Eltosian Kadath

It does if you ignore what Slayde actually says. Alm was the driving factor in the Deliverance taking Zofia Castle, and Slayde states his motives for his actions as the fall of Zofia Castle. I already conceded that the possibility of killing Slayde for a better outcome was me reading into things. Alm's resolve to take Zofia Castle leads to Slayde hurting Delthea. Sure it is indirect, and the game suggests no alternate outcome that magically invalidates all the meaning it could possibly have, but it still fits the paradigm. Wasn't the singular example I had, I was just pointing out that the specific hypothetical example you were using for how you would want things to be done in SoV, is something the games already does, although more indirectly than it sounds like you wanted, although... ...How else would Alm's actions result in a villain kidnapping Delthea? What did you want from this Delthea hypothetical?

...man the RNG really hates you. Hopefully you took advantage of this being a hack to use a save state to tell that no saving between maps to fu- Well parts of maps I guess. Also the unreachable sieges sound annoying, unless the game is very generous with good staves, or there are large holes in their coverage, like in FE7's final map.

You asked for positive, or well rounded characters, and most of these would fall under positive at least. If the example you used of Masena was meant to be a well rounded character, than most pass that low bar, which feels appropriate seeing as your premise about excluding player characters invalidated well over 90% of all characters one could seriously consider well rounded in the entire series, and well rounded is subjective enough that the argument that no well rounded characters exist in the franchise at all isn't out of the question. This wasn't what you were asking for before, but there are some. From the young fisherman complaining about how the war is keeping Rigel from dealing with real problems, to some of the people in the Sage's complaints about what the experiments of the Duma faithful have done to the environment, or the one that sacrifices himself to share the secret of Jedah's immortality. Although if you meant specifically suffering because of Alm's invasion, than not really, but as I said before, they could have done a better job here. You might have missed that I literally quoted the game. This isn't coming from headcanon, it is a part of the game that everyone experiences, which was the point of that statement. You can question my interpretation, or the importance of that quote, but you can't just headcanon away quotes from the game. It a small bit of bad that came with a large helping of good. Most acts have a smattering of both, and the important thing is to weigh their importance. Although leaving the kids alone to be kidnapped wasn't the best of looks... That is a fair point, although Slayde is rather explicit about the reason behind his actions... That is not entirely the case, as I learned the hard way in my ironman, although it is late into the fight before he starts moving. Map ambushes are rather worrying...yeah quite a few units died to those on my ironman...speaking of which I should get back to that. Extra witch reinforcements on the witch spawning map...yeah that doesn't sound fun. ...RIP, I guess you will have to hit up the revival waters in the Fear Mountain Shrine.

And that previous king was a bit of a monster that was more unfit to rule than Desiax is, and just as happy to have Slayde in his employ. Rigel had some valid grievances with how Lima IV treated them, and they didn't even annex the place outright, just install a Zofian ruler that was willing to work with them. If the Deliverance had anyone...AT ALL... to put on the throne, maybe it wouldn't seem so morally dubious, but they don't, and they were perfectly willing to work with knights that have proven just as rogue as Slayde in the form of Fernand. At this point the Deliverance is fighting for the legacy and "honor" of Lima IV, and even after they invade Rigel itself, they leave Zofia without a ruler at all... Slayde might, or might not have arranged the kidnapping at some other time, but Alm certainly created the situation that makes it convenient for Slayde to do so now, and he is culpable for his part in this event.

To put this all in a less Fire emblem comparison, Peter Parker didn't kill Uncle Ben, but he recognized how his own actions led to that event, and feels guilt for being an indirect cause of it. Alm's justifications for taking Zofia Castle are at best morally dubious, and some harm resulted from. Sure he didn't do the deed against Delthea himself, but he drove Slayde into that desperate corner. As for the Lyn comment, it is her fault for negotiating for Araphen's aid in the conflict between her and Lundgren, and making him and his lands a target. Lord Araphen makes that fairly clear in his dialogue as well. Note that Lundgren didn't burn down Kathleet when Lyn passed through it (twice...) and Lyn is overjoyed Eliwood ensured the other houses wouldn't get involved. She wasn't the primary cause, but an indirect one.

Other than the inhabitants of the Sage's Hamlet, plus the people of the Rigelian village, although one could argue they were in a similar position to Zeke and Tatiana. I suppose I could add the Rigellian sailors that were being held in Barth's pirate fortress to the list as well. Perhaps I am reading between the lines by hinting that Alm could have killed Slayde, but the game does treat it as partially Alm's fault through Slayde's lines Slayde is fairly explicit that the reason he had to defect and give away the secret of Delthea was because Alm's forces kicked them out of Zophia Castle. Indirect for sure, but still some clear fault on the side of Alm. If Alm hadn't taken Zophia castle, Delthea would not have been kidnapped. As for Alm not learning about it, not learning about critical information he should is one of his more notable features...

I seem to remember her getting the tome for the first one he captures.

Fair enough. Huh, I never thought there HP was much of a problem, although they don't give you much time to safely attack/heal. Although I will note that Kalameet is the most obnoxious creature in the world to try and get the tail cut on thanks to him only leaving it vulnerable after one attack he rarely does... Shrug, once you learn his pattern well enough its fun, but the process of learning it is down right obnoxious. Fun fact, after saving smol Sif you can find his summon sign in the middle of the Manus boss fight arena and can summon doggo to help out. Glad you found something you liked in the DLC, and congratulations! Yes, if you have the Darkmoon Seance ring you can wear it to gain access to his fight without attacking Gwynevere. Good Luck, although I get the funny feeling you will have similar complaints to the Artorias fight, as I thought the two were rather similar...

It could have done a better job of it, but it partially does this by trying to break down the barrier between Rigelian and enemy. The Dileverance and Rigel both have motivations for this war which aren't clearly good or evil, but lying in the moral grey. The villagers are all a clever look at why faceless mooks would fight in a war, even if it has questionable motives, like wanting to help support their family financially (like Tobin), taking advantage of the only opportunity they have to see the world outside their home town (like Kliff), buying into all the masculine rhetoric about war (like Gray), or simply devotion to a charismatic leader (like Faye). Plus Celica spells it out in their argument Alm may be othering the Rigelians, but the audience isn't necessarily supposed to. It partially is Alm's fault Delthea was enslaved, the Rigelians only learn about Delthea because Alm defeating Desaix at Zophia castle without finishing off Slayde, which convinced Slayde to defect to Rigel, and use the secret of her to secure his defection. If players weren't expected to experience it, it wouldn't have been made. The whole permadeath system is there because the devs don't expect people to play perfectly, and those imperfections will create a story unique to them, and that is by design, so why should this be so different? Plus the weight of its possibility has an impact on you, thanks to the ways you have to change your play to compensate for the trigger of these events. I think a big part of that is that Alm's flaws break a lot of expectations that have been ingrained in a lot of moralistic fiction. First he is a charismatic, handsome, and likeable guy, despite the longstanding tropes of beauty and charisma being tied to goodness. I rather appreciated that about Alm, him being charismatic, but flawed, as a lot of fiction primes us to equate the two to our detriment, or undermine the trope by making them full on evil, rather than the more nuanced approach here. Second is the "even once" sort of logic that undermines all of weight of the drug PSAs (although it is common in a lot of stories with morals). It feels far more true to life, as just like drug use, Alm's flaws don't lead to disaster every time, but it sure does make them more likely, and unless he corrects that flaw, disaster eventually becomes unavoidable. A part of his flaw is that it can be covered for by the player's capabilities, but that is why people, Alm included, often have to reach a rock bottom before they realize they need to fix things. Third is that it isn't an emotional flaw. There is that long standing cliche about good character's flaw being tied to a strong emotion, run rampant but that isn't what Alm has.

I think I know what you mean, as the two character's flaws are profoundly different, and I have that same sorta difficulty when I try to put Alm's flaw into words. I can put forth all this evidence for it, but its like I don't have the right word for it. Sometimes it gets shortened to recklessness, but its something quite different from that, and I can't quite put my finger on what the right word is. I may have made a judgement that these two characters and their flaws, but how well can I compare an apple to a fruit I don't know the name of? Celica's issues are a lot more emotional, personal, and easy to comprehend, while Alm's feel more detached and...negligent?

That is annoying, but you can just leave out the other exit and reenter to get access to all of your stuff. Plus Alm realized how cruel his comments were given who she actually was... Alm is wrong so many times that I have a hard time comprehending this feeling that he is always right. Take that first argument where Celica is criticize him for leading a war and Celica rightly calls him out for it, and its not like he doesn't know how much of a scumbucket Lima IV is. At the very least Celica does most of the stupid stuff she does trying to help people, and most of her stupid decision are made with the idea that most of the consequences will be for her personally, whereas Alm knows the consequences of his actions will mainly fall on others. The game regularly shows that Alm's ignorance, and "accidents" are the results of his own actions. Alm knew the questions he could have asked before he put his foot in it. Even if Alm didn't hear Desaix's final words due to dumb story reasons Alm knew Clive figured something out after Desaix's death about Alm, and he doesn't press Clive on this secret he "can't share". The game makes perfectly clear that Alm could have known if he wanted to in both of these cases. This was about as accidental as crashing a car while blindfolded. Or lets look at the time he decided to trust Clive's judgement about invading Rigel. This is shortly after that time he didn't trust Clives judgement because it would result in the unnecessary death of innocents. Not to mention Clive lead this army to disaster after disaster and is part of why Alm became the leader of this army. He has plenty of reason not to trust Clives judgement on military affairs like this, and yet he does.

Well done! Chester really is a jerk, glad he didn't catch you off guard. Uh-oh...hopefully you didn't lose too much progress...

That is probably your best bet, but if you have already recruited Pahn that would make it difficult to find people to heal. If Pahn is still an enemy its easy to let the enemy archers in the walls make people for you to heal. I think the only option if you have recruited him is to have Lara attack the dancer trapped in that room with them (you might need to use Pahn's stealing ability to rearrange the dancer's inventory, perhaps give it vulneraries to keep Lara from killing it too early, or give it a better sword if your Laura is defense blessed) hopefully you can either get enough wexp to reach B, or get to level 10 to promote him.

Yeah, not a big fan of him either. I seem to remember keeping as close to it as you can to it kinda help. Good Luck against the next boss, he is tough until you really learn his patterns.

If you rescued Big Hat Logan, and got him to move to the Duke's Archieve he would have spilled the beans on that secret immortality of his.

It wouldn't take much rewriting at all, the reason Vaida states for joining would work just as well for Murdock. In some ways it would work better for Murdock, whom feels more personally connected to Zephiel, and would feel indebted for the FE7 crew saving Zephiel when he wasn't there to do so himself.

Alright, time to suggest some that aren't on anyone's radar apparently. How about Morva from Sacred Stones. He would work perfectly as a Gotoh for that game. It would be interesting if Athos got a Samson/Arran like choice with Bramimond in FE7 As much mention as there has been for Gotoh like characters, adding Gotoh to Mystery and/or New Mystery seems like a no-brainer Now for a non-Gotoh like character suggestion, letting Shannam's brief and secret appearance in FE4 become a recruitment would be interesting. Back on this non-Gotoh trend, how about a young Murdock joining either on, or just after Battle Before Dawn. Getting Sigrun in Path of Radiance would be interesting. A bit more unlikely of an addition to Path of Radiance, that would still be interesting would be to have a level appropriate Gareth join after they crash into Goldoa. As for Radiant Dawn, cutting Largo from the game was just ridiculous, he should have been playable.

Oh well, it could be worse, as he has a chance of dying in that pit, but also could be better if has 50+% health when he takes them down with you. Did the same thing on my first run to be fair. It should be in that area between the Duke's Archie and the crystal cave. There is another one that has captured a character key to the DLC (well it was DLC in the original, but should be included in remaster) in a cave behind the lake with the hydra in darkroot basin... This kinda makes me wonder what you will think about the somewhat controversial choice made in DS2 where if you kill enemies enough times they stop coming back (unless you are part of the challenge rock covenant, but that is a discussion for another game...) ? I don't remember him summoning anything. Did some of the clams from in front of the boss room sneak in? If so you should be able to kill them all before entering to not have to deal with that. I will also note that cutting off his tail is a pain if you go for it, as only the middle tail counts, and you have to hit it far enough from the base to count as a tail hit. I am guessing you missed the secret and majestic area that is Ash Lake then. In the Blight Town Swamp there is a pathway past two illusory walls that leads to the Great Hollow, and at the bottom of that there is Ash Lake, and at the back of it is you can find the covenant of the Path of the Dragon...

I honestly don't know if that makes it better or worse for him. If it helps I remember there being one of each silver weapon in there, and there is a fountain right before the real exit. Yeah I got a couple battles into Celica's side of part 4 on my ironman before I remembered about him too...

Probably better than the alternative for Solaire. I am guessing you got the Sunlight Maggot before he could, as if he managed to reach it first he would have been overjoyed by it, and considered it his sun, but...he would then try to kill you, and probably die in the attempt. At least in his more depressive form he will survive to the end, and even be there to aid you in the final fight of the game. I am guessing you mean Siegmeyer. In Lost Izalith, did you kill all the cone-bodied monstrosities before talking to him? Did you rescue his daughter from the gold crystal golem? Ughh...can't stand that boss fight myself. Yeah, the invisible pathways are stressful to deal with (although Prism Stones do help), and one of those crystals is kinda bs with how you can falloff what looks like a perfectly walkable section of it...

Its things like this that keep jumping out to me as Alm's weakness. I always figured that they were the kind of dragons that refused to restrict their powers, even in the face of madness, and that was why Naga left them a Falchion, so that the humans of Valentia would have the means to put them out of their misery when the time was right. Celica has never been shown to value her life before, why would she start now.

Fun fact, he glitched through a wall and mysteriously died on my first run. Kinda anticlimactic really...

I must admit, I am a fan of the other option, but its a choice for a reason, and neither options are the obvious "right" one. Hard to argue with that point. Lol...Not a fan of the mouth based transportation system of the Primordial Serpents I take it. Well done! Although if you kill all the mooks around with divine weapons it really isn't that bad.

You sure? Looks like its working in this run.

Literally duck where you are and it would miss you...or if it makes you feel safer go two triangles to the right. Or better yet take the advice Shrimpy gave you yesterday about the directional shield shard that blocks that attack entirely. Never said it was easy, just that it was about something other than just luck. If you are relying on janky i-frame spam, I can see why you think its roll of the dice, but that sounds like it is more by your designs than the games. Its interesting how your experience with the Zelda franchise has colored your view of this game. The online messages can help clue people into some of its secrets, although they tend to get fewer as the game ages, and is played less, plus you need to be online for that aid, and can be very vague/esoteric. Also I think you are underestimating the learning curve of the combat for those that don't regularly play games. Getting a feel for the timing of dodges (and their i-frames), or parries, and learning to read enemy tells is something that doesn't come naturally to everyone, especially to those that haven't immersed themselves in how games work. Alas it isn't really the norm, as Dark Souls got its reputation for a reason... Fair enough. I have joking said the platforming is the worst part of DS, and this feels like a similar sentiment. There are a lot of people who act like Dark Souls combat is only designed for one-on-one fights, and I think they are the ones really memeing it, as I found the fight rather easy as well. I...don't know. Hopefully not...