Japanese Fire Emblem Twitter posts

[ciphertul]

Man they could have at least dropped Framme today.

[DefyingFates]

59 minutes ago, Seazas said:

Fuck man. I hate this account's inconsistency so much. Xenoblade fans are so lucky.

To be fair, this is only our second week of the news cycle and our first "standard" one. One reveal per week is probably the norm we should expect going forward.

As I said before, knowing when the reveals are coming is enough for me. Besides, if this means the cast is small, that means there's more chance of everyone being really fleshed out (and at least some time given to making the Emblems feel alive and not just living accessories, but we've talked about that part before). We've had small casts before (FE8 and FE2/15), but never on a home console title's budget!

[Use the Falchion]

2 hours ago, DefyingFates said:

if this means the cast is small

The June leak mentioned that there would be "many new characters," so I'm not sure that the cast size will be that small. Then again, "many" is a subjective and nebulous statement. 12 can be a lot compared to 6, and 15 is "many" compared to 8, so who knows how many characters there will be. 

As an aside, I don't think that the cast being small automatically means that the characters will be more fleshed out. I found most of the Three Houses/Hopes cast pretty fleshed out despite the amount of characters in the game. Yes, a smaller cast has a more room to receive that focus and more spotlight opportunities for each character (depending on the size of the game of course), but I think Supports and Paralogues help flesh out characters a lot. 

[Azz]

I don't think a lack of character updates means the cast will be small. I think this time around we probably just wont get to see everyone before the game drops like we did for Three Houses. IIRC that's what happened for both Fates and Shadows of Valentia (obvi going into SoV we knew most of the cast but we didn't get to see everyone until he game was actually released).

[Ivy Wife Supremacy]

12 minutes ago, Azz said:

I don't think a lack of character updates means the cast will be small. I think this time around we probably just wont get to see everyone before the game drops like we did for Three Houses. IIRC that's what happened for both Fates and Shadows of Valentia (obvi going into SoV we knew most of the cast but we didn't get to see everyone until he game was actually released).

I’m happy with this I rather keep a bunch secret until the game comes out. Three Houses was going very overboard with it despite yes every playable character was there from the start but cmon nothing was a surprise going into the game which is always the best part of a JRPG…

Edited September 23, 2022 by Mage Goddess Lysithea

[ciphertul]

Watching the Vander animation again and I wish they would get away the “samurai stance” swordies. I would like to see the older stance again.

[Fabulously Olivier]

3 minutes ago, ciphertul said:

Watching the Vander animation again and I wish they would get away the “samurai stance” swordies. I would like to see the older stance again.

Agreed. Swordmaster and Samurai should be distinct classes. Heck, Samurai should be a Sword & Bow or Sword & Lance class.

[DefyingFates]

3 hours ago, Use the Falchion said:

As an aside, I don't think that the cast being small automatically means that the characters will be more fleshed out

True, I just meant that there was a chance that a smaller cast receiving the same attention as the entirety of 3H's cast would mean each individual would be even deeper, but I know that isn't exactly a 1:1 assumption anyone can safely make. And as I keep forgetting, 3H was a special case with all the cast revealed early on and so it's likely a portion of Engage's cast will be hidden until release - just as you and Azz say. Thanks for the reminders!

@Mage Goddess Lysithea And yeah, I felt 3H showing off the entire cast ahead of time was a bit much too. I was actually lucky and missed some of the staff reveals, so at least I still had those for me. I'm sorry if no one fell through the cracks for you like that!

Edited September 23, 2022 by DefyingFates

[VincentASM]

4 hours ago, Use the Falchion said:

The June leak mentioned that there would be "many new characters," so I'm not sure that the cast size will be that small. Then again, "many" is a subjective and nebulous statement. 12 can be a lot compared to 6, and 15 is "many" compared to 8, so who knows how many characters there will be. 

As an aside, I don't think that the cast being small automatically means that the characters will be more fleshed out. I found most of the Three Houses/Hopes cast pretty fleshed out despite the amount of characters in the game. Yes, a smaller cast has a more room to receive that focus and more spotlight opportunities for each character (depending on the size of the game of course), but I think Supports and Paralogues help flesh out characters a lot. 

I don't really believe everything that miasmadelta said.

But if you look at the screenshots...

The scroll bar for the support list suggests at least ~35 characters.

[Corrobin]

Forgive me if this seems like a too-obvious realization, but... Clan and Framme have the color coordination of Christmas Cavs, and they're clearly related/siblings. But they have different classes? Clan's a mage, and Framme's a fist-user. 

[DefyingFates]

4 hours ago, VincentASM said:

I don't really believe everything that miasmadelta said.

But if you look at the screenshots...

 

  Reveal hidden contents

The scroll bar for the support list suggests at least ~35 characters.

 

Spoiler

It's possible that the Emblems are at the bottom of that list, so there'd be ~24 new characters and 12 (or more) Emblems. I don't have much hope for Emblem supports (as much as I'd love to see at least a few supports for each), but I thought that was worth mentioning.

 

38 minutes ago, Corrobin said:

Forgive me if this seems like a too-obvious realization, but... Clan and Framme have the color coordination of Christmas Cavs, and they're clearly related/siblings. But they have different classes? Clan's a mage, and Framme's a fist-user. 

Hey, it's good to mix things up, right? You could argue that Kaze and Saizo were the Birthright Christmas "Cavs" but both were ninjas 🙂

[Corrobin]

My confusion is less about them not being Cavaliers and more about the possibility of them not being the same class at all.

[DefyingFates]

15 minutes ago, Corrobin said:

My confusion is less about them not being Cavaliers and more about the possibility of them not being the same class at all.

Ah! Gotcha, that makes more sense. Thanks for clearing that up!

But I think it's fun to make them different classes too. It certainly makes for a more varied starting party, right?

[Azz]

I'm all for mixing up the Cain/Abel archetype. Mae and Boey could also be considered a Cain/Abel duo so it's not like we haven't seen a magical duo before. I'm just happy to see archetypes coming back. I'm hoping we get a new peg knight trio since we haven't gotten a true one in a while (if you don't count SoV of course).

[ciphertul]

1 minute ago, Azz said:

I'm all for mixing up the Cain/Abel archetype. Mae and Boey could also be considered a Cain/Abel duo so it's not like we haven't seen a magical duo before. I'm just happy to see archetypes coming back. I'm hoping we get a new peg knight trio since we haven't gotten a true one in a while (if you don't count SoV of course).

Especially after both 3 Houses and Hopes only gave 1 canon one.

[Fabulously Olivier]

I could do without a peg knight trio. What I'd like to see is a trio formed from characters of disparate classes (like the brothers from PoR/RD). That was cool.

Edited September 23, 2022 by Fabulously Olivier

[Seazas]

I don't believe for a second that Emblems have supports tbh. They're far too plot mcguffin-y and supports are reserved for units.

Edited September 23, 2022 by Seazas

[ciphertul]

Just now, Seazas said:

I don't believe for a second that Emblems have supports tbh. They're far too plot mcguffin-y and supports are reserved for units.

It would be odd for them to have both Bond and Support.

[Seazas]

2 minutes ago, ciphertul said:

It would be odd for them to have both Bond and Support.

That too. Especially when the bond system clearly doesn't adhere to how the support system handles things.

[Maimishou]

1 hour ago, ciphertul said:

It would be odd for them to have both Bond and Support.

Can I ask why? I don't think it'd be weird to have both if every character had both and they worked differently mechanically.

[Taho]

9 hours ago, ciphertul said:

It would be odd for them to have both Bond and Support.

I agree. And please, let them have learned from TH's mistakes of smothering players with C support, especially if we have bond dialogue to boot. I want supports to occur in a more organic way, one that reflects actual play, like making characters fight side by side, pushing/rescuing and swapping items. In Three Houses, you just had to fight a couple battles together and that was it, C support for most of your characters at once. That's 20 minutes of your life you're never getting back...

[KoriCongo]

15 hours ago, Taho said:

I agree. And please, let them have learned from TH's mistakes of smothering players with C support, especially if we have bond dialogue to boot. I want supports to occur in a more organic way, one that reflects actual play, like making characters fight side by side, pushing/rescuing and swapping items. In Three Houses, you just had to fight a couple battles together and that was it, C support for most of your characters at once. That's 20 minutes of your life you're never getting back...

TH had what you asked for, the only games in the series to have map-based support grinding was Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn. Even moreso then something like Echoes, since you had to get both adjacent allies and those that joined in a Linked Attack/Gambit Boost to get Support Points.

They made the requirements very low for C-ranks because they know that gaining a support chain is a lot harder than actually maintaining it, since the lack of bonuses makes it difficult to survive. Increasing the proximity range/having Linked Attackers add in as well is for player convenience. That's why support grinding in Awakening and Fates was such a pain and why it never incentivizes swapping pairs around. 

[DefyingFates]

8 hours ago, KoriCongo said:

TH had what you asked for, the only games in the series to have map-based support grinding was Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn. Even moreso then something like Echoes, since you had to get both adjacent allies and those that joined in a Linked Attack/Gambit Boost to get Support Points.

They made the requirements very low for C-ranks because they know that gaining a support chain is a lot harder than actually maintaining it, since the lack of bonuses makes it difficult to survive. Increasing the proximity range/having Linked Attackers add in as well is for player convenience. That's why support grinding in Awakening and Fates was such a pain and why it never incentivizes swapping pairs around. 

I think Taho was referring to having to watch so many supports at once. I don't remember that being so bad for me personally at C rank, but due to every A rank (other than Rhea's, obviousl y) and some B ranks being locked until after the time skip, you tended to just have a veritable flood of supports to view as soon as you got back to the Monastery in Part 2. There probably isn't a timeskip or similar change in status quo in Engage so that may not be a problem there.

[Taho]

11 hours ago, DefyingFates said:

I think Taho was referring to having to watch so many supports at once. I don't remember that being so bad for me personally at C rank, but due to every A rank (other than Rhea's, obviousl y) and some B ranks being locked until after the time skip, you tended to just have a veritable flood of supports to view as soon as you got back to the Monastery in Part 2. There probably isn't a timeskip or similar change in status quo in Engage so that may not be a problem there.

Yes, that's what I meant. Thanks for clearing it up. ☺️

 

I think all characters should have 3-5 support buddies tops, allowing you to play matching groups in one play through and another on the next. In TH, all characters had like 12 support buddies, thus leading to the aforementioned flooding issues.

[DefyingFates]

22 minutes ago, Taho said:

Yes, that's what I meant. Thanks for clearing it up.

I'm happy I could help!

22 minutes ago, Taho said:

I think all characters should have 3-5 support buddies tops, allowing you to play matching groups in one play through and another on the next. In TH, all characters had like 12 support buddies, thus leading to the aforementioned flooding issues.

While I get the hassle of having to view many supports at once, keep in mind that supports also build character so putting such a hard limit on them also limits how much you can develop the cast. As I said in my earlier post, if there are no timeskips there won't be any need to lock all the supports until a certain point in the story, so you'd just unlock them a few at a time as in past titles. I think that'll help the fatigue a great deal. You said you hated having to view a lot of C supports at once: how many did you get that made you feel that way?