Special Heroes: Our Path Ahead

[Fire Emblem Fan]

This month's Special Heroes bring us Zelgius, Heather, Reina, a Sanaki + Micaiah Duo, and Saizo as the TT+ unit. All ninjas, just like the last couple of years.

 

[Acacia Sgt]

Well, I nailed the Fates aesthetic at least, hahaha.

[Sunwoo]

There is literally no excuse for Reinhardt and Olwen not getting weapon refines at this point. Period.

Also, the only good Sanaki art in the game is apparently done by the original artist of the Tellius games. I kind of want to get her, but I'm also not really into the idea of throwing a shitton of orbs at this banner. Freyr was nice and showed up within 14 orbs though, so I can spare some.

EDIT: Saizo finally getting an alt is good too.

Edited November 6, 2023 by Sunwoo

[Tybrosion]

Ponytail Micaiah might cause me to act unwise with my orbs.

IS really dropped the shared class thing they had going on these ninja banners just because I brought it up in the General thread, huh?

10 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

There is literally no excuse for Reinhardt and Olwen not getting weapon refines at this point. Period.

No, there is not. They'll still never get refines anyways alongside the others on the refine ban list (base Hector, Ophelia, Surtr, etc.).

Though personally, base Armads not having a refine, while Berserk Armads and Thunder Armads do, is still the most ridiculous thing to me.

[Sunwoo]

Just now, Tybrosion said:

No, there is not. They'll still never get refines anyways alongside the others on the refine ban list (base Hector, Ophelia, Surtr, etc.).

Though personally, base Armads not having a refine, while Berserk Armads and Thunder Armads do, is still the most ridiculous thing to me.

Yeah, I agree that regular Armads not getting a refine is also stupid. Literally has only QR2 on it, and regular Hector has been powercrept by versions of himself that have more stats and better weapons and refines on those weapons.

Also ... Heather ... How many people actually like her? She always felt like such a nothing character to me ;/ It's kinda bogus that more popular dudes who aren't in the game keep getting rebuffed for female characters who are less popular than them. At the very least, Heather doesn't really scream "premium 5-star" material to me.

[Othin]

Heather and Reina! I've been looking forward to both of them, and they're even sharing a color. Zelgius and Sanaki look fun as well.

The refine distribution is still nonsense in general. Both the individual bans, and the categorical ones.

[Ether]

Folk need to get over the gen 1 refine skips already. If they had any intention of going back to them, they would have by now. Give Hector the weapon refine he did get, or give them arcanes and stop giving yourselves an aneurism already.

Anyway, banner looks neat. Hopefully I get one of Heather and Sisters duo along the way to spark, though the latter is priority if I don't. Zelgius looks annoying so I hope he's flavour of the month so I don't need to see him for too long.

[Sunwoo]

1 minute ago, Ether said:

Folk need to get over the gen 1 refine skips already. If they had any intention of going back to them, they would have by now. Give Hector the weapon refine he did get, or give them arcanes and stop giving yourselves an aneurism already.

Anyway, banner looks neat. Hopefully I get one of Heather and Sisters duo along the way to spark, though the latter is priority if I don't. Zelgius looks annoying so I hope he's flavour of the month so I don't need to see him for too long.

I'm not going to get over it, and who are you to tell me to do so anyway?

You're not obligated to respond to people who are still unhappy about the refine skips. People have different thoughts than you.

[Fire Emblem Fan]

People are perfectly in their right to bring up and criticize the lack of refines for Gen 1 units, especially when some are still used a lot today or are popular fan-favorite characters. Not everyone is fortunate enough to summon an Arcane weapon.

Anyway, you know what Tellius characters are objectively more deserving than Heather, who is only skipping others because she's a traditionally attractive lady? Kieran. Tormod. Brom. Calill. Tauroneo. Janaff. Ulki. Nasir. Not to mention characters already in the game like Titania, Nephenee, Jill, and Mist, who haven't gotten much representation. And, since we're getting a lot of Tellius characters here, we're probably not getting anymore for a little while, which is sad.

[Tybrosion]

12 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

At the very least, Heather doesn't really scream "premium 5-star" material to me.

Neither did Cath or Leila, but IS gave them premium seasonal alts too anyways.

Also, Reina did place higher (126th) than Heather (162nd) in CYL7. Make of that what you will.

[Ether]

6 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

I'm not going to get over it, and who are you to tell me to do so anyway?

You're not obligated to respond to people who are still unhappy about the refine skips. People have different thoughts than you.

Okay...? Feel free to keep working yourself up over it then, I guess? It just seems silly to harp on about something that is clearly settled by this point, especially on a banner that's entirely unrelated to them aside from the weapons sharing a single mechanic. It's something I see a lot of all over the place so I commented on it.

And Heather is a fine choice, who fits the banner. It's crazy to me that people will get upset at unrepresented characters getting something, because it's "the wrong one".

[Sunwoo]

2 minutes ago, Tybrosion said:

Neither did Cath or Leila, but IS gave them premium seasonal alts too anyways.

Also, Reina did place higher (126th) than Heather (162nd) in CYL7. Make of that what you will.

I agree about Cath, but I swear Leila was actually somewhat popular.

EDIT:

1 minute ago, Ether said:

Okay...? Feel free to keep working yourself up over it then, I guess? It just seems silly to harp on about something that is clearly settled by this point, especially on a banner that's entirely unrelated to them aside from the weapons sharing a single mechanic. It's something I see a lot of all over the place so I commented on it.

@EtherDo you know what ACTUALLY works me up? People telling me to get over something I'm not happy with.

Honestly, if you actually care about people getting worked up about this shit, you should've just kept that to yourself.

Edited November 6, 2023 by Sunwoo

[Ether]

If you have the right to complain about something unrelated to the banner at hand, I have just as much right to say that I think those complaints are past the point of being useful and that honestly, seeing them here too when they already come up so often in the refine threads is getting stale. But whatever, I'm not wasting anymore time on this. 

[Florete]

11 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Also ... Heather ... How many people actually like her? She always felt like such a nothing character to me ;/ It's kinda bogus that more popular dudes who aren't in the game keep getting rebuffed for female characters who are less popular than them. At the very least, Heather doesn't really scream "premium 5-star" material to me.

Cut it out with this nonsense already. Every character has their fans. What's really "bogus" is people whining about a character getting their first version in the game.

...

Anyway, I'm happy to see Heather and Reina make their debuts, the sister duo looks great, Saizo getting his first alt is a long-time coming, and Zelgius finally gets red armor (albeit not his red Begnion armor). While nothing will beat the Anna duo for me on a single-unit basis, this is probably the coolest set of new units in a long time.

[Sunwoo]

I'm not upset that Heather is in the fucking game. I'm just consistently baffled at how Heroes manages to always ignore relatively popular dudes while giving female characters less popular than them so much better treatment as units. There's honestly no reason why Heather couldn't have been Stefan or Edward, who are both popular enough to place on Tellius top 5 lists consistently.

Now, I'm not saying that she should've been Stefan or Edward on this banner. But how often do we hear of male characters even getting a shot compared to female characters? Far less often. And when they are in the banner, they're less likely (if ever) to get the premium treatment that characters like Heather get. THAT is what I'm complaining about. It sucks feeling like your favorite character(s) will never make it into the game just because they're dudes, when their female counterparts of equal or even lesser popularity ranking get far more grace.

[GrandeRampel]

2 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

I'm not upset that Heather is in the fucking game. I'm just consistently baffled at how Heroes manages to always ignore relatively popular dudes while giving female characters less popular than them so much better treatment as units. There's honestly no reason why Heather couldn't have been Stefan or Edward, who are both popular enough to place on Tellius top 5 lists consistently.

Now, I'm not saying that she should've been Stefan or Edward on this banner. But how often do we hear of male characters even getting a shot compared to female characters? Far less often. And when they are in the banner, they're less likely (if ever) to get the premium treatment that characters like Heather get. THAT is what I'm complaining about. It sucks feeling like your favorite character(s) will never make it into the game just because they're dudes, when their female counterparts of equal or even lesser popularity ranking get far more grace.

Or maybe they are introducing her as an alt to give a nod to her fans who got her to be the third most requested RD character (I think, I need to check that guy on reddit who keeps track) because they want to do a certain theme for the next Tellius banner (Dawn Brigade finally?) and they know she wouldn't fit that banner so in seasonal hell she goes.

TBH I don't really feel that female characters are more likely to get the seasonal hell treatment than male characters. Just last banner we got Kellam added to the game, and also Seadall. And there's also Rickard, Xane, Boyd, a lot of male students from 3H and so on.

About Female characters having more of a chance of being 5* than male characters you are right, but Heather really feels like a random character to get mad at about this. Maybe it's a straw that breaks the camel's back thing but leave the poor girl alone. She is already unlucky enough to be a RD exclusive, which means no supports to flesh her character out, and she also has been mostly ignored by IS in all spin-offs, merchandise and celebrations.

Her vocal and loyal fanbase has been starving, and being a 5* instead of a 4* isn't some major offense that she deserves hate for.

Also:

50 minutes ago, Sunwoo said:

Also ... Heather ... How many people actually like her? She always felt like such a nothing character to me ;/ It's kinda bogus that more popular dudes who aren't in the game keep getting rebuffed for female characters who are less popular than them. At the very least, Heather doesn't really scream "premium 5-star" material to me.

Can I say that is a very aggressive way to get your point across? If I really am to believe that you don't dislike Heather or her fans, that was a bad way to voice your opinion.

As an Heather fan I was ready to go all "EXCUSE YOU?! I will let you know that there are dozens of US! I take full offense with what you said and just so you know I believe that YOUR favorite character is really boring and I don't like them!"

But in the meantime you made your better and clearer comment and I decided to respond to that one instead.

 

 

Anyway I'm really happy to get both Reina and Heather in the game. I would prefer to have their normal versions, but there are still a lot of Tellius and Fates characters to get through so I get why that might not happen. Seasonal Hell isn't a big deal anyway.

Also cool to finally have Zelgius Emblem. And Sanaki is always a joy to see.

[Baron the Shining Blade]

I've expressed my hype on Discord, so I'll make it brief.

*ahem*
 

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS! RED ARMORED ZELGIUS AT LAST! FINALLY AFTER 5 YEARS THEY DID HIM JUSTICE!!!


Never imagined it would be in the form of a ninja alt. The lance I expected, but I will freaking take it to the bank and back. What an awesome early birthday present!

We all get to have our moment. This one happens to be mine. I sincerely wish all of you who haven't already will have your moments as well.

[Humanoid]

Nothing offensive here, but nothing interesting to me either. Won't be around to do anything with this banner anyway, but it's just as well there's no FOMO element here.

- Zelgius' extra mobility seems a bit out of place since his kit has no real synergy with it. I mean fine, I don't want every premium armour to be a save unit so I'm happy to see Assault Troop, but unlike Summer Edelgard where it serves a clear and obvious purpose, this one is just there.

- I have no idea who Heather is, but happy for her fans. I've never been able to properly use units whose schtick revolved around rallies.

- Oh look, another Seasonal-locked Atk/Spd Catch 3.

- Red Ninja Corrin I'm sure is good, if uninteresting mechanically these days.

 

[Jotari]

Nice to see the Spy Shuriken.

[Ice Dragon]

They're really baiting me away from Sanaki and Micaiah by having Heather and Reina share a color. Argh. I guess I'm doing the usual pulling both red and green until I get 11 copies of Reina.

Sanaki's weapon animation is gorgeous.

It looks like Schism is intended to be the counter to Freyr shenanigans. It's also really nice that we now have debuffs that remove the effects they nullify when they're cleared as a counter to dancers.

 

And once again, here's a reminder that Fates's localization team didn't think us Westerners could handle four-character Japanese names. Reina's name in Japanese is Yuugiri. (If I remember correctly, Yukimura is the only playable character with a four-character name that didn't have their name changed.)

 

3 hours ago, Sunwoo said:

Also ... Heather ... How many people actually like her?

Me.

 

1 hour ago, Humanoid said:

Zelgius' extra mobility seems a bit out of place since his kit has no real synergy with it. I mean fine, I don't want every premium armour to be a save unit so I'm happy to see Assault Troop, but unlike Summer Edelgard where it serves a clear and obvious purpose, this one is just there.

Assault Troop has synergy with Distant D/R Solo. It's a way to make a Distant Counter Solo skill actually viable on an armor because they normally have garbage mobility and can't actually get away from their allies and also makes it so that they don't have to make a new two-stat Distant Counter series with a more lenient condition yet.

Edited November 6, 2023 by Ice Dragon

[Jotari]

4 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

Me.

Me too.

[Tybrosion]

1 hour ago, Humanoid said:

- I have no idea who Heather is, but happy for her fans. I've never been able to properly use units whose schtick revolved around rallies.

She is a Thief (well, Rogue technically since she starts as a Tier 2 unit) character that Radiant Dawn added so that Ike’s party would have one in that game. 

In Radiant Dawn, Sothe is always in Micaiah’s party and Volke joins right before the final set of maps.

[Humanoid]

2 minutes ago, Tybrosion said:

Volke joins right before the final set of maps

For some reason I had it in my head that Volke was from a much earlier game. Huh.

[KMT4ever]

Another year, another ninja banner. The art all looks really nice, although Heather's "shuriken" is hilariously oversized. Sanaki and Micaiah are definitely the stars of this banner for me though. Their outfits look sufficiently ninja-like while still keeping in line with their normal clothes, and as usual it tickles my heart to see yet another pair that deserved more screen time than it got. I have a good number of orbs thanks to Veyle's banner being generous, so I think I'm going to pull for them when the time comes.

[Mercakete]

Looks like I was right about Zelgius being the silhouette. Also, Saizo is free, and Reina's the demote. They're the only 2 I even remotely care about here, so that's nice. Glad Reina's finally in the game, even if this was kind of a weird way to add her.