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New Heroes & Ascended Mareeta


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Well, as the title and video says, for the next New Heroes banner we're getting Ascended Mareeta (sword infantry), along with August (staff infantry), Galzus (sword infantry), and Karin (lance flier), and a Salem GHB. This is...not what I was hoping for for the next Thracia banner, but at least we're getting SOME new characters, I guess.

Edited by Fire Emblem Fan
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Hmm. I know I really wanted a Thracia banner, but ... this just feels underwhelming. Galzus' kit is just all sorts of what, and I don't mean that in the good way.

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2 minutes ago, Florete said:

Why is Vital Astra's damage reduction written so differently from normal dodge? Does it actually function differently?

Vital Astra requires the Special to be fully charged for the out-of-combat effect to activate and requires the Special to be fully charged at the start of combat for the in-combat effect to activate. If Vital Astra is not fully charged at that time, the Dodge effect does not apply.

Dodge skills being B skills do not have the additional requirement of needing the Special charged.

Edited by Ice Dragon
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SALEM GOT IN!!!

As a GHB and probably not a good one, but still. Galzus and August are unsurprising, their sets are certainly odd though. Karin is a nice surprise. Ascended Mareeta... eh. She doesn't even have a different weapon type from her previous versions! At least it means she color shares, though.

Still waiting on Linoan, Lara, and Safy, but that's fine. I certainly wasn't expecting Safy anytime soon, but hopefully Linoan and Lara will show up next year. And Raydrik, for that matter.

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Thracia banners are typically an instant pass for me, but oof is this banner particularly unappetizing. Mareeta is easily the most boring Ascended Hero so far, Galzus got screwed because he wasn't allowed to show Mareeta up, and Karin is here for no real reason since neither Misha or Fergus are here.

August is the only interesting one here, because you just know Salem is doomed to be a slightly tweaked Aelfric (with everything that entails).

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Galzus being so underwhelming is pretty offensive, they could've at least given him an "Astra" skill of some kind since he is 5-star locked. Also, literally all Mareetas are infantry swords. At least Ascended Idunn had the decency to be a different color than her previous selves.

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Yeah, I'm going to walk back my comment yesterday that I didn't mind the Ascended heroes. This is just wasteful, use those assets for a Resplendent hero instead and give us something new.

Still, at least the old man healer isn't the demote.

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I feel like not having Perne here is a massively missed opportunity. You can't just tease a character in someone's 5* Lv. 40 quote,  especially one like Pirate Lifis's, and not have them sooner or later. I don't know anything about him, but I really wanna see that Forging Bonds conversation chain. Salem's nice though. Finally, the series's first playable dark mage...and all the more reason to have Perne in this banner.

Edited by Morgan--Grandmaster
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Not happy with how Galzus was handled. Making one of the 5* basically fodder was never an idea I've been a fan of, and Galzus in particular was done pretty dirty here. What makes it worse is that he color shares with Mareeta so the poor guy's going to get some hate for pity breaking fans trying to get her.

Speaking of Mareeta, I wish they gave her a different weapon. As said before Idunn was a different color despite still being a dragon, and Fjorm, Joshua, and Lagjarn also changed weapon types in their Ascended forms, so Mareeta not doing the same makes her look rather bland as an addition. 

 

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Hey, guess what about Salem?

Spoiler

He doesn't get a Prf. That said, he has the red Vulture tome instead of the godforsaken Rabbit tome. I'll take any progress we can get.

Also, Salem's neutral art:

Spoiler

salem_dark_sage_slide01.png

 

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August's weapon effect is a permanent +6 Atk/Def/Res and guaranteed follow-up for his support partner, which is decent, I suppose. In terms of stats since we got to see them, he's a min-maxed Linhardt, which isn't great due to his awful Spd and complete lack of combat effects on his weapon, which basically just relegates him to Res-comparison support skills.

The additional effect on his weapon that activates if you've already lost a unit is powerful, but completely useless in every game mode that matters due to needing to lose a unit. It would have been great on defense teams if it weren't for the fact that supports don't exist on defense. I think the only game mode where the effect is actually viable is Grand Conquest.

 

Galzus at least has a good inheritable weapon and is another source for Surge Sparrow. He doesn't stand out at all otherwise, though, especially since I doubt his stats will be anything special enough to set him apart from his already-crowded class full of units with exclusive weapons.

Karin's weapon is the lance version of Zelot's Love Candelabra, which is nothing of note when we already have a million other lances that grant Atk and Def. Sure, this one also has Drive Atk/Def on it, but that's arguable less valuable than a combat effect. And it doesn't help that she's in another crowded class, like Galzus.

 

I'm a bit conflicted about Mareeta. She has the same 58% damage reduction that Valentine Lucina gets, which is really good, but unlike Lucina, Mareeta's damage reduction is dependent on a Spd comparison, so it isn't exactly reliable. It'll work on the typical slow, bulky heavy hitters, but not for the increasing number of faster units with strong counterattacks.

That said, she has a very reliable Special activation due to her weapon coming with both Quickened Pulse and a Special Spiral 2 that isn't dependent on activating the Special (not like that would be a hard condition to meet even if it were there). The only ways to really stop her Special activation and also block the 30% damage reduction from it are Pulse Smoke and Tie skills (and related exclusive skills). And also Resonant Battles, I guess.

Null Follow-Up on her weapon also gives her the ability to run Windsweep if she wants, though I'm not sure it's actually worth it. She shouldn't really have trouble tanking counterattacks if you give her Surge Sparrow to keep her HP up.

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Thought this was another Sacred Stones banner because I got Mareeta confused with Marisa. Not that I got the type of unit wrong...

  • August is interesting, but half of his effects just can't be used in most game modes. In Arena one unit being lost drops your score, Aether Raids Offense the only unit who is allowed to die is the bonus unit (and from what I understand they still aren't allowed to die if you wanna reach Vault of Heaven?), ally support is not active on CPU controlled teams so he doesn't do anything there, and of course who can forget Hero Battles, which are immediately lost if one unit is killed.
    To be fair, just the Atk/Def/Res and Guarenteed follow-up on initiation is still good, but I don't know why they have to add those effects that only work after an ally has been killed when in most cases you don't want to let your allies be killed...
  • Even knowing he's the skill fodder dump of this banner, Galzus looks disappointing. Surge Sparrow is nice to have not be locked to Brave Eirika anymore, but NFU should really just be demoted at this point, and Rein Sword would probably be judged as not being anything special if it weren't for the fact that there really aren't any inheritable Swords that boost the users Atk and Spd (it's mostly boosting Atk and Def).
  • Dunno who this girl is, but her skill fodder is frankly disappointing. Hope she makes up for it with stats.
  • Ascended Mareeta... the name of her game is keeping her Special ready at all times, else she loses a layer of Dodge 2. She could probably be converted to an EP setup with Distant Pressure, but seeing that Vital Astra's Dodge effect is still considered a non-Special effect is somewhat lame.
    ...yeah I'm not really feeling her. They had an opportunity to breathe life into a Thracian unit, and they use it on a unit who plays exactly the same as her normal alt but with some extra Special Readiness play.
  • Salem I remember reading was the first Dark Mage to be playable in the entire series. So... he'll be yet another Red Tome infantry to throw into the Grail shop.
    ...hope they at least give him a Prf. One that doesn't just have enemy debuffing effects. Welp @Tybrosion thanks for ruining my hopes before I can completely give my thoughts. What the hell, were Yen'fay and Riev freak accidents?

...I do not know a lot about Thracia 776, but I would have thought they'd be more interesting than this. August has some decent Ally Support effects, even if you don't want to be seeing half of them in most game modes.
...crap man. Last months banner was pretty cool, but this is just one big letdown...

Edited by Xenomata
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22 minutes ago, Baldrick said:

A lot of people don’t understand the appeal of Mareeta. It’d be just wrong for her not to have a sword in a serious alt.

@Medeus do you know who Galzus is? 

I played Thracia, so yes. 

10 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

The additional effect on his weapon that activates if you've already lost a unit is powerful, but completely useless in every game mode that matters due to needing to lose a unit. It would have been great on defense teams if it weren't for the fact that supports don't exist on defense. I think the only game mode where the effect is actually viable is Grand Conquest.

I think it may also have use in Summoner Duels, but that's about it. 

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Thracia is always an insta-skip for me, and this banner does nothing to change my mind about that. 

August is gimmicky. If he wasn't a Staff Infantry he could have some niche in Summoner Duels (for every other mode you don't want even a single unit to die). Well, I suppose he might help in some gimmicky PvE setups that aren't X-Hero Battles. 

Galzus is fodder. His fodder is pretty darned good, though. 

Karin is DoA. Saturated class, no prf, probably only has Speed as her standout stat. If her Atk is good, she'll be Marcia 2. 

A!Mareeta is the star of the banner, but she doesn't give me a great first impression. She's like OG!Mareeta 1.5 with a Regnal Astra variant. Her Prf has the same NFU her OG version had, but now with lots of CD reduction so she always has her special ready. The Special is Regnal/Imperial Astra with a 30% dmg reduction if the special is charged, combined with Spurn she gets a fifty something % reduction total which is cool...except for the fact that Dodge tanking isn't a very popular strategy nowadays due to stuff like Deadeye/Lethality, Save armor being the preferred tanks for almost anything and player phase nukes being so fast that she'll likely end up getting very little dmg reduction. 

Anyways. Free summon and tickets go to red but I won't use a single orb here. 

If the GHB has a Vulture tome then I'm very happy. Red and green tomes have a severe lack of inheritables compared to blues, although green doesn't fare that badly when considering Seasonal weapons. 

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Massive sleep banner considering the stuff that's already present and coming soon like the Legendary Remix currently running (sparkable CYL5 banner with a bunch of Legendaries in the mix) or the upcoming AHR 2022 banner.

I may as well drop my tickets onto red in hopes of snagging Mareeta -- gorgeous artwork and I have yet to get a second Floret (I basically never pulled an Ascended Hero yet). August's staff is interesting but I can imagine that he's at his most effective if he's supporting a speedy infantry tank that has NFU.

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@Medeus Then I don’t think understand why you think anyone interested enough in Mareeta to consider merging her would not also be interested in Galzus. She can be sparked for completionist purposes, and as others have said, I don’t see anything objectively interesting about her.

Edited by Baldrick
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Anyways, I have my usual translation notes:

 

The name of the banner, "New Heroes & Ascended Mareeta", is "新英雄&開花マリータ" (shin eiyuu & kaika marīta), "New Heroes & Blooming Mareeta". As usual, "開花" (kaika), "blooming flower(s)", is the name of the Ascended Hero feature.

August's epithet, "Astute Tactician", is "時代を読む軍師" (jidai o yomu gunshi), "Tactician Who Has Read the Era".

Diplomacy Staff is "軍師の諫言の杖" (gunshi no kangen no tsue), "Staff of the Tactician's Admonishment".

Def/Res Bond is "守備魔防の絆" (shubi mabō no kizuna), "Def/Res Bond".

Galzus's epithet, "Dark Blade of Od", is "オードの黒剣士" (ōdo no kuro-kenshi), "Odo's Black Swordfighter". "剣士" (kenshi), "swordfighter" or "swordsman", is the name of the Myrmidon class, but I prefer the more down-to-earth Japanese class name "Swordfighter". Or "Blade" (Radiant Dawn). Or "Sworder" (Path of Radiance). "Sworder" is just a really good, descriptive word in general. I don't know why Chrome thinks I spelled it wrong.

Rein Sword is "牽制の剣" (kensei no tsurugi), "Restraining Sword". "牽制" (kensei), "to restrain", is the name of the Rein skill series.

Karin's epithet, "Driven Knight", is "天馬を駆る少女" (tenba o karu shōjo), "Girl Driving a Pegasus". A slightly different meaning of "drive".

Allied Lance is "共闘の槍" (kyōtō no yari), "Lance of a United Front". "共闘" (kyōtō) means "to fight together".

Mareeta's epithet, "Astra Awakened", is "流星開眼" (ryūsei kaigen), "Astra Awakened". "流星" (ryūsei), "shooting star" or "meteor", is the name of the Astra skill, though in the Jugdral games, it was called "流星剣" (ryūseiken), "shooting star sword", alongside Luna being "月光剣" (gekkōken), "moonlight sword", and Sol being "太陽剣" (taiyōken), "sun sword", as all of the skills' users exclusively used swords.

Ascending Blade is "花開く心技の剣" (hana-hiraku shingi no tsurugi), "Sword of Blooming Spirit and Technique".

Vital Astra is "心流星" (shin-ryūsei), "Spirit Astra". "Spirit" as in "heart", not as in "dead person".

Salem's epithet, "Dark Sage", is "暗黒魔道士" (ankoku madōshi), "Mage of Darkness". The "darkness" used here, "暗黒" (ankoku), is not the same as the Dark magic type, which is "闇" (yami). The localization team likes to localize it as "shadow", as in Mediuth's epithet, "Shadow Dragon" ("暗黒竜", ankoku ryū, "darkness dragon", officially "Dark Dragon" in Japanese), and Fallen Mareeta's weapon, Shadow Sword ("暗黒の剣", ankoku no tsurugi, "sword of darkness"). "魔道士" (madōshi), "mage", is the name of the Mage class. The name of the Sage class is "賢者" (kenja), "sage".

 

Assuming the information about Salem's weapon is correct and assuming it follows the same naming pattern:

Rauðrvulture is "ラウアバルチャー" (rauabaruchā), "Rauðrvulture".

 

58 minutes ago, Medeus said:

I think it may also have use in Summoner Duels, but that's about it. 

You'd likely only get the second effect for the last two or three turns, and August himself is just dead weight other than the buffs he provides to only a single unit. You can probably make him work if you try, but there are better support units out there that provide their full effect starting on turn 1, aren't restricted to a single unit, and also have combat presence.

 

14 minutes ago, Baldrick said:

Then I don’t think understand why you think anyone interested enough in Mareeta to consider merging her would not also be interested in Galzus. She can be sparked for completionist purposes, and as others have said, I don’t see anything objectively interesting about her.

Mareeta has a good exclusive weapon and a good exclusive Special. Galzus is fodder.

Edited by Ice Dragon
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22 minutes ago, Baldrick said:

@Medeus Then I don’t think understand why you think anyone interested enough in Mareeta to consider merging her would not also be interested in Galzus. She can be sparked for completionist purposes, and as others have said, I don’t see anything objectively interesting about her.

You can be a fan of Mareeta and not like Galzus, they are linked to each other by relation and history, but they're not so joined at the hip that it's a requirement to like one if you like the other. Secondly, Mareeta has been around in FEH for over two years now and has two versions, if you grew to like her through those versions rather than through Thracia (which is still one of the least popular games) you're not going to have much familiarity with Galzus going into the summons. Thirdly, people may just pull for her design or liking how her weapon sounds, it may be uninteresting to us but there are many players to the game, and some may have more interest in it then we know. 

Obviously, these are just examples and may not apply to everyone, but Mareeta has reasons for why someone may pull her that doesn't involve Galzus. 

9 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

You'd likely only get the second effect for the last two or three turns, and August himself is just dead weight other than the buffs he provides to only a single unit. You can probably make him work if you try, but there are better support units out there that provide their full effect starting on turn 1, aren't restricted to a single unit, and also have combat presence.

Fair point, so unless your strategy is geared around sacking, he's probably too restrictive.

Edited by Medeus
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Urgh... this is so disappointing. Getting new units from Thracia is always a good thing, so in a way I am grateful that it even keeps getting banners but...

What a waste of an Ascended. If there was any game that really can't afford losing even a single slot it's Thracia and I hoped beyond hope we would get a random OC, like Freyr 2 years late, so we could have a fifth new unit, but nope.

And to make things worse it's Mareeta, who already had two versions in the regar pool and now gets the third one who is even the same move-weapon type as the others. Jeez, talk about choosing the worst possible option. Even Olwen or Reinhardt would have been better, at least they always get a different color. A sword Olwen/colorless Reinhardt would have been more interesting.

And this might only bother me, but why did they pick Karin instead of Misha?

We literally have Misha's mom already in the game waiting, come on the forging bond writes itself!

You had ONE JOB!

1 hour ago, Medeus said:

Not happy with how Galzus was handled. Making one of the 5* basically fodder was never an idea I've been a fan of, and Galzus in particular was done pretty dirty here. What makes it worse is that he color shares with Mareeta so the poor guy's going to get some hate for pity breaking fans trying to get her.

 

Speaking of which, what the heck is up with the descendants of Odr always color sharing with someone else on their debut banner?

Ayra shares with Eldigan, Shannan and Larcei shared with each other, as do Galzus and A!Mareeta, and base Mareeta shared with Eyvel. They always colorshare with someone with a sword too, not even a red mage or something.

You would think that for a family that is considered legendary for their sword prowess in lore, to the point that other sword users idolize/are scared of them they would know any other unit sharing with them would be overshadowed, so it would be pointless to share, they can carry the red by themselves on their banner.

But no, apparently that makes too much sense, and that is why we ended up in this situation. I will never understand IS.

 

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37 minutes ago, GrandeRampel said:

And this might only bother me, but why did they pick Karin instead of Misha?

We literally have Misha's mom already in the game waiting, come on the forging bond writes itself!

You had ONE JOB!

They probably just flipped a coin to decide the GHB.

Heads = infantry red tome (Salem), Tails = lance flier (Misha)

Though to be honest, Misha actually would’ve been a better choice in this case because Finn was Thracia’s only lance unit going into this banner. Thracia also didn’t have any melee fliers either, so in retrospect Karin being here makes sense to me now.

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They’re not joined at the hip but they are both fairly important characters in each others’ arcs. If somebody is interested in Mareeta as a character just through Heroes, Forging Bonds will almost certainly provide context for who Galzus is, and they will form some sort of opinion on him as a character. It may possibly be a negative opinion but in that case, it has nothing to do with colour sharing.
 

If they’re just interested in Ascended Mareeta in gameplay, the spark system guarantees they will get her and limits the amount of orbs they need to spend and the pity rate they could build, so I don’t see anyone getting so salty that they would hate Galzus.

Edited by Baldrick
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38 minutes ago, Baldrick said:

If they’re just interested in Ascended Mareeta in gameplay, the spark system guarantees they will get her and limits the amount of orbs they need to spend and the pity rate they could build, so I don’t see anyone getting so salty that they would hate Galzus.

If you're only going for one copy, perhaps, but you didn't pull 11 copies of Eitri before getting your second copy of Thorr.

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