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Rank Fire Emblem Villains From Least To Most Moral


Jotari
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Most Morally Upstanding Villain  

37 members have voted

  1. 1. Most Morally Upstanding Villain

  2. 2. Most morally depraved villain



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So, who are the most and least evil among are villains in Fire Emblem? For the purpose of this poll I'm ignoring sub villains and focusing primarily on the final boss even though there's usually a Gharnef archtype or cult you defeat first that is really pulling the strings. Why? Well it just makes things more clear cut. The only exception to this is Elibe because lol the Fire Dragon and if Idoun was on the poll she'd obviously win the most moral award since she has no choice in her actions. So Zephiel and Nergal go on the poll. I'm also ignoring Three Houses because A)It's still new and I'm sure most people haven't played all of it and B) It's kind of a mess when it comes to any single villain at the end.

Spoiler

I mean I would put Thales there if I was forced to. But he doesn't actually do all that much and the game just pulls giant space fleas out of nowhere denying him even a place as a final boss.

 

Edited by Jotari
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Hmmm... this is a pretty hard one, but ultimately I have to go with Zephiel. If I remember the story correctly, while his ultimate goal is horrifying, he's doing it out of a genuine conviction that he's doing the right thing for the world, and attempting to right a genuine wrong in the process.

 

As for the worst, Fomortiis, mostly because, of the "literal satan"s on the list, he stuck out to me as a total psychotic, sadistic, petty douchebag, as Eirika's route demonstrates.

Edited by Alastor15243
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At least Ashnard was trying to fix monarchy. And, hell - he made the trains run on time.

Least... say what you will about FE7's failings, twisting the knife in Nergal felt good. Which isn't exactly the question, but ties in some way, at least.

Edited by Parrhesia
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1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Hmmm... this is a pretty hard one, but ultimately I have to go with Zephiel. If I remember the story correctly, while his ultimate goal is horrifying, he's doing it out of a genuine conviction that he's doing the right thing for the world, and attempting to right a genuine wrong in the process.

I rank Lehran as very moral for similar reason. He too does what he thinks is best for the world and the Beorc going out of their way to butcher a people they kinda knew were fully innocents gives him a very legitimate cause to feel that way. For Zephiel I kinda think the wrong he was fixing exists only inside his own wacky head but Lehran has a very strong example to point to when he wants to justify his plans. And even while scheming to destroy the world and start over he's still a really kind man. He dotes on Sanaki like a father would, he heals villagers for no benefit and he helped Ike forgot that ''accident'' because he wasn't ready to handle it, also without gaining anything by it himself. Him and Sanaki trying to reform the system likely wasn't an act either. 

But mostly I'd say Arvis or the Flame Emperor. The thing about them is that their goals are neither crazy nor wrong. No matter what prompted Lehran to do it he was still trying to destroy the world. The two fire emperors just wanted to make a batter world and try to do so by following ideals that aren't at all wacky, crazy or wrong. Arvis wants a world without persecution and the flame emperor a world without classicism. Neither are dishonest in this or fixing a problem that doesn't actually exit. And when left to their own devices they do end up creating a golden age. Arvis golden era doesn't last very wrong but that's because he was sabotaged rather than because his ideals were wrong. 

Edited by Etrurian emperor
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How is Ashera the main villain of Radiant Dawn, when she doesn't even get introduced into the plot until Part 4? If anything, the Begnion Senate/Army is the main villain since they are your opponents in Parts 1, 3 and 4.

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2 minutes ago, NinjaMonkey said:

How is Ashera the main villain of Radiant Dawn, when she doesn't even get introduced into the plot until Part 4? If anything, the Begnion Senate/Army is the main villain since they are your opponents in Parts 1, 3 and 4.

Well Sephiran is the main villain really and he's doing it all in the service of waking Ashera and have her carry out her judgement based on her own subjective morality.

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1 minute ago, NinjaMonkey said:

So why isn't he in the poll then?

Per what I said in the intro.

 

4 hours ago, Jotari said:

For the purpose of this poll I'm ignoring sub villains and focusing primarily on the final boss even though there's usually a Gharnef archtype or cult you defeat first that is really pulling the strings. Why? Well it just makes things more clear cut.

If I let Sephiran on then it becomes a question of Sephiran + Ashera? She's a thinking being too with her own morality. I include both, then what about Gharnef? What about Manfroy? What about Alvis? Garon, Jedah, Lyon, Lekain, Zelguis, Raydrik, Gangrel, Validar, Reptor etc. Suddenly the list is twice or three times the size as I'm trying to fit every major antagonist in the series on two polls where people can only vote for one option.

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Medeus in his Earth Dragon form certainly ranks rather highly knowing his backstory (humans abused dragons after all they did for them, his kind were warped into monsters who he agreed to watch forever). He's also notable in that he's NOT a threat to humans when it comes to maintaining themselves and ruling themselves (at least no more than an empire like the Romans or Umayyads). Indeed, he has plenty of alliances with human lands. While also having humans in his kingdom who show no fear of being devoured.

Edited by Eryon
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29 minutes ago, NinjaMonkey said:

I'm pretty sure you can have that many poll options, meaning that there's no reason not to.

The reason not to is dilution. I want to keep things focused by looking at specific, easily comparable characters.

17 minutes ago, Eryon said:

Medeus in his Earth Dragon form certainly ranks rather highly knowing his backstory (humans abused dragons after all they did for them, his kind were warped into monsters who he agreed to watch forever). He's also notable in that he's NOT a threat to humans when it comes to maintaining themselves and ruling themselves (at least no more than an empire like the Romans or Umayyads). Indeed, he has plenty of alliances with human lands. While also having humans in his kingdom who show no fear of being devoured.

I've made a thread about that. The worst thing he seems to be accused of is slavery, which is something the humans practice themselves at the time (Ogma was found in a slave pit after all, and Linde was under threat from slavers, though that was post invasion). Life under Medeus rule would likely be a somewhat harsh caste system with dragons on top, but humans free to do whatever they please so long as it doesn't disrupt that status quo. With maybe a mid tier caste for humans who actively serve and curry favor from the dragons like the humans in the Doluna army. All in all, not pretty, but not really worse than what the humans were doing to each other throughout most of the story. Only real difference between Michalis and Medeus is that one of them can transform into a dragon.

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1 hour ago, Eryon said:

Medeus in his Earth Dragon form certainly ranks rather highly knowing his backstory (humans abused dragons after all they did for them, his kind were warped into monsters who he agreed to watch forever). He's also notable in that he's NOT a threat to humans when it comes to maintaining themselves and ruling themselves (at least no more than an empire like the Romans or Umayyads). Indeed, he has plenty of alliances with human lands. While also having humans in his kingdom who show no fear of being devoured.

I think this trait doesn't make Medeus as sympathetic as if could have been because Medeus himself hardly seems to care about humans mistreating dragons. Its Xane who tells us Medeus thinks this way but Medeus never says or does anything to suggest he holds the beliefs Xane says he does. Even before he becomes a Dark Dragon he only speaks like the most generic evil overlord imaginable. 

Its possible Medeus got so corrupted he forgot about his original goal but there's also nothing in his dialogue to suggest that either. He's just an evil prick who got his actions excused by a third party who could be totally off base for all we know. 

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27 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I think this trait doesn't make Medeus as sympathetic as if could have been because Medeus himself hardly seems to care about humans mistreating dragons. Its Xane who tells us Medeus thinks this way but Medeus never says or does anything to suggest he holds the beliefs Xane says he does. Even before he becomes a Dark Dragon he only speaks like the most generic evil overlord imaginable. 

Its possible Medeus got so corrupted he forgot about his original goal but there's also nothing in his dialogue to suggest that either. He's just an evil prick who got his actions excused by a third party who could be totally off base for all we know. 

And if we counted people before they got corrupted...

 

Spoiler

Nergal, Anankos and Julius, and going by Echoes possibly even Grima, would rank much higher.

 

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Considering how neither Gotoh or Xane actively have a high stance on humans before meeting Marth (with Gotoh changing his attitude while Xane leaves no doubt he treats Marth separate) I fail to see how we shouldn't take Xane's word on Medeus' will. He certainly had the bulk of talking dragons behind him we meet in the games/

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Medeus ranks higher than Ashera for me on the level of morality, simply because the guy's entire species was wiped out and he had to watch over their sleeping/as good as dead bodies for eternity, essentially, in service of Naga's ideals which were proven (to his perspective) to be false, in that humans did not deserve to inherit the earth with how they acted. Ashera has essentially the same "humans (including laguz in this, they have basically the same role) do not deserve to be the dominant species" thing, but with less of a personal my-entire-species-was-destroyed-for-the-idea-that-humans-deserved-to-be-the-dominant-species bent to it.

For the most evil, Loptyr (for being pretty much entirely sane and doing All That) is far, far and away the worst.

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 Ashera is probably the least evil because she only wanted to wipe out everyone because they kept fighting each other.While it's a bit extreme it isn't destroying all life just because.  

An argument could indeed also be made for Duma, Anankos & Nergal because they only became super evil after dragon dementia or using to much dark magic.

Medeus also has a backstory that kind of justify his anger so he wouldn't also be a bad pick.

I think Grima is the most evil (maybe Formortiis but I honestly don't  remember much about him).  Julius was my first pick but then I remembered that he saved Ishtar once and was generally nice to her so I can't pick him.

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6 hours ago, Eryon said:

Considering how neither Gotoh or Xane actively have a high stance on humans before meeting Marth (with Gotoh changing his attitude while Xane leaves no doubt he treats Marth separate) I fail to see how we shouldn't take Xane's word on Medeus' will. He certainly had the bulk of talking dragons behind him we meet in the games/

I think this is the most salient point. Every single dragon in the game aside from the ones that join your army and that one Dragon King, are on Medeus's side. This either suggests A) Dragons lean more towards just being evil in general and our party members are exceptions B) Medeus is actually doing something for the dragons to make them want to join him. And recall, Medeus can't even leave his own castle. So it's not fear or anything like that. He has to send out generals like Morzas and Khozen to carry out his will.

4 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

 Ashera is probably the least evil because she only wanted to wipe out everyone because they kept fighting each other.While it's a bit extreme it isn't destroying all life just because.  

Still, there are other villains who have no intention of wiping out all life at all. About the only villain who wants to destroy everything other than her is Grima. I'm kind of surprised she's winning the most moral vote. She is literally wants to commit genocide on all sentient beings because they won't follow her rules. And she's even breaking the contract she made with the humans. She was woken by the Galedr, not War. That means she has to discuss the matter with Yune, but instead she just decides to nuke the entire population. I'd consider Ashnard more moral than her. At least he was trying to preserve some semblance of life and didn't have the arrogance to believe it was his place to judge the world solely from his rank. He also never revive the hypocrites that started this mess in the first place or created a zombie army that deeply disrupted the laws of nature.

Edited by Jotari
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4 hours ago, LJwalhout said:

I think Grima is the most evil (maybe Formortiis but I honestly don't  remember much about him).  Julius was my first pick but then I remembered that he saved Ishtar once and was generally nice to her so I can't pick him.

I was torn between Grima and Fomortiis too. I picked Fomortiis because we see him doing at least one thing more petty and needlessly sadistic than generic world conquest, specifically his treatment of Lyon in Eirika's route. I dunno, that personal touch of not only being evil incarnate, but also sadistically torturing a sympathetic and sweet character on screen for basically no reason beyond feeling like it, pushed him a little over Grima for me.

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50 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

I was torn between Grima and Fomortiis too. I picked Fomortiis because we see him doing at least one thing more petty and needlessly sadistic than generic world conquest, specifically his treatment of Lyon in Eirika's route. I dunno, that personal touch of not only being evil incarnate, but also sadistically torturing a sympathetic and sweet character on screen for basically no reason beyond feeling like it, pushed him a little over Grima for me.

To be fair though Grima has also been shown to use Robin’s body as a means of manipulating their kids’(I.e. Morgan) sympathies in order to use them as puppets to kill both their friends and sibling(if they have one) I’m not gonna say if it’s better or worse but it’s still kinda fucked up.

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I think it's remiss to not include Lyon on the list as he's just as much, if not more integral to driving the plot than the Demon King is. Fomortiis corrupted Lyon but it was Lyon that was the core of the emotional narrative. It was his drive to save Grado from a catastrophe that led him to trying and failing to master the dark stone. With this in mind, I would rank Lyon as one of the most moral antagonists, somewhat similar to the "the ends justify the means" villains like Arvis and [redacted] from TH. Granted, the actual villainy was Fomortiis but Lyon got the ball rolling.

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Most of the villains are evil for the sake of being evil, or because that's their nature (for the dark dragons). I'd say Duma is the worst because of his stupid spartan ideology. He's a worse Ashnard, pretty much.

The "most" "moral" villain would be.... Ashera, I guess. Mortals fucked up twice and she's having none of it, although it's still a messed up decision because it's not morally right to condemn everyone for the acts of evil men. The entire conflict was also rigged: It was mostly Lehran inciting a large scale conflict and giving wicked men the means to do their bidding. So, while not justified, her motivation is better than the rest's.

Edited by Rapier
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