New Heroes & Ascended Ishtar

[Ice Dragon]

Anyways, the usual translation notes:

 

The banner name, "New Heroes & Ascended Ishtar", is "新英雄＆開花イシュタル" (shin-eiyū & kaika ishutaru), "New Heroes & Blooming Ishtar". As usual, "開花" (kaika), "blooming", is the Japanese name for Ascended Heroes.

Tinny's epithet, "Rumbling Thunder", is "受難の雷姫" (junan no raiki), "Thunder Princess of Suffering".

Thunderer Tome is "怒雷の紫書" (dorai no shisho), "Violet Tome of Raging Thunder". The word "怒" (do), "anger", is the same word used in "怒り" (ikari), the name of the Wrath skill. Violet is a color commonly associated with lightning in Japanese, such as in the word "紫電" (shiden), literally "violet lightning", which refers to the flash of lightning in a darkened sky and, by extension, any bright flash of light, but especially the glint of sunlight off of a sword (and is also the name of the Kawanishi N1K-J Shiden WWII-era IJN fighter).

Blue Feud is "青への暗闘" (ao e no antō), "Secret Feud Against Blue".

Arthur's epithet, "Furious Mage", is "怒りの魔法戦士" (ikari no mahō senshi), "Magic Warrior of Wrath". "怒り" (ikari), "anger", is the name of the Wrath skill in Japanese.

Gronnvulture is "グルンバルチャー" (gurunbaruchā), "Gronnvulture".

Spd/Res Menace is "速さ魔防の脅嚇" (hayasa-mabō no kyōkaku), "Spd/Res Intimidation".

Skasaher's epithet, "Astra's Wake", is "地を走る流星" (chi o hashiru ryūsei), "Shooting Star Streaking Across the Ground". "流星" (ryūsei), "shooting star", is the name of the Astra skill in Japanese.

Spirited Sword is "士気旺盛の剣" (shiki-ōsei no tsurugi), "Sword of Heightened Morale".

Ishtar's epithet, "Echoing Thunder", is "死地の雷神" (shichi no raijin), "Thunder God of Imminent Death". "死地" (shichi), literally "land of death" or "place of death", has several meanings, including "a dangerous location or situation likely to result in death", "a situation from which one cannot escape" (i.e. a deathtrap, both literally and metaphorically), or "the place where one died".

Thunder's Mjolnir is "雷神トールハンマー" (raijin tōruhanmā), "Thunder God Thor Hammer". "トールハンマー" (tōruhanmā), "Thor Hammer", is the name of Jugdral's Mjolnir, which is not the same weapon as the Mjolnir from Fates or the Mjolnir from Heroes, both of which are named "ミョルニル" (myoruniru), "Mjolnir".

Hilda's epithet, "Queen of Friege", is "フリージの女王" (furīji no joō), "Queen of Friege".

Fiery Bolganone is "嘲謔ボルガノン" (chōgyaku boruganon), "Sadistic Bolganone". "嘲謔" (chōgyaku) is a novel compound word composed of "嘲る" (azakeru), "to ridicule", and "謔れる" (tawamureru), "to be amused" (also "to play at" or "to joke"), and I'm interpreting it as "finding enjoyment in causing torment".

Edited April 19, 2022 by Ice Dragon

[Xenomata]

I don't have any attachment to any of these characters outside of +10ing Ishtar, so you can expect an outsider's perspective on these characters! (And also some unit analysis junk that gets ignored/picked apart)

• Tine's colorless nature confuses me. They were clearly okay with color overlap in previous banners, and as far as I know Tine is a Thunder Mage like her mom is, but they went and made her colorless because... she seems kinda moody I guess?
  Thunderer Tome seems set up to be active at all times except when stalling. Unless Tine has garbage for defenses, she might not even need a skill like Fury to get under 100% hp, and in fact she can just go under if she's on the same team as Winter Bernadetta. Shame she doesn't have Desperation and would be giving up NFU for it, but surely we're due for that sacred seal this year...?
• Someone at Intsys got confused clearly, because Arthur got very unlucky despite the actual unlucky Arthur currently being buried alive in someone elses grave right now.
  Gronnvulture brings the Plegian Torch to the summoning pool, and this I believe is the first Menace skill that does not target Atk? Honestly I think ASmenace would still be preferred anyway.
• ...hey... does Scathach give anyone else some anime protag vibes...?
  Pledged Blade enters the 4* pool now. I honestly can't help but wonder why though, sure the stat bonus is technically lower but the special charge effect is pretty neat.
• ...I can't say I like the plushes in her hand... I know she did not support the child hunt, but she still didn't stop it, so... I dunno, kinda wish she would have stopped supporting Julius, not even join the player army just STOP SUPPORTING HIM.
  Can't really say I'm interested in Ascended Ishtar. I have like 7 fast Blue Mage Infantry at this point, and one of them is regular Ishtar herself. It's not really like this version of her is doing anything different except having a conditional Brave effect on her weapon, yet assuming she is strong enough she may as well have just had a permanent Desperation/NFU effect. Tempo is different too I guess, but only barely.
• Hilda... Hilda... wasn't she the lazy girl with the giant pseudo-ASsolo axe? THIS IS A SARCASTIC STATEMENT, I know who Hilda is... vaguely... if you'll excuse my trip to the wiki later...

So... kind of an easy pass. I'll summon a bit of course, but probably just to my first 5* unit, not even a focus unit. Tine and Ishtar seem like the premier units to target, Arthur doesn't even have that amazing skill fodder imo, and Scathach is an anime protag-I mean demote so I'll have him sooner or later anyway.

Edited April 17, 2022 by Xenomata

[Sasori]

Not a bad banner, but its a pretty safe skip for me.

I've never cared much for the gen 2 freed siblings..or most gen 2 characters for that matter. The only thing of note is that I find it weird how they made Arthur as Vanilla as possible. Maybe they just don't like male cav mages in the general pool since they kicked Azelle of his too. At least Azelle had a prf though, while Arthur just gets a basic tome.

While I think infantry swords need a bit of a break after the deluge we got of them, I'll be making a exception for Scatch. The guy is been overshadowed by his much more marketable twin so much that i'm totally ok with him being in the game. It is also really silly how they did not give him his family's astra. As a 4 star demote scatach is already doomed so why not make him a bit more appealing with a good special? Its not like he'd break the game when there are a million godswords around.

As for Ascended Ishtar...I am not the biggest fan. To me the idea of a ascended hero is a hero thats...well Ascended.  A Joshua who took on his responsibilities as king, a Idunn who is getting better. Heroes that improved a lot. Ishtar never did so in her game so I don't see how she'd 'ascend' without going into 'what if fanfic' territory.
 

Edited April 17, 2022 by Sasori

[Hilda]

2 hours ago, Etrurian emperor said:

Yes! Hilda is finally in the game! Hilda! Hilda!

I like the Freeges a lot so I’m pretty happy with this banner. The only problem is that Fee got ditched for a boring swordboy.

Does the English trailer just not work for anyone else? Like it’s bugged or something?

I am glad i bring so much joy!

On a sidenote: i guess Brave Tome are becomeing more regular. There is no reason that Reinhardt and Olwen shouldnt get a refine by now.

[FailWood]

4 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

Fuck you and your female favoritism, IS.

Good man, saying what I'm thinking.

3 hours ago, Othin said:

I don't like Ascended Heroes, but I don't think they were really avoidable. A lot of games are starting to really run low on missing "waifu bait" characters, and that's unfortunately a big part of what keeps FEH profitable. So it makes sense that they'd feel the need to have future New Heroes banners go back to drawing on old ones, to make a more future-proof system.

This is also why Ascended Heroes are likely to continue skewing female - it's the whole reason they exist.

It's like someone *points at myself* predicted this would happen months ago when they brought up how IS is running out of female characters to add to Heroes and that they would start using Alts more to keep adding women reliably.  Granted, I didn't think it would be because of Ascended Heroes.  It's like Mythic Heroes and Harmonic Heroes all over again.

[MagicCanonBalls]

This is getting really boring real quick. What is the point of ascended unit if it's still the same class, same color, same weapon type?  And the art can pass as her og resplendent art as well. If this is the lazy boring path they are going then ascended banner would just become annoying to see.

[Some Jerk]

Hoo boy, where do I even start with this one?

Tine: Y!Innes but magical. Merging a 5★-exclusive is a much heavier investment than merging a TT reward, but the Anti-DR gimmick is powerful and Res is a much easier stat to target. She's worth a consideration if physical DR tanks are a consistent problem for you.

Arthur: A blatant Gronnvulture delivery service, and a botched one at that. Being able to inherit Gronnvulture+, Atk/Spd Ideal 4, and Spd/Res Menace all in one go would've been fantastic, but this falls flat because Threat. Spd/Res 2 didn't exist before this (in fact, it was the only double Threaten that had yet to be added).

Scáthach: Look what they did to our boy! Poor Scáthach got fucking flattened by the demote hammer. There is nothing good to say about him other than bringing Spirited Sword (and that's really reaching).

Asc!Ishtar: And I thought Asc!Mareeta was underwhelming; at least she had a cool skill fodder. Asc!Ishtar is just regular Ishtar with her PRF updated to version 2.0, with the rest of her skills being a standard infantry mage kit.

Tine > Asc!Ishtar > Arthur > Scáthach. I know I said this about the previous New Heroes banner, but I mean it about this one: I'm not sparking for the floret. The Forging Bonds stands to be good, but unit-wise this banner is one of the lamest we've had for a while. Only Tine vaguely interests me, and that's because I haven't merged Y!Innes enough to care about Anti-DR units in my teams.

7 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

Fuck you and your female favoritism, IS.

Honestly, that sums up this banner perfectly. The girls are at least workable even if they're boring, but the men are a total write-off.

[Diovani Bressan]

7 hours ago, Alexmender said:

Tine seems really strong. Her prf has Slaying, CD-1 on turns 1~3 or permanent if she suffers some damage, +6 Atk/Spd, half of Tempo and 7 true dmg per hit.

She doesnt have Tempo and she doesn't deal 7 true damage per hit.

When Tina's special triggers, she deals +7 damage and nullifies damage reduction skills, Just like Young Innes. She only deals +7 damage with specials.

[Humanoid]

There is a little bit of temptation to open greys on the ticket rounds, which would end up costing what, around 30 orbs in total across the five rounds? I can swing that but it's a fair bit for five Niles or Saizos. Gotta say I really dislike Tine's hair too, petty as that is. So I should probably build up that Young Innes instead, but to +10 him would be 3700 grail which just kills me. It's like, one fully merged Innes, or a fully merged Walhart *and* Yen'fay with grails to spare (and that's with me missing a freebie 5* Walhart too apparently). Ugh.

I hadn't truly been exposed to the absurdity that DR mechanics can reach until the current Grand Conquest which has been painful and tedious without me paying close enough attention to both my brigade compositions and my barracks in general.

[Diovani Bressan]

Honestly... This banner is a skip. Nothing really interesting here or a must have to me. I will use my tickets on blue only because of the Floret.

And also... Golden Week is coming, and we usually have Hero Fest there with CYL banners. Not to mention Fallen Heroes coming next, and that banner is usually pretty strong.

[Othin]

Honestly, I'm probably going to initially ignore Ishtar and start by pulling only green/colorless, and only start taking blue if I get one of the siblings to guarantee that I can have both after the spark. I like Ishtar, but I have both of her previous versions, I don't see anything I need from the new one.

[Humanoid]

Yeah, the appeal of Ishtar on this banner is mostly driven by the extra perks of being Ascended plus some consideration for her not having scoliosis in her new art. If I were to disregard those factors then probably Tine wins, if nothing else for being a grey mage.

(I don't presently have any Ishtars, but to be fair I hadn't sought to get any. Haven't pulled a single Ascended hero of any kind either.)

[Jotari]

I...have nothing to complain about. Huh...Can't remember the last time feeling like that. I guess I'd rather Ishtore as a GHB than Hilda, but it's not like she's a bad choice.

Arthur looks a lot more bad ass than I imagined him.

Edited April 17, 2022 by Jotari

[Othin]

24 minutes ago, Jotari said:

I...have nothing to complain about. Huh...Can't remember the last time feeling like that. I guess I'd rather Ishtore as a GHB than Hilda, but it's not like she's a bad choice.

Arthur looks a lot more bad ass than I imagined him.

Looks like Ishtore didn't score much lower than Hilda on CYL6, although both were very low. (50 and 58 votes, respectively.)

Top missing FE4 Gen 2 bosses going into this banner:

1. Emperor Arvis
2. Arion
3. Hilda
4. Ishtore
5. Manfroy

I hope they all make it in eventually, but it'll take a while at this rate. And FE4 Gen 1 looks set to run out of banners entirely first. It's only missing 9 playables - Dew, Naoise, Chulainn, Midir, Edain, Brigid, Beowulf, Claud, and Alec - which probably has the makings of 3 banners alongside a GHB lineup along the lines of Lombard, Reptor, and Aida. (Wait, is Pamela still not even on CYL?)

FE4 Gen 2, meanwhile, is missing 11 non-subs (Patty, Oifey, Fee, Febail, Lana, Diarmuid, Lester, Iuchar, Iucharba, Coirpre, and Hannibal) although most of them rank lower than its top subs so who knows what's gonna happen there. Laylea, Muirne, Hawk, Amid, Daisy, Creidne, and Linda all rank above the lowest non-subs, adding 7 for a total of 18. That could make 6 banners if they add, say, Brian and Bloom to the GHB lineup.

Edited April 17, 2022 by Othin

[Mercakete]

Ah, looks like they gave Arthur pants. I was wondering what design direction they'd go in there. It's neat to see Scathach, too. I never played FE4 (I just watched a Let's Play once), but it kind of looks like the guys got a bit underpowered, I think. Again, can't say for sure, though, given my lack of actual experience. It's nice to see more families brought together, though.

But what's with Ishtar's plushes? And why choose her as the ascended hero instead of someone else? Genuinely asking since the best guess I have is that she has some association with Julius or something. (Otherwise, isn't she basically just that "I hate to do this but my hands are tied and by the way I'm really powerful and on a horse" archetype/"siege tome disaster chapter boss"?) It's been a long time, so I don't have many details here.

Also, looks like Joshua's still the only male ascended hero. I wonder if that makes him feel special.

Edit: Oh right, I see people mentioning Ishtore and I totally forgot about him. Huh. Yeah, now that it's mentioned, I really feel his absence. Huh. Weird.

But yeah, I guess IS' female favoritism is showing up again, as others have pointed out. Annoying, but nothing new. At least they've been better about it lately, I think.

Edited April 17, 2022 by Mercakete

[Jotari]

35 minutes ago, Othin said:

Looks like Ishtore didn't score much lower than Hilda on CYL6, although both were very low. (50 and 58 votes, respectively.)

Top missing FE4 Gen 2 bosses going into this banner:

1. Emperor Arvis
2. Arion
3. Hilda
4. Ishtore
5. Manfroy

I hope they all make it in eventually, but it'll take a while at this rate. And FE4 Gen 1 looks set to run out of banners entirely first. It's only missing 9 playables - Dew, Naoise, Chulainn, Midir, Edain, Brigid, Beowulf, Claud, and Alec - which probably has the makings of 3 banners alongside a GHB lineup along the lines of Lombard, Reptor, and Aida. (Wait, is Pamela still not even on CYL?)

FE4 Gen 2, meanwhile, is missing 11 non-subs (Patty, Oifey, Fee, Febail, Lana, Diarmuid, Lester, Iuchar, Iucharba, Coirpre, and Hannibal) although most of them rank lower than its top subs so who knows what's gonna happen there. Laylea, Muirne, Hawk, Amid, Daisy, Creidne, and Linda all rank above the lowest non-subs, adding 7 for a total of 18. That could make 6 banners if they add, say, Brian and Bloom to the GHB lineup.

18 minutes ago, Mercakete said:

Edit: Oh right, I see people mentioning Ishtore and I totally forgot about him. Huh. Yeah, now that it's mentioned, I really feel his absence. Huh. Weird.

But yeah, I guess IS' female favoritism is showing up again, as others have pointed out. Annoying, but nothing new. At least they've been better about it lately, I think.

To be fair Hilda is a bigger character than Ishtore. Ishtore, despite being the relations of other major characters is a one time boss. You fight him, he dies, and then isn't mentioned much again (one or two references but no serious investment in mourning his loss). Basically warm up Ishtar before you really fight Ishtar. It's precisely because of this in between level of importance that ascended Ishtar would have been a great time to include him. Hilda we can throw into the game at any time and it would be appropriate, but this is kind of Ishtore's best opportunity. Without Ishtar being relevant in some way he's a tad bit too minor to really justify getting in (though random Chapter 4 pegasus got in and she's far more minor than Ishtore, so who knows, but even she got in as an excuse when they were doing other Sileese stuff, if I remember correctly).

18 minutes ago, Mercakete said:

Ah, looks like they gave Arthur pants. I was wondering what design direction they'd go in there. It's neat to see Scathach, too. I never played FE4 (I just watched a Let's Play once), but it kind of looks like the guys got a bit underpowered, I think. Again, can't say for sure, though, given my lack of actual experience. It's nice to see more families brought together, though.

But what's with Ishtar's plushes? And why choose her as the ascended hero instead of someone else? Genuinely asking since the best guess I have is that she has some association with Julius or something. (Otherwise, isn't she basically just that "I hate to do this but my hands are tied and by the way I'm really powerful and on a horse" archetype/"siege tome disaster chapter boss"?) It's been a long time, so I don't have many details here.

Also, looks like Joshua's still the only male ascended hero. I wonder if that makes him feel special.

She's Julius's girlfriend.

 

[Othin]

34 minutes ago, Mercakete said:

But what's with Ishtar's plushes? And why choose her as the ascended hero instead of someone else? Genuinely asking since the best guess I have is that she has some association with Julius or something. (Otherwise, isn't she basically just that "I hate to do this but my hands are tied and by the way I'm really powerful and on a horse" archetype/"siege tome disaster chapter boss"?) It's been a long time, so I don't have many details here.

I'd guessed she would be the Ascended, personally, since she was the most marketable candidate by far. The only FE4 Gen 2 characters who scored higher on CYL6 were Seliph, Leif, and Finn - between Seliph and Leif being lords while Leif and Finn are more closely tied to FE5, she's essentially the top of the list. The next most likely picks are Larcei and Ced, who each received less than half as many votes as Ishtar - and less than Tine, for that matter. (Ced also scored below Arthur and Scathatch.) I think those two are likely to be future FE4 Gen 2 Ascended picks, but it makes sense to hold off and do Ishtar first, between her closer association with Tine and Arthur, the fact that Larcei and Ced got their original versions more recently (the previous FE4 Gen 2 banner, even!), and the fact that Ascended Larcei would feel really redundant immediately after Mareeta.

[Yexin]

Arthur is in the game (with great artworks too) and that's what matters to me

yeah, it's damn garbage that him and Scathach don't have PRF weapons (or anything decent to begin with, in Scathach's case), but i mean it's not like I$ ever made us think wiener-abled demotes ever deserved anything at all

also yeah, Ascended Isthar is super boring, but at least she looks cool

[FailWood]

...Completely ignored.

[Interdimensional Observer]

10 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

Isn't there like a super high probability that Ishtar is dead by the end of FE4? Does this mean that people who are probably dead at the end of their games qualify for Ascended now? So where's my Ascended Reinhardt lol

They never died. Have you not played FEs 17 and 19 yet? SF will have the requirements posted soon.😝

[Jotari]

11 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

So. Uhhh ...

Isn't there like a super high probability that Ishtar is dead by the end of FE4? Does this mean that people who are probably dead at the end of their games qualify for Ascended now? So where's my Ascended Reinhardt lol

The rest of the banner is kind of typical, although why couldn't we have gotten Faval instead of Hilda as the GHB ...

EDIT: Ugh, Scathach was done dirty. And there's no reason Arthur couldn't have gotten a prf tome. Fuck you and your female favoritism, IS.

Reinhardt doesn't necessarily die in Thracia. And not just in the sense that almost every boss in Thracia can be captured, but even in his own chapter he's not the boss guarding the seize point so you can go right around him (and by far the best strategy in that map is to warp skip it by killing Cowen on the first turn. Because all those damn authority stars and status staves are a major pain).

[Etrurian emperor]

I think Tine looks a bit too much like a loli. I know she's smol, frail and needs protecting but due to how the timeskip works she cannot be any younger than 16, yet here she looks 13 at best. 

[Jotari]

16 minutes ago, Etrurian emperor said:

I think Tine looks a bit too much like a loli. I know she's smol, frail and needs protecting but due to how the timeskip works she cannot be any younger than 16, yet here she looks 13 at best. 

That's a surprising issue with quite a few of the gen 2 units. It feels like there was a miscommunication between Kaga and the character designers. Corpre looks no older first gen Oifey.

[Etrurian emperor]

2 minutes ago, Jotari said:

That's a surprising issue with quite a few of the gen 2 units. It feels like there was a miscommunication between Kaga and the character designers. Corpre looks no older first gen Oifey.

Corpre especially is a strange case since he seems so much younger than the other characters. To the point that in Tracia he's a victim of the child hunts in Tracia while other young characters like Leif or Asbel seem too old for the hunts. 

Though Tinne does have the excuse that Hilda probably didn't feed her very well.

[5PointGordin]

4 hours ago, Yexin said:

Arthur is in the game (with great artworks too) and that's what matters to me

yeah, it's damn garbage that him and Scathach don't have PRF weapons (or anything decent to begin with, in Scathach's case), but i mean it's not like I$ ever made us think wiener-abled demotes ever deserved anything at all

also yeah, Ascended Isthar is super boring, but at least she looks cool

Scathach didn't get anymore screwed over than the previous 2 demotes, Karin and Cath. I'm really not sure what the big deal is here.

Even if his statline is bad, I guarantee that his greater availability will put him in a much better position than a character like Galzus or Niime.