Seteth and Ingrid (and Crests) *minor spoilers*

[Tenzen12]

Which is exactly how it doesn't work. You don't attack Japan because it didn't do anything to stop China from becoming dictature and even if you do, it attack  Japan it will not help you make reforms in China. 

[Nihilem]

36 minutes ago, charcoalswift said:

The church didn't support the crest system but they also did not stop it. That is why the Flame emperor wants to overthrow the church, then true change can be made

That argument does not make any sense. The fisher from the next village also doesnt do anything to stop the crest system, but noone wants to overthrow him.

EDIT: Ok Tenzen Analogy for that is better 😅

The Flame Emperor wants to overthrow the church because he THINKS that they support the crest system. Which is as we know not entirely true, but he doesnt KNOW that.

Edited August 27, 2019 by Nihilem

[charcoalswift]

48 minutes ago, Nihilem said:

That argument does not make any sense. The fisher from the next village also doesnt do anything to stop the crest system, but noone wants to overthrow him.

EDIT: Ok Tenzen Analogy for that is better 😅

The Flame Emperor wants to overthrow the church because he THINKS that they support the crest system. Which is as we know not entirely true, but he doesnt KNOW that.

Lol what is tenzen analogy?😅

The Church of Seiros definitely has much power and authority than the average fisher guy from a village. It's the religion institute of 3 territories and all the nobles send their children to study at their monastery

When House Gautier got their relic stolen/ when Lonato rebelled in the kingdom/ when pirates attacked Derdriu, the nobles asked the church to solve their problems

As for the Flame Emperor's hatred for the church, it's also due to the archbishop Rhea being 

Spoiler

A dragon, something that is not quite a person pulling strings in human society.

 

[Tenzen12]

Not all nobles. Adrestia family didn't send anyone for three hundred years or so. 

Anyway having certain influence doesn't mean Church can orders nobles around. If they did that, THEN you would have reason calling that "pulling strings". 

ChoS isn't like Empire forcing its will on others and that's good thing, because humans should rule themselves given Sothis isn't around. 

Edited August 27, 2019 by Tenzen12

[Hardric62]

2 hours ago, Nihilem said:

 

Does not really sound like a whole lot of support of how the current system runs. Just because they dont do anything against it, doesnt mean they support it. 

 

Rhea has an army, and the supreme moral authority of the continent, and that scam has been on-going for one thousand years. There was time  and opportunities aplenty to squash out  that line of thought, long before it became the dominating one. In conditions like this, it is as the saying goes: "Silence means consent".

Worst, the Church's mythos has the archetypal case of this abuse 'Nemsis', opposed and destroyed. While nothing is done against the current houses descended from the 'heroes' who fought the archetypal bad guy. It builds an image of sanctioned Crest Use, and of condamnation when abuses are there. By not condamning, consent is explicit.

[Tenzen12]

Yeah Rhea has Army that doesn't mean she can order sovereign nations around. You are literally saying it's correct purge Church because it doesn't abuse its power evenif we assume it has actually enough power to abuse in first place). 

 

There is also nothing worth to be called scam and ChoS explicitly condemn misuse of crests. It's very core of its doctrine. 

Edited August 27, 2019 by Tenzen12

[Hardric62]

That's called 'excommunication', or whatever equivalent Foldan probably have, and all these sorts of tools associated to that, something which can most certainly use as the head of the continent's Church. And by 'scam', I mean the false explanation for Crests. She had hundreds of years to see the abuses cropping up and condemning them by putting the weight of the Church on the issue. Also, her army is already acting accross the entire continent with a near-blank check, often when locals begged for the intervention. And you can't have a Church able to negociate and enforce treaties between nations then say it cannot act like that. Medieval popes were doing more with way less power.

 

And by not enforcing this doctrine when the everyday abuse of the nobility cropt up with time, and not condemning them when they likely used the Crests of 'blessed heroes' as proof of a 'divine mandate' (it's a move as old as the pharaohs, of course it happened, and that the Church had to take a stance on something like that), they unofficialy aproved them by virtue of not acting against these practices. A law loses all meaning if you don't enforce it, and she had all the tools needed to do so, long before the rot became system-wide. This sort of things is why 'heresies' or new religion movances crop up.

[Tenzen12]

You should really decide we're you stand.

 

Do you want Church of Seiros who is led by someone "who is not quite person"  control everything  humans do... 

... Or do you want people be freed from this nebulous shadow ruller Rhea is supposed be? Because you can't have both

 

Anyway Crest system is something that developed independently on church and its doctrine. As long as crests bearers aren't right down ostracized it would end same way, because power always attract more piwer

[Hardric62]

I mean that: Rhea wants to enforce order on Foldan after Nemesis, that much she says, and by doing so she became Fodlan's de facto ruler, because enforcing an order accross an entire continent is ruling. The tools she chose were 'hands-off approach for everyday stuff', 'supreme moral authority', 'shaping the elite with my ultimate school', plus an army to squash things not going according to plan for when the other tools weren't enough (maintaining your own army is always a political statement of your possession of means of violence and the willingness to use them for your own goals). My problem is that she misused these tools, in part because of her personnality and emotional bagage, in part because the Aghartans were rocking the boat, leading to the current quagmire. She tried to rule in one way, and failed so badly that it ended in a continent-wide war.

 

And the Church became part of the Crest system the moment the creed 'Crests are Goddess' Gifts' was written and the central heroes of its central mythos Crest Bearers like Seiros, the Saints and the Elites. It associated Crests with the idea of 'Divine Mandate', and even pushed this idea forward with Nemesis' tale, by making Fodlan's current elite 'correct' Crest Bearers (see Marianne for treatment of people with no Goddess-sanctioned Crests), and then did absolutely nothing while the misuse developped and spread, over the centuries, implicitelt giving approbation to said abuses.

[Kanethedragon]

Pretty much to add my two cents, as people have been pointing out, yeah Rhea could have kept everything in line. Unfortunately she chose not to for whatever reason. As for the books in the library, 

Spoiler

To me those accounts are pretty fishy after having done GD. This is because on GD the 10 Heroes who “worked with Seiros to defeat Nemesis” were actually part of Nemesis’ gang all along, meaning Seiros’ allies in the war were just the saints. It’s hard to imagine Seiros would so easily approve of her followers lauding their enemy in the war as the good guy. Couple that with the choice words of having Nemesis go down as “The King of Liberation” instead of “A really strong and imposing thief and murderer”. I wanna say those books were instead placed there by Thomas/Solon/TWSITD and hidden whenever there was an inspection done. As such TWSITD created the church religion around the story they wanted to spin to use it as their foil for their comeuppance in the future. As for Rhea and Seteth, they just don’t know the full details of what the religion became and pressure from the Nobles to keep the system how it is resulted in Rhea acquiescing because she likely didn’t care what the people were doing and instead was too focused on trying to revive Sothis by making her experiment nun children, of which one went on to marry Jeralt. As such it led to things deteriorating to the point they have and thus Edelgard’s PoV, while not completely wrong (since the Church/Rhea were complicit in their own atrocities), it still isn’t necessarily correct because she didn’t have the full picture. Also doesn’t help that her only perspective into the church is whatever Arundel was feeding her and from what I hear about BL, we know that he’s effectively been replaced by Thales or a Slither pawn for quite a while now, couple that with all the other threads they have in the empire and elsewhere which probably largely served to result in the Empire’s separation from the church for quite some time.

But anyways, yeah it’d be nice to have a route where El and co. can just have a nice sit down and talk to each other about the problems they got and what they want to do. Literally that’s all there was to having a united front against Thales and co. and Dimitri probably could have tried to get with his childhood crush (even though they were technically 

Spoiler

Step siblings)

And Claude wouldn’t have to dorty his hands with the lives of innocents to pave a better future. And also Randolph and Ladislava would live too. Maybe even hook up and have a happy Fleche seeing her beloved brother grow more.

[dragonlordsd]

1 hour ago, Hardric62 said:

I mean that: Rhea wants to enforce order on Foldan after Nemesis, that much she says, and by doing so she became Fodlan's de facto ruler, because enforcing an order accross an entire continent is ruling. The tools she chose were 'hands-off approach for everyday stuff', 'supreme moral authority', 'shaping the elite with my ultimate school', plus an army to squash things not going according to plan for when the other tools weren't enough (maintaining your own army is always a political statement of your possession of means of violence and the willingness to use them for your own goals). My problem is that she misused these tools, in part because of her personnality and emotional bagage, in part because the Aghartans were rocking the boat, leading to the current quagmire. She tried to rule in one way, and failed so badly that it ended in a continent-wide war.

 

And the Church became part of the Crest system the moment the creed 'Crests are Goddess' Gifts' was written and the central heroes of its central mythos Crest Bearers like Seiros, the Saints and the Elites. It associated Crests with the idea of 'Divine Mandate', and even pushed this idea forward with Nemesis' tale, by making Fodlan's current elite 'correct' Crest Bearers (see Marianne for treatment of people with no Goddess-sanctioned Crests), and then did absolutely nothing while the misuse developped and spread, over the centuries, implicitelt giving approbation to said abuses.

A few factual points of contention:

First off, the reasons behind and timing of the founding of Garreg Mach I do not believe are correct in your account. I think it was more recent than you're making out. And further, if she's trying to "shape the elite with her ultimate school"... uh... she's failing horribly.

Second, you, like a lot of people making this line of arguement, are guilty of circular reasoning. And, I don't mean any offense by this, I just want to show you that this is a bit of a logical contradiction.

Your argument seems to be that:

A) Rhea enforces order through influencing the continent -> B) this is bad because she maintains a system that is oppressive -> C) She maintains this system by not enforcing enough order through influencing the continent

Which... does not work. Either A) Rhea has too much influence which is bad, but the whole nobility system based on crests is fine or B) The nobility system based on crests is evil, and Rhea does not have enough influence, because she should be changing that.

To break it down more clearly, are you arguing that:

Rhea should hold absolute power over human governments and forcefully stop the crest-based nobility system

or that she should not hold absolute power, and should allow the crest-based nobility system to exist

[Eryon]

Rhea is an ultimately lazy ruler. Her attitude towards Fodlan communicates that she didn't really wish to rule, just buy time for her mother (and perhaps her kind) to return.

Edelgard is in the line of Stalin, Thomas Jefferson, etc. Spreading mayhem, doom, and destruction (namely directed at the kulaks or Aboriginial Americans, or just Untermenschen) to create Heaven on Earth, ruled by their brand of new men. She's effectively a modernist conqueror.

[timon]

25 minutes ago, Eryon said:

Rhea is an ultimately lazy ruler. Her attitude towards Fodlan communicates that she didn't really wish to rule, just buy time for her mother (and perhaps her kind) to return.

Edelgard is in the line of Stalin, Thomas Jefferson, etc. Spreading mayhem, doom, and destruction (namely directed at the kulaks or Aboriginial Americans, or just Untermenschen) to create Heaven on Earth, ruled by their brand of new men. She's effectively a modernist conqueror.

lol sure, and what would the "untermenschen" be in Edelgard's view?

Because all I see is political motives, there's nothing (and I mean nothing at all) pointing to the fact that she has a "hierarchic" view of mankind, or to a "brand of new men". Quite the opposite, actually.

You're getting ridiculous mate, I get that she's a bit of a controversial character, but going out of your way to call her literally hitler or satan himself is definitely a bit much.

Edited August 27, 2019 by timon

[Hardric62]

6 minutes ago, dragonlordsd said:

A few factual points of contention:

First off, the reasons behind and timing of the founding of Garreg Mach I do not believe are correct in your account. I think it was more recent than you're making out. And further, if she's trying to "shape the elite with her ultimate school"... uh... she's failing horribly.

Second, you, like a lot of people making this line of arguement, are guilty of circular reasoning. And, I don't mean any offense by this, I just want to show you that this is a bit of a logical contradiction.

Your argument seems to be that:

A) Rhea enforces order through influencing the continent -> B) this is bad because she maintains a system that is oppressive -> C) She maintains this system by not enforcing enough order through influencing the continent

Which... does not work. Either A) Rhea has too much influence which is bad, but the whole nobility system based on crests is fine or B) The nobility system based on crests is evil, and Rhea does not have enough influence, because she should be changing that.

To break it down more clearly, are you arguing that:

Rhea should hold absolute power over human governments and forcefully stop the crest-based nobility system

or that she should not hold absolute power, and should allow the crest-based nobility system to exist

 

First point, Garreg March is indeed a 'newer' thing,  but it is still almost one thousand years old, time aplenty for someone near-immortal to use it as I said, especially when it is coupled with control of knowledge (removing books you don't like in your library). But the fact it failed horribly does lead to my big problem with Rhea.

Not that she wanted to rule Fodlan in one way, but that this rule was failing. She was holding this power, and failing to use it. From the moment she decided 'I want to shape that whole continent's destiny', she became accountable of the result.

Sothis crushed the Agarthans for being ducktards? Cool, they are pricks, only critic is that some of them survived.

Seiros shanking Nemesis? Bloody, but the ducktard deserved it.

With these issues hanging on her mind, Rhea/Seiros decided to shape Fodlan's society in a way that would ensure this shit never happened again and imposed order, progressively going with the tools I mentioned. Can't fault the intentions, but the end result... Rhea gave herself the missions and the tools to rule Fodlan, and what I'm judging is the end result.

The importance Crests took is a by-product of how she ruled, by co-opting Nemesis' surviving lieutenants, and making them a big part of her religion's main mythos, thus giving these Crest  Bearers an unofficial 'Divine Mandate'. Initial motive was very much stopping more wars by co-opting what was left of Nemesis' world rather than purging it all, while preserving what little was left of her fellow Children of the Goddess' 'legacy'. Well, that, and she also had to explain why her Crests and those of her fellow Saints were okay, lest you end with a result like Marianne, although that one is also a consequence of how she enforced some Crests. Marianne's is never mentioned, henceforth she is one of these 'Bad Crests Bearers's descendants as mentioned in holy books, and people are people when faced with something their religion tells them is evil.

To take the ABC approach that you did:

A) Rhea enforces order through influencing the continent (Alright for me)

B) The way she went at things lead to some misinterpretation warping her intentions (the way she 'presented' the Crest system is twisted by nobles, not even necessarily out of corruption at first, but wanting to cement their power, but it only goes downhill from there.).

C) She fails to use the tools she created for herself to correct B (My big problem. Shitty people subverted her construction, and she did jack shit to correct the mess, when she has this moral authority and an army to do so. Also, Immortal, she was literally there when the seeds of the problem began to appear and failed to do anything before the whole continent was infested).

Tl;dr My problem isn't the system chosen, it's the rot settling in because of other actors deciding to corrupt that system in their favor, and her absence of reaction.

[Eryon]

The "untermenschen" doesn't refer to what we call race today, at least not exclusively. The Soviets had their kulaks for one. In this usage, the untermenschmen is the enemy who through his actions or perhaps his mere presence stands in the way of the full emergence of the "free and equal" "new man", answering to none but their will, for a new, "better", world.See, the "better" world would already be here if it were not for "oppressors"  who represent the chains of tradition and history, and from whom the ubermenschmen must be emancipated.

That said, Edelgard yaps about monsters in human skin and building a world for humans.

Edited August 27, 2019 by Eryon

[Dalquist]

49 minutes ago, dragonlordsd said:

A few factual points of contention:

First off, the reasons behind and timing of the founding of Garreg Mach I do not believe are correct in your account. I think it was more recent than you're making out. And further, if she's trying to "shape the elite with her ultimate school"... uh... she's failing horribly.

Second, you, like a lot of people making this line of arguement, are guilty of circular reasoning. And, I don't mean any offense by this, I just want to show you that this is a bit of a logical contradiction.

Your argument seems to be that:

A) Rhea enforces order through influencing the continent -> B) this is bad because she maintains a system that is oppressive -> C) She maintains this system by not enforcing enough order through influencing the continent

Which... does not work. Either A) Rhea has too much influence which is bad, but the whole nobility system based on crests is fine or B) The nobility system based on crests is evil, and Rhea does not have enough influence, because she should be changing that.

To break it down more clearly, are you arguing that:

Rhea should hold absolute power over human governments and forcefully stop the crest-based nobility system

or that she should not hold absolute power, and should allow the crest-based nobility system to exist

I agree with this.  Another way to put it is that

Edelgard argues that Rhea actively enforced the crest system to control the nobility, and hence all of Fodlan.

Many of the posts here argue that the church took too passive a role and allowed the current crest system take hold.  This argument doesn't support Edelgard's views (though I it is still anti-church).

[dragonlordsd]

Just now, Dalquist said:

I agree with this.  Another way to put it is that

Edelgard argues that Rhea actively enforced the crest system to control the nobility, and hence all of Fodlan.

Many of the posts here argue that the church took too passive a role and allowed the current crest system take hold.  This argument doesn't support Edelgard's views (though I it is still anti-church).

Agreed.

@Hardric62 I find your points interesting as well, as your view points are not ones I've seen other people arguing, so I appreciate the clarification.

[Dalquist]

42 minutes ago, Hardric62 said:

To take the ABC approach that you did:

A) Rhea enforces order through influencing the continent (Alright for me)

B) The way she went at things lead to some misinterpretation warping her intentions (the way she 'presented' the Crest system is twisted by nobles, not even necessarily out of corruption at first, but wanting to cement their power, but it only goes downhill from there.).

C) She fails to use the tools she created for herself to correct B (My big problem. Shitty people subverted her construction, and she did jack shit to correct the mess, when she has this moral authority and an army to do so. Also, Immortal, she was literally there when the seeds of the problem began to appear and failed to do anything before the whole continent was infested).

Tl;dr My problem isn't the system chosen, it's the rot settling in because of other actors deciding to corrupt that system in their favor, and her absence of reaction.

 

Almost sounds like an impossible situation for Rhea.  The nobles that cemented their power were the former lieutenants in her army.  Without them how much power does she have left? Could she oppose them all and stop the corruption of the crest system?  We know the church army is powerful enough to subdue insurrections, situations where only 1 noble gets out of line.  I don't know if she has the power to go against all the nobles.  

Another thing to keep in mind is that the crest system has been successful at defending the continent from outside threats.  

I'm not arguing for the crest system.  Just suggesting that Rhea, as powerful as she is, may not have had the power needed to subdue the nobles, revolutionize the continent, and then also protect the continent from outside threats.

[Hardric62]

14 minutes ago, Dalquist said:

I agree with this.  Another way to put it is that

Edelgard argues that Rhea actively enforced the crest system to control the nobility, and hence all of Fodlan.

Many of the posts here argue that the church took too passive a role and allowed the current crest system take hold.  This argument doesn't support Edelgard's views (though I it is still anti-church).

 

This is pretty close to what I was going for. Rhea and the Church didn't react when rot and misinterpretation of their party line led to the current mess. And because Crests are also an important part of the Church's creed ('Gifts of the Goddess' is a pretty loaded thing to use in a holy book), so to the outside eye it looks like the Church is enforcing the system by virtue of making the Crests look so important and not chatising the abuses like they were in Nemesis' case. Yes, inexact, but it is what it boils down to in a way:

"The Church 'showed' how to act in front of misused Crests. If they are not doing that now, then clearly the system is working as intended." Corrupt noble using circular reasoning on the masses to comfort their power.

[Hardric62]

11 minutes ago, Dalquist said:

 

Almost sounds like an impossible situation for Rhea.  The nobles that cemented their power were the former lieutenants in her army.  Without them how much power does she have left? Could she oppose them all and stop the corruption of the crest system?  We know the church army is powerful enough to subdue insurrections, situations where only 1 noble gets out of line.  I don't know if she has the power to go against all the nobles.  

Spoiler

Euh, the Elites are very specifically Nemesis' lieutenants, that she spared probably both because it was convenient and because it kept alive in some way the memory of the CotG they butchered to get it.

And the problem would probably  have been more doable if it had been done progressively as these first deviations appeared rather than wait for them to become widespread.

 

Edit: Mea Maxima Culpa.

Edited August 27, 2019 by Hardric62

[Dalquist]

14 minutes ago, Hardric62 said:

Euh, the Elites are very specifically Nemesis' lieutenants, that she spared probably both because it was convenient and because it kept alive in some way the memory of the CotG they butchered to get it.

And the problem would probably  have been more doable if it had been done progressively as these first deviations appeared rather than wait for them to become widespread.

Wasn't it Nemesis against Seiros and the 10 elites?  I'm gonna stop here cause I suspect there will be spoilers if I dive into this any deeper (I've only completed 2.5 paths).

Edited August 27, 2019 by Dalquist

[Eryon]

The obvious alternative system Rhea could've tried if she was more concerned about ruling Fodlan would be to order the executions of Nemesis' followers alongside retrieving what crests she can so they can be kept within her control and those of the empire's ruling lineage.

Frankly, Judgral's Loptous provides a worthy model of governance to pursue (make a blood pact with a human who'll carry on your wish, seize his and his descendants bodies when needed, the otherwise human empire maintains their civilization on the continent). Rhea ultimately made feudalism when she should have made a divine monarchy with undivided power.

Edited August 27, 2019 by Eryon

[Nihilem]

52 minutes ago, Dalquist said:

Wasn't it Nemesis against Seiros and the 10 elites?  I'm gonna stop here cause I suspect there will be spoilers if I dive into this any deeper (I've only completed 2.5 paths).

Thats the official story line, yes. For what actually happened ... play church route.

Edited August 27, 2019 by Nihilem

[Dalquist]

1 hour ago, Nihilem said:

Thats the official story line, yes. For what actually happened ... play church route.

Hmm that's the first route I did.  I remember

Spoiler

 

1. Nemesis was a bandit who plundered the holy tomb and stole the crests then attacked Zanado. 

2. Rhea didn't know for sure how he got the Sword of the Creator. 

3. TWSITD like dubstep.

 

but I don't remember anything about the 10 elites being on Nemesis' side.  The truth is so spread out over each path I may have missed that.  To be clear I've completed both BE routes and am nearly done BL.

[timon]

33 minutes ago, Dalquist said:

Hmm that's the first route I did.  I remember

  Hide contents

 

1. Nemesis was a bandit who plundered the holy tomb and stole the crests then attacked Zanado. 

2. Rhea didn't know for sure how he got the Sword of the Creator. 

3. TWSITD like dubstep.

 

 

 

but I don't remember anything about the 10 elites being on Nemesis' side.  The truth is so spread out over each path I may have missed that.  To be clear I've completed both BE routes and am nearly done BL.

I'm pretty sure most of the information is in GD. Church route has a bit less info on the history but explains everything about Byleth.

Anyway, if you want to know:

Spoiler

10 (actually 11, with Maurice) elites were Nemesis's closest allies and warriors. Nemesis gave them the blood and hearts of dragons (eg. the crested bloodlines and the crest stones), and harvested weapons out of Sothis's body (which are the relics).

Seiros fought with her dragon people (children of the goddess or Nabateans), she and the other 4 saints survive to this day, everyone else was killed. Their crest bloodline exist because they shared their blood with some humans (in the case of Seiros it's the first emperor). That's also the reason there's no Seiros/Chicol/Cethleann/Indech/Macuil crest stone, since their hearts are still in place.

Seiros (Rhea) changed the story to create the religion basing it on the crests as divine gifts from the goddess to great heroes, thus the bloodlines are revered.

Now before all of this there's the conflict with Agartha (TWSITD ancestors, or "mole people"). They coexisted with Nabateans for a bit, then decided they wanted to be on their own and waged war. They lost, and to "heal the land" after that war Sothis had to use her power and then go ibernate. Nemesis is not actually Agarthean, he's just a random bandit who was manipulated by them, basically your average FE first chapter villain.