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"Gently Caress Bloodpacts!" Lets Play Radiant Dawn


Onmi

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I know Radiant Dawn has been LPed a lot, I would point everyone on this site to Fedule's Excellent LP in the Something Awful LP Archives but I've never really seen an LP focusing on analyzing the story, I've seen a lot focusing on the technical and how one guy can pull off what seems to be an impossible feat, but nothing giving in-depth analysis of the games stories.

This is an LP about Radiant Dawns story, oh there will be plenty of gameplay for people to see, vote upon, and laugh at, but the posts will be comprised of me analyzing the strengths (because it's an injustice to say there are no strengths) and weaknesses (And the game has a lot of these as well) of the script and story structure. I'll also be digging into the good and bad game design choices, though in this case it's MOSTLY good and very little bad.

1. I Will be playing this on Normal (JP: Hard) because I'm not a masochist and I disagree with Hard (JP: Maniac) turning off the Weapon Triangle etc. It's a big case of bad game design in my personal opinion.

2. You Will vote on which units I bring to each chapter (when the choice presents itself) I am fairly comfortable and confident in my abilities to take any unit you guys throw at me, and make sure they can contribute, though with that said...

3. This is Not a speed run, I am not going for efficiency, or Low Turn Count, or anything other than "Don't spend 200 turns a chapter making the game ridiculously easy" I know this may disappoint some of you, but honestly I wouldn't be showing you anything new. Dondon's pretty much done it better than I ever could no matter what I tried.

4. You Can vote on the Forges I make once the Forge is available, I don't mind you voting Weapon type, name, or anything else specific, just BOLD YOUR ANSWERS. Yes Fedule did do this for both his LPs, what's your point?

With those 4 rules laid in place, I'm going to point out I will try not to lose my shit at minor things. I'm going to very much try to remain calm and analytical of the game, providing reasonable analysis. Unless it's funny otherwise.

With that said, let's very much kick this into gear.

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Lets talk Radiant Dawn. As a game I think RD is wonderful, the mechanics are tight and well polished, there are balance issues but not so much that the game becomes unplayable, some of the best maps in the series are in this game, but that's when my loving praise for RD ends. I dislike RDs story, I find it insulting on quite a few levels, I find the plot-holes insulting, I find the lack of character development insulting, I have a hard time playing Radiant Dawn because of the story, and really I don't know why this is. It's not that the IDEA behind the story is flawed, it's the execution and purely the execution. This LP is hopefully going to explain why I feel this way, and again I'm going to attempt to do this in as rational and calm a manner as I can. Really though the thread title is more appropriately "Fucking Sending Stones!" but we'll get into that in a while yet.

Well, I've had to revert to an 'Older' Perfect save (The final Laguz king isn't perfect, not as many A supports as I wanted, including no A support with my favorite pair, I know it doesn't mean anything in the story but bleh!) but that still means I can do more than spend 4 days making a new one.

But now we're all prepared so lets move on.

Prologue-1: Meatshields and Bandits

[spoiler=Update1]



From a design perspective the cutscene looks very pretty, it helps establish this is Daein, and the protagonist is not Ike this time, also that Sothe's made a return. But here's my problem with it (this is a minor problem) What's the point? The very next moment after the cutscene has ended, it's daytime and it's barely mentioned again. Compare with the cutscene at the beginning of Path of Radiance, which drops us into the story, in real time, and lets us know what's going on. We establish relations, and the following scene helps cement what just happened.

Again, this isn't a major crime, but as it stands it just looks pretty and we learn very little from it. If the prologue had continued at night, with Micaiah and Sothe evading troops to make it back to a Dawn Brigade safe-house separate from their Hideout, then we would establish some continuity, and maybe build on the oppressive feel of Begnion occupation.

Instead?

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It's a few days later, with absolutely not connection to the animated cutscene. Fantastic.

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The 'Him' here is referring to Leonardo, obviously the game has dropped us In Media Res, so we aren't supposed to know who he is, but from the conversation we can discern that he's punctual.

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We also find out that Micaiah can see the future, though Micaiah says she doesn't choose what she see's, as we'll find out later in the game, this is bullshit, and it's a plot convenience power. Now I'm not at all opposed to having a Seer in the party, after all we've had Seers in the past, such as Claude, but their visions aren't quite the same as Micaiah.

And no, I may dislike Micaiah and RD's story but I'm not going to start calling her a Mary-Sue, that's the easy way out.
(Micaiah Power Count: 1)

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But enough of learning minute details about our characters, it's time for our routine bandit fight. And of course the Begnion Occupation Army is nowhere in sight. They only care about the Dawn Brigade, who must be masters of chaos and stealth if they've managed to elude an occupied force for 1-3 years.

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But Edward goes ahead and says "Hey, we're the Dawn Brigade!" so that theory's thrown out the window. Seriously Edward what the HELL? no secrecy, no "We're good Samaritans" (Or Equivalent) and helping without announcing the fact that the guys making every ones lives hell around here are after you? Well there's common sense violated.

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So the Dawn Brigade is the group fighting for Daeins independence, I certainly hope that these guys are more than pranksters and what not, cause from what we've seen there's the competent one (Sothe) the one who's got a fancy light trick and talks to birds (Micaiah) and the idiot (Edward).

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Here are our Bandits, fresh from Fire Emblems endless printer, this is just a common occurrence in these games, nothing to complain or cry about.

TURN 1.

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I move Edward up, and since this is really meant to be JP Hard Mode face a 61% chance of being hit.

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Not that he doesn't clean up like a BOSS! after eating the counter...

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Micaiah moves up and heals him with the power of 'Sacrifice' which lets her sacrifice her own HP to restore others, and cure status aliments. Handy since we don't have a healer yet.
(Micaiah Power Count: 2)

TURN 2.

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This time Edward doesn't wind up Critting the bandit, and Micaiah shoves light magic down his throat. And no this doesn't count as a 'power' I'm not going to unfair here.

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Here's Leonardo, fortunately not an Alien-Turtle full of explosions, but unfortunately an Archer, I have no doubts you guys will force him on me many times. (Edward countered the bandit twice in the enemy phase and ate a counter attack.)

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Anyway, Leonardo shows himself to be a bit of a worry-wart, which adds a serious character as counter to Edwards hyper idiot character.

TURN 3.

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He comes down and finishes off the bandit, Micaiah moves behind the crates to snipe the one at Range 2, and Edward moves just in range of 2 of the bandits to bait them.

Turn 4.

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Edward kills one Bandit on the counter attack, but only weakens the other. While we aren't playing for speed, we do need to finish in 10 turns for all the BEXP. And I don't really want to kill 10 frigging turns.

Turn 5.

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Again, Leo comes down to kill off the weakened bandit and in doing so triggers a redundant cancel. I'm still not sure why he wound up with the cancel skill baked in, maybe for fighting mages? Regardless I'm in no hurry to rip it out of him just yet. Though it will most likely be going to Edward for the durability. Micaiah heals up Edward a bit with Sacrifice (reducing her to 1 HP) and Edward chews a herb. In RD's favor they greatly expanded upon items in this game, from multiple tiers of healing and weapons to even minor things such as Cards. If nothing else you can't fault the games Gameplay.

Turn 6.

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Edward gets the first level of the map as he and Leo clean up the last two non-boss bandits, and I am VERY pleased, extra Myrmidon chow for you tonight Edward. Micaiah pops a Herb and moves just outside the bosses range.

TURN 7.

Micaiah just heals up Edward, after they move into Boss range, nothing worth capping.

TURN 8.

I risked way too much this turn, Edward was on low HP after eating a counter attack, and rather than have him heal up, I decided to end this map here and now. Thank god he dodged the counter attack (he was still facing 60 hit even with that point of speed). Leo came over and weakened the boss further, and Micaiah cleaned him up for a level, the result?

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Bitching.

With that the map is cleared, and my happiness turns to sadness.

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Yeah it's not like you did most of the work or anything Edward, this is small right now, but it is a common occurrence of everything being thrown up in favor of Micaiah despite the fact that she really does not deserve it. Like I said it's small now, and it's Edward who's apparently been with her for a while (We don't know because the game doesn't bother informing us about silly things like backstories) but later... hoo boy.

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The fuzz arrive to put a damper on our victory celebration, and considering the hit rates we faced vs Axes, I'm not about to pit these guys against Soldiers.

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Edward gets in a snarky comment, and I want to clarify something. I have no problems with Begnion being the villain in this game, if you had told me, just from the one scene the senators outside Oliver got in PoR that these guys were evil and dickheads, I would have gone "Yeah, that seems legit." My problem with the BOF is going to be apparent the further we get into part 1.

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Either way Leonardo says we have to split, bumping him up on the list of people I like in this game, and this little boy signs his death warrant.

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Here's Jarod, the unrepentant dickhead that by the end of this they will try to make us sympathize with, which is hilarious considering all the shit he does. He helps the soldiers exposit that the cut-scene we saw before the mission was the soldiers storming the Dawn Brigades hideout. A Hideout apparently out in the open... You know what I'll go with it. They also tell us about Micaiah's sacrifice power she's apparently made no attempt to hide, despite it being a defining feature, and how the town basically worships her. again this grows to be more and more uncomfortable the more we progress through Part 1.

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Yeah, me too, thanks exposition soldier, you get a reward.

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THE REWARD IS DEATH! But seriously what the fuck? I get it, Jarod is a bad boss, but outright executing your troops for no reason what so ever is shit usually reserved for the Shaagal/Narshen/Valter of the game, someone who's supposed to be completely irredeemable and I'm never supposed to like. But right near the end of Part 1, and later on in Part 4 I believe, Micaiah tries hyping Jarod up as an honorable soldier... but we'll get to that later.

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This seems weird to me as well, this is STILL the Capital of Daein, It's not like this is a village out in the boonies where you don't even have the basics of comfort, Jarod is pretty much king shit. Actually that makes me wonder how Jarod hasn't heard of the Dawn Brigade before now, did he just arrive? in the Capital? you would think the Occupation Force operated out of it, indeed the game will cut back here whenever the Occupation Force has a cutscene, so this strikes me as odd. I get it's exposition for the player, but wouldn't it have worked better the other way. The soldier just thought they were a bunch of kids, Jarod gets the description, and after a mock-calm voiced lecture on who the Dawn Brigade are, he stabs the guy? I mean it looks like he's a complete newbie. In that case who was in charge before hand?



As an introduction, the prologue sort of works, we get all the information about our group, a bit of information about Micaiah, and we get to fight off Bandits, but I question the structure, and outside "Is an Idiot" and "Is cool headed" we haven't really learned much about Edward and Leonardo. I know plenty of Fire Emblems don't tell us more in the introduction, but the problem is this will be a CONSTANT throughout the game, and we will never really learn more about these guys. But with the prologue done and a clock flashing 1:45 AM at me, I'll wrap this up here.

Drop comments, if you would rather I keep the updates in spoiler tags, let me know.

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We also find out that Micaiah can see the future, though Micaiah says she doesn't choose what she see's, as we'll find out later in the game, this is bullshit, and it's a plot convenience power.

I don't really feel that way. I can't really think of many instances where Micaiah even uses her power productively. It's not like "the plotline necessitates that they're in the desert of death so Micaiah has a vision out of nowhere telling her to go there", it's more like "they're told that the heir to Daein is in the desert and Micaiah feels like it's a good move".

Now I'm not at all opposed to having a Seer in the party, after all we've had Seers in the past, such as Claude, but their visions aren't quite the same as Micaiah.

Claude's visions were more useful.

But enough of learning minute details about our characters, it's time for our routine bandit fight. And of course the Begnion Occupation Army is nowhere in sight. They only care about the Dawn Brigade, who must be masters of chaos and stealth if they've managed to elude an occupied force for 1-3 years.

Er, not really. There have been resistance movements before who have evaded capture for many years.

Micaiah moves up and heals him with the power of 'Sacrifice' which lets her sacrifice her own HP to restore others, and cure status aliments. Handy since we don't have a healer yet.

(Micaiah Power Count: 2)

I prefer the power to heal others without losing health, an ability exclusive to only every staff user ever.

Yeah it's not like you did most of the work or anything Edward, this is small right now, but it is a common occurrence of everything being thrown up in favor of Micaiah despite the fact that she really does not deserve it. Like I said it's small now, and it's Edward who's apparently been with her for a while (We don't know because the game doesn't bother informing us about silly things like backstories) but later... hoo boy.

I think this is kind of nitpicking. Obviously, Micaiah did useful things like healing and chipping. So it's not like Edward did it all on his own. It would come off as very arrogant if he said "I defeated them!". Moreover, it's expecting rather a lot for the creators to program in different dialogue deper mnding on who is MVP. It wouldn't be very hard, true, but there's not really that much point.

I think this is part of the typical segregation of story and gameplay: like Joshua and Marisa being "evenly matched" when they duel in their support, or Eirika talking about how Prologue is her first time in a battle, even when the player might have soloed the enemies with Seth. After all:

Boyd

Hey, Ike! that wasn't bad for your first battle. Not as flashy as my first time, though!

And this is in a chapter where Titania does most of the work. So if Micaiah is a Mary-Sue because Edward said he didn't solo the entire first chapter, then Ike must be one too!

Here's Jarod, the unrepentant dickhead that by the end of this they will try to make us sympathize with, which is hilarious considering all the shit he does. He helps the soldiers exposit that the cut-scene we saw before the mission was the soldiers storming the Dawn Brigades hideout. A Hideout apparently out in the open... You know what I'll go with it.

It's almost certainly the case that they were hiding in the cellar of the ruins we saw in the cutscene. Which makes... sense?

They also tell us about Micaiah's sacrifice power she's apparently made no attempt to hide, despite it being a defining feature, and how the town basically worships her.

There's not really much point in being able to heal people if Micaiah never does it to keep it secret, is there?

THE REWARD IS DEATH! But seriously what the fuck? I get it, Jarod is a bad boss, but outright executing your troops for no reason what so ever

Incompetence? I've killed off characters for less.

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I don't really feel that way. I can't really think of many instances where Micaiah even uses her power productively. It's not like "the plotline necessitates that they're in the desert of death so Micaiah has a vision out of nowhere telling her to go there", it's more like "they're told that the heir to Daein is in the desert and Micaiah feels like it's a good move".

I said I would get more into it as other visions progressed, Chapter 1 actually has exactly what I mean

Claude's visions were more useful.

That's... wonderful? I didn't say that her visions were more useful, just that they weren't quite the same.

Er, not really. There have been resistance movements before who have evaded capture for many years.

I'm not questioning the logic of them evading their captors, I'm questioning the logic of them evading their captors when they make no efforts towards stealth at all.

I prefer the power to heal others without losing health, an ability exclusive to only every staff user ever.

Even when I did my whole "Ideal Radiant Dawn" thing (still not posted) I left Sacrifice in. It's her Branded power and I have no problem with it. I'm merely listing it on her power count.

I think this is kind of nitpicking. Obviously, Micaiah did useful things like healing and chipping. So it's not like Edward did it all on his own. It would come off as very arrogant if he said "I defeated them!". Moreover, it's expecting rather a lot for the creators to program in different dialogue deper mnding on who is MVP. It wouldn't be very hard, true, but there's not really that much point.

I think this is part of the typical segregation of story and gameplay: like Joshua and Marisa being "evenly matched" when they duel in their support, or Eirika talking about how Prologue is her first time in a battle, even when the player might have soloed the enemies with Seth. After all:

Boyd

Hey, Ike! that wasn't bad for your first battle. Not as flashy as my first time, though!

And this is in a chapter where Titania does most of the work. So if Micaiah is a Mary-Sue because Edward said he didn't solo the entire first chapter, then Ike must be one too!

Actually... I was making a joke, Also I specifically said "No. I'm not calling Micaiah a Mary-Sue that's lazy and the easy way out" so...?

It's almost certainly the case that they were hiding in the cellar of the ruins we saw in the cutscene. Which makes... sense?

That was there hideout, yes. I noted that it looked very out in the open, which it did. Judging from the state of their other Safehouse though, this seems to be a common occurance

There's not really much point in being able to heal people if Micaiah never does it to keep it secret, is there?

I'll get into this in Chapter 1, but in short I'm not displeased with her power to heal, more that I feel the game handled it wrong.

Incompetence? I've killed off characters for less.

You Monster! But those are characters in a video game that you a human have killed off, in the narrative, this is a person killing other people. It's not the same thing. Though I am willing to bet you are telling a joke. My main beef with Jarod is that he's an asshole, I know he's an asshole and so does everyone else. But then the game tries to act like he was an honorable Asshole when he never was. But that's for future updates.

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I said I would get more into it as other visions progressed, Chapter 1 actually has exactly what I mean

That's... wonderful? I didn't say that her visions were more useful, just that they weren't quite the same.

Yes, and I said that Micaiah's visions aren't really that useful.

I'm not questioning the logic of them evading their captors, I'm questioning the logic of them evading their captors when they make no efforts towards stealth at all.

Well, it's funny since Edward is actually supposed to be better at evading capture than Leonardo (who grew up in a military academy rather than on the streets of Nevassa).

Actually... I was making a joke, Also I specifically said "No. I'm not calling Micaiah a Mary-Sue that's lazy and the easy way out" so...?

You said:

Yeah it's not like you did most of the work or anything Edward, this is small right now, but it is a common occurrence of everything being thrown up in favor of Micaiah despite the fact that she really does not deserve it. Like I said it's small now, and it's Edward who's apparently been with her for a while (We don't know because the game doesn't bother informing us about silly things like backstories) but later... hoo boy.

You're not joking, you're pretty clearly complaining. You say that this is just part of everything seeming to be in Micaiah's favour. What, Edward says "they were no match for us" and SOMEHOW that's all part of the great Mary-Sue conspiracy? Even if you don't actually use the word Mary-Sue, you are pretty clearly setting yourself up to argue that Micaiah has too much powers and that people favour her too much, which is the same fucking thing as being a Mary-Sue. And to suggest, that this is evidence to that conclusion, even if it's small evidence, is ridiculous. If you want, I can quote a thousand million times when people talk like this in every FE game. Somehow, it's acceptable for Lyn to say:

That’s the last of them! Fantastic work, Mark!

But it's NOT ACCEPTABURU for Edward to say:

Fantastic! We won! It's just like you said, Micaiah. They were no match for us!

Unless, you also think that such a phrase is evidence of Mark being a Mary-Sue. A Marky-Sue?

You Monster! But those are characters in a video game that you a human have killed off, in the narrative, this is a person killing other people. It's not the same thing. Though I am willing to bet you are telling a joke. My main beef with Jarod is that he's an asshole, I know he's an asshole and so does everyone else. But then the game tries to act like he was an honorable Asshole when he never was. But that's for future updates.

I don't believe that, either.

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Yes, and I said that Micaiah's visions aren't really that useful.

Okay? And? What's your point?

Well, it's funny since Edward is actually supposed to be better at evading capture than Leonardo (who grew up in a military academy rather than on the streets of Nevassa).

I know, but I am also not looking at the external source information when doing a story analysis, I shouldn't need to read the designers notes they didn't even bother including in some way with the game, just to understand everyones characters

MARY SUE CONSPIRACY!

Anouleth I don't like the Tactician, trying to use him as an evidence of NOT a Gary-Stu is worthless with me. I never play with it on. Also? Calm down. I am not the enemy. You sound like a nutter. I already said, in the first post that I do NOT LIKE MICAIAH, but I also said that I would explain why, I specifically mentioned that later it got UNNERVING with the praise she received, but I don't go in depth with it because we are not past the damn prologue. I also said 'Like I said it's small now, and it's Edward who's apparently been with her for a while' That is justifying its inclusion. You will KNOW when I am sufficiently creeped out, and it's not the Prologue, or Chapter 1, it's not for a while. Put it like this, this is from IRD.

"If Edward had run off ahead, hotheaded and Micaiah had joined him as backup, maybe he was outnumbered, maybe he didn't know how to approach the situation. Then the end conversation would work better, because Micaiah has taken a superior role in the story."

As it stands, Micaiah doesn't take that superior role. In fact she's the one who asks Edward if they should keep up their usual plan of attack. The only lead in for this line is " Micaiah

I'm ready. You and I should be more than a match for them. Let's go!" Which admittedly does lead in to Edwards comment, but going by what happens later in the story, I was only noting that this was a something small, that was going to become something big. I have no problem with Micaiah receiving praise, especially not from someone who's her friend. I mentioned that this was small, as in miniscule. But seriously Anouleth. Calm down. I'm not out to ritually slaughter Micaiah. I'm not out to burn her at the stake, and if your going to act like I am every time I post an update, I think it would be better if you didn't read the thread for your own sake, because EVERYONE, from Micaiah to Ike to Sanaki to Kurth (Oh especially Kurth and Almedha) is going to get a stern talking about.

And to clarify? THIS part of the line? 'Yeah it's not like you did most of the work or anything Edward' was a joke. I do not expect the game to start praising my MVPs, Otherwise it might bug out when Mordecai gets the MVP spot while being an enemy.

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EDIT: a comment was in poor taste

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I know, but I am also not looking at the external source information when doing a story analysis, I shouldn't need to read the designers notes they didn't even bother including in some way with the game, just to understand everyones characters

Yeah, but that was more of a general comment about how it's weird that the way that Edward and Leonardo act doesn't really mesh up so well with their background. I guess you could interpret it as "Edward is more experienced, so he's more confident".

"If Edward had run off ahead, hotheaded and Micaiah had joined him as backup, maybe he was outnumbered, maybe he didn't know how to approach the situation. Then the end conversation would work better, because Micaiah has taken a superior role in the story."

If Edward had trouble, then it would make no sense for him to say that the bandits were no match for them. As it is, it does make sense. The bandits really are no match for Edward, Micaiah and Leonardo working together. Even if they were, it doesn't matter. The conversations and comments that the characters make about battle rarely match up with the gameplay.

And no doubt, if Micaiah bailed Edward out, people would complain even more. "she's such a Mary-Sue, even in the first chapter Edward needs to be saved by her even though he can obviously solo the chapter!"

As it stands, Micaiah doesn't take that superior role. In fact she's the one who asks Edward if they should keep up their usual plan of attack. The only lead in for this line is " Micaiah

I'm ready. You and I should be more than a match for them. Let's go!" Which admittedly does lead in to Edwards comment, but going by what happens later in the story, I was only noting that this was a something small, that was going to become something big. I have no problem with Micaiah receiving praise, especially not from someone who's her friend. I mentioned that this was small, as in miniscule.

It's not a small problem, though. Or even a miniscule problem. It's not a problem at all. Characters complimenting each other should not be treated like it's some kind of mistake. Unless you don't think that the praise that Micaiah receives isn't a problem which is fine.

But seriously Anouleth. Calm down. I'm not out to ritually slaughter Micaiah. I'm not out to burn her at the stake, and if your going to act like I am every time I post an update, I think it would be better if you didn't read the thread for your own sake, because EVERYONE, from Micaiah to Ike to Sanaki to Kurth (Oh especially Kurth and Almedha) is going to get a stern talking about.

If you're not out to burn her at the stake, why do you complain when someone gives her an indirect compliment?

And to clarify? THIS part of the line? 'Yeah it's not like you did most of the work or anything Edward' was a joke.

Well, it was confusing since you immediately followed it up with a diatribe about how Micaiah gets too much praise and you've made it clear that you don't like Micaiah.

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Yeah, but that was more of a general comment about how it's weird that the way that Edward and Leonardo act doesn't really mesh up so well with their background. I guess you could interpret it as "Edward is more experienced, so he's more confident".

If Edward had trouble, then it would make no sense for him to say that the bandits were no match for them. As it is, it does make sense. The bandits really are no match for Edward, Micaiah and Leonardo working together. Even if they were, it doesn't matter. The conversations and comments that the characters make about battle rarely match up with the gameplay.

And no doubt, if Micaiah bailed Edward out, people would complain even more. "she's such a Mary-Sue, even in the first chapter Edward needs to be saved by her even though he can obviously solo the chapter!"

It's not a small problem, though. Or even a miniscule problem. It's not a problem at all. Characters complimenting each other should not be treated like it's some kind of mistake. Unless you don't think that the praise that Micaiah receives isn't a problem which is fine.

If you're not out to burn her at the stake, why do you complain when someone gives her an indirect compliment?

Well, it was confusing since you immediately followed it up with a diatribe about how Micaiah gets too much praise and you've made it clear that you don't like Micaiah.

I'm going to give an overview of each part when I reach the end of each part. Also I don't think Micaiah being given a verbal pat on the back by Edward (Who's more accurately saying "we're awesome") is bad, or a problem. But I can't accuratly point out what I mean by 'something small, becoming something big" until we hit the end of 1-6, It's not that Micaiah doesn't deserve praise, she's the protagonist, she does good work, it's just that it starts getting creepy. It's not her fault, I'm not going to bitch whenever she gets praised. If anything I'll bitch at the characters.

I only recorded 1-1 a while ago. So we have a while still.

Speaking of

Reset Count: 1(2 Technically)- Didn't expect the boss to move when he did, so Micaiah (who I thought could snipe him freely) would up eating steel. When she used a herb on the second run the boss left her alone.

2nd reset is I ended recording (closed Dolphin) before I hit save, so had to do that last part again by loading the Battle Save, since I didn't have a save state of after the battle.

A level from Run 2(3), Leonardo seems determined to stay on the team it seems

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I'd like to register my support for this effort. Keep it up! I too was disappointed with Radiant Dawn's plot, especially after the solid Path of Radiance. I can lend some support in ripping apart 1-3 and 1-8, if needed. :awesome:

I believe that the weakest plot element so far is Jarod's introduction (and it gets worse in 1-1). Storytelling tip: if you have your antagonist casually killing his own soldiers and civilians in his first two scenes, you're doing something wrong. Jarod's characterization destroys the plausibility of the Begnion Occupation Army and the game world as a whole.

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I'd like to register my support for this effort. Keep it up! I too was disappointed with Radiant Dawn's plot, especially after the solid Path of Radiance. I can lend some support in ripping apart 1-3 and 1-8, if needed. :awesome:

I believe that the weakest plot element so far is Jarod's introduction (and it gets worse in 1-1). Storytelling tip: if you have your antagonist casually killing his own soldiers and civilians in his first two scenes, you're doing something wrong. Jarod's characterization destroys the plausibility of the Begnion Occupation Army and the game world as a whole.

But Path of Radiance also did this, with Petrine. The very first thing you see Petrine doing is executing a soldier for incompetence. How can you compliment one game and complain about the other?

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But Path of Radiance also did this, with Petrine. The very first thing you see Petrine doing is executing a soldier for incompetence. How can you compliment one game and complain about the other?

  • Petrine doesn't personally execute that soldier.
  • That soldier isn't executed on-screen. The scene leaves open the possibility of a court-marshall (which may result in execution, but is in the realm of plausibility) or that Petrine was merely threatening.
  • In the entirety of PoR, Daein executes zero of its soldiers on-screen. Many of the soldiers who interact with General Petrine seem to have some fear of execution, but their fear is never validated. It seems like Petrine knows how to inspire fear without killing her own soldiers. Unlike Jarod.
  • No civilians are executed in the entirety of PoR. In fact, no civilian lives are directly threatened.

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Storytelling tip: if you have your antagonist casually killing his own soldiers and civilians in his first two scenes, you're doing something wrong.

You've failed to explain what's wrong with that. Guess what? Jarod's a bad guy. He does bad things.

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You've failed to explain what's wrong with that. Guess what? Jarod's a bad guy. He does bad things.

That's passable for a Sunday morning cartoon. If that's the level of sophistication you hold the FE series to, then so be it. I prefer plausible antagonists. I'll even accept borderline sadists (like Petrine) every so often so long as they still behave rationally. What possible good could come from executing soldiers that commit the sin of reporting bad news? The logical end result is a reluctance of soldiers willing to report bad news truthfully. They might lie or simply fail to volunteer information. You could, in turn, execute those who lie or are reticent to volunteer information. But to what end? Now most soldiers would prefer to desert. Sure, the penalty of desertion is death, but so is the penalty of staying in the army. Execution is the ultimate penalty. Handing out the ultimate penalty for minor misconduct puts all misconduct on the same level, at which point desertion or mutiny can become the rational reaction for many soldiers.

And what about murdering civilians as an occupational army? This is more obviously stupid. If civil disobedience is punished by death, rebellion becomes a lot more attractive. Even Hitler's Nazi regime didn't execute civilians openly. They coralled dissidents and undesirabled to "camps" whose true purpose (mass execution) was known by few. I'm pleased that the Begnion occupation narrative included denigrating work camps. This is realistic. This is rational (but still risky). Gather those most individuals most capable of rebellion and put them to work under heavy guard. Don't openly murder civilians. That's just dumb.

Jarod's behavior is unexcusably irrational and implausible on its own. But as Onmi points out, it reaches a whole new level of ridiculousness when the narrative tries to incite some sympathy towards the Jarod character at the end of Part 1.

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Page 1 and already a flame war.

BRING IT!

Never let it be said I did not know the can of worms I was cracking open here. Writing the 1-1 update and recording 1-2 now.

EDIT:

Reset Count: 3 (4)

- I misjudged targets and heals, so Nolan winds up eating an axe to the face and promptly drops dead

- In an attempt to get both Archer reinforcements in 1 turn, I had Leonardo attack the full health one. On the enemy phase he ate both hits. The annoying thing is when I reloaded and just decided to pick off the weak one, Leo dodged the counter attack.

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Chapter 1-1: Would you kindly file that under 'Shit I already know'?!

Welcome Back to Let's Play Radiant Dawn, Last time Micaiah, Edward and Leonardo managed to stomp a mudhole in the ass off some bandits, Jarod was confused about whether or not he was a new arrival or in charge of the BOF for 3 years, and a little boy condemned himself to death by mentioning his name. With that said, let's return to our heroes.

[spoiler=Update 2]

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You know I think it's meant to be a story telling element that their safehouse is as run down as it is. I mean we never saw their original hideout but if the Dawn Brigade are meant to be on the run then it's good at showing what conditions have to be like. That is of course lost when the game never really treated them being on the run seriously in the prologue, but that's nitpicking and I know it.

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Leonardo responds to Edwards bitching that they lost the war, but Edward just shoots back that they lost to Crimea, not Begnion. I would say that this isn't exactly correct, since Begnion had officially supported Crimea when they begun the invasion of Daein. But the sequence helps establish why Crimea isn't here and Begnion is.

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But enough about that, Nolan and Sothe are back, rounding out the Dawn Brigade, apparently they had trouble getting here because the group let themselves be spotted in 1-P. Off screen they explain what happened 1 chapter ago, and the game fades to black, then Sothe drops the question

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Of course she did. Don't be ridiculous. I always wondered if this line of dialogue changed if you never healed in that battle, probably not. Sothe warns her against doing so in the future saying it's a distinguishing feature. So is the silver hair Sothe, this bugs me quite a bit actually. Not so much Silver hair for the sake of silver-hair, but it really undermines a scene at the end of the chapter, and when we get to the end I'll explain why.

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Regardless Sothe is right, and we have to go splits-ville before the BOF comes along and kills us, I have no problem with this course of action.

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The area is SWARMING with soldiers it seems and we're going to take the path of least experience RESISTANCE to break through. Though Nolans comment here is making me ask how long have the DB been active? They never really give a time frame for their activities, oh well, feel free to debate this fact till you're blue in the face.

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Why yes I am using cheats to grab these screen shots don't worry this isn't the main file

I decided to disregard Nolans Advice over Edward and send him to the front lines, though we will eventually wind up doing exactly what he said.

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Here's our generic boss for the area, only notable by his dropping of a Steel Sword, in the main run, Leonardo put an arrow in his eye and Micaiah cleared the map on turn 7.

MUCH RAPING LATER

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Well hey Sothe, nice of you to pop up out of nowhere, no it's cool, we had that fight back there.

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Sothe don't ignore me, where did you come from? This is honestly just bad design, Sothe's gone for the mission, and then right after the missions done the game acts like he never left, and despite saying 'This way!' he's the one at the BACK of the group. Allow me to get my Multimedia Major geek on and ask what the fuck they were thinking with the structure of this scene? I understand the reason, Sothe can't participate because he trivializes the game (Especially my Sothe) what I don't understand is why they didn't have him join up LATER? I'll go over how I would have done it in just a bit. Just know this scene makes no sense structure wise.

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But you guys aren't generics! It will never work!

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Anyway not 5 tiles down we run into Nico, and despite being on the run, Micaiah stops to have a lovely chat with a boy she met not a day/few hours ago. You know she also met Sothe when he was a child and was unusually interest in him, and she's with her brand, somewhere in the range of 30 or 40 now.

MICAIAH! SERIAL PEDOPHILE! (That's a joke, to clarify)

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So the BOF features Genome Soldiers censored by 4Kids? Seriously Moldy Onions is just an incredibly bad translation choice when we consider what happens in this very scene?

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Okay so Genome Soldiers mixed with T-Rexes and censored by 4Kids, regardless the villagers say they will heroically fight against the 3 archers and 1 soldier chasing the 5 guys who outnumber them (counting the Rogue with 20 strength who could honestly handle Jarod at this point, also this is a joke)

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HA HA, FORESHADOWING! Also if you haven't noticed, they are heavy handedly hammering Nico as a character so this next moment may have emotional weight, and it does.

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This right here is what I meant by "Farsight is a plot convenience power" The same effect could have happened just from hearing the screams of the townsfolk, And while Micaiah doesn't "Choose" what she see's like she says in the Prologue, later on you'll see that she DOES choose what she see's, and given what we learn of Farsight in the future, this is pretty much here so Micaiah can be moved where ever the writers need her. This would be a problem on any character, from a new one to an old one. It pretty much lets the writers go "Oh here's the plot point" and whenever you ask in a reasonable situation "Well where was Farsight then?" the cop out is "Oh she doesn't choose what to see or how to see it" even though we clearly see her close her eyes and activate Farsight at will in this very scene and in many later scenes.

When I wrote 'IRD' I dropped the Farsight plot point, it's stupid, and it's simply there to serve as a plot convenience power. And no Anouleth, this isn't a shot at Micaiah, it's a shot at the power in general, slap it on Edward and it would STILL be as poorly implemented as it is now. I wouldn't even have a problem if she would just come out and say "I can activate the power at will, but I don't want to abuse it" and throw in some explanation about how it exhausts her. But instead she establishes "I don't choose what to see" and now chooses what to see. Again Farsight isn't anymore overpowered than Claude praying to Blaggi for visions (and then coming back as a spirit mentor after death), But it is much more poorly thought out.

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Of course the horrible thing that Micaiah sensed is Nico getting an arrow in the chest in the barrage. boo? Really when this scene played for the first time I was more confused if this was REALLY the way they were going to characterize the Begnion Occupation Force. To put it mildly, by the time we hit 1-E these guys will be one Railroad track away from tying a maiden to it while twirling mustaches. They are just cartoonishly evil I can not take them seriously.

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Regardless Micaiah runs back, and here's a scene that works great in theory, but fails in context.

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She uses Sacrifice to heal Nico, and then falls unconscious from exhaustion.

Why this scene works in theory: It not only shows off Micaiah's caring nature, but it allows the player to learn about Sacrifice, and what separates Micaiah from any other Light Mage in the world.

Why this scene fails in execution: We already KNOW Micaiah has a caring nature, and what Sacrifice is, hell the Begnion Occupation Army AND the Townsfolk all know the power of Sacrifice.

What would make this scene work: If you have Micaiah act potentially distant to the townsfolk, and not reveal the power of Sacrifice (you can allude to it, have Sothe ask if she did 'It' in public) until this scene, then you set up in one single act that, as distant as she may act, she does care very much for these people, and it reveals the power to the player AND the enemy. You can even have Sothe go "Sacrifice, the power to give life for another" just to hammer the point in.

It's not that this scene is bad, because it's not, it's just pointless. Micaiah is up and at it in the very next chapter and the player has learned nothing new. The map could have ended with the DB escaping and no new information would have been imparted.

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What? She's literally the only silver haired character in the game! How could she be anyone else than the 'Silver Haired Maiden'? and she's already shown herself with the Dawn Brigade, so even if Silver hair is common enough that other people have it, there's no reason to say this, I know, you should know, and Begnion just said it out loud.

Again, this scene is just confusing me in it's structure.

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Oh not this shit again!

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Oh here's Jarod, well last time he was simply told of a failure he executed a soldier, lets see if the writers intend to make him more plausible this time around.

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Fuck no, he'll just out and out murder civilians! Okay here's why I don't like the Begnion Occupation Army, they lack the subtleties that Begnion is usually associated with. While later we'll see (with extremely poorly thought out plot devices) Begnion tricking and passive aggressively manipulating entire nations, right here we just have Grade A cartoon villains. Let's compare Jarod here with Valter. Valter is a bloodthirsty chaotic rapist, and yet even he comes across as more plausible, because something is clearly wrong in Grado and later on the game doesn't try to make me sympathize with Valter. He even mentions that he's prolonging the war because he loves the chaos of it.

Jarod here is supposed to be an oppressor, an effective villain would have said "Round up these people, then find their families, they clearly sympathize with known terrorists and need to be taken to the work camps. Then spread word of what happened on the street"

A. He's going to punish these people severely for standing up to him, but he wont kill them. After all that would be an open show of abuse.

B. He's doing it 'legally' so if Begnion does send an investigation team, he has justification for what he's done. Nothing is more hateable than a villain who's done horrific things and has the law to protect him.

C. He spreads an aura of fear across Daein and makes it harder for the Dawn Brigade to find refuge, merely saying you stand by them got these people and their FAMILIES thrown into the camps. Again it builds an aura or oppression and fear in the game.

So here's how I would have done the scene.

1. The Dawn Brigade flees through the crowd, not stopping for a chat, but the people recognize them as the people who helped them out with the Bandits.

2. The people decide to stand up to the BOF, who prepare to open fire

3. The screams ring out across the town, Micaiah hears them and runs back despite protests from Nolan (he's supposed to be the leader remember)

4. Micaiah, who's until this point acted very reserved, busts out sacrifice to save Nico's life, thus showing her power and her kind nature in one scene.

5. Sothe grabs Micaiah and makes a break for it

6. The people form up again

7. Jarod arrives, is informed of the peoples rebellion, and he says the above.

See how, rather than a bunch of shit the player already knows is being told to us again, we learn new things from that series of events? how the bad guy comes across as a smug dickhead who protects himself behind a veil of red tape as a prelude to the Begnion Senators? Rather than a murderous psychopath who literally has to hold out on the hopes that no inspectors are sent out. The scene plays out almost exactly the same, but with a bit changed in the past things are actually imparted to the player, this doesn't become a waste of time.

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That is a nice sunset though. Edward and Micaiah talk about Nevassa being like home, and how they wish to return in the future.

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...

...

...

I'm not saying ANYTHING. I just laughed for like a straight minute.

Anyway, see you all next time for Part 1, Chapter 2: The Case of being Incredibly Incompetent Freedom Fighters

EDIT: I mentioned I would say how I would have handled Sothe's absence, I would simply have made him play decoy to the larger force, and any question of "Will he be okay" is met with "He's a war hero and a soldier, don't forget that" then have NOLAN leading the group and shouting 'This way" with Sothe popping up behind them "Just had to finish off the last of the stragglers"

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Chapter 1-2: NOTHING MAKES ANY FUCKING SENSE!

[spoiler=Update 3]

When we last left off, Micaiah and the Dawn Brigade had fled from Nevassa and a scene that told us nothing new and everything we already knew played. We pick up in a forest somewhere...

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Thankfully, two members of the Dawn Brigade have their heads screwed on right, and both Nolan and Sothe agree they can't be anywhere near towns for now. Edward take a moment to cry about having to sleep in the wild again and, to bring up something Anouleth said, shouldn't he be the one MOST comfortable with it of the new characters? Considering he's the one who's had to rough it up on the streets and has been fighting a war of independence? Oh whatever, it's not like they bothered including the Dawn Brigades BACKSTORY in the game or anything.

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Micaiah takes a moment to connect with her inner hippie and sound like she just smoked a bowl. Which still makes her about a thousand times more preferable to Astrid, who doesn't have a scene in this game where she does NOT look stoned off her tits and act like she's living in a drugged up fantasy, But hey we'll go look at that logical blackhole when we get to Part 2.

We're interrupted by a girl named Laura, who just happens to stumble across the Dawn Brigade from behind.

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And Micaiah goes and BLOWS THEIR COVER! Okay so I want you guys to picture this, you just left Nevassa, pursued by people who want to murder you and everyone you love, you have no supplies, you can't risk entering town, and then all of a sudden from behind you a girl comes up behind you and goes "Hey can you go to this Begnion Manor? Which is filled with Begnion troops to help an Abbot you've not seen proof of?" What's your response?

To tell her that you're a group of rebels the Begnion troops are hunting, and you'll gladly walk into this manor without even doing a routine check!

I know Laura is a protagonist, I know this isn't a trap, but it's just so god damn Illogical. I'm going to quote 'Iceman' here.

In Fire Emblem 6' date=' when Roy is told by Elphin that Lycia is potentially primed and ready for invasion, instead of jumping on the information Roy sits down and considers it, before saying he intends to finish the job he was given, because any information could be a lie and he needs to confirm it. If Micaiah was in charge, she would have just gone back to Lycia and completely fucked up.[/quote']

Here's how I propose it should have happened.

Clearly the Dawn Brigade are hungry and roughing it in the wild, and they are under pursuit, by having Nolan (the leader supposedly) point out that they can't really afford to alert Begnion to their presence, you can then have Micaiah (who's supposed to be a Strategist to set up her role when they meet Pelleas) say that they could resupply there. Nolan can then think on it and say "Sothe, investigate. If it looks like we can do it, we will, if not, Laura is on her own."

That way, even though the situation is still legit, the characters show caution, this is supposed to be occupied Daein they just mentioned they can't go to any towns, and now they're going to attack a mansion. I also wouldn't make the goal of this stage Medicine, if it was just Medicine, why couldn't Sothe just go in and steal it? as we'll see in the stage, Sothe pretty much moves around unnoticed. He also mentions having BEEN to this Manor before, so it makes no sense for the whole Dawn Brigade to go in to get some Medicine, when Sothe, THE STEALTH SPECIALIST, can knock over the joint in no time flat.

This sequence is illogical, Again like many things in part 1, the basic premise is GOOD, it works, it's just the execution is done so poorly.

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The purpose of those 3 screens is to confirm that yes, Sothe knows exactly where the Medicine is, all Laura needs to do is tell him what it's called/looks like and he can go and get it, and as we'll see on the map, this sequence becomes even more illogical

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So despite the conversation implying that we were going in alone, Laura's joined us and the objective is to get her to the designated location on the map, and that makes me wonder if the people designing the maps and gameplay had any talks with the people doing the story.

1. Why does Laura need to go there?

2. Why do we need to do anything? Sothe can get in on his own.

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Wha? Sothe you're right there, just grab the medicine and we can book it! Why do all of us need to get up top? we aren't trying to take the place over just get some medicine!

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We just got done explaining at the beginning of the Chapter that you didn't want to alert the Begnion army to your presence, and now you're trying to reclaim everything? Why? You don't have a safe house to retreat to, hell Sothe you managed to get in without being spotted, you could probably nick from these guys over time, there is no reason for you guys to be doing this, Laura just asked for some medicine.

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And to top it all off, JAROD IS HERE?! Coincidence much? Wait a second... You've been running ever since you left Nevassa, how did he get ahead of you? Ontop of that, why is he even at this specific manor, at this specific time, he doesn't mention leaving to hunt the Dawn Brigade, for fucks sake he's the head of the Begnion Occupation Military Force, Doesn't he have anything better to do?

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And I just checked over to make sure I didn't miss an opening text crawl or something, no time has been mentioned, nothing indicates it's been more than a day since they left. This entire chapter is a logical singularity that is making my mind collapse in on itself!

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Wouldn't it be smarter if you went with one of our capable fighters? At this point I've given up trying to rationalize why Sothe couldn't just grab the medicine, but why is the person with no combat experience and 1RKOed by everything going alone to find the medicine?

That reminds me, while playing this map on my proper save Laura was almost ORKOed, she just dodged the second hit and saved me a restart.

Anyway the map's cleared after that.

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So? Micaiah she's not a member of the Dawn Brigade, she wanted Medicine, she got Medicine, she probably left. Also Scene Transition?! I have no idea if Micaiah means that Laura was captured as they were escaping or if she lost sight of her when she went to go grab the medicine. I know a lot of stuff happens off screen during the various chapters, but for the love of all that is good in this world, would it kill the game to have everything progress in a logical manner?

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And again, contrary to her statement in the Prologue that she can't just use Foresight whenever, She proceeds to turn on foresight to tell that Laura has been captured. I know someone's going to come in and say "Oh this is just another random occurrence" but these seem oddly coincidental for random occurrence, I mean she must be manipulating the RNG manually at this point. Anna will be pissed.

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No, she just said "Someones nearby" for the fun of it you ponce.

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... Clever is not what I would call Micaiah. This entire chapter is proof enough of that. If she was clever, she would have told the other DBers about Laura being captured and all that. It's not like Leonardo the archer, or Sothe the fucking ROGUE would be able to get a drop on him. But no if we approached this moment with any sort of logic, we wouldn't have a set up for 1-3.

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Can anyone spot the logical contradiction in these pictures? I'll give you a minute.

...

...

...

Found it? How is Micaiah a valuable hostage if the rest of the Dawn Brigade doesn't matter?! How is LAURA a valuable hostage? WHY DOES NOTHING MAKE ANY GOD DAMN SENSE IN THIS CHAPTER?!

I can accept that Micaiah is a good way to keep the Dawn Brigade in line, but if you then tell me they don't think the rest of the group matters, then who is she a good hostage for? kill her quietly, don't let her be a martyr or anything, I mean god damn Jarod murders his own troops and 3 civvies, but he captures the woman who's been fucking with Begnion, and now he thinks of prison? And who is Laura important too? Aran is working for Begnion by choice, it makes no sense to hold Laura as a hostage, I'm not sure Begnion understands the whole 'Hostage' concept.

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Oh shut up this is no time to be quoting Star Wars...

Next Time: We're back to the proper save file.

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This is going to be a loooooong topic if you provide so many screenshot per chapter. But it's all K cuz the boards were dying out a bit so we need this.

(what happened to all the drafts?)

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Man, I hate that chapter. It's just such a mess. Laura went into the room to look for medicine and immediately afterwards they are looking for her in a forest? The game feels like an abridged series.

I just wonder what happened during development with this game. Maybe the extended script helps the game save face a bit but why do two versions of the script even exist. Everything is so wired.

It's too bad you didn't write about the part where Jarod overreacts about Yune though. I found that hilarious.

However I would also say, that it makes sense for Jarod to take Micaiah prisoner to execute her later in public. He is the "See what happens to those who oppose us!" -kinda guy.

Of course those things never work as intended but it is consistent with his portrail so far.

Also, where does it say that Micaiah uses foresight intentionally to find out that Laura has been captured? Not that the scene doesn't have enough problems as it is but I'm sure it's not even stated that she used foresight at all.

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Man, I hate that chapter. It's just such a mess. Laura went into the room to look for medicine and immediately afterwards they are looking for her in a forest? The game feels like an abridged series.

I just wonder what happened during development with this game. Maybe the extended script helps the game save face a bit but why do two versions of the script even exist. Everything is so wired.

It's too bad you didn't write about the part where Jarod overreacts about Yune though. I found that hilarious.

However I would also say, that it makes sense for Jarod to take Micaiah prisoner to execute her later in public. He is the "See what happens to those who oppose us!" -kinda guy.

Of course those things never work as intended but it is consistent with his portrail so far.

Also, where does it say that Micaiah uses foresight intentionally to find out that Laura has been captured? Not that the scene doesn't have enough problems as it is but I'm sure it's not even stated that she used foresight at all.

The second screen I posted where she talks about the forest being huge, she always shuts her eyes whenever she uses Foresight and it's scripted for her to shut her eyes during the "..."

I thought about including a bit about how Jarod's dialogue was hilariously out of whack with the character, but I was just so focused on all the inconsistencies in the chapter that I skipped over it. And while indeed it makes sense to take her prisoner to execute her, he calls her a valuable 'hostage' Hence why I pointed out the BOF don't seem to understand what a Hostage is.

EDIT: Reset count: 8- Various deaths DAMN IT LAURA!

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The second screen I posted where she talks about the forest being huge, she always shuts her eyes whenever she uses Foresight and it's scripted for her to shut her eyes during the "..."[/s]

Well the visions are sent by Yune. Micaiah doesn't know that. As far as she is concerned she can't use that ability willingly so her statement at the beginning was correct.

Personally I would have put my money on her using her heron empathy. A huge group of people with similar thoughts probably draws attention to an empath and Micaiah is shown to be overly reliant on that ability anyway. Which is why I consider her visions to be stupid. Her empathy gives her anything she needs. The visions serve an alternate purpose in regards to the true Apostle but why would Yune even be able to see the future?

But then gain, maybe Yune actually can't. If you could sense someones feelings and thoughts, it shouldn't be to hard to get an idea of their intention.

That might be the reason that Micaiah only got some news about "dark clouds" after she let Jarod live, because Yune herself didn't know. Just that he was desperate and out for revenge.

Yune might not have knows that Nico would get shot but that the soldiers where going to make their way by force. And because she is an impulsive child it didn't occur to her that Micaiah would just make things worse if she went back.

I love how Micaiah goes back to save one kid, and three guys get butchered by Jarod as a result.

It doesn't matter how many people you kill as long as you save one. I'm sure that nets her the Athos-Seal of approval. Did I ever mention I hate Elibe?

On a serious note, I'm sure the dissonance is intentional here. Just because Micaiah has good intentions doesn't mean she can't make wrong decisions.

She is way to emotional and impulsive. It's a character flaw.

And since she used a miraculous power to save Nico, the "Maiden of Dawn" gets even more worship despite the people that died.

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1-3 is done, I was a choice between doing it in 10 turns or letting Kurth escape and taking the BEXP hit to get the 100 BEXP he gives.

Well the visions are sent by Yune. Micaiah doesn't know that. As far as she is concerned she can't use that ability willingly so her statement at the beginning was correct.

Yeah I'll get to Yune when we get to Part 4...

Personally I would have put my money on her using her heron empathy. A huge group of people with similar thoughts probably draws attention to an empath and Micaiah is shown to be overly reliant on that ability anyway. Which is why I consider her visions to be stupid. Her empathy gives her anything she needs. The visions serve an alternate purpose in regards to the true Apostle but why would Yune even be able to see the future?

No idea, When I wrote IRD I cut out everything but Sacrifice, since I've not seen Stefan show any traits of a Lion Laguz, or Soren show any dragon traits (Maybe? they mention that Soren is sensitive to the emotions of places but I never really felt that was because he was a dragon), and I felt that was enough for her. On the other hand she got actual intelligence, which I would take over Future Vision any day.

But then gain, maybe Yune actually can't. If you could sense someones feelings and thoughts, it shouldn't be to hard to get an idea of their intention.

That might be the reason that Micaiah only got some news about "dark clouds" after she let Jarod live, because Yune herself didn't know. Just that he was desperate and out for revenge.

Yune might not have knows that Nico would get shot but that the soldiers where going to make their way by force. And because she is an impulsive child it didn't occur to her that Micaiah would just make things worse if she went back.

I talk about Farsight (Man I jump between that and Foresight a lot) as a narrative device, my displeasure stems from it essentially being pointless, other than to give Micaiah another 'Power' she really doesn't need.

On a serious note, I'm sure the dissonance is intentional here. Just because Micaiah has good intentions doesn't mean she can't make wrong decisions.

She is way to emotional and impulsive. It's a character flaw.

And since she used a miraculous power to save Nico, the "Maiden of Dawn" gets even more worship despite the people that died.

I'm pretty sure 1-2 Signs the warrant on "Micaiah is an idiot" though there's plenty of future examples of that. like I said in the first update, she's not a Mary-Sue.

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That's passable for a Sunday morning cartoon. If that's the level of sophistication you hold the FE series to, then so be it. I prefer plausible antagonists. I'll even accept borderline sadists (like Petrine) every so often so long as they still behave rationally. What possible good could come from executing soldiers that commit the sin of reporting bad news?

According to Naesala, Petrine also does this. He tells his subordinates to send a Daein soldier to bring the news, because she'll kill them if they do.

The logical end result is a reluctance of soldiers willing to report bad news truthfully. They might lie or simply fail to volunteer information. You could, in turn, execute those who lie or are reticent to volunteer information. But to what end? Now most soldiers would prefer to desert. Sure, the penalty of desertion is death, but so is the penalty of staying in the army. Execution is the ultimate penalty. Handing out the ultimate penalty for minor misconduct puts all misconduct on the same level, at which point desertion or mutiny can become the rational reaction for many soldiers.

Or they might even send a beorc instead of a Raven to send news, which would be slower...

And what about murdering civilians as an occupational army? This is more obviously stupid. If civil disobedience is punished by death, rebellion becomes a lot more attractive. Even Hitler's Nazi regime didn't execute civilians openly.

It depends on who it was... because some of them did. People; even commanders, did act this way in the past. Did Amon Goth ever execute his own soldiers? probably not. But he did kill Jews with absolute impunity, in the belief that nobody would care or hold him accountable. He would probably have been court-martialled if he had killed his own soldiers, so he didn't. In the same way, Jarod knows that his superior Numida doesn't care about the lives of his soldiers, or care about the life of any Daein. So he feels free to kill them with impunity too.

Anyway not 5 tiles down we run into Nico, and despite being on the run, Micaiah stops to have a lovely chat with a boy she met not a day/few hours ago. You know she also met Sothe when he was a child and was unusually interest in him, and she's with her brand, somewhere in the range of 30 or 40 now.

I don't think Micaiah is quite that old. After all, she's the sister of Sanaki. A 20 year age gap? Seems improbable.

This right here is what I meant by "Farsight is a plot convenience power" The same effect could have happened just from hearing the screams of the townsfolk,

What difference does it really make? I don't see how it's really significantly more convenient for her to go back and help Nico. In fact, it seems awfully inconvenient...

Again, I don't really see what's wrong with Miciaha using her vision to determine that something bad is going to happen to Nico.

Again Farsight isn't anymore overpowered than Claude praying to Blaggi for visions (and then coming back as a spirit mentor after death), But it is much more poorly thought out.

Really? In Chapter 3, Claude uses his farsight to figure out literally the entire plot of 1st Gen. It's all laid bare, because the writers literally couldn't think of any other way for Sigurd to find out what's going on in Grandbell. "Sigurd figures out the plot to take over Grandbell because... a wizard tells him."

Of course the horrible thing that Micaiah sensed is Nico getting an arrow in the chest in the barrage. boo? Really when this scene played for the first time I was more confused if this was REALLY the way they were going to characterize the Begnion Occupation Force. To put it mildly, by the time we hit 1-E these guys will be one Railroad track away from tying a maiden to it while twirling mustaches. They are just cartoonishly evil I can not take them seriously.

Do you think that the Begnion Occupation Force should have broken out the tear gas and the water cannons? The Begnion Occupation Force firing on civilians is not "cartoonish", unless you think that the Rape of Nanjing or the Sharpeville Massacre are "cartoons". Armies fire on crowds of civilians. It really, really does happen. And it's not a joke, like you seem to think it is. If anything, it's unrealistic that the soldiers refuse to fire on the civilians later on.

And again, contrary to her statement in the Prologue that she can't just use Foresight whenever, She proceeds to turn on foresight to tell that Laura has been captured. I know someone's going to come in and say "Oh this is just another random occurrence" but these seem oddly coincidental for random occurrence, I mean she must be manipulating the RNG manually at this point. Anna will be pissed.

Well duh, it's a coincidence. Also, Micaiah doesn't say, and never says, that she can't activate her farsight. All she says is that she can't "choose what she sees".

... Clever is not what I would call Micaiah. This entire chapter is proof enough of that. If she was clever, she would have told the other DBers about Laura being captured and all that. It's not like Leonardo the archer, or Sothe the fucking ROGUE would be able to get a drop on him. But no if we approached this moment with any sort of logic, we wouldn't have a set up for 1-3.

Uh, even if Micaiah brought the whole DB with her, she knows she's walking into a trap. Why would she put their lives in jeopardy as well as her own? Great, bring Leonardo. Sure will be funny when he tinks Jarod.

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I don't think Micaiah is quite that old. After all, she's the sister of Sanaki. A 20 year age gap? Seems improbable.

When she met Sothe, he was tiny as all hell, She does not look her age, she in fact looks exactly the age she does now when she first met him, and he's 12 in PoR, either the same age or older than Sanaki. 30-40 is VERY likely. Then again, the entire fucking 'Micaiah is the true Apostle' plot is very very poorly thought out. And No I'm not getting into it now, I will get into it in Part 3/4, you'll just have to wait until then

What difference does it really make? I don't see how it's really significantly more convenient for her to go back and help Nico. In fact, it seems awfully inconvenient...

Again, I don't really see what's wrong with Miciaha using her vision to determine that something bad is going to happen to Nico.

Easy, in one we didn't need frigging god to come in to establish that Micaiah is someone who puts others before her, while if she simply hears the screams, and consciously makes the decision to double back, then it is all on her. It hurts Micaiah as a character to use the plot device. And if you can't see that then I don't know what to tell you.

Really? In Chapter 3, Claude uses his farsight to figure out literally the entire plot of 1st Gen. It's all laid bare, because the writers literally couldn't think of any other way for Sigurd to find out what's going on in Grandbell. "Sigurd figures out the plot to take over Grandbell because... a wizard tells him."

Yes and this aids Sigurd... how? He still dies, roasted alive by someone he called a friend, his two best friends and sisters murdered. I'm saying "One is as bad as the other" you're saying "This one is superior to the other"

Do you think that the Begnion Occupation Force should have broken out the tear gas and the water cannons? The Begnion Occupation Force firing on civilians is not "cartoonish", unless you think that the Rape of Nanjing or the Sharpeville Massacre are "cartoons". Armies fire on crowds of civilians. It really, really does happen. And it's not a joke, like you seem to think it is. If anything, it's unrealistic that the soldiers refuse to fire on the civilians later on.

No but thanks for comically missing the point. The point is "Well we can't think of a way to make the villains sympathetic, might as well make them kitten killers". Let's sequence break for a bit, In 1-6 A Begnion commander orders them to stand down or they start killing hostages, so once the Dawn Brigade stands down they decide "Hey lets kill the hostages anyway, LOL!" And yes, when a dumbass bandit did the same thing in Path of Radiance, IT WAS JUST AS STUPID. This is cartoonish, these figures I am fighting against aren't a frightening evil, their the bad guys of a cartoon, with no redeeming traits because Gawrsh, it would be hard to make the bad guys anything BUT unrepentant! Tell me, of the Begnion commanders in the game, which of them have redeeming qualities. 3. Zelgius, Levail, and the Dark Mage working under them, and technically he doesn't count because he's not a commander.

Begnion in this game is cartoonish because they do not come across as a nation, they come across as the agents of Dr. Klaw, Again they are one fucking train track away from literally tying maidens to the train track. And the worst part is in Part 1? there's no subtlety to the evil, it's hammer in the face "We're assholes!" "They're assholes!" But don't you worry, I'll vent my frustration at this shitty writing next update.

Well duh, it's a coincidence. Also, Micaiah doesn't say, and never says, that she can't activate her farsight. All she says is that she can't "choose what she sees".

Bullshit, she always choose what she see's right up until the flames of war start getting stroked and we have Chaos in the air. You know what a story that relies on coincidence and contrivance (Read: RELIES not, contains) is called? A bad story.

Uh, even if Micaiah brought the whole DB with her, she knows she's walking into a trap. Why would she put their lives in jeopardy as well as her own? Great, bring Leonardo. Sure will be funny when he tinks Jarod.

Yeah I'm sure, Sothe, the War veteran with the custom Crit knife was going to have so much trouble with the troll who's main actions has been gunning down civilians and growing a snidely whiplash mustache in private. Speaking of which, Sothe was the only one with her at the time. So even if she just told HIM, he could have easily handled the situation. This is a CONTRIVANCE.

Now there wont be an update tomorrow since I'll be out all day. but 1-3 has been capped and is being written, a little sneak

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Laura! quit stealing the good level ups!

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