Special Heroes: Summer's Dream

[Ice Dragon]

10 hours ago, Mercakete said:

I think that it's more likely that the artists are used to drawing busty women when it comes to scanty clothing and aren't sure how to both downsize their usual to the character's actual size, and that they aren't sure how to make smaller-chested ladies look good in a swimsuit.

Based on his Pixiv art, the artist is perfectly capable of drawing swimsuits (and that particular style of swimsuit) on smaller boobs.

[Sunwoo]

1 hour ago, Othin said:

I think they could justify Jugdral summer units, but FE5 is an even steeper ask than FE4.

The next Harmonic expected is the dancer banner, so maybe that's where they're planning to introduce a TMS Harmonic?

Dancer banner also seems to be a good spot to put in a Thracia harmonic, honestly. The dancer banner was the first one to give us an actual Jugdral seasonal, after all. It could be either TMS and Thracia, or just one of them. Olwen would be a decent Thracia harmonic choice for the dancer banner, if IS wanted a decently popular unit for that? (Can't reuse Reinhardt here, it'd be weird if he got TWO dancing alts.)

[Othin]

6 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Dancer banner also seems to be a good spot to put in a Thracia harmonic, honestly. The dancer banner was the first one to give us an actual Jugdral seasonal, after all. It could be either TMS and Thracia, or just one of them. Olwen would be a decent Thracia harmonic choice for the dancer banner, if IS wanted a decently popular unit for that? (Can't reuse Reinhardt here, it'd be weird if he got TWO dancing alts.)

True, that's another option. I feel like FE5 isn't as closely tied to the theme, though.

[Sunwoo]

5 minutes ago, Othin said:

True, that's another option. I feel like FE5 isn't as closely tied to the theme, though.

That's fair enough. Although by IS's own weird metrics, apparently a ballroom theme is "serious" enough for Jugdral alts who are not Brigid to fit into them, so I wouldn't be too surprised if they did do ballroom for a third year and slide in a Thracia harmonic that way.

[Othin]

1 minute ago, Sunwoo said:

That's fair enough. Although by IS's own weird metrics, apparently a ballroom theme is "serious" enough for Jugdral alts who are not Brigid to fit into them, so I wouldn't be too surprised if they did do ballroom for a third year and slide in a Thracia harmonic that way.

Thracia/TMS Harmonic. Everyone wins!

[Acacia Sgt]

Doesn't Jugdral also has Lene in the Plegian banner? Admittedly as half of the Harmonic, but still...

[Sunwoo]

2 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Doesn't Jugdral also has Lene in the Plegian banner? Admittedly as half of the Harmonic, but still...

I totally forgot she existed lol

Fair enough

[Othin]

21 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Doesn't Jugdral also has Lene in the Plegian banner? Admittedly as half of the Harmonic, but still...

Good catch. The Plegian and pirate banners are also notable for being newer banners, and not as goofy as most of the older ones. So even if Jugdral units would seem like a poor fit for most older banners, they have that option.

Personally I think they could use the chance to loosen up like anyone else, and they do have some comedic units. They're just also the least-known FE games. Like with a lot of things, I don't think it's something IS is actively averse to doing, just a lower priority they haven't gotten to yet.

[Tybrosion]

Stats and stuff [SPOILERS]:

Spoiler

Freyja
Super Asset(s): Atk, Spd, Def
Super Flaw(s): none

Freyr
Super Asset(s): Def
Super Flaw(s): Spd

Ogma
Super Asset(s): Atk
Super Flaw(s): none
*Atk/Spd Solo 3 is the 4* unlock.

Caeda & Plumeria
Super Asset(s): Spd, Def
Super Flaw(s): HP, Res
*Flow Refresh is exclusive to swords, lances and axes. They also need be either cavalry or flying.

Norne
Super Asset(s): Spd, Res
Super Flaw(s): Def
*Spd/Def Bond 3 is the 4* unlock.

 

[Naoshi]

Norne actually had nice stats, nice.

[GrandeRampel]

21 hours ago, Tybrosion said:

Honestly, I feel people were greatly overestimating F!Kris's chances and never realized that she actually isn't that popular (unlike the other three female avatars). In F!Kris's best year (CYL4), she only managed to make it to 217th (M!Kris got 98th) and then backslide to 267th in CYL5 (M!Kris was 185th). Compare that to the CYL4 ranks of the other female avatars: 

Robin: 23rd (rose to 18th in CYL5)
Corrin: 21st (rose to 11th in CYL5)
Byleth: 7th (rose to 6th in CYL5)

I mean on one hand you are right, but on the other hand IS has always tried to keep things as equal as possible for selectable gender characters. Always introducing both genders at the same time even if it resulted in strange stuff like M!Kana as a GHB unit, or M!Byleth as a weird "available first on a legendary banner" unit. Currently we have gender parity for Morgan, Kana and Byleth, and we obviously have the same number of options for each gender of Kiran.

And for the unbalanced ones, it's always a difference of a single alt, with pretty much everyone expecting the balance to be restored with a legendary M!Corrin someday (even if he is less popular like F!Kris compared to the counterpart) and some kind of Robin simply because it would be weird for a consistently popular character like M!Robin to be ignored forever.

You would have more of a point if M!Kris also got nothing, because then we could speculate that both Krises were too unpopular for alts, but since they aren't it makes no sense to deliberatly exclude F!Kris when she is not THAT unpopular. You are mentioning the difference in rank, but I would more look at the number of votes since the lower you go in CYL the more even a couple of votes can change your position.

M!Kris got 499 votes in CYL 5, while F!Kris got 294. 200 votes may seem much, but since we are drawing a comparison between avatars, wanna know how many votes the least popular of the non-Kris avatars got?

2.027

1500 votes didn't make M!Kris too unpopular to join the cool kids club with the others but now you are telling me a couple hundred less make a huge wall that F!Kris can't overcome? It seems a bit farfetched to me, and it's not like IS hasn't picked characters that were deep cuts into the 300th-400th rank for seasonals before.

Just to give an example in Cyl5 F!Kris is surrounded on both sides by characters like M!Morgan, Clair, Zeke, Ursula, Rinkah, Shannan, Xane, Ares, Aversa, Lethe, Flora, Merric who are separated from her by less than 50 votes, which are pretty much nothing in the developers' eyes. They are functionally exactly as popular as her.

And each of them either has an alt already or could get one in the next seasonal banner and nobody would bat an eye or think they are a weird pick for an alt.

This narrative that: "oh, F!Kris is a literal who of a character that nobody likes, I would call shenanigans if she got an alt! But Shannan, of course he is a lock for the next Jugdral seasonals if they do gen 2, everyone knows he is popular!" is ill-conceived and needs to die yesterday.

But now I realize, I'm putting words in your mouth with this Kris vs Shannan comparison. For all I know you are a big Shannan hater and always exclude characters with less than 400 votes from banner speculation with complete fairness and no bias against F!Kris in particular, I'm mostly ranting here against people that use CYL results to shut-down characters they don't like while at the same time pushing characters they do like with very similar results. 

The point is if anything this proves that "patterns" about female avatars getting an alt in summer and males in winters are bullsh*t like all other patterns. But an F!Kris alt on like Christmas is still possible and imho very likely, sorry, I disagree with you there.

 

Anyway the banner is good, three characters getting their first alt and one making his debut, and the harmonic was totally out of left field, which I like because it's better to be surpising than predictable. And about their art... yeah I have to admit it's flawed, but it has some neat details like the shoes and imho it's far from the worst in the game. With art like Rebecca, Lloyd and HS!Camilla you can feel the wrongness (and creepiness) at first glance, while Caeda-Plumeria is mostly just basic and stiff. It looks less polished than the really great art the other characters on the banner got, but nothing offensive or ugly.

[Tybrosion]

@GrandeRampel

Uh, where did I ever say that I don't think F!Kris will ever get an alt or that I just have it out for her in general? All I did was state my opinion that people were overestimating F!Kris chances here and cited CYL results as a potential reason why.

I have literally nothing against F!Kris and don't particularly care either way about her getting an alt or not. I also don't doubt that she will get an alt at some point.

[GrandeRampel]

4 minutes ago, Tybrosion said:

@GrandeRampel

Uh, where did I ever say that I don't think F!Kris will ever get an alt or that I just have it out for her in general? All I did was state my opinion that people were overestimating F!Kris chances here and cited CYL results as a potential reason why.

I have literally nothing against F!Kris and don't particularly care either way about her getting an alt or not. I also don't doubt that she will get an alt at some point.

I'm sorry, looking back I think I misinterpreted what you said. To me it seemed like you were saying that F!Kris was too unpopular, especially compared to the others, so it's unrealistic to expect IS to give her attention. But you are right that you never stated that, I just thought you were implying it. 

[Mercakete]

Spoiler

Ouch. Ogma suffers from "low res, high def infantry dude" syndrome. At least he isn't another axe user.

Freyja is a fragile speedster; no surprise there. I only note this because, in a way, she's Freyr's opposite, and he's the one I want to focus on: indeed, he is Tank Goat. Great def and res, low spd, good atk. I want to get this goat so badly. I love having tanky units! Though I'd like a +def one, I wouldn't mind a +res one. Man, I'm glad I got Beast Valor recently!

 

[Tybrosion]

The summer units compared to their previous versions [SPOILERS]:

Spoiler

Freyja
40/38/44/24/22/168 [Lady of Nightmare, Green Beast Cavalry]
40/39/43/25/20/167 [Fleeting Summer, Colorless Beast Cavalry]
-/+1/-1/+1/-2/-1

Yeah, it's pretty much the same type of stat line. Summer Freyja does get a better selection of super assets though (in Atk and Spd, while base Freyja has a super flaw in Spd).

Freyr
41/40/16/32/40/169 [Dream-King, Blue Beast Cavalry]
41/38/16/38/35/168 [Estival Dreams, Red Beast Cavalry]
-/-2/-/+6/-5/-1

He's still a slow tank, but now leans more on Defense and also lost a bit of Attack (though his Prf does make up for that).

Ogma
47/35/34/28/13/157 [Loyal Blade, Sword Infantry]
44/38/38/35/21/176 [Blade on Leave, Lance Infantry]
-3/+3/+4/+7/+8/+19

I like how he did manage to lose some HP, but given his gains in Defense and Resistance that doesn't really matter too much.

Caeda
36/33/42/25/30/166 [Princess of Talys, Sword Flying]
39/33/42/26/28/168 [Sea-Blossom Pair, Axe Cavalry]
+3/-/-/+1/-2/+2

Yeah, she really is Baby Caeda 2 but now with a horse.

Norne
42/32/36/31/27/168 [The Volunteer, Colorless Bow Infantry]
42/37/39/31/27/176 [Seaside Volunteer, Lance Infantry]
-/+5/+3/-/-/+8

Yup, she has the exact same bulk as before. That's honestly kinda funny.

 

[Mercakete]

So, it just kinda struck me that Caeda's pegasus lost its wings. Guess Sumia was right (or was it Cordelia who thought that horses came to be via pegasi losing their wings.)

[Sunwoo]

2 minutes ago, Tybrosion said:

The summer units compared to their previous versions [SPOILERS]:

  Hide contents

Ogma
47/35/34/28/13/157 [Loyal Blade, Sword Infantry]
44/38/38/35/21/176 [Blade on Leave, Lance Infantry]
-3/+3/+4/+7/+8/+19

I like how he did manage to lose some HP, but given his gains in Defense and Resistance that doesn't really matter too much.

Norne
42/32/36/31/27/168 [The Volunteer, Colorless Bow Infantry]
42/37/39/31/27/176 [Seaside Volunteer, Lance Infantry]
-/+5/+3/-/-/+8

Yup, she has the exact same bulk as before. That's honestly kinda funny.

 

The power creep is fucking ridiculous

[NSSKG151]

Spoiler

Now, usually I don't look twice at summer units but I like Norne and her summer variant looks like a good unit to build with those stats. And the best part is that she is a grail unit. Just have to find out what the best inheritable lance will be for her. Though I will probably hold off on getting merges for her though since I already have a speedy all rounder infantry lance built up and I am still saving grails for Winter Felix and Young Innes. Moments like these are when I wish they stop making good grail units of characters I like.

So yeah only Norne interests me and I am looking more forward to the new heroes banner later this month (hoping for Fates) and even the Pirate banner next month (or whatever they end up doing for the non CYL banner in August).

 

[Etrurian emperor]

She sure loves her floatie. 

[Ice Dragon]

5 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

She sure loves her floatie. 

This version of Freyja is adorable.

[DefyingFates]

Spoiler

Norne hits 180 with a superboon in Spd, great! I was worried because Shellpoint Lance boosted Def, but she really is "Lance N!Hana," huh?

I still want to merge up Y!Innes (and Hana) but Norne is joining the list right after. If anyone's already started theorycrafting, what would be a good weapon for her? Unfortunately the common Hana builds don't translate to Lances well, so I'd love to get some input! (I still have a "It's Curtains..." waiting from the Limited Combat Manuals, if that helps.)

@Sunwoo

Spoiler

In Norne's case, she's going from ranged to melee, so the BST boost was inevitable. Ogma on the other hand, that's just straight up powercreep. It's crazy how much has changed in 4.5 years.

 

Edited July 6, 2021 by DefyingFates

[Ice Dragon]

15 minutes ago, DefyingFates said:

If anyone's already started theorycrafting, what would be a good weapon for her?

If you want to focus on Atk and Spd, Springy Lance (Spring Minerva) is the best one, as it gives you +5/8 when refined and nullifies your penalties to Atk and Spd.

Otherwise, all of the other good lances are side-grades of her default lance (+5 Atk/Def if there is an ally within 3 spaces and +6 Def field buff if there is an ally within 3 spaces at the start of the turn). Most of them give +5/3/5/0 when refined (with the latter 2 giving +4/3/4/0):

• Candy Cane (Winter Hilda): +5 Atk/Def and Guard, both with a Unity condition
• Courtly Candle (Dancer Eldigan): +5 Atk/Def and 50% damage reduction on first hit if the opponent can make a follow-up, both if HP is 50% or higher
• Flowing Lance (Pirate Geese): Lull Atk/Def, but -5 instead of -3, with a Solo condition
• Gilt Fork (Spring Narcian): +5 Atk/Def and nullifies penalties to Atk/Def, both with a Unity condition
• Instant Lance (Fernand, Melady): +4 Atk/Def and prevents opponent's follow-up, both with a Blow condition
• Spirited Spear (Gatrie): +4 Atk/Def and +1 Special charge rate on opponent's attacks, both if the unit has a bonus active

Flowing Lance is probably the most useful weapon in the Arena due to the fact that most opponents in the high Arena have Rally skills, and disabling their bonuses to Atk and Def is relatively valuable. However, if you're using a Lull skill in the B slot, you should probably pick a different weapon due to the overlap in effect.

If you're running a Galeforce build, Sprited Spear + Time's Pulse lets you activate Galeforce on every turn if the opponent can counterattack and takes 2 hits to kill. It doesn't work with Desperation, but does work with Wings of Mercy or a Dodge skill.

For a non-Galeforce player-phase build, Spirited Spear hits the hardest if you aren't constrained to Specials used for scoring, as it lets you land a 3-cooldown Special (Luna, Sol, or Bonfire) on your follow-up attack. Otherwise, if you aren't using Flowing Lance, Instant Lance and Courtly Candle are both decent. If you're stacking Norne's Spd with her passive skills, it's unlikely she'll get doubled by units that don't have guaranteed follow-ups. If you're running Courtly Candle, she'll take half damage from the counterattack, but can't block the follow-up if she can't kill in one round, whereas if you're running Instant Lance, she'll take full damage from the counterattack, but will block the follow-up if she can't kill in one round. If you're running Desperation, Instant Lance is probably slightly better, but the difference is extremely small.

For pure enemy phase, if you're running Distant Counter, Flowing Lance is the best option due to it effectively boosting Res, unlike all of the other weapons. Without Distant Counter, Candy Cane and Courtly Candle are both good options for bulkier builds, while Spirited Spear is more suited for boosting counterattack damage. Gilt Fork is also an option if you're expecting Norne to soak up debuffs since her stats are rather high across the board.

For dual phase, again, Flowing Lance is likely the best option if you aren't running a Lull, but other weapons (other than Instant Lance, which has no effect on enemy phase) still have the same advantages and disadvantages as listed above that might be useful for specific situations. However, similar to Instant Lance not having an effect on enemy phase, Candy Cane and Gilt Fork both have a condition that is more difficult to activate on player phase.

 

1 hour ago, DefyingFates said:

[second spoiler tag]

It's worth noting that of Ogma's 19-point stat total difference between his vanilla version and this version, 10 of those points can be covered by Dragonflowers, leaving the actual difference quite a bit smaller:

Spoiler

With Dragonflowers, Ogma's stat difference is reduced to -5/+1/+2/+5/+6.

His offenses are only barely improved, and his primary gains are in bulk. He actually has almost the same single-hit bulk due to the distribution, but single-hit bulk is rarely relevant.

 

[DefyingFates]

52 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

Otherwise, all of the other good lances are side-grades of her default lance (+5 Atk/Def if there is an ally within 3 spaces and +6 Def field buff if there is an ally within 3 spaces at the start of the turn).

So you're saying it may be good to keep her default Lance instead of looking for something else?

Of the weapons you listed, I only have Courtly Candle and Instant Lance. Of those two, I'm probably leaning towards using Instant Lance, since I have more Fernands to burn. So you're suggesting a Desperation build with that, right? I think I have a spare SS3, but that still leaves the C slot open. I think the only T4 C Skill I have free right now is L!Corrin's Joint Drive Atk, but obviously I'd rather give that to someone who can also use DC...

Edit: I also have a Ronan with Joint Drive Spd, but he also has Swift Stance 3 as well, which is admittedly a more niche Skill than DC, but it still makes me want to wait before foddering him.

52 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

It's worth noting that of Ogma's 19-point stat total difference between his vanilla version and this version, 10 of those points can be covered by Dragonflowers, leaving the actual difference quite a bit smaller:

That's a good point. Doesn't he get 15 points though, with the cap increase last year?

Thanks for everything!

Edited July 6, 2021 by DefyingFates

[Othin]

8 minutes ago, DefyingFates said:

So you're saying it may be good to keep her default Lance instead of looking for something else?

Of the weapons you listed, I only have Courtly Candle and Instant Lance. Of those two, I'm probably leaning towards using Instant Lance, since I have more Fernands to burn. So you're suggesting a Desperation build with that, right? I think I have a spare SS3, but that still leaves the C slot open. I think the only T4 C Skill I have free right now is L!Corrin's Joint Drive Atk, but obviously I'd rather give that to someone who can also use DC...

That's a good point. Doesn't he get 15 points though, with the cap increase last year?

Thanks for everything!

Base Ogma gets 15 dragonflowers, Summer Ogma gets 5, so the difference is 10.

[DefyingFates]

11 minutes ago, Othin said:

Base Ogma gets 15 dragonflowers, Summer Ogma gets 5, so the difference is 10.

Oh right, I forgot about that, my bad! As you were, Ice Dragon 😛