all to actually hate), I think Rinea might just be in the contender for the worse Fire Emblem Character in the entire series. She has about as much characterization as an average random chapter boss.

 

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2 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Don't know if it's said in-game, but the Valentia Accordion says the desert is expanding precisely because Mila is no longer blessing the land. Normally it'd be much smaller and likely a non-issue.

There's no indication the desert was larger before Mila arrived, so it's likely the desertification is simply backslash of the land being blessed for centuries then it suddenly got cut off. So it's not the land returning to its original state.

It's nice to have a throwaway expalnation rather than nothing (well usually), but that is quite clearly a throwaway explanation. We're that actually the case, then people would be freaking out a lot more about it, because three years (I think that's how long it's been since Mila was sealed, maybe less, but certainly not more) is a crazy short amount of time for such a high level of desertification. That's like super worrying and should have been the first indicator to Celica that Mila is no longer around.

(double post because I can't edit the post I made like two seconds ago)

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6 minutes ago, Jotari said:

With all the back and forth between the two characters and this game not having traditional chapter numbers, I think you're going to have to drop a reminder of which map you're on, because I really can't remember now. You fought Desaix last time with Alm, right?

No, last time with him I did the shrine after that. I just did the battle right before the sluice. Sorry for not being clearer, that's a good point!

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7 minutes ago, Jotari said:

That is a really odd design choice now that you point it out. It's even really close to Mila's Temple. The desert is practically her own backgarden. Maybe she's...fond of sand? Or maybe it's a byproduct of the massive sluice going across the country? Does that make geological sense (I mean in a world in which we can conceive of a sluice that big spanning across an entire continent, seriously that's such a massive industrial endevour it puts the Panama Canal to shame if Valentia is meant to be anything other than a remote island *cough* *cough*)

This reminds me, I have a vague recollection of someone saying there's a pink pegasus in the game for some female's class change that's only possible with the Pitchfork. Can anyone confirm if this is true? I guess Mae would make the most sense, but it is possible my brain just conjured this idea up randomly.

There's a mountain range between the temple and the desert. Though the desert is kinda encroaching the patch of forest in the north patch between the mountains and the coastline that leads to the temple from the east. Maybe she can bless already arable land, but perhaps a desert is out of her scope? It's not stated she actually directs the weather too, right? Since it's of little use to make the desert land fertile if the lack of precipitation keeps it arid anyway... and all the sand around...

If there is, I guess that explains this Cipher card:

c1pvb00ls2o21.png

4 minutes ago, Jotari said:

It's nice to have a throwaway expalnation rather than nothing (well usually), but that is quite clearly a throwaway explanation. We're that actually the case, then people would be freaking out a lot more about it, because three years (I think that's how long it's been since Mila was sealed, maybe less, but certainly not more) is a crazy short amount of time for such a high level of desertification. That's like super worrying and should have been the first indicator to Celica that Mila is no longer around.

(double post because I can't edit the post I made like two seconds ago)

To be honest, we don't know what would be the desert's original size. To know if it has expanded enough for people to panic. But then, eastern Valentia has always been the remote half of the land. The desert might not receive as much attention as the war, the rest of the land becoming blighted, the rise in bandit and pirate raids, etc.

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2 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

There's a mountain range between the temple and the desert. Though the desert is kinda encroaching the patch of forest in the north patch between the mountains and the coastline that leads to the temple from the east. Maybe she can bless already arable land, but perhaps a desert is out of her scope? It's not stated she actually directs the weather too, right? Since it's of little use to make the desert land fertile if the lack of precipitation keeps it arid anyway... and all the sand around...

A more sensible explanation would be that she's not blessing the land because of her sealing, but because of her madness (so that gives a much larger time frame for the desert to grow, still though something people should be a bit concerned about.). In otherwords Mila is too high to notice the guys thumb blocking out that portion of the map whenever she looks at the scroll deciding what part of the land to bless.

2 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

If there is, I guess that explains this Cipher card:

c1pvb00ls2o21.png

 

Maybe my memory is coming from someone talking about the cipher card rather than it being in the game. Is that Mae or Genny? The hairstyle looks more like Genny, but it's as pink as Mae's and the overall attitude screams Mae.

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1 hour ago, Jotari said:

Maybe my memory is coming from someone talking about the cipher card rather than it being in the game. Is that Mae or Genny? The hairstyle looks more like Genny, but it's as pink as Mae's and the overall attitude screams Mae.

That's Genny. Mae has pigtails, and Genny tends to wear that hair ribbon.

Certainly, Cipher tends to make Genny's hair pinker, like so:

Genny | Wiki | Anime, Manga y Juegos de Japón Amino

Edited by Acacia Sgt
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5 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

I'm talking to Saber, and I wonder why the stubble on the shaved sides of his head is a different color than both his top hair and his beard. Does he dye both his head hair and his beard?

...No, that can't be right, because unless his little sister (who he amusingly literally just mentioned after I noticed this) dyes her hair too, Saber's comment that his little sister “kinda looks like [Celica]” would be weird. So, what, is it the stubble that he dyes black? That's gotta be profoundly tedious and exhausting work.

It's anime hair, dude. Don't try to make sense of it.

5 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Also, Kliff looks really cool in black. I'm glad that's his color for his armor. At least in the cav and archery lines. Dunno about mage.

Always black.

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/fireemblem/images/7/74/Kliff_Sage.png/

5 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

...Honestly, I would love to get, like, any insight to what's going through Rudolf's head right now. A huge part of why Berkut is so messed up is because he's been brought up thinking that he's going to be king of Rigel, a position that Rudolf is essentially leading him on about, and now he's making Berkut feel like he's an immense disappointment for failing at a task that Rudolf doesn't want anyone to succeed at. Does he feel guilty about this? Did he have opportunities to make Berkut a more well-adjusted person, or be less of a shit to him, that he felt forced to knowingly pass up on because the Duma Faithful were watching him like a hawk during his convoluted and idiotically roundabout plans for deicide? Does he feel torn up later about making what he knows are his last words to Berkut essentially a denouncement of him as a worthless failure? I wish we had literally any insight into this.

Berkut is a mistake.

5 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Doesn't “baba” mean something like “old witch”?

It means something like "old woman".

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Or it's Baba from the Old Russian sorceress/fortune-teller. Like in Baba Yaga.

In Gaiden Nuibaba was a man so... eh... *shrugs*

Edited by Acacia Sgt
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7 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Isn't Baba Yaga also a really old woman?

Yes, but is not named Baba because of it. Not back then at least. Although Grandmother / Babushka is derived from it. And the word today is more used in that sense too, though not in a nice way or so.

Edited by Acacia Sgt
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18 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Or it's Baba from the Old Russian sorceress/fortune-teller. Like in Baba Yaga.

In Gaiden Nuibaba was a man so... eh... *shrugs*

Well, probably?

Nuibaba_2.png

It's not like a such a mug is wildly conforming to either gender streotype. I agree it probably was meant to be a man give the Arcanist class (swapped to Witch in Echoes), but of all the characters in the series to give a gender swap to, it's by far the most tame. Actually I wonder how the character was handled in the Novel. As far as I can remember, the manga skips over Fear Mountain entirely.

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13 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Well, probably?

Nuibaba_2.png

It's not like a such a mug is wildly conforming to either gender streotype. I agree it probably was meant to be a man give the Arcanist class (swapped to Witch in Echoes), but of all the characters in the series to give a gender swap to, it's by far the most tame. Actually I wonder how the character was handled in the Novel. As far as I can remember, the manga skips over Fear Mountain entirely.

From what I gather, in Gaiden Nuibaba is referred to in third-person with かれ, which is exclusively a male pronoun. Or at least, in modern usage it means "boyfriend".

http://web.archive.org/web/20040410031856/http://homepage1.nifty.com/miruka/fe/fe2/talk_04.html

Gaiden's Ch4 script.

Edited by Acacia Sgt
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3 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

If there is, I guess that explains this Cipher card:

This card is super well-done, and it makes me super-uncomfortable.

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Yes, I am genuinely suggesting that a character is so shallow and worthless that adding in a type of scene that has been memed to death and immortalized by the concept of the Bechdel Test... would have been a significant improvement to her character. Those are the levels of “satellite love interest” that we are dealing with here, people.

Rinea has, like, one moment of agency. Where she mentions that she abhors violence, at the end of Act I. She leaves with Berkut shortly after, but it's unclear whether her feelings influenced Berkut's decision.

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

That is a really odd design choice now that you point it out. It's even really close to Mila's Temple. The desert is practically her own backgarden. Maybe she's...fond of sand? Or maybe it's a byproduct of the massive sluice going across the country? Does that make geological sense (I mean in a world in which we can conceive of a sluice that big spanning across an entire continent, seriously that's such a massive industrial endevour it puts the Panama Canal to shame if Valentia is meant to be anything other than a remote island *cough* *cough*)

They also established that Terrors become more frequent the closer one gets to Mila. Which seems totally backward, when their greatest banes are "blessed" weapons, and holy magic like Seraphim.

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Also, Jesse talks like this is some optional side-quest, when if you go to the Temple of Mila now, it'll become clear that you need to do this stuff to progress. What's the intended order of doing things here, exactly? Narratively, canonically I guess, how is this route split intended to be tackled? Logically it would make sense for her to make a beeline for the Temple of Mila when it's just over the hill. If she refused to make a detour that would protect the lives of herself and her friends due to the fate of the country just being that at stake, it feels weird that Celica would go on this massive desert-bound campaign against Grieth when the temple of Mila is just a couple of battles away.

I kinda hate this design. The "head priestess" being captured by Grieth makes the Mila Cult look even more incompetent. Plus, it transforms a "sidequest to save east Zofia, and gain crucial allies" into an "obligation to proceed with the mission". It... was optional in Gaiden, right?

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

...That said, I don't really see Berkut as a tragic figure. I'm quite certain his vocal performance is the only reason anyone likes him at all. A lot of this lines are so wangsty and dumb that I could easily picture Prequel Anakin Skywalker saying them. And Rinea doesn't help, because, well... like people have said, I don't really get any impression of why she likes him. No sense of what human elements of him she sees that charm her so, and why she forgives him for doing... that thing he does at the end. I think it doesn't help that she literally gets absolutely no scenes where she isn't in his presence and talking to him, so we never hear her talking about Berkut to someone else.

It's possible for a character to be tragic, without being sympathetic. Which is what I would say Berkut is. The bad system he grows up in fosters his terrible attitude, which leads into his fate.

7 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Mila's domain is a land of blessings and plenty and bountiful harvests. And yet something like a fifth to a quarter of Zofia's landmass is a scorching barren desert. What's going on there?

Ah, but there are animals and plants that can only thrive in the deserts! Perhaps Mila thought of the cacti when moulding Zofia?

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5 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Was it? I can't remember.

Apparently not. The Wiki says it was required in the original Gaiden - I was mistaken. So this aspect was faithful to the original, but I'm still not a fan of it, in terms of design or story.

Edited by Shanty Pete's 1st Mate
Typo.
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Indeed. The only big differences is that Irma is not named, and Celica promotes right there in Greith's Citadel. I think the whole explanation of the circlet also happens there instead of the Temple.

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

This card is super well-done, and it makes me super-uncomfortable.

They also established that Terrors become more frequent the closer one gets to Mila. Which seems totally backward, when their greatest banes are "blessed" weapons, and holy magic like Seraphim.

I kinda hate this design. The "head priestess" being captured by Grieth makes the Mila Cult look even more incompetent. Plus, it transforms a "sidequest to save east Zofia, and gain crucial allies" into an "obligation to proceed with the mission". It... was optional in Gaiden, right?

Haha, because of Genny's expression and the fact she took down a Gargoyle?

I think it's more because where she is rather than she herself.

To be fair, that is meant to highlight the problem Zofia has at large. That with Mila providing and catering to their needs, they become decadent and spoiled. That's why Lima IV ended up how he is, why Mila herself didn't do anything to stop him, and the fact that when Rudolf came knocking the clerics did nothing but cower behind Mila. The incompetency is Zofia's design flaw.

Edited by Acacia Sgt
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49 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

They also established that Terrors become more frequent the closer one gets to Mila. Which seems totally backward, when their greatest banes are "blessed" weapons, and holy magic like Seraphim.

This is admittingly a head-canon but I got the impression that since Mila is the Earth Mother and technically plants are a living organism of some kind, that Mila's power to essentially "give life" to crops more easily in the soil also has the unfortunate side-effect of giving life to any dead there, hence Terrors AKA: Zombies.

So sure it gives more crops but it also in a twisted way gives "Life" back to corpses. 

Probably gives people who follow Mila more reason to learn/create means of dealing with terrors too, you'd probably make Seraphim a spell you teach your clerics alot when Shanty Pete's Parrot rises from the Dead for the 8th time that week and starts trying to peck the nearest person to death.

Edited by Samz707
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The thing about the Terrors is that they're showing up as a result of the Divine Accord being broken. Though Mila's connection with the land itself, which would include buried corpses, does make the idea her having a connection with Terrors to make sense.

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38 minutes ago, Samz707 said:

This is admittingly a head-canon but I got the impression that since Mila is the Earth Mother and technically plants are a living organism of some kind, that Mila's power to essentially "give life" to crops more easily in the soil also has the unfortunate side-effect of giving life to any dead there, hence Terrors AKA: Zombies.

So sure it gives more crops but it also in a twisted way gives "Life" back to corpses. 

Probably gives people who follow Mila more reason to learn/create means of dealing with terrors too, you'd probably make Seraphim a spell you teach your clerics alot when Shanty Pete's Parrot rises from the Dead for the 8th time that week and starts trying to peck the nearest person to death.

It's strange, then, that only the followers of Duma are shown to have the power to generate Terrors (which include Revenants, who are basically Zombies). Disciples of Mila can Invoke various soldiers, but those don't appear to be literal reanimated flesh-and-bone, so much as "ghosts in armor".

Ah, so that's where the cap'n's parrot went! He thoughts it met an end most grisly.

1 hour ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Haha, because of Genny's expression and the fact she took down a Gargoyle?

I think it's more because where she is rather than she herself.

Moreso that she's canonically 15, and dressed like... that. I know Pegasus Knights aren't allowed any thigh protection, but c'mon.

1 hour ago, Acacia Sgt said:

To be fair, that is meant to highlight the problem Zofia has at large. That with Mila providing and catering to their needs, they become decadent and spoiled. That's why Lima IV ended up how he is, why Mila herself didn't do anything to stop him, and the fact that when Rudolf came knocking the clerics did nothing but cower behind Mila. The incompetency is Zofia's design flaw.

Admittedly, this makes a fair amount of sense. Still, design-wise, I'd prefer if it were an optional sidequest, like Alm's trip to Fear Mountain in Act IV. In either case, the player can press ahead for a quicker finish, but misses out on certain units and items by doing so. Celica being required to fight Grieth might say something about her personality or attitude, but it's nothing that her decision to go after Barth didn't already show us. And, it's another case of the persistent "damsel-ification" of women in this game. And and, it makes the sluice-gate-keeper seem even more ridiculous in context. Sweet Mila, what I wouldn't give for Grieth to have kidnapped that jerk instead.

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