Branching support system

[Shinon.]

I thought it would be a neat idea if in future games if they decide to keep the avatar character they make it so supports actually have dialogue options that matter. So for instance if you say something a character really doesn't like you might cut off the support with them at B, but if you get along with them you can go all the way to S. The conversations would also change in future supports depending on what choice you picked. Obviously it won't happen due to the wish fulfillment aspect of the series now, they wouldn't be able to write a support with every single unit in the game which means you wouldn't be able to have a relationship with every unit in the game.

Edited February 16, 2020 by Shinon.

[eclipse]

First, it requires a lot of good writing to pull off.  Second, that's a lot of alternate conversations.  Third, I prefer NOT having dialogue boxes in the middle of a support.

[AnonymousSpeed]

37 minutes ago, eclipse said:

First, it requires a lot of good writing to pull off.  Second, that's a lot of alternate conversations.

 

1 hour ago, Shinon. said:

Obviously it won't happen

Acknowledging it as a wishful thinking type deal, I do think it would be kind of cool if the avatar, who is ostensibly supposed to reflect you, could actually reflect your opinions towards characters in conversations. It might be fun to be able to tell off characters you don't like or make an absolute fool of yourself for some giggles. I like things like that, and without them there really is no reason to have an avatar character.

[Ertrick36]

Here's what I think would be a most ideal for a FE branching support system, and why I think it wouldn't work and a lot of this is unrealistic wish fulfillment.

First, lemme just say that if branching supports were to apply to the series, they'd only apply to an avatar character - a main character that you create.  You should not be able to decide what characters with pre-established personalities say to other characters with pre-established personalities.  Duh, that's obvious.  But more than it allowing you to pervert the personalities of characters you didn't make, it has the potential to absolutely ruin a character's development, as the player may incidentally make choices that backpedal on their development or else the supports would be made "on budget", meaning that two roads would give you the same end.

Now, what I'd believe to be the best branching support system for an avatar... would be something out of an old-school RPG.  I'm talking Fallout 1 and 2.  You have lots of choices that aren't formulaic or systematic.  To give an example, let's say you find Setsuna from Fire Emblem: Fates caught in a snare trap in a support.  The conversation would start something like this:

Quote

Setsuna: Oh, hey [avatar name]...  What's going on?

• Avatar: What the hell are you doing in one of our own snares?
• Avatar: Hey, Setsuna, nothing much is going on.  How are you doing this afternoon?
• Avatar: How do I know you're Setsuna and not... I dunno, a wolf disguised REALLY well as Setsuna, or even a spy using magic?
• Avatar: [High strength check to rip the rope stringing her up apart and set her free] Well, good thing I was around...
• Avatar: If you give me a week's paycheck, I might consider freeing you.
• Avatar: You know... I don't even want to bother with this.  Goodbye... hopefully forever.

In the example above, you're given five very different starts to the conversation which could take it to different areas and gives you a lot of freedom to decide how you want to treat the character.  One even includes a stat check based on strength to allow your stats to help flavor and better characterize your avatar.

This would be the most ideal system, giving you seemingly limitless possibilities for how to define your character.  You could even choose to stop the pursuit of relationships with characters prematurely if you don't like them, and it could give the player much incentive to play through the game multiple times.

Now, the reason this isn't viable for the series may seem self-evident.  Firstly, this would create a massive workload for the development team for something that's really only a fraction of the actual game - it'd be a tremendous waste of time and resources.  Secondly, Fire Emblem has always traditionally had linear, book-ended stories - they start, proceed, and end in a predetermined way.  This would clash with the open-ended nature of an avatar such freedom in support dialogue - and worse, it might cause inconsistencies between the character you make your avatar into and the character the game wants you to be.

So with that said, I think it also stands as an example of why true-to-player avatars just aren't viable in Fire Emblem.  We ask for an avatar that represents what we see in an avatar of our own creation, but that goes against Fire Emblem's tradition of telling a grand story with an ultimate destiny at the end.  The best we get is Robin, who succeeds as an avatar-lite because they are only semi-present in the story and don't take the spotlight often - being presented as the second fiddle and support to Chrom, the actual main lord of the game - and has a personality that lends itself well to the ideal blank slate that's desired in an avatar.  And they accomplished that with no branching dialogue whatsoever.

Now, before I finish off, contrast the Robin approach with the Byleth approach.  Like I said, Robin does not have dialogue choices - they have predetermined dialogue for the story, and they have predetermined dialogue based on the supports they accrue with their allies.  Meanwhile, apart from some combat and level-up barks, Byleth only speaks in these dialogue branches - sometimes there's even only just one option.  Byleth is not allowed to be anything more than binary breadcrumbs of a character scattered throughout the game, naturally resulting in an emotionally stunted character that not very many will connect to.  There's obviously story reasons for Byleth being this way, but Byleth doesn't feel like an avatar because Byleth isn't really much of... anything.  Byleth feels more like a body you've taken possession of.  And perhaps they kind of wanted that, but it was the wrong approach... or it was a possessed body in the wrong way.  Instead of feeling like I was inserted into the story, I just felt like I controlled a reanimated corpse that occasionally talked.  Obviously not as grisly, but there was actually more of a disconnect with Byleth than there ever was with Robin.

 

To qualify what I've just said, I do enjoy playing as avatars in Fire Emblem games.  Despite what I may have implied, I do feel like an avatar connects me to the Fire Emblem worlds in a way that a predetermined character just doesn't quite do.  So when I say this, I'm not calling for a complete and total removal of avatars.  I'm just saying that while the idea of an avatar saying what you want them to say is nice, it strays too much from the focus of Fire Emblem games.  Fire Emblem's narrative never was about freedom to do what you want, it was about going on an adventure with an army to conquer your enemy through tactical prowess.  Even with the advent of the support system in Binding Blade, the main focus was still about building your armies to fight against those you don't trust.  As such, Fire Emblem doesn't need to have a narrative element that can be controlled by the player in any way.  So ultimately I think if Fire Emblem 17 is to have an avatar the avatar doesn't need to have branching supports.

TL;DR: Cool concept, but wouldn't work out because it takes away from the focuses that make Fire Emblem what it is.

[Ottservia]

so basically combine the support system with the 'reverse arcana' system in personas 3 and 4. That's actually not a bad idea like if you say something the character doesn't like then you won't gain support bonus's with them you reconcile. I like that idea

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

I was going to answer, but then I remembered - you're not the boss of me now. And you're not so big.

I could this being fun, if it's well-executed. Could take a lot of work to pull off, though.

[Shinon.]

On 2/16/2020 at 12:07 PM, Ertrick36 said:

First, lemme just say that if branching supports were to apply to the series, they'd only apply to an avatar character - a main character that you create.  You should not be able to decide what characters with pre-established personalities say to other characters with pre-established personalities.  Duh, that's obvious.  But more than it allowing you to pervert the personalities of characters you didn't make, it has the potential to absolutely ruin a character's development, as the player may incidentally make choices that backpedal on their development or else the supports would be made "on budget", meaning that two roads would give you the same end.

Yeah this is only for the avatar character, otherwise I think it would be pretty bad.

 

On 2/16/2020 at 12:07 PM, Ertrick36 said:

Firstly, this would create a massive workload for the development team for something that's really only a fraction of the actual game - it'd be a tremendous waste of time and resources.

I agree but maybe it could work if the options were more limited than your average CRPG, and the support count for the avatar was limited.

 

On 2/16/2020 at 12:07 PM, Ertrick36 said:

Secondly, Fire Emblem has always traditionally had linear, book-ended stories - they start, proceed, and end in a predetermined way.  This would clash with the open-ended nature of an avatar such freedom in support dialogue - and worse, it might cause inconsistencies between the character you make your avatar into and the character the game wants you to be.

Good point, I hadn't really thought of that. Maybe they could just make the avatar a plain tactician for the lord of the game and give them little to no main story interaction like Mark? I think an idea for that would be flavor text responses that don't affect the main story but do show off your personality a bit. At most you would be able to initiate what branch of the story you want to do if they go that route again.

[starburst]

I would go even further and make Support chains rely on chance. Want to play Cupid and marry Unit X to Unit Y? Fine, but X may reject Y, or vice versa. They may or may not be compatible as a couple. You know, as in real life. For a game that considers chance in every situation, it seems rather odd that romance is given and yet non-canon.

I remember that when I first played Conquest and units visited Cornflakes, I saw messages saying "unit X left in a good mood" (or something along those lines; I did not play it in English), and I thought that such interactions could also be negative; that Cornflakes or the unit could say something that would irritate the other and thus worsen the relationship.

[Samz707]

It could be neat.

If the avatar supports became less about (From what I've seen.) worshipping the avatar, maybe have a few "Trap" situations, where a character is going though something, you can say stuff that appeals to them but is actually terrible advice and it can backfire somehow.

While giving them actually good advice that they'll hate hearing, while it doesn't give you support points right away, turns out to benefit that person and their support later.