Thinking about what advantages Beorc have over Laguz (lore-wise)

[Hanes]

(Skip to bolded, colored part if you want my theory right away)

As is with several works in media, humans are almost always depicted as weak fragile creatures, whose only real trait is intellect. If there's any other sentient race alongside humans, these almost always will mock humans for being weak/fragile and so on. It's a trope I'm honestly very tired of because from a biological standpoint there's much more that can be attributed to humans, like you can make thumbs play a role in biological advantages, or taller stature, etc, but it all gets thrown away in favor of the modern era of self-loathing.

FE9 and 10 are really not much different in that regard, for all intent and purposes it seems like Laguz are infinitely better than humans, they live longer, they have certain abilities that are practically lethal to humans, and their intellect never shows to be that much lower other than the fact that they never developed metallurgy but more so because they didn't need it.

This begs the question as to how Beorc haven't been completely extinct yet, as we do know that a long time ago, it was the Laguz that dominated the land, and then it was the Beorc that in-turn tamed them. And through some thinking I finally found it: It's the age at which they reach their peak form, being much sooner than that of Laguz. Several Laguz mention this, about how humans send "babies", presumably between their 20s-40s, to fight. Faster reproduction could be a factor too, thought really 9 months is quite slow compared to other animals, at least in our world.

But what do you think? Do you know of any other advantages Beorc hold over Laguz? I'm only halfway through FE9, so no major spoilers please.

Edited May 30, 2020 by This boi uses Nino

[eclipse]

No transformation gauge.  😛

A less troll-worthy answer is magic, something that laguz don't really have outside of dragons.  Another advantage is FE10 spoiler territory, so open this at your own risk.

Spoiler

Declining birth rate in dragons, along with years-long pregnancy.  In a Branded situation. the laguz parent loses far more than the beorc one.

 

[Hanes]

1 minute ago, eclipse said:

No transformation gauge.  😛

Oh shit, that's right 😛

1 minute ago, eclipse said:

A less troll-worthy answer is magic, something that laguz don't really have outside of dragons.

Oh right, not only do humans have magic, but they are not weak to it, I remember someone mentioning this in a forum, in fact while writing this I remembered I had seen sth somewhere. As for dragons, I see their fire breath as just their ability, like flying is to the hawks and ravens or claws are to the beast tribe.

3 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Another advantage is FE10 spoiler territory, so open this at your own risk.

  Reveal hidden contents

Declining birth rate in dragons, along with years-long pregnancy.  In a Branded situation. the laguz parent loses far more than the beorc one.

 

Well that's interesting, and kinda sad honestly.

[Ertrick36]

I think another reason is because the Laguz seem to have an aversion to using unnatural weapons - that is, weapons that aren't their claws and fangs.  Granted it seems like this aversion is a more recent thing, but I don't think they'd be so ready to forgo the use of handmade weapons if they became familiar enough with them that they knew how useful they were, no matter what sense of honor they had.  Especially if this aversion transferred to the use of siege weapons, as they'd be hard pressed to expand their territory through warfare without using artillery such as trebuchets or ballistae - there's only so much a powerful beast can do to a city, especially when that beast values their own life.

That puts them at a pretty strong disadvantage against Beorc armies, especially those with archers and mages.  You simply cannot win wars without the use of ranged weaponry - not when your enemies use such weaponry.  You can have all the natural speed in the world and you'll still fail when the enemy has solid ranks of cavalry, infantry, and archers.  It's what the French learned when they tried to rely solely on cavalry charges to win their battles against the Swiss.

[Hanes]

2 minutes ago, Ertrick36 said:

I think another reason is because the Laguz seem to have an aversion to using unnatural weapons - that is, weapons that aren't their claws and fangs.

True, only time I've seen so far of a Laguz using a Beorc-tool is Lethe using a knife that she says is helpful to cut things like food.

3 minutes ago, Ertrick36 said:

It's what the French learned when they tried to rely solely on cavalry charges to win their battles against the Swiss.

Absolutely love the history reference though, which war was this? Was it one of Napoleon's battles?

[Acacia Sgt]

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

A less troll-worthy answer is magic, something that laguz don't really have outside of dragons.

Also Herons. They too have magic.

Also, does ravens having Vortex in PoR doesn't count? It's basically wind magic.

1 hour ago, This boi uses Nino said:

Oh right, not only do humans have magic, but they are not weak to it, I remember someone mentioning this in a forum, in fact while writing this I remembered I had seen sth somewhere. As for dragons, I see their fire breath as just their ability, like flying is to the hawks and ravens or claws are to the beast tribe.

Was it from here, right?

Edited May 30, 2020 by Acacia Sgt

[eclipse]

Just now, Acacia Sgt said:

Also Herons. They too have magic.

Also, does ravens having Vortex in PoR doesn't count? It's basically wind magic.

Herons get bent out of shape if there's too much fighting, so I don't think they'd be able to launch fireballs and the like (RD magic cards are the closest, IIRC).  Was Vortex a command skill, or counter only?  Could've sworn it was the latter, which is still inferior to hurling lightning bolts on both phases.

[Boomhauer007]

IIRC even in lore they generally can't stay transformed for particularly long periods of time (I think multiple people in RD comment on how odd it is Volug can handle it for the lengths that he can), and are pretty defenseless untransformed since they have no concept of fighting without being transformed. 

[Acacia Sgt]

Just now, eclipse said:

Herons get bent out of shape if there's too much fighting, so I don't think they'd be able to launch fireballs and the like (RD magic cards are the closest, IIRC).  Was Vortex a command skill, or counter only?  Could've sworn it was the latter, which is still inferior to hurling lightning bolts on both phases.

It was their Mastery skill; and yes, it functioned as a command.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

Let's see:

• have no transformation gauge
• can counterattack from range at any time
• gain more experience
• don't need a satori sign to learn their mastery skill
• available to fight at the start of the first turn (not applying to royals)

[NinjaMonkey]

2 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Also Herons. They too have magic.

They don't have offensive magic though. Bringing a dead forest back to life isn't going to kill anyone. Creating blazing infernos, vortexes and huge bolts of lightning is.

[Etrurian emperor]

The bird Laguz are blind at night with even someone as powerful as Neasalla not wanting to be near Beorc at night. 

RD states that the Laguz have somewhat of a cultural habit of arrogance and stupidity. According to Ranulf they need Soren partly because the Laguz as a whole typically just don't bother with strategy. 

[Jotari]

6 hours ago, This boi uses Nino said:

Faster reproduction could be a factor too, thought really 9 months is quite slow compared to other animals, at least in our world.

That is specifically a featuring in Binding Blade if you're looking for stories that go that route.

[Light Strategist]

Herons kinda get the short end of the stick though.

Sure they can reinvigorate people... but if there's so much as a stray Tomahawk and they're more dead than their their kin after what happened to Serenes.

Edited May 30, 2020 by Light Strategist

[SSbardock84]

I'll just let you play the games to find out. But they do specifically note what the two races are known for.

[Hanes]

12 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Was it from here, right?

Yeah, that one!

12 hours ago, Boomhauer007 said:

IIRC even in lore they generally can't stay transformed for particularly long periods of time (I think multiple people in RD comment on how odd it is Volug can handle it for the lengths that he can), and are pretty defenseless untransformed since they have no concept of fighting without being transformed. 

Oh true, I played up to the chapter where you get Volug, I do remember sth like that.

10 hours ago, Falcom Knight said:

Let's see:

• have no transformation gauge
• can counterattack from range at any time
• gain more experience
• don't need a satori sign to learn their mastery skill
• available to fight at the start of the first turn (not applying to royals)

I meant more lore wise rather than gameplay wise, I don't think experiece and transformation gauges exist like in-game or that Laguz simply don't transform before a battle starts.

9 hours ago, Etrurian emperor said:

The bird Laguz are blind at night with even someone as powerful as Neasalla not wanting to be near Beorc at night. 

RD states that the Laguz have somewhat of a cultural habit of arrogance and stupidity. According to Ranulf they need Soren partly because the Laguz as a whole typically just don't bother with strategy. 

Oh yeah I'm at that PoR chapter.

Interesting...

8 hours ago, Jotari said:

That is specifically a featuring in Binding Blade if you're looking for stories that go that route.

is it? Where or how? I just finished playing that game but I don't remember there being any births, only in FE4 where each battle is like a few months or a year or sth.

[Ertrick36]

13 hours ago, This boi uses Nino said:

Absolutely love the history reference though, which war was this? Was it one of Napoleon's battles?

Nah, I was more referring to a general period of time before well before Napoleon's rise when the Reisläufer - that is, Swiss mercenaries - and the Swiss's use of pikemen were at their height, which was around the late 1400's.  If there's one specific conflict I'm thinking of, it's the Burgundian State against the Swiss (known as the "Burgundian Wars") - specifically the Burgundian State under leadership of Charles the Bold, who relied greatly on cavalry as a "main force".  He suffered three crucial defeats at the hands of the Swiss, first because he misjudged the size of their main force during a siege (he also brutally killed a bunch of Swiss, which he thought would terrify them into submission, but because of his loss they were only emboldened by his cruelty to more or less viciously kill him) and the next two times were mainly due to him abandoning his artillery and having only cavalry and infantry to rely on (and he only really tended to use infantry as a distraction/to keep enemies off his cavalry).  The last battle even saw his life taken from him.

I think it helps demonstrate my point because while cavalry are extremely powerful, especially the Burgundian cavalry, they couldn't defeat an army with a more varied and unique approach.  Of particular note were the Swiss pikemen, who notoriously readied pikes against cavalry charges by pointing them upwards and forwards against the ground.  When you're charging at the enemy while in formation with other chargers, you don't have a lot of room to either stop or turn around when the enemy prepares a defense like this.  It resulted in a lot of horribly skewered cavalry.  And before you say that's cruel, I'll have you know that before the Battle of Grandson began Charles had about 400 men of a Swiss garrison, who were all begging for mercy and didn't really wrong him in any way, hanged from trees over an excruciating four hours just to shock the enemy forces (again, that backfired because of his loss), so I'd say the skewering of the cavalry was the least that Charles and his forces deserved.

 

By the time of Napoleon's rise in power, people were abandoning traditional military tactics in favor of those that employed guns.  That said, because guns were still a bit inconvenient to use, armies still employed melee combat quite prominently - it's just that they didn't wear full plate armor or chainmail anymore.  But once the percussion cap was introduced and they started making repeaters and revolvers, people abandoned most melee combat tactics altogether because using a gun was not only easier, but it also was faster and more effective.  Nowadays people rightfully turn their noses up at those firearms because they're slower to reload than firearms that use cartridge magazines, but back then they were a revolution - they were called "repeaters" because you could just repeatedly fire without much pause, while with a flintlock you still had to fiddle around with the gun each time you fired, not to mention the fact that a flintlock gun could be ruined by weather while every percussion cap weapon could work in just about any conditions.

[Hanes]

13 minutes ago, Ertrick36 said:

Nah

cool!

[eclipse]

14 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

It was their Mastery skill; and yes, it functioned as a command.

Since it was PoR, it was most likely slapped on Naesala to give him some sort of edge over Tibarn.  Maelstrom is counter-only.

[Dragoncat]

If the beorc invent guns and planes and tanks, the laguz are screwed. Turning into a sabertooth tiger won't help you if someone's shooting at you with a sniper rifle. And the laguz aren't going to mount missile launchers on the backs of their animal forms. I can see the ravens eagerly learning how to drop bombs though.

Quote

Faster reproduction could be a factor too, thought really 9 months is quite slow compared to other animals, at least in our world.

Elephants are pregnant for a year I think.

Edited May 30, 2020 by Dragoncat

[Hanes]

34 minutes ago, Dragoncat said:

If the beorc invent guns and planes and tanks, the laguz are screwed. Turning into a sabertooth tiger won't help you if someone's shooting at you with a sniper rifle. And the laguz aren't going to mount missile launchers on the backs of their animal forms. I can see the ravens eagerly learning how to drop bombs though.

Oh well, yeah but I'm talking about the medieval setting the game is in, in which it seems weird to me that humans can hold them as slaves.

35 minutes ago, Dragoncat said:

Elephants are pregnant for a year I think.

Actually it takes 22 months for them, almost 2 years, which is insane. According to this wikipedia table, humans are on the 17th place for longest pregnancy duration on average for mammals, so it's still quite long.

[Light Strategist]

3 hours ago, This boi uses Nino said:

I meant more lore wise rather than gameplay wise, I don't think experiece and transformation gauges exist like in-game or that Laguz simply don't transform before a battle starts.

Beorc have both magic and weapons that can tear Laguz apart with relative ease.

Remember how they're weak to the Magic Triangle?

[Hanes]

20 minutes ago, Light Strategist said:

Beorc have both magic and weapons that can tear Laguz apart with relative ease.

Remember how they're weak to the Magic Triangle?

Well, "easier" I guess, since an unforged regular fire, thunder, wind etc tome or their El- variants do very little, but I suppose it is in fact a weakness that just isn't integrated very well into the story.

[Jotari]

9 hours ago, This boi uses Nino said:

 

is it? Where or how? I just finished playing that game but I don't remember there being any births, only in FE4 where each battle is like a few months or a year or sth.

It's in the backstory. The reason humans could beat the dragons in the Scouring was because dragons had a much lower birthrate relative to humans.

8 hours ago, eclipse said:

Since it was PoR, it was most likely slapped on Naesala to give him some sort of edge over Tibarn.  Maelstrom is counter-only.

I think it's actually to make him more managable as an enemy in Path of Radiance. Naesala's magic isn't that high iirc, so it allows him to still attack your units without completely destroying your units with end game Gotoh stats.

[Hanes]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

It's in the backstory. The reason humans could beat the dragons in the Scouring was because dragons had a much lower birthrate relative to humans.

Oooh right, that was why.