Jotari

Some how I've completely missed all this Accordion stuff, alongside the Book of Revelations. Researching now. What I find interesting (admittedly a little disappointing) is that Forneus was a human. I, and a few others, used to assume he was a dragon, as Thabes was seen as 'the' ancient advanced civilization, so it was only natural to think it was the civilization of the ancient advanced dragons. But it was a city of humans destroyed by Duma. This also brings up another important point in that Gotoh only reintroduced magic to humans when he established Khaden, not long before the first game. So there's absolutely nothing stopping them making a game set in the era of the Earth Dragon war (that's something I actually argued intensely with someone before, can't remember who or where).

I knew it! Even when the game's text directly proves me wrong, I'm still right!

I wouldn't be pointing fingers. To me, at any rate, you're coming across as the most negative one here.

Yeah, that does make sense. As I said earlier, I don't actually have a problem with Celica's actions and motivations throughout the section. It's just that Jedah is written so badly, he drags her down just by proximity. You could keep most or all of her dialogue the same and just change some of his and it would improve things phenomenally (though the gameplay fights will always be a problem). Just one example, Celica rightly points out that Rigel were the ones that imprisoned Milda in the first place, have Jedah blame that all on Rudolf and claim he never wanted any harm done to the gods. In fact, have him claim that he never wanted Rigel to go to war in the first place, and that it was all the ambitions of Rudolf. That way he can at least try to absolve himself of wrong doing in Celica's eyes and paint a better picture of himself (and make Celica empathize with him in a way, as she sees herself in the same position regarding Alm).

Well you could add an infertile female. Now there's an interesting gimmick!

Thracia probably has the best unit balance in the series. There are some units with prf weapons that make them more valuable, and if you have a staff your inherently better, but on the whole, every last unit is worth deploying and can hold their own with a unique niche of some sort.

The difference between Jedah and an actual cult leader, is that Jedah offers absolutely nothing to gain trust. Cullts pray on the weak and insecure by giving them a place to be accepted and valued. Jedah never does anything even vaguely nice. He just offers Celica a particular form of suicide and she's all for it. I don't mind Jedah being evil and gradually showing his true colours, but he needs to do something before then to convince Celica he's not lying his ass off (which again, he totally is). The first scene is pretty decent, he approaches her with a rationale suggestion, and Celica appropriately mistrusts him. It's just that from there, he never tries any other tactic, instead, getting more and more overt in his evil, yet Celica becomes more and more convinced that he shares her motives and will keep his end of the bargain (which he doesn't).

It is kind of contrived and makes Ethlyn a really bad mother, but it still would work better than having her kidnapped when Leinster fell. We get to see it happening in Chapter 5, which is much more powerful than getting some opening text at the start of a chapter saying BTW, Leif's sister got kidnapped. If it were any other game, they could probably do a cut away scene and show us it happening at a different location, but that just isn't Holy War's mandated style. Things happen on the map, the scope is too big to leave a cut away to somewhere else. You stay ingrained in the world, where the action is happening at all times.

Which is precisely why I hope Jahn gets a big important model in the hypothetical future remake with boosted stats to cement him as the real final boss of the game (because let's face it, Idoun's heart just isn't in it).

Well regarding the final comment first (because that makes sense as a way to do things), he does also proclaim that he wants an age of fear and chaos, which he'd be more likely to get out of crazy Duma than sane Duma. He also says this in front of Celica, when she could still resist (and renege her consent, but whether that's necessary or not is just as frustratingly unclear as Jedah's motives). Jedah also doesn't provide anything for Celica to trust him. She meets him with healthy skepticism at first, demanding to see Mila before making any decision. Instead of complying with Celica and escorting her up Duma tower, he tries to kill her friends and forces her to fight for her life to make her way to him. There she discovers that, while he didn't lie about Mila's state, he certainly misled her about it. It barely even feels like he showed Mila off willingly considering Celica had to fight her way to him (and he probably could have just as easily used his crystal ball magic in their first encounter). Then he separates her from all her friends. The friends he's already proclaimed trespassers and shown a desire to kill (and sure enough, while Alm and Celica are doing their whole dance around a dragon, Saber and co are fighting for their lives). Que meeting with Alm and his whole line about wanting fear and chaos. So to sum up, Jedah is a leading figure of the nation at war with her homeland, attacks Celica at every opportunity he gets, blatantly says he wants to kill her friends, laughs manically at everything he says, withholds information until it's convenient, and doesn't even offer her a cup of tea when she's forced to barge into his house. I get Celica's motivations, she wants to save Mila and even failing that Duma, and is willing to sacrifice her self to do it. But Jedah is written is such a two dimensional way that lacks any nuance, it really brings her down. The writing around him is squarely to blame. He's does absolutely nothing to garner her trust and everything to make himself seem untrustworthy, and then, shocking twist, he proves to be completely untrustworthy. The biggest problem are the tower and swamp fights. They just don't make any sense narratively. Celica wants to be there, and Jedah wants her to be there. So he has no reason to try and kill her, and she has no reason to trust him after he actively does that. It's a case of them wanting to have their cake and eat it in regards to Gaiden. They want Jedah to have a bigger presence in the game by introducing him earlier, but they also want to keep all the maps the fights that were in the original game, without much care as to how to the two conflicting points don't gel together.

You know you can save mid map in Genealogy of the Holy War, right? A lot of people seem to miss that fact (probably because the option outright disappears if you move a unit, when it should probably go grey and unselectable). You're not expected to sit down and put two hours into each map, you can stop half way through and come back later and even reset to that point if someone dies. That's why each chapter is divided into several distinct parts. I see people complain about how long it takes to finish Holy War's chapters, but it seems like such a illogical complaint to me. The game only has 12 of em, it takes roughly the same amount of time to finish as every other title in the series. Yeah, there's some slog with dead turns moving units around, but minute for minute, the game's no more of an investment than any other.

Nolan and Boyd do illustrate what you were trying to say, even if they're not seen as a CordBord. Most classes in Radiant Dawn have 2-3 characters in it with one focusing on power and the other focusing on skill/spd, and maybe a third that balances between the two. It's actually impressive how diverse the cast is given how large it is. The big thing holding it back, however, is that most characters are either completely screwed or blessed by their level of availability (and the difficulty curve between the Mercs and Dawn Brigade being completely screwed, oh and peasant laguz sucking). Wait is the jetliner stationary or in flight? Because that makes a huge difference.

Well I obviously agree with you there. Over all, I'd like them to constantly try new things. Fire Emblem isn't an iterative franchise, like Pokemon. Each game is distinctly different to the last, even when they have the exact same mechanics, like Binding Blade and Blazing Blade. Fates did a good job of building off of Awakening, but I hope they don't grow too cautious due to the success of the DS games and just keep repackaging the same experience over an over. They should have the freedom to throw out things like reclassing and children characters for a game or two and try things like the biorhythm and fatigue again. Give us something completely different like Gaiden and Holy War every now and then. I don't really care what they do specifically, I'll buy the games regardless, so long as the series doesn't become static and I know exactly what kind of experiencing is waiting before I even buy the game. In particular, I hope they do away with the Awakening/Fates style of skill acquirement in the next game. It's fine, but it's definitely not something I want to permanently keep.

He ate his vegetables and exercised daily for a thousand years. Seriously though, he's not quite the size of Ylisse. He gets his own fancy big position on the map, we can only take that so far. After all, it would mean Chrom's an giant who can stomp across an island. No, we see that he's about the size of a castle in the Lucina flashback and when he reawakens near the end of the game. So still really, freaking big, but not big enough to have his own gravity field. Another unit of measurement you could use is the final map. At maximum width he's nine tiles wide, so we can assume that approximately nine horses could ride side by side on his back. So yeah, really freaking big, but not even Vatican sized as far as comparing him to countries go.

Hey now don't be all like that. There's no need to jump down my throat. I never claimed I don't want reclassing in the game. In fact I've actively said I like the idea. I was just merely pointing out that it's not something that can really be ignored. That's like saying you can ignore Silver Weapons in Fates because you don't like the attack loss. Like yeah, they might not be suited to your playstyle, but you're severely nerfing yourself if you ignore them completely because the game is designed with Silver Weapons being something you have access to in order to defeat the stronger enemies you encounter. If reclassing is in the game, then it's in the game. It's part of the intended experience by the developers for the product they've sold to you.

Jedah categorically lies about everything except that Mila and Duma are going mad. He promises A) To let Mila go free B) To let Alm go free C) To use Celica's soul to restore Duma to sanity. He A) reveals that he has neither the means nor the intention to release Mila. B) Immediately tries to use Celica herself to kill Alm, and C) Doesn't even want Duma to be sane in the first place! His line before the final battle essentially says that if Duma wants to be crazy, he gets to be crazy because he's the god.

It doesn't help that Naga seems inexplicably confused that Tiki is still lingering around as a spirit, even though she's presumably in the exact same state. I'm suggesting someone revived Naga in her physical dragon body to do battle with Grima in a colossal war of the gods.

I think Tiki's line makes it very clear it's a different Naga, but Grima's line is pretty confusing. If he believes he's killed Naga, then how can he be expecting her to play any more cards. I think there's only one real solution...Someone revived Naga and she fought the giant sky Grima one on one, devastating half the world (why else is Grima appearing before you in the Robin body with a spectral dragon head? He could just flatten them all with his giant dragon body). Grima managed to kill her body, thus killing her, but her soul persisted. It's basically fan fiction, but it's the only thing that really satisfies all the references.

Constance wondered to the water's edge and stared out at the sea. It was an unfamiliar sight to her. Raewald had a large coast, but it had always been distant from her. She briefly considered tossing her tome into the water, but an innate distaste for the destruction of knowledge prevented her. She held the book close to her chest and allowed the sound of the waves to bring peace. She did not discard the guilt that overwhelmed her, but she removed the stress and shame that would only hinder her. I will have no tome to defend myself, she thought. So I must make some armour. She raised her hand and started to weave a spell, a spell she had not cast since the days when she traveled with Oswald. Shadows formed around her, creating what appeared to be a suit of plate mail. She used some illusion to bolster the effect, it wouldn't provide much defense, but she hoped it would make her seem larger and more intimidating. She still the waves before her, and made a pool of calm water to study her reflection. The helmet she wore stared back at her, fierce and cold. I look nothing like a healer, but that can be a good thing. At the very least, I have steeled my heart.

Yes, she most definitely made the Valencian Falchion long before Jugdral as Duma and Mila split off from everyone else even before the Earth Dragon war.

I expect you missed the quote I just dredge up. Tiki clearly believes Grima's claim even upon seeing Naga standing right before her. She treats it as an alternate version of mother dearest, just like our party are alternate versions of Chrom and co.

Yeah, but she likely made the Archanean Falchion before the Jugdral game's went down.

Evidently, she must have been wrong, because we get this in Future Past Naga: Tiki? But...you died in that world. Tiki: Yes. And now only my spirit remains. But I came here to tell you something important before I take your place there. Before I become tied to that world forever... Naga: Take my place? Tiki: You know what I mean. And why. Naga: ...... Tiki: But everything will turn out all right. We have you to thank for that, Naga, for sending help. And you, brave warriors, for giving it. In our world, Naga is dead, but you fought in her stead and gave us hope. We cannot thank you enough. But we will always remember— (Tiki leaves) Chrom: Huh? She's gone! What just happened? So Grima killed the Future Past's version of Naga. They were fortunate a parallel version of Naga took interest and sent main time Chrom and co to help out. I suppose it's possible Tiki just meant Naga is a plain old corpse when she says "In our world, Naga is dead," but it wouldn't really make sense as a comment as the same is true for all Awakening era worlds with any way similar a timeline.

Might be cool to see reinforcements in chapter 21 that vary based on the route you chose. If you went Ilia, then bow knights show up to ruin your day, if you when Sacae, then it's pegasus knights. As for why Bern ignored Lycia, Etruria is a much more powerful enemy. They could have eliminated Lycia if they wanted, but Etruria is a military match for them and is protecting Lycia. So putting their focus on backing the coup in Etruria (which they do by actively fielding soldiers) is prudent. Had the coup succeeded, it's likely they would have conquered Lycia pretty quickly afterwards. It's also possible that they did make some attempts at taking it over while Roy is busy in Ilia/Sacae, but Eliwood repelled the invasion and we just didn't hear about it, he is specifically said to be commanding the defensive army even in his sickly state. It wouldn't be too strange if they never did though, as after Roy liberates the Etrurian capital, they liked had lands there that they were trying to keep and expand from.

Naga could normally revive herself eventually, but in the future past timeline Grima does outright say he killed her (how, I'm not sure, maybe firing off an expiration at her spiritual image would suffice) so Tiki took the spot as the new Naga because there was an opening. That about sums it up. But what I was really wondering, is do the Divine Dragons themselves have a method for permanently eradicating Earth Dragons or fellow rogue Divine Dragons (of which there seems to be a surprising amount of) other than sealing them in the Dragon Table. There must have been casualties on both sides of the war before the Divine Dragons won and they must have had a way of stopping the dead dragons, otherwise there would likely be evidence of it. So perhaps Grima's soul destroying abilities has less to do with him being Grima and more with being a divine dragon (wait, no, Naga says she can't permanently destroy Grima though...Hmm, maybe she just meant she's unable to as the spirit from she's comfortably occupied for a couple thousand years). The point about the Elibe dragons is interesting. On the whole, we don't see much evidence that they're as strong as the Archanea dragons. Elibe dragons managed to go extinct from puny humans while Archanea dragons were the undisputed master of the human race, and just in general displayed more varied and greater powers. So I think I'm willing to bet that if the Elibe dragons could destroy souls, then the Archanea dragons possess that ability too. Now that I think about it, Duma does actively display this power in regards to the witches (and yes, I recall Fomantiis talking about consuming Lyon's soul too).