Best/Worst in the Series Round 166

[BrightBow]

Where is it said that the one ambush killed them all, though? I mean, they were fighting a war. People die.

How do you interpret those phrases then? "have almost been completely obliterated"? "We've almost exhausted"?

At least to me they don't leave much room for interpretation.

Edited November 15, 2012 by BrightBow

[Just call me AL]

Lyn is only special and heroic during Lyn's Mode. On Eliwood/Hector's mode, she's nothing more than a side character who only exists because the game said so.

Again. How exactly, pray tell, does that make her any less heroic than other Lords in the series? That's like saying Hector's the least heroic Lord because the game treats Eliwood as the main protagonist regardless of whether you choose his mode or not. Don't you think that committing, let alone considering amoral actions, or pursuing morally questionable goals, justified or not, would be far more important criteria to determining such a quality, instead of whoever is or isn't the central focus? It just seems needlessly petty that focus seems to be the only factor being taken into play here in some of these responses. Focus isn't everything, you know.

How do you interpret those phrases then? "have been almost completely obliterated"? "We've almost exhausted"? At least to me, they don't leave much room for interpretation.

I think what she means is that the word "almost" suggests that there's soldiers that survived Micaiah's ambush. On this part I concur with her. If every soldier were killed, it would sound as such. But not every soldier was killed. However, out of those 5,000 soldiers, we don't exactly know how many survived. Only thing I can assume from this, the number of survivors isn't a high number. Even in comparison to a number like 5,000. Edited November 15, 2012 by Little Al

[Florete]

How do you interpret those phrases then? "have almost been completely obliterated"? "We've almost exhausted"?

At least to me they don't leave much room for interpretation.

"We've almost exhausted" in particular sounds to me like it was definitely not the result of an ambush as that suggests that it happened over time. Also, soon after the Begnion Central Army and the Crimean Royal Knights have almost been completely obliterated line, we get:

Soren

Many of them, including the commander, are fine and well. However, despite the large number of survivors, the oil that Daein used has injured the Holy Guards' pegasi and all but grounded them. The only thing we can be grateful for is that they didn't succeed in firing those flaming arrows.

Edited November 15, 2012 by Red Fox of Fire

[BrightBow]

"We've almost exhausted" in particular sounds to me like it was definitely not the result of an ambush as that suggests that it happened over time. Also, soon after the Begnion Central Army and the Crimean Royal Knights have almost been completely obliterated line, we get:

Soren

Many of them, including the commander, are fine and well. However, despite the large number of survivors, the oil that Daein used has injured the Holy Guards' pegasi and all but grounded them. The only thing we can be grateful for is that they didn't succeed in firing those flaming arrows.

Well, the whole dialogue sounds to me like a single big tragedy.

Ike: Elincia... We've almost exhausted the 5000 soldiers we borrowed from Crimea... I'm sorry.

Elincia: Empress Sanaki just apologised to me before... I heard the soldiers' bodies have already been buried by the bishops. So the only thing I can do... is to bring their spirits back home... and tell their families everything.

Ike: ...

Elincia: Lord Ike... Please lift your spirits. This is war... I already anticipated this.

Personally I would guess that the line about the fire arrows not flying was the result of them now knowing how to display the burning canyon in the game engine without it looking ridiculous. After all, they couldn't even display the oil.

And they do treat it like they all died. Crimean and Begnion units are suspiciously absent in all the following chapters. The game designers probably did that for a reason.

Oh well, consequently if Soren said that they were obliterated and the fire didn't go off, that probably simply means that Micaiah managed to wipe them out with the rocks.

[Florete]

I don't see how that suggests at all that they died in one fell swoop. As Elincia said, "This is war." People die every day. And I don't think the developers would care about not being able to display burning oil since they could just say it happened without showing it. Fact is, it didn't happen. And "the following chapters" is all of 3-E. Other than the CRKs, the only Crimean units we ever actually fought alongside are Elincia's guard in 3-10. The GMs were hired into the war by the Laguz Alliance, so it makes perfect sense that they are largely fighting alongside Laguz. Not fighting with green/yellow Crimean units is just the way the game always worked. You can't really take that as an indication that no one else is there.

[BrightBow]

I don't see how that suggests at all that they died in one fell swoop. As Elincia said, "This is war." People die every day. And I don't think the developers would care about not being able to display burning oil since they could just say it happened without showing it. Fact is, it didn't happen. And "the following chapters" is all of 3-E.

The following chapters are 3-13 and 3-E actually.

Other than the CRKs, the only Crimean units we ever actually fought alongside are Elincia's guard in 3-10. The GMs were hired into the war by the Laguz Alliance, so it makes perfect sense that they are largely fighting alongside Laguz. Not fighting with green/yellow Crimean units is just the way the game always worked. You can't really take that as an indication that no one else is there.

That doesn't make any sense at all. Begnion, Crimea and the Laguz all joined together. Ike is everyones leader at that point.

And what's normally is the case doesn't matter since 3-E just so happens to be one of the few chapters were you do have allies. And a quite significant force at that.

And of course in 13-3 they are all equally red. But there are still no Crimean or Begnion troops.

How would the Crimean and Begnion troops have died outside the canyon anyway? The Daein were stated to be terribly outnumbered and fighting an hopeless fight. They didn't just wipe them all out off-screen without any mention after having a perfectly fine and playable ambush scenario which ended with Soren saying that they have almost been obliterated. And this was after Ike asked or a status report and Ike was devasted by that line. So he didn't meant it like: "Well, we just barely dodged that bullet there".

And just in case you doubt it because of this part of the line you quoted:

Many of them, including the commander, are fine and well. However, despite the large number of survivors, the oil that Daein used has injured the Holy Guards' pegasi and all but grounded them. The only thing we can be grateful for is that they didn't succeed in firing those flaming arrows.

Because that was Soren answering Ike about the state of the Holy Guard and no one else. No contradiction there.

Edited November 15, 2012 by BrightBow

[Florete]

The following chapters are 3-13 and 3-E actually.

I was talking about chapters where you actually use Ike.

And what's normally is the case doesn't matter since 3-E just so happens to be one of the few chapters were you do have allies. And a quite significant force at that.

And of course in 13-3 they are all equally red. But there are still no Crimean or Begnion troops.

There are Crimean troops, though, in the CRKs. This is the way FE has always been. I, at least, generally assume that the units you use in a map are not your entire "army" unless specifically stated as such. Otherwise your teams would always be horribly outnumbered. The primary reason that Gallia and Phoenicis are on the field in 3-E is because this is the climax point where Ashera is to awaken, so all the nations need to be present and at war. The group you fight with is Crimea, and the Laguz allies are for the Laguz nations. You're fighting against Daein and Begnion (Senator side). Hatari and Goldoa are also mixed in.

For 3-13 I'd sooner say the game designers just didn't want to mix generic Laguz and Beorc enemies. No other map does, either. There's no mention that there were no more Crimean soldiers to fight, and a Daein soldier even says "The apostle's army is storming the castle!"

How would the Crimean and Begnion troops have died outside the canyon anyway?

I've said it a few times now: war. And if the following line from 3-13 is anything to go by, 5k soldiers isn't even that many:

Tibarn

Welcome back. What's going on with Daein?

Ulki

They're holed up in this big castle to the east. I'd say ten thousand soldiers, give or take. They're looking pretty desperate.

(Later)

Ranulf

Ten thousand? They aren't really going to try to fight us with only ten thousand men, are they? It'd be suicide!

The Daein were stated to be terribly outnumbered and fighting an hopeless fight.

The LA was also fighting against the senator side of Begnion, don't forget. Some of the enemies in 3-E are Begnion soldiers, for example.

Gotta go now, but I'll post this for the time being.

[shadykid]

But Begnion isn't there in 3-E....

[Guy Starwind]

Most: Sigurd

Least: Micaiah

[NinjaMonkey]

This round is now over, and the next shall commence shortly.