Alastor15243

Biggest takeaway from the thread, honestly. Wizard hat horse is amazing. But also, cavalry gets one good edge for emblem bonuses: Eirika. It makes Ephraim's attack 50% stronger, which makes a huge difference. And Eirika's pretty fantastic for a mage knight. Lunar brace helps buff physical attacks, bravery buffs magical ones, and the mods buff magic (and cover one of Clanne's biggest weaknesses: low luck making him susceptible to crits).

It would certainly make the story slightly less stupid, eliminating the infinite questions of "why the hell wouldn't you rewind here" in cutscenes. I hope they eventually realize they don't have to make the damned thing a canon part of the story, and can just make it a mechanic, maybe with the number being a difficulty setting like casual and classic. But it's certainly far more forgivable and easier to pretend doesn't exist here than it was in Three Houses due to the map design no longer being full of bullshit and mind games seemingly designed to force it to be relevant to how you play. In fact it's got some of the fairest map design in the series, to my pleasant surprise, with a few exceptions. Which brings me to my change: Bring back ambush spawns.

I've been doing a Maddening draft in which I also drafted Celine and Pandreo, so I figured I could add my two cents: Clanne has consistently been the best of the three. After he promotes to mage knight he immediately became my fastest unit, and was only dwarfed by Merrin or later someone using speedtaker. He's always been able to double anything that magic would be particularly effective against, and with Eirika for the damage boost and a decently forged elfire (along with being the recipient of my two spirit dusts), he's very frequently been able to hit one-rounding thresholds as well. Meanwhile Celine and Pandreo, who have comparable stats to him except for his overwhelming speed advantage, haven't been anywhere near as dominant in the playthrough, and have mostly found themselves doing less impressive elfire chip, or thoron chip, or staff utility. So I think there's a pretty good argument that the speed edge that mage knight gives, between bases and the skill, is a pretty hefty advantage that can make a world of difference, especially on maddening.

Inigo/Nah I just find profoundly disturbing, and I'm frankly surprised I'm the first to mention it. For those of you who don't know, it involves Nah getting annoyed that Inigo isn't attracted to her underage body, so she terrorizes him in dragon form and then forces him into marriage under threat of cannibalism.

I'd say Alear is my favorite of the avatars character-wise. He seems the most human, ironically, and I really like his straight-man attitude to the absurdity that is the rest of the cast. The fact that the worship is both justified and also acknowledged by Alear as weird as hell is pretty refreshing.

Fates' biggest contribution to discouraging lowmanning is its exp system. Exp gain peters off really quickly after getting just a few levels higher than the enemy, so putting all your exp into one unit has almost no returns at all.

To a degree. I actually think Engage's game design is pretty high up there, it just isn't on Conquest's level. But it makes up for it with just how fun the Emblems are.

Yeah the actual solution is to bait each boss out of Hortensia's range one by one with Astra Storm and the mountain of recharge tiles right outside their door.

I dunno, I think you could make magic gauntlets work. I mean you get one in Engage late-game and it's absolutely nuts.

Yeah, but only on physical attacks, and given Eirika gives magic boosts, bravery still has plenty of use. Plus, now that SP is more plentiful with the well I just figured out the full utility of, getting bravery/gentility on multiple units could have some seriously interesting shenanigans behind it.

Nah, I've found both consistently useful. I've started putting Eirika on Clanne and I like the results. Bravery is great when you need a bit of extra oomph for magic attacks, and the self-healing takes a good deal off of your healers' workload.

Honestly I wish they'd lean more into stronger personal skills rather than weaker. What's the point of having them if they aren't going to make a meaningful, fun difference in how characters play?

Sure, but that doesn't change how much time I get to look at it and absorb what's on it, so thank goodness for screenshots! I wish I could remember my exact reasoning at the time for not counting her under "conventional". But I assure you I had one. Big agree there. He has the worst of the three steward skills by far. +5 crit is like nothing. +10 hit or avoid is way better. But of course they all pale compared to what Corrin's servants did for them. Ahh, but archers can BYOB (bring your own bows), and that's a big difference for maximizing the power of Astra Storm. Forged and engraved silver bows outstrip Mulagir by a lot. And then there's the fact that Alcryst has a chance to proc Luna on every individual hit...

My Ranking Difficulty: I think I’ve played enough of Maddening to know where I stand on this. It’s good. It’s pretty damned good. It’s got a healthy difficulty curve that doesn’t make the start of the game absurd yet still provides a satisfying challenge. But I don’t think it’s tying with Conquest. Hard mode is far too easily cheesed, and Maddening suffers the downside of radically altering the game’s balance with its stat inflation. That’s not something it should feel too bad about. It’s in pretty good company in that regard. But Conquest is just on another level with its tight game design, and Engage doesn’t quite make the cut there. Still, it’s not just that I can count the number of games that do better than it on one hand… I can count them on one finger. So congrats, Engage, on a pretty damned good start. +8: Very tough in ways that are fun and engaging, even if not every difficulty mode is perfect. Engage, Shadow Dragon. Ironmannability: Yet another category where this game does well, but alas not perfect. I was pretty happy with this game’s ironmannability for a while, even in spite of fog of war, but in addition to having a few shockingly shitty moments of moving the goalposts, this game’s cast is obscenely frontloaded, especially when you take into account all the paralogues that don’t give you new recruits, just new tools. New units slow down to a trickle after Chapter 15, and stop entirely after Chapter 19 if you don’t count Mauvier and Veyle. Which I don’t, because as I said, they can’t replace losses, they’re just there to fill the new slots they come with. So I have to take off a few more points than I’d like here, and I have to relabel an entire category as well. +3: It has some problems with FOW, ambush spawns, or replacement drought, but it’s mostly fair. Engage, Sacred Stones, Path of Radiance. Alright, so far that’s a score of 11. Pretty good! Let’s move forward! Usability: All in all I’d consider this something of a side-step compared to the golden 3DS standard, which is in itself something to be lauded as I once bemoaned that we’d likely never see a game with an interface as good as the 3DS games again. While the inability to check raw weapon stats is highly unfortunate in principle, in practice it’s not something I’ve had much occasion to be concerned about. There’s also a lot of more complicated math calculations for certain abilities that make prep a bit more annoying in some respects, but where it really counts the game’s good about showing them to you. The attack lines are of course a nice touch as well, as is the fact that you don’t have to completely commit to an Engage once you do it and can cancel out without consequence. And this is the first console game in the entire series to have unit info be a single page. That is a huge plus, given as I’ve said before, not being able to do that is a pretty good sign you’re overcomplicating things. And then there’s that nifty ZR menu that lets you display additional information, though in fairness I mostly used that to display crit and dodge rates since those don’t show up on the mouse-over preview. Drastically simplifying the effects of the weapon triangle and having a more involved combat prediction window are also pluses. Honestly, the game takes so many steps forward and back that I struggle to make any definitive argument for why it should be placed lower. So I won’t. +9: The best we’ve got. Always room for improvement, but there has never been less clunk in the way of your strategies than there is here. Conquest, Birthright, Revelation, Engage, Awakening. Bringing our score to 20! Alright! Next up… Depth: Ohhhhhhh goodness this is a toughie. The Emblem system of course is a pretty major win for this game. There’s just so much you can do with the Emblems to make characters distinct from each other, and a lot of different paths you can go with each character. But still, Conquest has that advantage that it’s the only game in the entire series to do interesting things with enemy skills on anything but maybe bosses. And Conquest is no slouch when it comes to character builds either, it not anywhere near as flashy. That… and, well, Engage’s skill list is actually kinda lame, all told, and a lot of them are just about impossible to inherit on a normal playthrough. Also, I noticed they started giving random units the odd skill here or there in Engage Maddening, and a lot of them are skills that have been in our hands in previous games, but which seem to have no apparent means to obtain. Which only further makes me question why they couldn’t find room to put skills like that in our hands. Plus… okay, so, while the Emblems are cool as hell… there’s really not all that much character building in this game. I really felt like the Fates games and Awakening did a way better job at making me feel like I was building my characters. Taking them down various paths, investing time and effort into giving them various skills. Here, I mostly slap Emblems on whoever I want to use them in the moment, and skill unlocks just amounted to paying up in bond fragments. And the game only gives you two skill slots for inheriting skills, and precious little SP to buy them with, so building your characters beyond what Emblem they’re using is clearly de-emphasized. …But the Emblems are so fucking much, though… and it’s such an interesting system… …Okay, sure, I think this ties. +7: Tons of interesting mechanics and unit customization for allies and enemies alike. Conquest, Engage. That brings us to 27. Next up: Balance: …Okay. Let’s be honest here. A game with Engage’s design philosophy was never going to have a stellar balance score. There is just so much going on, and so much crazy shit you can do. This game was way more focused on giving you lots of cool toys to play with, rather than delivering a tight, well-rounded challenge. …Which makes me astonishingly impressed at how much it still managed to do right. The class category system was a great step in the right direction, particularly toning down movement ranges and minimizing the advantages of being on a mount. Engage, I think, is pretty high up there in terms of games that managed to make certain routinely-underpowered classes worth using. Armored units definitely get their time to shine, to be sure, even if it doesn’t last that long. But also, y’know, it’s just a clusterfuck of obscenely powerful abilities and also some ones where I question why they even exist, arts are just so comically difficult to make good, and Maddening mode in particular has made it plainly obvious that its unit balance is just all sorts of wrong. …Honestly, I feel like this is in a similar situation as Binding Blade. It does a hell of a lot wrong, but it also does enough stuff right that rarely gets done right that I think it’s worthy of acknowledgement. +3: There’s at least a wide variety of good units and roles, and nothing breaks the game too hard. Engage, Binding Blade. That brings us to 30. Next up: Pacing: …The Somniel… is better than the Monastery… but like I said, it pales in comparison to My Castle. It’s just too over-designed, and has a lot of stuff that really didn’t need to be done manually, like running around the map to gather all the resources the Somniel gives you between maps. My Castle was just way more compact and streamlined. Also, the game should just give you the items scattered around maps in exploration automatically as well, not just the bond fragments. There’s really no reason to make people run around for them if they aren’t interested in exploring and talking to people, especially on repeat playthroughs. But at least the map design pacing is top notch. I can’t remember a single point where I found myself going “wow, I don’t have anything to do right now but move mindlessly forward to the next objective”. So with that in mind… +0: Has some moments of frustration or slow pace, but mostly inoffensive. Engage, Shadow Dragon, New Mystery, Radiant Dawn, Path of Radiance, Thracia 776, Shadows of Valentia. Still at 30. Alright, what’s next? Writing: …I have been thinking about this category… a lot. I’m very, very, very torn on it. Part of me wants to flip the fucking table and rebuild this list from scratch. I have taken a fucking scalpel to objectively better stories than this. I have watched them like a hawk for the slightest weird detail and taken pleasure in roasting them for hours until the manuscript papers curled and blackened amidst the flames. But here? I don’t know what happened. I don’t know if it was coming back into things after a long, long hiatus, or just general disillusionment with the concept of picking apart these stories… but I just haven’t done nearly as much of that. And in fact multiple times people had to remind me of the story implications of the time crystal when major tragedies happen in the plot. Anyone who read my Three Houses playlog will know that I leapt at every opportunity to point those out there. I don’t know why, but I just haven’t been nearly as critical of this game’s story as I probably should have been. I feel morally certain that this game is littered with plotholes that I should have noticed but didn’t. I feel, confidently, without any real concrete evidence to back it up, that I have underperformed in my job critiquing this game’s story. …I suspect this mostly stems from two things: the game is new, and I like it. The game is new, and therefore I have been experiencing every part of this story devoid of the power of hindsight, only able to catch that which is obviously wrong at first blush, or wrong if you remember enough of what came before. The game is new and I like it, and therefore I had better things to do with my time than roast the story, because every moment I spent doing that is a moment in which I am not playing this fun new game full of surprises around every corner. …I think I’m going to simplify things and just put it right next to Awakening. A bit above, because it doesn’t grotesquely violate any mother canon, but really, this is a successor to Awakening in a lot of ways. Story’s dumb fanservice, but nothing as grandly, comically idiotic as Fates, and I like the characters a lot and enjoy seeing them interact. -4: Technically a story, but distractingly difficult to take seriously due to copious writing flaws. Shadows of Valentia, Sacred Stones, Engage, Awakening, Mystery of the Emblem Book 2, Mystery of the Emblem Book 1, Three Houses. So now we’re knocked down to 26. Next? Music: …Okay, slam dunk, this game’s soundtrack is an absolute banger. While I have my complaints about quite a few of the paralogue themes, outside of that the soundtrack is just wonderful, and with better instruments than any of the existing reigning champions. I see absolutely no reason whatsoever to keep this out of the top spot, especially given this is the only game that has that awesome upgrade Three Houses introduced regarding boss themes continuing to play after you challenge the boss… without actually being Three Houses. +6: Consistently gorgeous music that flows throughout. Engage, Conquest, Revelation, Awakening, Birthright. Which puts us at 32, and brings us to… Presentation: There’s no fucking competition here, Engage is the new winner. Its combat animations are absolutely gorgeous, and it manages to fix enough flaws with its predecessor’s presentation everywhere else that the remaining hiccups it inherited simply do not matter in the slightest. I don’t want to retroactively take away points from previous games simply to keep every category in 7 point tiers… so I’m just gonna staple an extra category up top for Engage and mess around with the names of some of the ones immediately below: +8: The best we’ve got. Manages to use the latest technology enough to sweep the competition. Engage. +6: Does a great job with pretty good graphics. Shadows of Valentia. +4: Does an amazing job with primitive graphics, or a mediocre job with pretty good graphics. Awakening, Conquest, Birthright, Revelation, Blazing Blade, Sacred Stones, Binding Blade. +2: The visuals never feel like they’re holding the experience back. Radiant Dawn, Path of Radiance. +0: Mediocre, but inoffensive. Does the job. New Mystery, Shadow Dragon. -2: Showing its age a bit too much. Thracia 776, Genealogy of the Holy War, Mystery of the Emblem Book 2, Mystery of the Emblem Book 1. -4: Vastly overstretched its boundaries to the point that it managed to do less with more. Three Houses. -6: Really, really showing its age. Gaiden, Dark Dragon. Bringing us to 40! Already in second place, which only leaves… X-Factor: Okay, full stop, the Emblems feel like they were specifically designed to justify the existence of the X-Factor category. Do they make the difficulty better? No. Do they make the game more interesting to ironman? Not really. Do they make the interface better? Definitely not. They’re actually to blame for its worst aspects. Do they improve gameplay depth? Not nearly as much as you’d think. Do they make the game more balanced? Holy shit no. Do they improve the pacing? I mean maybe you can argue the movement tech does, if you stretch the definition…? But no, not really. Do they improve the writing? Not likely! Do they improve the music? They contribute the worst songs in the game! Do they improve the visuals? Well, let’s just say the game would still be exactly where it is on the rankings without them. …But are they awesome and fun and worthy of all of the hells to the fucks to the yeses in the totality of the cosmos? HELL TO THE FUCK TO THE YES. Not since Thracia have I felt as much like a kid in toyland while playing a Fire Emblem game, and I cannot justify giving it any fewer bonus points than Thracia got. And so to Engage, I award… TWELVE POINTS! +12: A truly splendid point of merit. Engage, Thracia. Putting Engage’s final score… at 52! A single! Goddamned! Point! Shy! Of tying! With Conquest! Ohhhh man. Ohohohohohohohoho man. I have my complaints with this game. I have areas where I wish it would be better. But it cannot be denied: This is a great Fire Emblem game. And it has single-handedly snuffed the life out of every last one of the fears for the franchise’s future that Three Houses put in my head. I am so happy that we got this game, and I expect to be playing it for ages. And words cannot express how satisfying it is to be able to say that. The future’s looking bright, ladies and gentlemen. The future. Is looking. Bright. And for that… I bid you adieu. For a while, anyway. I’m going to take a month and a half off. Re-assess if I want to go back to this in May after a bit of a break from doing this every day. Because if I do… there are still places I haven’t gone. There are the Kaga Saga games, of course, but there are also games that need revisiting. Games I didn’t do on the highest difficulty. Radiant Dawn. New Mystery. Awakening. Yes, maybe even Three Houses. And who can forget, I also would probably need to do a playlogging revisit of Maddening Engage. There’s more to do with this, to be sure. But for now… I rest. I rest, and get some goddamned food inside me, because I haven’t eaten in just under 12 hours. Alastor… …signing off.

Engage Day 49: Endgame Sorry if anyone talked to me directly in the mountain of comments that happened while I slept, but I stopped reading them the second it became apparently the topic was the Dark Emblems. I don’t want to spoil myself even on what they are. Because it’s not like that’s inherently obvious. For instance, I have a feeling it isn’t always the final boss of the final map. Because, like, “The Fire Dragon”? Really? I have a good feeling Lyn’s going to be fighting Nergal. But we’ll see. Alright. So. Let’s boot this up, and start working out which is which based on their titles alone, without reading the descriptions. Because if I can’t do that after having played all seventeen fucking games, there’s either something wrong with me, or something wrong with the game. …And here I am, already hedging my bets in case I fail. I CAN DO THIS! Okay, they are, starting from the top and going clockwise around: Dark Bishop Dark God Shadow Dragon War Father. …Seems to be just those four right now. I guess they’ll come back in waves of 4 after I kill each set of four? Or maybe replace one by one as I kill them individually. Anyway, I’m pretty damned sure that those are, respectively, Veld, Fomortiis, Medeus and Ashnard. But before I check my answers, let’s see what my options are: 1/3/11/12: Medeus. 2/15: Duma (Oooh, actually that’s another candidate for Dark God). 4: Julius/Loptyr… But like… That’s the thing, Sigurd never fought Julius. He fought Arvis. 5: Veld. 6: Idunn, Roy explicitly talked about her so that’s a fair given, even though Zephiel is also an option. 7: Nergal. I question some random unnamed Fire Dragon being the pick for final boss, but I suppose that’s also possible. 8: Fomortiis. Maaaaaybe Lyon? 9: Ashnard, no question. 10: Ashera, also no question. 13: Grima. 14: Anankos. 16: Edelgard/Rhea/Nemesis. It could really go with any of them. …I notice that if it turns out Duma is the Dark God (I suppose “Demon King” is more accurate for Fomortiis), then that would make Ashnard for War Father be an extreme outlier. The other four picks would be in basically linear order, the first four. So I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that War Father is Sigurd’s counterpart… whatever they pick for that. That sounds like something they could say Arvis was, since he ruined fucking everything. …Nope! Shit! I was dead wrong! Duma’s the war father! Okay, that actually makes way more sense and I can’t believe I fucked that up! In that case, Loptyr must be the Dark God then! Correct! Which, again, I maintain, is kinda weird because Sigurd never fucking fought him. And yep, Dark Bishop is Veld, and Shadow Dragon is… the Shadow Dragon. Obviously. Honestly this is kind of lame and profoundly embarrassing. I was hoping to get all twelve on the field at once so I had all the pieces to put together at once, thinking about all of them. And here I am, failed at the first hurdle, and now the rest will be dead giveaways because I know the pattern now. …Anyway, let’s work out our strategy and hoooooooooly fuckmothering god what the hell am I looking at with Sombron!? He can cancel your engages, apparently map-wide! Damn it, well, guess I better save them for when I actually need them. But thankfully the first two Dark Emblems are immediately within reach and the slayer effect I get on them is insane. Lindon unfortunately can’t one-shot Loptyr, but he does enough with Goldmary’s help and Seadall. …Or he would, if he didn’t fucking miss. But thankfully these guys don’t have dragonskin or any equivalent. They’re just decently tough enemies with multiple health bars who take slayer damage from the bearer of a specific Emblem. Minions start moving, but they’re no big deal. My army’s split up to approach the two other Emblems (and that reminds me to send Mauvier over to where Veld is). …Actually, I overestimate my characters’ attack power against the fliers, so this seems as good a time as any to test out what Sombon does when you engage a single character. Go get ‘em, Rosado! …Oh, and apparently the ranged attack of Wille Glanz is just… summoning a rainbow vortex of energy. It’s okay, but the Ragnell crescent shockwave is still the best. …Sombron still hasn’t done anything. Alright, how do we handle this next batch of enemies…? …Well hey, that’s simple: Clanne can handle all three on the left side! …Though the others would have to stand back… there might be a more time-efficient method… Now, I could Warp Ragnarok Ivy over to help take out Duma (she’s helping out the right side since that’s how things turned out for player-phasing the initial waves)… but it’s wholly unnecessary since Clanne can one-round a full health bar on his own and he just took out the first and Cantered to safety. But I’m gonna do it anyway to see if any of these quotes are good. I have to say, not impressed so far. Sigurd still sounds like he’s on Xanax. …Okay, so one of his attacks at least is a directional map attack, and now he’s using it, with a turn of warning. Cool, I’m glad the game’s doing that. …Leif’s is pretty cringeworthy too, gotta say. Honestly, I have a feeling a lot of these characters were cast by people who hadn’t played the original games, because I can’t imagine a lot of these Emblems actually saying their original lines in their original games. It’s a pervasive problem. Some are fine, and some are even great, like Ike, and some of them are just their original voices so there’s no issue there. But Sigurd, Leif, Lyn and Micaiah are… uncomfortable. …Speaking of, though, as if I needed any more evidence that Veyle is a precious treasure, I saw a clip of characters using Claude and saying his kill lines. Apparently “That’s the Golden Deer for ya!” morphs into the royals of each kingdom saying “that’s [my kingdom] for ya!”. Then we get to Veyle, and she’s like “That’s… (awkward silence) …me for ya!” and like oh my precious child. Alright, I’m going to send Ivy in to Warp Ragnarok Duma. She very nearly one-shots. Celica’s is pretty okay, mostly because it’s a repeat of what she says to Duma at the end of Echoes, which is a verbose way of basically saying “Please, Grandpa, take a fucking nap already”. …The shield is now completely down. …I sincerely hope the game isn’t going to make us kill this guy three consecutive times with each set of four Dark Emblems. That would be so fucking repetitive. …Oh. No. Oh I see. He summons new ones the very next fucking turn. As in you have less than a full player phase to take advantage of the opening. Okay, game. Well at least he didn’t summon the new ones mid-turn like Three Houses would have done, but still, laaaaame. Alright, noted. Kill the last of this new set with the first action of a turn. Seems the game warns me about all of his attacks a turn in advance with info boxes. Honestly, this is user-friendly to the point of being user-hand-hold-y. I would’ve just had him say a line, then have him equip what he’s about to use, or have it flash in his inventory or something while he glows and the area he’s targeting lights up. Anyway, looks like there aren’t nearly as many enemies this time. Good, but there is the miasma he just breathed to deal with. Anyway, next wave is Dark Druid, Demon Dragon, Demon King and Mad King. Okay, those are obvious, especially now that I know the pattern. Nergal, Idunn, Fomortiis and Ashnard. I knew they weren’t going to use “The Fire Dragon”. And yep, correct on all counts. In hindsight I was expecting their titles to be way more vague and made-up, and not their literal ones. …And maybe “Shadow Dragon” should have immediately clued me in that I was overthinking things. …Roy is on Framme. Well, she won’t be doing much, but I still want to see the quote. I’m gonna have Alcryst Astra Storm from the opposite side of the map to finish off Nergal, because I don’t want to spend time getting him over there. …Yeah, yet again, this is not how I imagine Lyn would talk to Nergal. It was about as cringey as I’d suspect. And not just the reading, also the line itself. This is what she says in Engage: Lyn: Fate is full of surprises. Who would have thought we’d meet again? Yet this, I’m afraid, is our final parting. Soon you’ll only be a stain on my sword! …Setting entirely aside the fact that they put Nergal on a fucking flier and thus in all likelihood player instincts would cause you to be attacking him with a bow… …Here’s what she says to Nergal if you have them fight in FE7: Lyn: The nomads of the plains do not abandon their fellow tribespeople. Eliwood and Hector are my dear friends… Their sorrow is my sorrow. Their anger is my anger. Nergal! In my friends’ names, I will cut you down! …That said, I accidentally timed this moment amazingly. The post-death slow motion happened the instant the music cut out for a big pause in the song. It was honestly pretty hardcore. Now for Ike and Ashnard. …Yeah, Ike’s was okay. Not as great as it could have been, but the performance was at least decent. I dislike how generic these are, though. They don’t really say anything about who their enemies were or what they did. I get they don’t want to spoil who the final boss is in a lot of cases, since this is a love letter to the whole series and they don’t want to completely ruin the stories, but like… they could give hints or inside jokes! …Eirika’s is pretty cringey. Saying “Before you beguile anyone or cause a tragedy” is a pretty awkward way to phrase things, but I mean, in fairness, at least she references something her villain did! …These reinforcements are pretty annoyingly incessant. …Okay, time to see Roy’s line against Idunn. …Roy seems confused why Idunn is fighting here. “We have no quarrel.” Is that just him wondering why any of these Emblems are fighting here, or does he specifically mean Idunn, like this is from a timeline where he cured her? …Christ, I really should have taken that chance to attack him that first time. My forces are spread pretty thin, so even on hard mode this is frustrating. Still, I managed to pull through with some pretty mediocre units fighting Idunn. The fact that Framme literally cannot ever die to a single round of combat is a great relief, to be sure. Alright, everyone but Idunn is dead. Time to finish her off next turn and then blitz this fucker with Team Pepsiman and the freestyle dance squad. …Oh yeah, unless Sombron pulls some more bullshit after all his health bars are gone, we’re done here. …Should I wait to see the remaining Dark Emblems? …Naaaaaaaaaah! …Okay but seriously, every fiber of my ironmanning soul tells me it wouldn’t be worth it. With plenty of actions to spare, I’m going to completely obliterate this mother fucker with… DRAGON’S FIST! …And the music stops. We’ve won. We’ve fucking won. …And weirdly, the game pauses to access the internet before showing him falling down dead. Updating those rankings or something? …Sombron starts rambling about all the dark places he looked for Zero Emblem in. If they start telling him he should have been searching the light like this is fucking Kingdom Hearts… Pepsiman: You chose to be alone, yet continued to look for this Emblem. Why? …Pepsiman asking the real questions. Sombron: Perhaps I wanted someone to appreciate how far I’d come, all on my own. …Fuck this last-minute characterization of Sombron. Seriously. …And… after rejecting his last chance at redemption… Pepsiman asks him if he remembers the Zero Emblem invocation. “Burn us, Emblem of Foundations”? …Pepsiman seems surprised to hear these words. What’s up? …And now Sombron is… hallucinating the Zero Emblem in his dying moments, without letting us see what he sees. …And he dies and fades into light, saying “Engage” as his last words. They’re… …They’re closing the portal… …From their side… …after the battle’s over… …and keeping the Emblems near it. Am I forced to just assume that just doesn’t fucking matter? Proximity to the portal clearly mattered before with regards to its effects on the Emblems, so why aren’t they putting the Emblems somewhere safe before closing it!? Why wouldn’t they at least try!? …But no, we’re just having a scene where Marth says goodbye to Pepsiman while dissolving into light. Actually, it looks like all of the Emblems are saying goodbye before dying one by one. Apparently in reverse chronological order. …Speaking of, I do at least want to see what the conversations with the remaining Dark Emblems are. Okay, looks like they picked Nemesis as the Dark Emblem. Okay, honestly, I was thinking they’d do that. While I maintain that #NemesisDidNothingWrong, he is the only final boss of any of the conventional routes who isn’t also an Emblem. …Okay, Corrin’s is actually pretty badass. Corrin: I didn’t want to see you… But if it’s true that you are at the end of every path I take… Then I will stop you every time. I won’t give up! Lucina’s too. Lucina: You’ve come chasing after me again. You, who are the wings of despair and the breath of ruin… If that’s so, then I challenge that fate! Die now, that our future can live! I like the growling tone to her voice when she does it. A lot. …But fuck Micaiah’s to deepest hell for calling Yune “Yoon” again. Fuck this retcon with every fiber of my being, it feels so deeply wrong to me to retcon the pronunciation of a name you already fucking canonically pronounced. It’s like when they started calling Edea “Ih-dee-a”, like the same rhythm as idiot, in Bravely Second. Anyway, back to the deaths. I like the music here, but really, I don’t like this story beat for the ending, in concept or in execution, so it’s hard to get emotional about it. …Tears are still trying to fight their way out though, so I suppose that’s saying something. …And with that… I’ve beaten the game. …And the rankings are coming. When I get back, hopefully they’re slow enough I can copy them down. Alright, back. Let’s do this. Prologue: 3 turns, MVP Pepsiman and ???... …Really? Really? We’re still keeping Marth unnamed here? Ugh, fine, whatever, moving on: Chapter 1: 5 turns, MVP Pepsiman and Marth. Chapter 2: 7 turns, MVP Pepsiman and Marth. Chapter 3: 6 turns, MVP Etie. Chapter 4: 9 turns, MVP Louis. Chapter 5: 12 turns, MVP Clanne. Jean’s Paralogue: 8 turns, MVP Louis. Chapter 6: 9 turns, MVP Pepsiman and Marth. Anna’s Paralogue: 12 turns, MVP Louis and Micaiah. Chapter 7: 9 turns, MVP Yunaka and Marth. Chapter 8: 7 turns, MVP Louis and Sigurd. Chapter 9: 13 turns, MVP Louis and Sigurd. Chapter 10: 16 turns, MVP Louis and Sigurd. Chapter 11: 9 turns, MVP Diamant. Chapter 12: 9 turns, MVP Ivy. Chapter 13: 14 turns, MVP Yunaka. Chapter 14: 28 turns, MVP Yunaka. Chapter 15: 21 turns, MVP Merrin and Ike. Chapter 16: 16 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. Lucina’s Paralogue: 6 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin (Apparently this one took me twelve minutes, hilariously enough). Ike’s Paralogue: 9 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. Chapter 17: 18 turns, MVP Alcryst and Lyn. Eirika’s Paralogue: 13 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. Chapter 18: 8 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. This has bene the case so often that Word is starting to suggest those MVPs as autocompletions. Chapter 19: 12 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. Lyn’s Paralogue: 7 turns, MVP Clanne and Micaiah. Byleth’s Paralogue: 9 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Roy’s Paralogue: 11 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Micaiah’s Paralogue: 6 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. Corrin’s Paralogue: 6 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Sigurd’s Paralogue: 7 turns, MVP Yunaka and Corrin. Chapter 20: 8 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Leif’s Paralogue: 4 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Celica’s Paralogue: 4 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Chapter 21: 9 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Chapter 22: 12 turns, MVP Kagetsu and Ike. Marth’s Paralogue: 16 turns, MVP Alcryst and Lyn. Chapter 23: 12 turns, MVP Pepsiman. Pact Ring Paralogue: 5 turns, MVP Clanne and Pepsiman. Chapter 24: 10 turns, MVP Clanne and Pepsiman. Chapter 25: 12 turns, MVP Clanne and Pepsiman. Chapter 26: 14 turns, MVP Clanne and Pepsiman. Oh shit, here are the endings! And the piano song playing briefly chord-changed into the notes of Lost in Thoughts All Alone. If it starts referencing other games’ themes too, I’ll assume that was intentional. Looks like Pepsiman and his partner are first. These are going worryingly fast and I’m not sure how long they’ll stay up, but thankfully I have my screenshot button just in case, so let’s look at the full thing here: Pepsiman: 123B 90 W. Most Used Emblem: Byleth. Yunaka: 116B 75 W. Most Used Emblem: Corrin. A hundred and sixteen battles for Yunaka? That… that can’t possibly be right. Does it not count paralogues or something? How can the Hiya Papaya Messiah have only been in battle a hundred and sixteen times!? Anyway, while the Hiya Papaya Messiah’s bloody legacy of conquest frankly speaks for itself, and she was by far one of my most pivotal units on this run… Pepsiman was kind of a disappointment in some respects. He did manage to find a niche and play it to perfection by the midgame, but the Divine Dragon class is a major disappointment. It’s supposed to be able to get extra bonuses from using Emblems, but it has the two single shittiest weapon choices in the entire game, doesn’t even have the stat spread to use either of them to their full potential, and doesn’t get a non-Emblem 1-2 range option that he can do damage worth a damn with until the end of Chapter 25. In practice, most Emblems are better off on basically anyone else but him, with the only exceptions being Byleth and arguably Corrin (and even then thieves make a compelling argument even on Maddening). On Maddening I’m finding he struggles to even fight. His damage just cannot keep up. Still, while he only has a few options, he’s amazing at them, so I guess there’s that. …Yeah these aren’t staying on screen nearly long enough to absorb them, so I’m glad I took those screenshots! Vander: 13B 3W. Most Used Emblem: None. I guess that means I’m going to see who I never put an Emblem on. But yeah that seems about right. Honestly I think it’s a shame that Vander falls off so much. He’s a cool character, I wish I had more excuses to use him. He’s great in the early game, with his good defense and sky-high HP, but he’s very swiftly replaced. Clanne: 162B 142W. Most Used Emblem: Micaiah. Clanne was a bit of a sleeper hit. I didn’t really know what to do with him for most of the game, but he was still a pretty consistently good unit, one I came to appreciate even more on my Maddening file. And once I got the Fire Emblem, he was the perfect choice for Pepsiman’s partner, and as you can see by his battle records, the rest is history. I’m honestly shocked he got more battles and wins than Yunaka though. He only really became a major enemy-phase menace in the very lategame. Framme: 19B 14W. Most Used Emblem: Roy. While the fact that she got into more fights and got more kills than Vander must count for something, yeah, of all the units I used, she was by far the most mediocre. I think the only reason I didn’t bench her was because of Merrin and Louis’s deaths. I’m certain that if Merrin in particular hadn’t died, I’d have never kept Framme around this long. Still though, staff utility is staff utility, and she saved my ass in Chapter 11 when suddenly she was the only healer I had. And I’ll never take that away from her. Amusingly they called Clanne the Calm Steward and Framme the Eager Steward, even though their narrations said they both grew into calm, collected mature adults… while keeping their childish fanatical streak for their god. Oh that’s nice! The music medley of location themes changes to fit the nation currently gone through with the roster. So now we’re shifting to Firene, and… Alfred: 35B 20W. Most Used Emblem: Sigurd. I’ve seen his growths, and he looks like he might have had potential if I had kept him around, but I just couldn’t get him off the ground, and had no use for him when the Great Midgame Recruitment Fest was upon us. At any rate, Maddening has taught me that physical fighters aren’t nearly as important as magical ones, so I doubt I’ll be trying to make him work any time soon. …Also, holy fuck his ending is surprisingly morbid. He accomplishes a lot in his rule, but they say he died young. If they say the same thing about Diamant but not Ivy and Timerra, I think I’ll be sensing a pattern here… Etie: 15B 9W. Most Used Emblem: None. She was an early game archer. She did her job, which was to one-shot fliers. Beyond that, I didn’t really have much of a use for her. Would she have been good if I trained her? I’m not so sure. This isn’t really a game where archers are good so much as an archer is good. As in “it’s good to have an archer on your team to do crazy things with Lyn”. And why use Etie for that role when Alcryst does it better? Boucheron: 8B 5W. Most Used Emblem: None. I have a feeling Boucheron probably would have been fine if I used him. I remember struggling to get a good axe user on my team for a lot of the early-game, and I was mostly repelled by Boucheron due to my initial impression of his personality. But at any rate, I didn’t pick him, so here we are. Céline: 38B 28W. Most Used Emblem: Celica. Of all the characters in the game that I haven’t given a chance, I think Céline might be my biggest regret. I like Clanne better, but I have a feeling that she might have been really handy if I had just given her a bit more focus on my Hard or Maddening run. I think next time I play, I’m gonna try making her good. Not instead of Clanne, though. Alongside. …And here comes my first casualty. Louis: 159B 93W. Most Used Emblem: Sigurd. …While in the long-run I think he definitely became one of the worse members of my party, and I wound up dropping him on my Maddening run entirely… I can’t imagine attempting the earlygame without this guy. He saved my ass on so many occasions, and was the first unit I ever ran into where I could safely throw him deep into enemy territory on a regular basis. He was a valued member of the team, and he is dearly missed. Lame they say “defeated” though, when the black-and-white memorial nature of the thing clearly indicates he died. Chloé: 7B 5W. Most Used Emblem: None. I have not had good luck with Chloé. I thought to give her another shot on Maddening, but she just keeps dying in unfortunate ways. She died to an archer in the dark on my first Maddening attempt, and then again to my forgetting the enemy had a stronger weapon in his inventory in Chapter 4 of my short-lived Maddening ironman restart. She’s another character who probably has potential, and I hope one day to see her in action. Diamant: 16B 10W. Most Used Emblem: Leif. Oh good, Diamant lives. Apparently he demilitarized and had a “make ore not war” platform. Honestly, Diamant is a character I’ve struggled to make work. His major problem is that he joins at a point in the game where it’s hard to get him any good skills from the early-game Emblems before you lose them, and also he’s so swiftly swarmed with so much competition a few chapters after he joins. Really, you can only afford to make a handful of characters in the early-game remain relevant Post-11, and he joins just late enough in that era that it’s hard to make him one of them. Amber: 0B 0W. Most Used Emblem: None. I apparently didn’t use Amber at all. His greatest contribution was giving Louis his iron greatlance. That is hilarious. Jade: 0B 0W. Most Used Emblem: None. I was tempted to use her, and I’m glad I didn’t, because while the game made a valiant effort at it, armor units just do not have any lategame staying power, and she would have struggled even harder than Louis did to stay relevant. Alcryst: 171B 128W. Most Used Emblem: Lyn. Alcryst got more kills than Yunaka. Wooooooo! I literally do not understand how that’s physically possible, but wooooooo! While like I said, from what I can tell archer utility only extends so far in this game, I think these results speak for themselves as to how much use I managed to get out of the guy. I’m finding him harder to use in Maddening, but I’m still finding ways to use him at least, even if I have to work really hard at it. His biggest disadvantage is his poor strength in a game where on Maddening defense gets really high. But still, with clever use of him and damage stacks, he’s pretty badass, and he procs Luna at a frankly immoral frequency. Lapis: 4B 3W. Most Used Emblem: None. Didn’t really use her, don’t really know what to say. I kinda like her personality though. But moving on… Citrinne: 3B 0W. Most Used Emblem: None. Again, didn’t really use her. Probably could have, though, maybe. Ivy: 98B 74W. Most Used Emblem: Celica. While her speed was a problem and her accuracy consistently needed work-arounds, the sheer utility of being a flying, staff-wielding magic expert meant there was never not a place for her in my army. Clanne’s better, though. Curiously, Ivy’s ending offhandedly gives mention to Pepsiman’s eventual death, which is a bit odd, especially to mention in someone else’s ending. Zelkov: 2B 1W. Most Used Emblem: None. I have a feeling he could have been decent if I let him, but I was too determined to stick with Yunaka, and honestly I think I made the right call. Thieves really don’t need more evasion, so the crit boost is far more useful. And now, for the man, the myth, the menace… Kagetsu: 123B 86W. Most Used Emblem: Ike. That cannot possibly be correct. What!? He fought so much! There have to be battles that are being excluded here. Anyway, I’ll be honest, while his bases and growths speak for themselves, and while he rapidly snowballed into an unstoppable menace on hard mode… I’m not sure how much of that was due to him and how much of it was due to circumstance and luck, because I’m struggling to make him anywhere near as good on Maddening. He’s miles from being one of my MVPs there. Maybe he’s just not meant to be a wyvern knight, and Merrin’s death put him on a much better path he’s better suited for. Not sure. But I definitely feel weird watching him struggling to double almost anything in Maddening and having mediocre speed on a run where I know his growths are fixed. Hortensia: 41B 28W. Most Used Emblem: Micaiah. She’s a flying staff bot with staff conservation. She was never all that good in combat, but she never needed to be. Those battle statistics barely scratch the surface of how useful I’ve found her. Rosado: 53B 45W. Most Used Emblem: Eirika. Honestly, one of my greatest regrets until just recently is not noticing how astonishingly mediocre Rosado is as a unit. I still kinda like his personality (especially his interactions with Merrin that I finally got to see more of), but like holy shit, I just looked at him the other day and realized that he was just kinda there on both my Hard and Maddening files. Just an Eirika bot. I didn’t really give him or Eirika another glance, and that was a huge mistake, because Eirika is so much better of an Emblem than I gave her credit for. Not sure if I said this, but I gave her to Clanne on my Maddening file and those two have been amazing together ever since. Rosado just has a terrible start thanks to his lame bulk, and there’s little reason to get him over the hump. Goldmary: 34B 18W. Most Used Emblem: Leif. She was a Brave Assist bot, nothing more, but certainly nothing less. She was an emergency replacement for Merrin in my army, and she was never, ever, ever good at actual proper combat, but simply having her around for chain attacks on bosses was worth the deployment slot alone, I feel. Timerra: 8B 4W. Most Used Emblem: Ike. Honestly, I would’ve liked to use her more, but holy shit is she just terrible at wielding her weapons of choice. She’s slowed down so much, and she has so much competition. I brought her to Chapter 14 on my Maddening run and forgot to promote her in advance, and she could do like nothing for that entire chapter, it was ridiculous. I can’t imagine promoting her would have let her fare much better. Merrin: 52B 22W. Most Used Emblem: Ike. Ah, Merrin. Oh how your death was a tragedy. Honestly, I think she might be one of my new favorite characters in the series, and playing Maddening has only further cemented that. I’m so sad that I didn’t get to see her in action more here. Still, at least it meant I got to see Kagetsu become batshit insane. Panette: 3B 2W. Most Used Emblem: None. Panette is a character I’d be interested to be forced to use, if that makes sense. Like if I did a draft. She seems fun, but I just never had a place in my roster, or, apparently, in my heart, for a proper dedicated axe specialist. Fogado: 3B 2W. Most Used Emblem: None. Fogado’s main issue I feel is that he’s a bow user who can’t make much use of Lyn. His greatest contribution to the campaign was giving Alcryst his silver bow. A shame, because his character seems pretty great. Honestly, I should probably do a draft sometime and see what characters I wind up seeing more of. I like a lot of this cast, even though the story is dumb as hell. Pandreo: 6B 1W. Most Used Emblem: None. I can easily imagine this guy getting into my party if the right person died at the right time, sheerly due to his staff utility. But that was not to be, either in this run or any other I’ve done. It is kinda cute that he starts a religion worshipping all dragons, as if to make sure that Veyle isn’t left out. Come to think of it, I wonder what his supports with her are like, if indeed they have any… …They do! Okay, I’ll have to look out for that in the future! Bunet: 11B 6W. Most Used Emblem: None. Bunet is… frankly, a joke. He has one, one redeeming quality, and that’s the fact that he comes right before a map with serious demand for fliers, with the ability to become one in spite of your serious dearth of Emblem-based reclassing options. It’s frankly comical how terrible his stats are laid bare to be if you reclass him into anything but his home class. Anna: 15B 11W. Most Used Emblem: None. Huh. Could’ve sworn I put one on her once. Anyway, I have a feeling I could probably make Anna good with quick and decisive reclassing, but if you’ll pardon the pun, she’s a big investment, and the earlygame is just so tight. Jean: 0B 0W. Most Used Emblem: None. Not using Jean was a mistake. I pulled him through the early game on my Maddening run thanks to him not having the same limited EXP pool as everyone else, and he’s come in pretty clutch. I’ve had some pretty decent success making him a griffin knight, though I made the mistake of temporarily making him a wyvern in the hopes that he’d get some great defense. I should’ve kept him in Griffin Knight for the speed and magic, and I’ve been correcting that mistake recently. He makes a pretty good Leif user, given he can actually do damage with all four hits of Quadruple Strike. Seadall: 0B 0W. Most Used Emblem: Lucina. He’s a dancer. In a game where you can teach dancers Canter. I’d say he was consistently one of my most useful units, for reasons I trust I need not take further time to explain. Lindon: 13B 2W. Most Used Emblem: Sigurd. He was a filler unit, and he never really contributed that much, but he was still nice to have around and he put in some decent work softening up enemies with Thoron in the final map. Saphir: 2B 1W. Most Used Emblem: None. She’s a unit you’d really only have occasion to use if you suffered a very recent death and/or you really like her. I fit neither category, so I can’t really say much about how useful she is. Veyle: 8B 6W. Most Used Emblem: Byleth. She took over Pepsiman’s job when he got the Fire Emblem, and she was pretty good at it. Not much more to say. Her stats never really made her all that suited to combat, unfortunately. Amusingly, her ending says she managed to somehow terraform Gradlon into a lush green land. Like fucking how? Also, her people wanted her to become their first queen? Gradlon has a population? Fucking what!? This was a volcanic wasteland that spent a thousand fucking years under the sea! What am I reading here!? Am I even reading this!? Am I having a stroke!? Mauvier: 19B 14W. He mostly joined my army by virtue of being the best unit I had when my deployment limit increased, which isn’t saying much. He was… there. He contributed. He helped. Really though, I am pretty annoyed at how new recruits peter out by the endgame, and he’s a continuous reminder of that. …Oh dear, the credits have a new vocal song. Please don’t be cringe, please don’t be cringe… I like the artwork though. I wonder if it’ll show dead characters though… …Yeah it seems that a royal only gets two pics if all their retainers survived. I only got Celine’s solo pic, no image of Louis. While I haven’t sighted any specific lyric-butchery, the lyrics are still a bit awkward and don’t flow amazingly with the music. OH MY FUCKING LORD, ENGAGE ANNA IS LEAPING INTO THE ARMS OF AWAKENING ANNA AND FATES ANNA THIS IS SO PRECIOUS! …There’s a picture of Mauvier and Veyle walking together and coming across a little girl who looks suspiciously like Marnie. I wonder what the implication of that is supposed to be. Did her biological parents change their mind about not wanting a daughter and had another one…? And now there’s a portrait of Pepsiman with all of the Emblems. And now there’s a CGI scene, and… Pepsiman tries one last time to summon Marth. Lemme guess, it’s gonna show a little flicker that the Emblems might be coming back? More than a little flicker. They all just erupt into columns of light the moment Pepsiman leaves with all his friends. …And with that… I’m directed to the save screen, and my army is back the way it was before I started Chapter 26, just with a record that I cleared it. Nice. …So… …That’s the end of the game. I’m, uh… possessed of a madness, shall we say, to get this finished tonight. So I’m going to attempt it. I’ll post this first. Stay tuned.

Engage's, because it, the Heroes Book 3 theme, and Annette's goofy cake song are the only English vocal songs in the entire FE canon that don't butcher syllable stress in order to cram a lyric where it doesn't belong. Also, the instrumental version goes so hard, and I adore it.

Oh, hey, so, another thing: I've got a feeling the reason they give you no new recruits for the endgame is because they don't want it to be too difficult to get supports with characters or something. Well, to that, I have a solution, and I'm only half joking: Sommie. Like, just discover something in the endgame, a magic mech, or Lumera's construct-making machine, or the legendary Holy Hamster Wheel, and have it be a thing Sommie can use to join in the fight. It would be stupid, but it would also be adorable and hilarious, and it's not like the game isn't already overflowing with Saturday Morning Cartoon Energy. But no repeats of the ghost Lilith bullshit. They don't die if they lose all their HP, the thing they use to fight just breaks and Sommie scampers off.

Would she need Canter? I can't remember enemy placement for that map that well.

...Noted, thank you.

Ah yes, I did at least do that, unfortunately neither weapon is particularly useful for my squad.

My understanding is that there's nothing I can do with it now. I'd have to wait another map to get the results of putting anything in today. Does it do more than that? And at any rate it was also for boosting my bond fragments, though I suppose maybe they also added well achievements.

Engage Day 48: Chapter 26 Today is not a very time-ridden day, unfortunately. And it occurs to me I have a shitton of money to spend, so I may need to spend even more of it prepping. But I’ll get as far into Chapter 26 as I can at least. …Alright, that thankfully didn’t take too long. I splurged on a bunch of staves, and spent my remaining bond fragments breaking the bank on everyone’s SP reserves and getting them some good skills while I still can. Including giving Pepsiman a skill I’ve really been sleeping on: Favorite Food. Really, having an emergency engage refill is such a huge help, especially for someone who relies so much on their engage meter to be powerful. Frankly, I should get in the habit of getting this on him before Chapter 10 since it’s so cheap, albeit at a relatively high level, and it would be awesome to be able to splurge more often on my use of Byleth in the midgame. PFFFFFFFFF Clanne starts fanboying about the Divine Dragon and saying he was so happy talking to Pepsiman that he could faint, and Sigurd’s like “Fainting during conversation? Some would consider that rude. Strive to remain upright, Clanne.” …Fuck, I need to get a few more bond fragments if I want to get Canter+ on Clanne. Alright, one sec, what are some achievements I can still do? Yeah, I sold the shit in the inventories of everyone I benched, and that netted me a few achievements. Woo! Alright, so, I got those skills, and then I bought a shitton of tonics, medicine and staves. I think I’m pretty set. Alright, let’s go. …So I get back to the map and wait for it to show where the final battle is on the map… …only to reveal I access it from the second floor of the Somniel’s Café Terrace. …Oh shit. Oh shit, it’s happening, holy shit please be this wonderfully ridiculous. YES! WE’RE FLYING THE SOMNIEL INTO THE BLACK HOLE! …Hey, what’s this “rankings” thing? …These seem to be the most popular combinations to bring into the final battle or something? Huh. Okay. Anyway… OFF WE GO! … …Oh that is so fucking lame. We don’t even get a cutscene! It’s just a portrait of the Somniel rising to the portal and kinda breaking apart in the process. …So Marth’s finally coming clean about what’s going on now that he’s literally falling apart at the seams. …Oh, it’s the portal itself destabilizing them? And closing the portal will be too cataclysmic for the Emblems to survive? It had nothing to do with the miracle? …Okay, I get why Marth’s been hiding this, it would probably give everyone needless pause about doing the right thing. …But then, wouldn’t that imply that the Emblems would be fine if we just kept them away from the Portal and only used Pepsiman’s Emblem powers to win? That would be hard as hell, but they’re acting like the other Emblems are necessary to win the battle, and that they have to die. Veyle has a line where her actress seems to read it like the “…” is at a different part than the line actually says. She says “It’s beautiful… but very cold”, but the text says “it’s beautiful, but… very cold.” AND WE’RE JUST SUDDENLY IN FRONT OF SOMBRON OKAY. …But amusingly, Sombron’s like “look, at this point, I’ve gotten all I wanted from your world. I don’t need to mess with you people anymore, so I’m totally happy agreeing not to bother you again. Let’s just both part ways, no conflict, you close the portal from your side and live happily ever after and all that shit in your world, and I’ll go conquer the rest of the multiverse somewhere far, far away from you. We good?” That is… by a country fucking mile the most reasonable offer any FE villain has ever made to the heroes, even though it would still be immoral and cowardly to take it. I honestly love this. It’s cold pragmatism, pure practical intelligent self-interest, hedging his bets just on the off-chance they actually have the power to beat him, rather than cartoonishly stomping puppies for the sake of it. Honestly this one singular line drastically improves my opinion of Sombron as a character and makes me want to replay the game taking a closer look at his actions and behaviors. That is way more intelligent than I’ve been giving Sombron credit for. Could I have been sleeping on his character this whole time? But then Pepsiman doesn’t even just say that would be selfish and cowardly of them, he just points out they have nothing but Sombron’s word that the bastard won’t attack Elyos again later when he’s well and truly consolidated his power. But now Sombron seems to wish to elaborate on his big Evil Plan. Let’s see what he’s got for us? …Zero Emblem? …So they seem to be doing the Alexander of Brennenburg motivation, where Sombron’s been committing all of these atrocities because he’s an extradimensional alien trying to get home? He was apparently a child on the losing side of a big Emblem war and was banished to Elyos instead of being killed like all of his relatives. But he brought the Zero Emblem with him? Then why is he trying to reunite with them? …Oh shit. Because when summoned with his power the Emblem had no free will. …Okay, is he about to explain why he couldn’t just ask the nice Divine Dragons for help summoning the Zero Emblem with free will? Assuming I’m reading into this correctly that the Zero Emblem was his childhood friend or something. …No, I apparently am giving the game too much credit. That would’ve been a pretty compellingly tragic backstory, spending eternity with no allies or company but the soulless, mindlessly obedient husk of your childhood friend. But no, apparently the Emblem just kinda vanished, leaving behind only the ring, because Emblems can’t survive outside of their homeworld. The homeworld of the ring, not the homeworld of the spirit of the ring, that is. …Actually Sombron says the Emblem “abandoned” him because it befriended people of another world. So he burned the village that took him in to ask in order to… earn this heartless Zero Emblem’s approval… or something…? Okay this is super edgy and dumb. …And Pepsiman suggests that what actually happened was that Zero Emblem stayed strong long enough to make sure Sombron was found by someone, keeping him company until the day that leaving wouldn’t mean leaving Sombron alone. And then Sombron, misunderstanding this in the most comically, grotesquely edgy way imaginable, ruined all of it and dedicated his life to being the edgiest, most heartless bastard imaginable in the hope of reuniting with someone who would have never wanted anything he did in the Emblem’s name. Yeah, this is such a terrible attempt at a tragic backstory that I almost want to vomit. And he was doing so well in the moment just before this! Though I have noticed the dialogue music and prep music is the same music as the map and battle music for the prologue. …This map is fucking tiny. So tiny I have to assume the final battle is more than even two parts. The enemies are all high level and have legendary weapons, but if I had used both boots on Pepsiman instead of just one (giving the other to Seadall), then I would’ve been able to attack Sombron with my first fucking move. I have every confidence I could Engage magdump to one-turn this, but at this point I have decent cause to suspect that wouldn’t work out well for me, so I’m going to do this the old-fashioned way, and fight the enemies normally. I’ve got 15 of every tonic, so I’m going to use 7 of each of them on my best units here just in case this is my only opportunity to do it, and if it isn’t, and they wear off later, I’ll use the remaining 8 of each on the next map if it looks like the true final battle, or 4 then and 4 later if it doesn’t. Okay, keeping in mind that anyone young already has +2 in str, mag, spd and def… …Just as I feared, wading through all of these tonics and using them is… a pain. …Oh shit, I just remembered something! Turns out that Veyle had a pretty badass conversation with Zephia in the volcano chapter! Zephia talks about her cold contempt for Veyle, and it ends like this: Zephia: I hated you. No, that’s not right… I was indifferent to you. Veyle: … Zephia: Lord Sombron’s puppet. That’s all you were. A thing to be used and cast off. Yet somehow… I knew this day would come. Veyle: The day I would kill you? No wonder you didn’t like me. Zephia: Well… You finally have my undivided attention. …Anyway, okay, I finally have my tonics sorted out, and I’m ready for my first move. I can player-phase the two side groups, then brace for enemy phase, and all without a single engage. Let’s do this. …Oh christ, pre-battle cutscene. Is the game gonna throw another curve-ball at me? …Fuck, Sombron’s sealing off the portal, locking us in and “killing” the Emblems. Damn it! Honestly, while I think Chapter 11 managed to make it work, I really don’t like when the game takes the Emblems away or significantly nerfs them. It’s annoying. Sombron: You will die here as I have lived: IN ANGUISH, FAR FROM HOME! …Okay, props to Sombron, that’s a pretty badass villain line. …Oh nice! Is Pepsiman gonna bring back the Emblems now? I was thinking there would be at least this part of the map we were forced to do without them. …That makes it kinda frustratingly pointless though, to introduce this conflict and so quickly resolve it. And then we get everyone’s final battle lines… and then back to a cutscene… and… …And then we get the Emblems back. With these big bombastic poses and introductions like they’re all some cross between Power Rangers and Magical Girls, and honestly, again, they should have leaned into that more! And then Sombron gives a rant right out of the “friendship is for losers” playbook about how having friends will only hurt you in the end, and… We begin. Honestly, I don’t know how much my opinion of this final map theme is colored by realizing that it’s that thing I heard in the outro of some FE videos on YouTube that I thought was some lo-fi remix or something. But it’s definitely not doing much for me right now. Anyway, Kagetsu kills the guy on the far left with the smashing sword, Alcryst uses his brave bow and Seadall’s help to kill the one with Caladbolg and Canter back to safety, and then Ivy kills the axe fighter with Ukonvasara and Clanne kills the one on the far right with the Fragarach. …Oh thank goodness, the final map theme transitioned into the badass version of the main theme that played when Pepsiman first engaged in Chapter 1. …Aaaaand only enemies in range of us attack. They have that kind of AI. Wonderful. I know there’s going to be more after this. There just has to be, it’s a mathematical necessity. So I’m not going to complain too much about the first part being simple. But honestly at this point it might have actually been nice to force us to do this part without the Emblems, given how simple it is otherwise. The fighters have been taken out, now time to bait in Sombron, who can move. I’m not sure how the game defines “the start of the turn” when it comes to this skill, so I’m having anyone who majorly depends on engaging stay far enough away that they won’t lose their full engage gauge. …Seems to be the start of his turn, not the turn, which would be player phase. Good. Alright, then let’s finish him. I don’t think we’ll even need to engage anyone! He has a bit of a crit rate, so I’m avoiding taking chances whenever I can. Thankfully, Yunaka, Alcryst and Kagetsu are enough, with the help of Goldmary’s brave assists. And then the screen fades to black, comes back with everyone’s positions reset and some sigils on the map. Did I mention how much this looks like the final map in Revelation? Because this looks so fucking much like the final map in Revelation. And now he finally turns into a dragon. …And now there’s a barrier around his giant ass, and he’s supported by 12 Corrupted wielding… twelve Dark Emblems? …Apparently I have to kill each one with the corresponding Emblem, or at least I should, but the game isn’t explicitly telling me who is who. …So basically… the game is challenging me to a test of my Fire Emblem knowledge… asking me to correctly guess who’s who based on their descriptions alone. …Oho. …Ohohohohohohohohohohohohohohoho. OH HELL FUCKING YES! BRING IT ON, GAME! I HAVE BEEN TRAINING FOR THIS MOMENT SINCE BEFORE THE AGE OF PLAGUES AND MADNESS! When we next meet tomorrow, friends… WE’RE GONNA HAVE SOME FUN! ALASTOR! SIGNING! THE FUCK! OFF!

The game gives literally no explanation for why Pepsiman can't do that. Lumera could, and she was orders of magnitude less powerful than Pepsiman was when she did. That's probably one of the most frustrating things about the story, that Pepsiman is so comically uninquisitive about his dragon powers.

Engage Day 47: Cleanup Yeah, sorry for tempting fate yesterday, but today is waaaaaaay too busy for me to commit to a proper chapter. I’m just going to do the story for the end of this part, then devote this day to cleanup. So, resuming where we left off… …Looks like Lumera’s dying with a few moments of lucidity, just like Hyacinth and Morion did. …It’s weirdly adorable that Pepsiman’s partially using this time to go “Look, Mom! I’m an Emblem now!” like he wants her to be proud of him, or he’s reassuring her he made something of himself in her absence. …Seeing him show off the ring with a clenched fist, looking amusingly in a few moments like he’s about to punch her in the face… made me realize he’s in a class that can actually do that, if ineffectually. Which makes me wonder if the rings, or arts themselves, have some sort of shielding to them that keeps wearing a ring while doing fisticuffs from being super awkward. PFFFFFFFFFFFFF LUMERA’S ARM IS CLIPPING THROUGH HER HAIR AS SHE REACHES UP TO TOUCH PEPSIMAN! Actually, come to think of it: at no point in that battle did Lumera enter her dragon form. It’s kind of comical how utterly pointless that form wound up being. It feels like it solely existed to justify the Divine Dragons being called dragons when the devs had no interest in that being a game mechanic. …outside the DLC. Honestly, this is making me wonder if somehow, for some reason, we won’t even fight Sombron in dragon form. Unlikely, I think, even with what we’ve seen so far… but it would be hilarious. Again though, there’s only so much I can feel at this scene. Like I’ve said before, Lumera really should’ve died at Chapter 10. We needed more time with her for, like, any of Pepsiman’s emotional reactions here to not feel forced. Oh, and they actually show the pinkie promise this time. How cute. …Lumera’s saying the sky is beautiful above her, but given we’re indoors… I’m assuming she’s seeing some afterlife thing. Okay, what next, after exploration? Alright, so a shot of the portal sans barrier… …Which begs the question of how we’ll get to it. I hope it’s something ridiculous yet awesome, like flying the Somniel like a starship a la the end of Super Mario Galaxy. OOOH! OR! Pepsiman turns into a dragon, literally just for the cutscene to fly everyone up there on his back! For some reason! …And now all the heroes are talking about the idea of Pepsiman ruling everything, and I’m like can we not? Do we have to do this again? Are these people allergic to checks and balances or state rights or something? The next rulers of the nations are right fucking here! Please tell me the nations don’t dissolve and become some kind of creepy utopian one world government again! But yes, it seems like this next battle is the last one, or at least the first part of the final two-parter. …I wonder if they’ll let us save in the second half of the two-parter this time, since that’s how two-parters have worked elsewhere in the game. It would be weird, but maybe once you beat it you’re sent back to the world map prior to the first part so you’re not permanently locked out of the rest of the game. Alfred seems to think that since the miracles have been used forever, nobody will try to steal the rings anymore. Oh yes. Sure. I’m certain nobody would be tempted to steal the rings at the mere promise of teleportation, super speed, long-distance sniping and nigh-invulnerability. Actually, come to think of it, something occurred to me… …What’s the game’s explanation for what happens in Chapter 10/11 if you didn’t put one of your rings on someone? Are they implying that the ring wouldn’t stay at the Somniel, and that you’d bring it with you completely unused? And actually, after that bullshit, why did it never occur to anyone to single out one Emblem Ring to leave at the Somniel just to make sure Sombron never gets his hands on all 12 in the worst case scenario? Though in fairness had they been that smart, Pepsiman would still be dead because the miracle couldn’t have happened when it needed to and the last ring would have been locked forever inside the Somniel where nobody alive can access it. Still, I do like this conversation, talking about all the things that the rings can do now that they don’t need to be completely locked away for fear of ending the world. Ah yes, but of course, I sensed some hesitance in Marth talking about sticking around… …Fuck, yes, Marth’s now talking to himself in terms that heavily imply they’re going to leave. Or die. Or something. I hate this. …“May soon have to part ways”? Anyway, moving on… Veyle got a C bond with Byleth, so let’s get that out of the way… Whoop! Whole lot of supports! Alright, let’s get started! Clanne and Hortensia’s A. …Oh goodness this sounds like it’s going to be cringe. It sounds like it’s gonna turn out Clanne made a fan club in between the B and A. Though I do like the line where Hortensia’s annoyed that everyone, when told she made up the fan club, was like “Yeah, I figured”. …Yeah, I was right. This is really awkward that Clanne did this. It feels kind of out of character, and it seems like it was solely because Hortensia had the courage to own up to the embarrassment she brought upon herself. Yeah, this is cringe. Pure unleaded cringe. I can barely watch this. Please make it stop, like, immediately. …Well, while not immediately, it did, in fact, at least, stop. Clanne and Veyle’s C. Oh, woo! Hopefully this is good! Please be nice to her, Clanne! He’s nice to her, that’s a good start. He seems to be doing his little pickling hobby I’ve seen him talk about here and there. Veyle has… apparently never heard of pickling. In more than a thousand years. Then again, it’s more than a thousand years of being on the run and alone. Hahaha, Veyle thinks the pickles are too basic for her tastes! Because she’s obsessed with spicy foods! Clanne: You can’t make pickles with peppers. No, but you can pickle peppers! Either that or I have been the victim of a conspiracy of insidious lies since preschool. But anyway, Veyle’s telling Clanne that he needs to have a broader concept of what pickles could possibly be if he wants to make cool new recipes. Honestly, I think this conversation is pretty cute. I’m glad they’re getting along. I was kinda scared Clanne would be uncomfortable with the whole “killing Lumera” thing and might have residual trauma towards her. Alcryst and Ivy’s A. Interestingly, Alcryst says “toward” as “towards” in the vocalized line. Honestly, while this support chain is rooted in the awkwardness of empty and unsubstantiated claims of Elusia being a victim, I do think that Ivy and Alcryst are cute together, and I like their dynamic. Seadall and Veyle’s C. Honestly, I think it really speaks to casting and character design that while Veyle has some annoying elements regarding the construction of her backstory and character… the instant I see her face and hear her voice I am completely suffused with a desire to see her happy and safe. She is very precious, and I like reading her supports and seeing her being cute with people. Anyway, this is about Seadall apparently being “in a rut” with his fortune-telling lately. Veyle asks him to tell her her fortune anyway and she’ll just assume it’s wrong, and he says in a comically “mystical” voice that she should go to the market and act like a cat. I have a feeling the next support is going to reveal she did it, and that it did actually bring her good fortune. I mean, she’s cute enough that I could believe she could get away with acting like a cat in public without serious social consequences. Framme and Goldmary’s C. …Goldmary is apparently stripping in front of Framme in the middle of picking fruit in a remote field. …Apparently because a spring was nearby. Framme is understandably alarmed. …Something tells me that “shy” is not the correct translation for whatever the hell Japanese word was originally in this script. I cannot fathom how Framme could ever get the impression that Goldmary is “shy”. “Prim” or “proper” maybe? I’m assuming it was some other word for “disinclined to get stark naked in the open”. Mauvier and Lindon’s C. Ooooh! I’ve heard about this one! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! So, Lindon has this thing with “experiments”… and also cooking with lightning magic. He wants Mauvier to throw up an ear of corn so that Lindon can fry it in midair and create a shower of elthunder popcorn. When told the most likely complication would be that Mauvier’s head could possibly be hit by the blast and explode instead, Mauvier gives the soon-to-be immortal line: “I will not risk my life for corn.” …However, while this was a great support… thinking of the fact that Lindon and Mauvier are in my army reminds me of something unpleasant. I have to say, I have a bit of a complaint about the game’s late-game recruits. So, the last proper replacement unit you get is in Chapter 19, with Saphir. I say that because Mauvier and Veyle aren’t “replacement” units. They join simultaneously with a commensurate increase in the size of your deployment slots. And if anyone dies after that, you’re shit outta luck, and gotta whip out someone you benched multiple chapters ago, if not longer. Like I had to do with Lindon here. That and the occasional but present unpleasant “gotcha” moments combine to mean I think this game isn’t quite getting a perfect ironmannability rating. Alright, last support. Lindon and Saphir’s C. …Oooh, old soldier from Elusia meets old soldier from Brodia! Let’s see how this goes! …Okay, so Saphir’s talking about something that happened 30 years ago. Which, apparently somehow, would have been when she was 5. …Yeah, she suspects Lindon might have been among the soldiers who attacked her village by the looks of it. But she doesn’t complete the question. …I’m interested in seeing more of this. But that’s enough with supports, so time to do some game maintenance. The Cinquedea is worse than Yunaka’s Steel Dagger +4 in every way, but then the latter has the Pepsiman engraving on it. Let’s see how it looks with a little tweaking… …Yep, it’s stronger after just three forges. Alright, time to make that her new weapon then, and put the Pepsiman engraving on that. Apparently when it comes to engraving, Pepsiman’s engage is called the “Emblem of Fire”, and not the “Fire Emblem”. Thankfully Pepsiman has enough bulk that he can wield the Wille Glanz without any speed penalty. In fact, he could afford to let it get one heavier. So with that in mind, what should we engrave his weapon with… Yeah, Leif makes sense. It was already on his Liberation+5, so no reason not to put it on his new weapon of choice. Now then! I’ll do some assorted Somniel stuff, head out to do my job, then get back… …and finally give that ring to Yunaka. …Okay no, first, one thing before I go: I just did the arena to level up Hortensia, and my god, some of the mini stories these arena bouts tell are priceless. Hortensia introduces herself. Saphir reciprocates and hopes for a fair fight. She immediately whips out a bow on a flier. Too bad for her, it’s the radiant bow. Hortensia wipes the floor with her. Saphir: You got me good. Hortensia: Obviously! Okay, now to head out and then give that ring to Yunaka when I get back! …Back. Okay, let’s do this. Where is she…? …Nowhere. Gotta sleep and reshuffle then. Just as well, given I totally forgot I have to take it out of the bedroom drawer first, and going there was a good reminder. Kagetsu trolls me by making me think I overslept, and implies I’m just as annoyed as Ivy usually is by his antics. Alright, she’s in the plaza. Let’s go. I give it to her, and immediately we’re somewhere else, and she’s apparently the one starting this conversation, saying she wants to “come clean”. I take it this is where she tells me the truth about her? …The concept of the S-rank ring-giving just felt so Three Houses to me that I temporarily forgot we’re in a game with a protagonist with an actual personality who can talk. I was kind of disarmed for a moment when Pepsiman reminded me. …It’s been a long day, okay? So, Yunaka’s real name is Larimar. And yes, she used to be an assassin, as was fairly obvious. …Yeah, this… I distinctly notice they avoid using the word “love” anywhere in this conversation, which is… so profoundly awkward as to beggar belief. They seem to have decided that since you don’t have an entire cast of characters Pepsiman can marry without it being awkward, he can’t marry any of them. This feels like they’re watering down the whole story appeal of S-ranking in order to maximize the gameplay utility of it, similar to what Radiant Dawn did with supports. And you know me. Gameplay over story, big time. I’ve got “writing” as just this single category in my rankings, and it doesn’t even give all that many points. I hear people say “the only good part about Conquest is the gameplay” and it literally does not compute to me, I go “how the fuck can that be an ‘only’ to you!?”. I can count the number of games in this series with stories worth shit on a single hand, and I still love this series enough to devote years worth of days of my free time to cataloguing my journey through it. The point is, I feel like I’m in a better position than most of the fandom to tell people who don’t like S-supports being watered down: “calm down guys, this isn’t a big deal”… …And in spite of that, that’s not my answer. I agree with them. This sucks. This is boring. Bring back S-supports and romance properly, or don’t bring them back at all. Don’t make a mockery of them like this just because you don’t want to worry about leaving any characters out. You’ll notice I didn’t give the pact ring to Clanne, the character I actually use Engage+ with. I gave it to Yunaka. The character I most wanted to see more of. Well, among the living, that is. I’m not a cold-blooded machine. I still get attached to, or pissed off at, these characters. Sometimes I insist on using some of them over objectively superior options because I like them, or I refuse to use them on principle of finding them ungodly insufferable to be around. And sometimes, crazy enough, I even like seeing characters fall in love! …Actually, I’m curious if anyone else has paired endings, and if they’re going the Three Houses route of having it be almost entirely out of my hands. Christ on a silver platter I hope not. But hey! Look! It’s the first time we’ve ever seen 2D artwork of Yunaka in the entire game! Because the game doesn’t use portraits for mugshots, it just uses the 3D models! That, personally, I don’t really mind. I think it probably pressured them to make the 3D models more expressive, and if so, it was worth it. …They don’t even call it an S rank. It’s just a fucking ring icon for the rank. It’s a pretty mediocre bond rank 21 bonus (a player-phase crit and dodge boost), but again, at least that minimizes the pressure to actually Engage+ with your… ugh… ring-rank partner if you’re too attached to the build you’ve already set up for them. Aaaaaaand I apparently got 1000 bond shards for using the pact ring and getting that achievement! Okay, that’s nice. But yeah, I’m gonna have to call it here. I’m tired, I’m hungry, and I’m honestly a little disappointed at the game, and I’d like to take some time to address all three of these things. Tomorrow we get cracking on the beginning of the end. Alastor, signing off.

This is sounding uncomfortably similar to Shadow Dragon's H5 meta.