Dark Holy Elf
-
Posts
3,623 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Posts posted by Dark Holy Elf
-
-
I like Camilla quite a bit. While I'm not sure about "insane", she is clearly mentally unstable and I like how her behaviour, particularly her relationships with her three younger siblings, is explained so neatly by her backstory. One of the strengths of Fates' writing (I know, there aren't that many, but shhh) is it examines how several of its characters are scarred by past abuse and trauma, and Camilla is one of the good examples of that. That she has some positive traits mixed in there as well is just a nice bonus; I do admire her strength and confidence even (especially?) though it's mixed in with her scary, violent and possessive side.
''If you survive long enough to make it all the way here, I will do what I must and pierce your body with my blade, then cradle you in my arms, just as I did when you were a child''
And I do love this line. It is filled with raw emotion, and communicates the character's current emotional state so simply and effectively (and chillingly). I remember when my partner got to this part of Birthright (she played it before me) she put the 3DS down and expressed and impressed shock at it.
-
If you can dip into Berserker for a spell then that + Trample will give her +10 damage with the Bolt Axe, which she'll typically double with. Crappy base magic? Yeah, but you won't notice.. There will be a lull midgame between where Camilla's initial uber status has worn off and before getting the L15 skills where this will be less impressive, though, and at the end of the game Maligknight's terrible speed cap may hinder her ability to double (might be able to fix this to a large extent with tonics/pairup).
Bolt Axe vs. Hand Axe involves a bunch of tradeoffs for her main 1-2 offence and I could see going either way, or even switching between fights. e.g. a +10 damage Hand Axe will likely OHKO master ninjas in C25 (who have good res) but it'll never double so tankier enemies will be forever out of reach for a one-round.
-
There are a few places in the game where it is helpful to unpair and have a large number of competent units to rush in and blitz with dual attacks (chapter 26 comes to mind in particular) but I'd never say it's necessary. You've chosen some strong units so as long as you raise them appropriately and their growths don't turn out wretched I would think you should be fine.
The only thing I find a bit worrying is that by sending Elise over to Witch you've ensured that you only have one pair capable of using staves, which could be a problem in some maps (staves are very helpful for breaking certain enemy formations). However, in many of those maps you may be able to deploy Jakob, Shura, Izana, Flora, or Forrest, so I imagine you'll probably be able to get away with it.
-
It's your playthrough, do what you will. I certainly don't feel forging is unfair compared to some of the things you can do in the game if you're so inclined (grinding, skill buying, etc.), though. You could avoid visiting other castles for gems if you want to keep it under control (it's what I do anyway, but I like the idea of my playthroughs being pure and not affected by other people's files; YMMV).
-
Good list! I generally agree with most of your comments. I'm not sure how I'd order them specifically but I have few complaints.
Really, the only one that jumps out that I disagree with is Poison Strike. It's useless if you one-round an enemy, and useless if you soften them up enough that the next blow was going to kill anyway, and those are usually the case. If it activated on the enemy phase to punish those who attack you and can't be countered that would be one thing (like Grisly Wound) but as is I don't see much utility here. It compares poorly to the better Seal skills (Defence and Speed, as well as Draconic Hex) for that reason.Trample and the -faire skills are generically good if we're considering L15 skills, though I agree that most are too late to figure in a list like this. Replicate and Inspiration may well be better anyway (espeically Inspiration since Jakob/Felicia get it pretty easily).
-
Going much higher isn't really practical (+7 is ludicrous). I generally wouldn't say that something which takes hours upon hours "breaks game balance" but your milage may vary.
That said forging may be slightly on the too strong side. Once you have lots of gems, it becomes a hard sell to use, say, silver, when iron +2 is the same cost and only slightly weaker without the myriad downsides. I've used silver weapons, but rarely would I consider buying them once I can make Iron +2. On the other hand the presence of weapons like the Prf weapons makes me feel like forging was assumed. So maybe I'm really just arguing that steel/silver are a touch more expensive than they should be.
-
<- Check out my favourite FE game, yes.
The Fates supports aren't the best things ever (again: I'm not super-enamoured of supports in general like some fans, notably when Radiant Dawn lacked them I just shrugged), but they do elaborate on some interesting backstory and setting elements (which should have been in the main game itself in some cases, but oh well!), and of course yeah some are funny.
-
A few things:
1. For all that this fact displeases me somewhat, it is Awakening that has the title of best FE of all time according to professional reviewers.
2. Yeah, the gameplay of Fates is really, really good. Most people agree on this, and generally the biggest fans of Fates are ones who prioritise this more over story.
3. I personally felt like the supports in Fates were some of the better ones in the series, but full disclousure that I consider this a low bar to clear. I can hardly read most GBA supports without being bored to tears.
-
For those of you who say the Valm arc is unnecessary, I have to say that I'm sorry you feel that way. I, however, feel that it is quite necessary, because without it, The Geosphere, Starsphere, and Lifesphere would never have been obtained. The Binding Shield wouldn't have been at full power when Grima revived. Valm was a convenient way for the Binding Shield to come back while shifting focus off of the Grimleal, and that Chrom had to keep his enemies closer. Now, I would've prefered that Excellus was fought more than once, and that people didn't act around Walhart like Chatot did with Wigglytuff in the Explorers Series.
With all due respect, saying a plot arc matters because of macguffins you obtain during them is a bit of a stretch. The writers can easily put in such things to make an arc "relevant" but it's very artificial.
As you said, Valm pretty much takes the focus of the Grimleal. I don't really mind its irrelevance so much of how weak its storyline is. The behaviours of characters like Yen'fay make no sense, Excellus feels like he has a great setup as a manipulator but the execution was terrible, and Walhart is a very tired Japanese trope of "strength means everything" villain, kind of an Ashnard 2.0 although at least none of his plans are as nonsenscial as Ashnard's decision to abandon his country.
Overall I think Awakening's story is much like that of many FEs, it has some good moments and occasionally shows some potential (like with the plot point of Chrom's father being a bit of a tyrant and causing Gangrel to be the way he is. Good idea! Totally isn't run with, and the Grimleal being horrible worshippers of a literal Satan figure actually kinda justifies him...) but overall is weak and muddled. It has some fun characters at least, but in general it remains yet another game in the series you shouldn't play for plot. Which is a pity because I thought FE8-10 were on the right track for getting better about that (although still not yet where I wanted the series to be) and thus Awakening was a significant step back for me.
-
You probably know most of this but:
Arms Scrolls are good, each rank is +5 Hit until A. (Note that a Secret Book is only +3.) Use bronze a lot, I know it will feel like you are "wasting" Charlotte's crit but she shouldn't need crit to one-round things anyway once she gets going and bronze has substantially more hit than other options. The Dual Club is also great against sword- and tome-users. Once her stats are good enough try to attack with her unpaired, as this gives major hit boosts if she has an adjacent supporting ally.
-
Am I the only one who had no idea who this character was and had to look her up?
I never thought enemy dancers were really a good idea. Outside of it being dumb in general, the AI hasnt utilized them greatly in previous games, and they were just easy kills.
Normally I'd agree, but this FE has shown some sign of having some better AI programming at points so it's possible they could have used Dancers effectively. That said they're still largely superfluous for enemy designs because they can just put in an additional strong enemy instead and accomplish largely the same thing. The big advantages dancers have on the player side (versatility, the fact that they essentially focus exp and weapon rank gain on the rest of your army, etc.) don't really translate well to enemies.
-
I wouldn't, strategists aren't that much faster, have rather lame skill growths (and his skill isn't that high to begin with in my experience), and as a dark knight he's got pretty good durability, which a paired up fighter generally wants.
Let's not pretend that Skill growth matters. A 10% skill growth difference will take 14 levels just to result in a difference of a measly 2 hit.
Strategist does have slightly more speed so it can be good for reaching certain benchmarks. It also has staves and at Level 15 gets Inspiration which is really useful IMO. If you have the spare seal I think it's a decent idea to hop over for a few levels just for that. It depends what role Leo is serving in your army and what his stat spread looks like.
-
The DLC is an option for those who want it. If you don't want to grind (and I certainly don't), you don't have to buy it / make use of it. Don't let the availability of options prevent you from playing the game in the way which is most enjoyable to you, personally.
-
I love Conquest's gameplay; it's amazing really. You can really tell how much love went into the design of maps and enemy formations, and how much they tried to balance out the mechanics. So yeah, I suppose I qualify.
The story's not very good, though I'm one of those people who feels that even at its peak, story wasn't really wonderful in this series (though I certainly think Sacred Stones and Radiant Dawn, at the least, had better plots than Fates did). It has some things going for it, though, at least.
-
Calill is good and usable right out of the box, the only problem with using her is that you'll be without a mage for more than half the game if you're only using her.
I'd argue that E rank staves are just fine. With a decent Magic stat, even a Heal staff is going to heal a decent chunk of HP.
Well, as I alluded to in my previous post, I don't agree that going without a mage in the first half of the game is much of a loss since the first three mages all start off rather bad IMO. I'd rather use Lethe/Mordecai and drop them when I get Calill (or perhaps use Muarim/Stefan for a bit in the middle, etc.), that is if I'm going to use any mage at all.
Heal restores a fine amount of HP, it's just not needed. Thanks to the incredible amount of avoid generated by some supports (Ike's, Oscar's, Kieran's, etc.) as well as Sol/Aether, healing is only rarely needed later on. Since I already have one healer (with access to Physic if needed), as well as Reyson to give them an extra turn if for some reason I actually want that, the value of a second healer is very low, especially one that can't use Restore or Physic.
-
As far as late-joining staff filler goes, I prefer Shura and Izana because they can actually take the odd hit (and in Shura's case, have more move and locktouch and anti-flyer utility), as well as any kid PCs you may be getting around that time such as Forrest and Dwyer.
She does have a better base staff rank than most of those though so if you need someone else to use e.g. Entrap, then she does have that niche, for all that Jakob/Felicia/Elise will all likely be able to do that too.
-
Flora's death was terrible, for reasons already stated. Her lighting on fire makes no sense, her calmly monologuing as the fire conumes her is beyond ridiculous and broke any immersion I might have had with the scene. Even her actions are pretty bizarre, but that pales beyond how the scene itself plays out.
I don't share the view that all the deaths in Fates are poorly done. Those of Elise and Ryoma certainly got to me, for instance. But it does have a lot of bad ones, and this one tops the list, along with Lilith's. -
The only one of the four I particularly like is Kaze, and the only one of the four I particularly dislike is Felicia. So, ninjas.
-
Mm, I don't think being important makes you a lord (Sothe isn't a lord), and simply being a foreign royal certainly isn't enough (Tana and Innes aren't lords). Azura can die without causing a Game Over, is pretty much never force-deployed on any route (early maps where everyone is auto-deployed don't count), and doesn't have a Prf weapon. Feels like she meets pretty much none of the criteria.
-
Nergal has a reason for being insane and devoted to darkness: dark magic in Elibe corrupts people in various way, and in his case it made him power-hungry. Why did he study dark magic? To get back with his lost/dead wife.
Well you have to admit this is still a pretty terrible reason. "Dark magic makes you evil/crazy" isn't a very intriguing or human explanation for why someone would fall to evil. Compare with, say, Sephiran, who does terrible things because watching his own race be exterminated caused him to lose faith that laguz and beorc could live together peaceable and thus that Ashera had been right to propose wiping both out and starting anew. The game sells you on how someone might reach that mental state, and it doesn't require hocus-pocus.
It's still better than Validar etc., I suppose, but only just.
-
Calill is the best.
Her stats are every bit as good as any other Sage's, and she doesn't have the painful start all the others have. And she has good weapon ranks, so she can actually use those spare siege tomes you get, and those are surprisingly powerful in FE9.
I guess she doesn't have staves but you know what I don't need more of in FE9? E rank staff users in the second half of the game. The paladin death squad with their high defences and avo-boosting supports and possibly even Sol hardly ever needs healing, so the one I raised with staff exp instead of combat exp suffices, and has access to Restore/Physic without grinding.
Of the rest, Soren vs. Tormod feels like it depends on taste, Tormod has an even worse start but the best payoff (due to Celerity), Ilyana is just Tormod minus like 4 speed, Bastian is pretty much prepromo Ilyana only even slower. -
Ture; however, Benny himself is kinda hard to use and redundant when you've got both Silas and Effie.
He's using 22 first-gen PCs, I don't think he's concerned with redundancy.
And while I'm inclined to agree with you that Effie > Benny and Silas > Peri, the latter end of each pair definitely has clear advantages over the former. In Peri's case, she's actually not too similar to Silas aside from being on a mount; she has considerably better speed/offence (which gets even better with Azura), while he's more of a mobile tank who happens to have good power (similar to a classic wyvern lord). In Benny's case, once he gets rolling with Wary Fighter he's the single best wall in the game, while Effie is merely a respectable tank who happens to have great power and can thus fish for OHKOs + has great dual strikes.
-
I agree that you're probably using too many units for Conquest Hard, unless you plan to grind.
Peri's also hard to use, due to being a glass cannon that's a bit too glassy; in comparison, Silas is pretty decent all-round and (if you don't get RNG screwed) could end up as a second Xander of sorts.
Peri's really not that fragile, especially with Great Knight as a promotion to boost her Def by 5. And she's being paired with Benny.
-
My favourite pattern has been to leave her in Malig Knight until Level 11, taking advantage of Bolt Axe letting her one-round things at range 1-2. Then, over to Berserker for four levels, to buff her HP and damage by 5, then back to Malig for 1 level for Trample, then over to Wyvern Lord to finish.
Takes three Heart Seals but the product is completely ridiculous (OHKOs C25 Master Ninjas with a Hand Axe, for instance, no poison strikes for you!) and it's powerful every step of the way too, so I've generally found the resources worth it. The four levels without flight are the only unfortunate part since on Conquest they're likely to overlap with at least one of the maps where flight is really, ridiculously good (C19-21). You might be able to time them with some paralogues, though.I've tried this with Beruka too but since she doesn't have the interal level push the resources feel less worth it; Camilla should actually have a lot of time to benefit from the full wrath of Trample/Axefaire.
Calculations for Fates?
in Fire Emblem Fates
Posted
One rank to the next. If it were cumulative, then it C->B would take less weapon exp than E->D and I can certainly confirm from personal experience that this is not the case. So the cumulative totals should be:
D: 20
C: 50
B: 95
A: 160
S: 250