April Special Heroes: Unlikely Friends

[Tybrosion]

Yeah, that sure is the exact same passives that Pirate Geese had a Boost skill in the year 2022. I can't wait to say this again sometime next year.

Warding Breath Sacred Seal is at least dope, though.

[Alexmender]

Welp, guess I'll keep on saving those grails just as I predicted a while ago. 

Kid Boyd is a sidegrade to Charlotte on his good turns (trades Slaying and 2nd hit of true dmg for more Atk/Spd and penalty neutralazation on those stats) and on his bad turns his Prf is just a measely +5 Atk/Spd, which is worse than inheritable axes like the one Spring Saleh has, or the Plegian axe, or Unbound axe, etc, etc. I guess it's sorta on par with Rein Axe on the bad turns, but that one is kinda meh to begin with and it has a bigger range if one wishes to use the axe unit as a support-ish unit. 

[Ice Dragon]

It looks like Boyd's weapon's effect is intended to reference the fact that he has the Tempest skill in Path of Radiance, which doubles his biorhythm effects.

The weapon is not bad, as it gives an unconditional +5 Atk/Spd, but it has no other effect on even turns and instead stacks a gajillion points of stats on odd turns. It honestly looks like he'll be a pain to use in player control, but at the same time, he could also be a pain to go up against under AI control.

[Etrurian emperor]

Kinda disappointed on this one. The devs seemed to have made their choice primarily for fanservice rather than to have a specific theme. Baby Marth and co were all Marth and his loved ones, the baby Magvelians were all the main nobles but Mia and Illyana just seem random. They could have done baby Elincia and friends. Or the baby Greil mercenaries with Titania as babysitter but now they just did the obvious two picks in Ike and Soren, and some random popular characters. 

47 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Wow, WTF did they do to Boyd. His art and skills are both pretty bad.

Guess the devs really do hate Boyd. First they flatly refuse to put him into the game for years and when they do its in the most half hearted way possible as a lame freebie. Its kinda bad that we can clearly see which characters the debs like and which they are completely uninterested in.

[Jotari]

4 hours ago, Humanoid said:

The child banner has always been arguably the more boring of the seasonal banners because of how slavishly close they to canon classes, making them closer to New Heroes banners than to the average Special Heroes banner.

I'm still kind of flummoxed as to why they didn't make Minerva a pegasus knight. That's not something we've seen from her before and actually is canon (but not in the slavisly close to canon because it's actually different). She even could have kept the axe if they didn't want to ruin the colour balance (though I would like to see Levin Sword Minerva to reference her appearancein the first game). It would be a very easy visual edit that works both as fan service and makes the character more unique. What are we  meant to understand about her canon now, that she swapped away from pegasus before the super young age we see her in that banner? Or she swapped to pegasus and then swapped back to wyverns?

[Some Jerk]

Good lord, what a skippable banner. Only thing that possibly interests me is Spd/Def Tempo to give to Larum, and knowing my luck it's probably restricted from Ranged.

5 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

EDIT: WHAT THE FUCK IS DISTANT DART. WHAT THE FUCK WAS DISTANT PRESSURE THEN??? COULD WE JUST GET MORE COPIES OF CERTAIN SKILLS INSTEAD OF A MILLION VARIATIONS ON JUST ONE UNIT EACH

The difference with Distant Pressure is that its Spd buff works on both Phases. Distant Dart's boost is only on Enemy Phase.

Edited April 5, 2022 by Some Jerk

[Jotari]

I feel there's a slight missed opportunity to get Path of Radiance Sothe into the game here. Yeah, he doesn't quite fit the mold of the timeline with young Ike and the gang, the basic concept is "Young Tellius units" which is what Path of Radiance Sothe is. Maybe not stick him on the banner, but as the Tempest Trials unit he would have fit in nicely, I think. Path of Radiance Sothe is in an odd position wherein he's the only character between the two games with a noticable overhaul in design, where otherwise they're kind of treating Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn interchangeably (kind of, like each banner is usually dedicated to one or the other, but the characters themselves are composites, ie they're never going to give us both Path of Radiance Haar and Radiant Dawn Haar, but they do have reason to do so for Sothe).

 

It's a small thing, but I'm slightly disappointed Ike's sword isn't called Ettard. I kind of want that weapon in the game, and it does look like it's designed after it. I felt Fallen Ike should have had it too (of course I also feel that Fallen Ike shouldn't even exist and should have been Fallen Greil instead).

[Some Jerk]

Am I the only one who thinks Distant Dart is being overhyped? I feel like dedicated Spd-tanks are already stacking plenty, so the extra 5 Spd won't do much in the way of DR, and units that want to double you will probably still do it anyway with all the Player Phase Spd options. I think I might prefer Distant Pressure over it just so I have something for Player Phase, though that could just be me misconstruing "becomes a better speedtank on EP" for "the unit now does one task and one task only", and skills that lean towards only one end of the versatility spectrum aggravate me.

Edited April 5, 2022 by Some Jerk

[Humanoid]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

I'm still kind of flummoxed as to why they didn't make Minerva a pegasus knight. That's not something we've seen from her before and actually is canon (but not in the slavisly close to canon because it's actually different). She even could have kept the axe if they didn't want to ruin the colour balance (though I would like to see Levin Sword Minerva to reference her appearancein the first game). It would be a very easy visual edit that works both as fan service and makes the character more unique. What are we  meant to understand about her canon now, that she swapped away from pegasus before the super young age we see her in that banner? Or she swapped to pegasus and then swapped back to wyverns?

I'd have supported that, in a very short amount of time my Valentian Palla has already become one of my favourite units to use, so getting an adaptive damage flier even earlier and with easy merge access would have been great.

They should make up for it by putting next year's inevitable Spring Michalis on a pegasus.

[Ice Dragon]

1 hour ago, Jotari said:

She even could have kept the axe if they didn't want to ruin the colour balance (though I would like to see Levin Sword Minerva to reference her appearancein the first game).

Minerva was a Tempest Trial unit, so it wouldn't affect color balance to begin with.

However, at the time of her release, Spring Fir and Summer Innes were the only other fast axe fliers in the game, so it made more sense from a gameplay perspective to have her remain an axe unit.

Still should have been a pegasus, though.

 

46 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Yeah, he doesn't quite fit the mold of the timeline with young Ike and the gang, the basic concept is "Young Tellius units" which is what Path of Radiance Sothe is.

The internal name of this banner theme is "BEFORE", so Path of Radiance Sothe doesn't really fit the actual theme.

 

46 minutes ago, Jotari said:

It's a small thing, but I'm slightly disappointed Ike's sword isn't called Ettard. I kind of want that weapon in the game, and it does look like it's designed after it. I felt Fallen Ike should have had it too (of course I also feel that Fallen Ike shouldn't even exist and should have been Fallen Greil instead).

Sturdy War Sword actually has Regal Sword's hilt, but with a sharpened metal club attached to it as a poor excuse for a blade.

(Fallen Ike is a reference to a Cipher card and at least gives me some hope of eventually seeing Cipher's Risen King Chrom implemented. That said, he does have Ettard on his card art.)

 

31 minutes ago, Some Jerk said:

Am I the only one who thinks Distant Dart is being overhyped? I feel like dedicated Spd-tanks are already stacking plenty, so the extra 5 Spd won't do much in the way of DR, and units that want to double you will probably still do it anyway with all the Player Phase Spd options. I think I might prefer Distant Pressure over it just so I have something for Player Phase, though that could just be me misconstruing "becomes a better speedtank on EP" for "the unit now does one task and one task only", and skills that lean towards only one end of the versatility spectrum aggravate me.

No, you're not the only one.

I mentioned that Duo Ike himself would probably prefer to have Distant Pressure instead of his default Distant Dart because his exclusive Special heals himself, making the +5 Spd on player phase from Distant Pressure more consequential than the lack of recoil on Distant Dart.

Edited April 5, 2022 by Ice Dragon

[Jotari]

8 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

Minerva was a Tempest Trial unit, so it wouldn't affect color balance to begin with.

I was suspecting that was the case, but even so I would have still liked Axe Pegasus Minerva because Axe+Pegasus is a combination we haven't seen yet in Fire Emblem (outside of some random seaosnals like Bride Azura, though I guess Young Minerva would be a random seasonal too, but idk it'd feel less random because it's more canonical and less seasony).

8 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

The internal name of this banner theme is "BEFORE", so Path of Radiance Sothe doesn't really fit the actual theme.

Yeah that's why I was saying he could have fit in more neatly as the Tempest Trials unit than directly on the banner (or hell give us a random GHB unit with him, wouldn't be the weirdest thing they've done with GHB). He's not a perfect fit like a glove for this month, but he's also kind of an odd outlier in general so the similarity could have been used as good excuse to stick him in in some tangential capacity.

8 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

(Fallen Ike is a reference to a Cipher card and at least gives me some hope of eventually seeing Cipher's Risen King Chrom implemented. That said, he does have Ettard on his card art.)

Yeah I know that's where Fallen Ike comes from, but it still doesn't interest me as a what if as it has no real opportunity to happen. At least Risen King Chrom has a tangible what if scenario in the dark timeline unlike Berserk Ike which is just "What if Ike touched the medallion, lol" without any explanation as to how, why or when. There's also a bit of the element of if you're going to give us Cipher Content why not give us some of the actual Cipher units first? And just preferring Berserk Greil for being something from the game (and a very memorable and dramatic thing from the game). They'll probably give us Berserk Griel eventually as the source of Fallen Heroes is running a bit thin (for viable ones at least), but I would have rathered him first over a non canon hypothetical Berserk Ike.

[Magenta Fantasies]

Depending on the next New Heroes banner, I might summon for young Soren. Other than that, I’m disappointed by this banner. I couldn’t care less about Boyd, Mia or Mist, and while I somewhat like Ilyana, I don’t like her enough to invest significant orbs to summon for her. I would’ve rather seen young Elincia, Sanaki, Sothe or even Micaiah for non-Greil Mercenaries characters. Young Titania would be very interesting, though she’d be considerably older than the others, teenage at the youngest.

[Karuu30]

Fortunately it’s a skip for me. Young Ike and Mist seem tempting, but yet they’re alongside with Young Mia another speedy sword infantry that will probably be overshadowed by another one in a couple of months.

The characters selection is also… very particular, to say the least. They still look cute though.

No Young Elincia or Sanaki is a bit disappointing too. 

[Jotari]

32 minutes ago, Magenta Fantasies said:

Depending on the next New Heroes banner, I might summon for young Soren. Other than that, I’m disappointed by this banner. I couldn’t care less about Boyd, Mia or Mist, and while I somewhat like Ilyana, I don’t like her enough to invest significant orbs to summon for her. I would’ve rather seen young Elincia, Sanaki, Sothe or even Micaiah for non-Greil Mercenaries characters. Young Titania would be very interesting, though she’d be considerably older than the others, teenage at the youngest.

Young Elincia would give us a chance to use her non combat design.

[Nym]

9 hours ago, Xenomata said:

Is... everyone just going to be salty at this banner?

I am not, I just found it laughably boring and uninspired. It was cute two years ago, a bit less cool one year ago (at least kid L'arachel was different and kid Ignes was hype for most people) but now, it's really bad. Picnic would be way better, at least as a joke banner at least.

9 hours ago, ZeManaphy said:

Ditto. Funny, you think people here would be happy that 3H, Fates, and Awakening are getting a break from representation but instead I find people complaining. Fandom and satisfaction can never cross it seems. 

You are missing the point entirely. Those that don't like it like me aren't complaining about the game represented, we are complaining about the units of this banner being boring and uninspired, they are basically better, powercreep versions of their older versions. They just swapped some tome colors and that's it.

They could have gotten more creative of course. I think seeing a younger Titania or Greil with Ragnell before he crippled himself would be ten times more interesting than any of those kids.

[Ice Dragon]

5 minutes ago, Nym said:

Those that don't like it like me aren't complaining about the game represented, we are complaining about the units of this banner being boring and uninspired, they are basically better, powercreep versions of their older versions.

"Boring and uninspired" sounds a lot like an excuse to avoid saying that the characters on the banner were "not the characters I wanted".

 

17 minutes ago, Nym said:

I think seeing a younger Titania or Greil with Ragnell before he crippled himself would be ten times more interesting than any of those kids.

I feel like Gawain would be better suited for an Ascended Hero (or otherwise on a regular banner) instead of being on this banner theme. The characters in this banner theme are given their power-creeping ability from Thorr, which wouldn't really make sense for either Gawain (who wouldn't need it) or a slightly younger Titania (who also wouldn't need it).

Gawain at the height of his strength is a fully canon character, unlike the units on these banners.

[Nym]

37 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

"Boring and uninspired" sounds a lot like an excuse to avoid saying that the characters on the banner were "not the characters I wanted".

I am not even the slightest interest in Tellius when it comes to its units so I would avoid making assumptions if I were you.

I just look at those units and all I see is just better versions of older units, there's nothing different aside of tome color changes. It's boring and uninspired in my opinion. If fans of those units are happy, good for them. Personally, I would be upset to have to waste orbs for a better and modern version of an unit I already own and invested a lot of skills into them.

37 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

I feel like Gawain would be better suited for an Ascended Hero (or otherwise on a regular banner) instead of being on this banner theme. The characters in this banner theme are given their power-creeping ability from Thorr, which wouldn't really make sense for either Gawain (who wouldn't need it) or a slightly younger Titania (who also wouldn't need it).

Gawain at the height of his strength is a fully canon character, unlike the units on these banners.

Thorr's intervention was just an excuse to explain how kids their age can even possibly compete with grown adults in combat. It's not a requirement for the banner, just a lore explanation of how it's even possible.

Christmas Zephiel happened and he isn't a kid. The Paralogue could just be that young Titania and Gawain got summoned from a time they were trying to make the Greil Mercenaries work at its earliest stage with Ike's mother and young Oscar. Saying 'oh we need Thorr' is false, IS makes the rules. They can decide to make it only a kid banner or not, that's their choice and only theirs.

Edited April 5, 2022 by Nym

[Xenomata]

1 hour ago, Nym said:

Thorr's intervention was just an excuse to explain how kids their age can even possibly compete with grown adults in combat. It's not a requirement for the banner, just a lore explanation of how it's even possible.

Christmas Zephiel happened and he isn't a kid. The Paralogue could just be that young Titania and Gawain got summoned from a time they were trying to make the Greil Mercenaries work at its earliest stage with Ike's mother and young Oscar. Saying 'oh we need Thorr' is false, IS makes the rules. They can decide to make it only a kid banner or not, that's their choice and only theirs.

Is it though?

If they made an Echoes kids banner featuring Alm/Celica, Gray, Kliff, Tobin, and Faye, would they be able to make overpowered units out of those kids, who canonically needed protection just to live through a battle?
Regardless of what IS says the rules are, realistically they are kids. They are inexperienced, weaker and flimsier, and without the explanation of Thorr having any involvement they'd probably be wielding Bronze, Slim, or training weaponry at best.

Also worth mentioning is that these banners need the involvement of Loki/Thorr because the units cannot be allowed to remember the events of what transpired. If a Gawain/Titania/Oscar/Elena banner was made out of them trying to make the mercenaries work, they would be gathering inspiration from their new experiences to make the group work even better, which itself changes the course of history in at least one implied world.
It ALSO doesn't make sense for all 4 units to have been even stronger than they are in the present, since remember they have to be overpowered as hell here.

I'm not saying it needs to be limited to kids, there's certainly more than a few ways that "child banners" could go in the future, but I am saying that Thorr and Loki need to be involved.

[Othin]

7 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

Is it though?

If they made an Echoes kids banner featuring Alm/Celica, Gray, Kliff, Tobin, and Faye, would they be able to make overpowered units out of those kids, who canonically needed protection just to live through a battle?
Regardless of what IS says the rules are, realistically they are kids. They are inexperienced, weaker and flimsier, and without the explanation of Thorr having any involvement they'd probably be wielding Bronze, Slim, or training weaponry at best.

Also worth mentioning is that these banners need the involvement of Loki/Thorr because the units cannot be allowed to remember the events of what transpired. If a Gawain/Titania/Oscar/Elena banner was made out of them trying to make the mercenaries work, they would be gathering inspiration from their new experiences to make the group work even better, which itself changes the course of history in at least one implied world.
It ALSO doesn't make sense for all 4 units to have been even stronger than they are in the present, since remember they have to be overpowered as hell here.

I'm not saying it needs to be limited to kids, there's certainly more than a few ways that "child banners" could go in the future, but I am saying that Thorr and Loki need to be involved.

There are units who attack by hitting people with ice cream, carrots, or floaties. IS can find excuses for whatever they want.

[Jotari]

20 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

Is it though?

If they made an Echoes kids banner featuring Alm/Celica, Gray, Kliff, Tobin, and Faye, would they be able to make overpowered units out of those kids, who canonically needed protection just to live through a battle?
Regardless of what IS says the rules are, realistically they are kids. They are inexperienced, weaker and flimsier, and without the explanation of Thorr having any involvement they'd probably be wielding Bronze, Slim, or training weaponry at best.

Also worth mentioning is that these banners need the involvement of Loki/Thorr because the units cannot be allowed to remember the events of what transpired. If a Gawain/Titania/Oscar/Elena banner was made out of them trying to make the mercenaries work, they would be gathering inspiration from their new experiences to make the group work even better, which itself changes the course of history in at least one implied world.
It ALSO doesn't make sense for all 4 units to have been even stronger than they are in the present, since remember they have to be overpowered as hell here.

I'm not saying it needs to be limited to kids, there's certainly more than a few ways that "child banners" could go in the future, but I am saying that Thorr and Loki need to be involved.

I think you're missing the point. The Thorr aspect exists because the child units exist. If it was just a banner featuring young Greil and young Tatiana then Thorr wouldn't be required, because they don't need her power. These aren't "banners for Thorr to show off her power", they're "younger versions of existing characters" banners.

And just so my position is clear, I don't really care about this banner, not in a salty way, as I doubt there's anything they could have given me that I would care about more. Young Soren is nice though since we know his youth and how radically different it is to when we see him in the game. I did make a dedicated thread for people to talk about what baby units they would like to see.

 

[Nym]

39 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

Is it though?

If they made an Echoes kids banner featuring Alm/Celica, Gray, Kliff, Tobin, and Faye, would they be able to make overpowered units out of those kids, who canonically needed protection just to live through a battle?
Regardless of what IS says the rules are, realistically they are kids. They are inexperienced, weaker and flimsier, and without the explanation of Thorr having any involvement they'd probably be wielding Bronze, Slim, or training weaponry at best.

I'm not really sure what is the point of that part because it's literally what I said.

Thórr's intervention is a lore explanation to explain how these younger versions of heroes can compete with grown adults in combat. That's basically it. They will continue to use that explanation for any of these "child banners" as necessary.

44 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

Also worth mentioning is that these banners need the involvement of Loki/Thorr because the units cannot be allowed to remember the events of what transpired. If a Gawain/Titania/Oscar/Elena banner was made out of them trying to make the mercenaries work, they would be gathering inspiration from their new experiences to make the group work even better, which itself changes the course of history in at least one implied world.

The first thing I want to say is that I'm not even sure if Thorr or Loki ever erase anyone's memory if they involved them. I don't pay a lot of attention to those Paralogue dialogue anymore.

Also, I'm pretty sure any units that would return to their world, younger version or not, would affect the course of history in their world. I don't think that's a really a possible explanation. 

49 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

It ALSO doesn't make sense for all 4 units to have been even stronger than they are in the present, since remember they have to be overpowered as hell here.

Thorr's intervention is a lore explanation to elaborate on a gameplay feature. I'm pretty sure from a lore perspective, these kids are still at their normal strength. It's just IS saying: "This is how these kids acquired their broken weapons and skills you most certainly don't want to miss out on!"

56 minutes ago, Xenomata said:

I'm not saying it needs to be limited to kids, there's certainly more than a few ways that "child banners" could go in the future, but I am saying that Thorr and Loki need to be involved.

Not necessarily. Again, their involvement is to explain how kids can even fight grown adults. Young Titania, Greil, Oscar and Elena are adults (or late teenager for Oscar?), with less battle experience yes, but their bodies are most suitable for combat. The goddess could still be involved by blessing them with weapons or skills, but I think that would just ruin the entire point of the banner.

From someone who is more interested in the story, I would like to see the earlier days of the Greil Mercenaries. Their struggles, how they managed to get by every day, etc. It's never really shown in the Tellius games, just mentioned by a few characters from time to time. Heroes as its limits, but it could work even if a FB for them would be better.

[Tybrosion]

1 hour ago, Othin said:

There are units who attack by hitting people with ice cream, carrots, or floaties. IS can find excuses for whatever they want.

IS also frequently lets us summon FEH antagonists who canonically died in the main story and even have some of them lampshade their deaths (like Surtr, Hel and Ascended Laegjarn).

They really don’t care that much about making sure that everything in this game will make sense from a lore perspective.

Edited April 5, 2022 by Tybrosion

[Sunwoo]

9 hours ago, Some Jerk said:

Good lord, what a skippable banner. Only thing that possibly interests me is Spd/Def Tempo to give to Larum, and knowing my luck it's probably restricted from Ranged.

The difference with Distant Pressure is that its Spd buff works on both Phases. Distant Dart's boost is only on Enemy Phase.

I KNOW what the difference is, but it still feels like an unnecessary addition, which is the point! Instead of spreading out these numerous variations of DC/CC by putting one on one character only (some seasonal or legendary locked) they should really consider putting more sources of the DC variations in this game on other units. There's honestly no reason both distant pressure and distant dart both had to exist.

10 hours ago, Etrurian emperor said:

Guess the devs really do hate Boyd. First they flatly refuse to put him into the game for years and when they do its in the most half hearted way possible as a lame freebie. Its kinda bad that we can clearly see which characters the debs like and which they are completely uninterested in.

Yeah, it sucks. Sometimes it feels like Heroes is the devs' own personal wank fest on what units they want to spoil and what units they want to ignore or totally fuck over.

[Rinco]

To be honest, I'd rather have two New Heroes banners in April than having child banners. Most of the seasonal themes are already saturated and this one doesn't appeal at all to me.

[Sunwoo]

We didn't need pirates or ninjas or random desert seasonal clogging up January, August, or November either. But it seems this is the direction the game wants to go in now.