Ana Evaluates the Characters!

[Anacybele]

So, I'd been thinking lately, Awakening has my favorite cast of characters of almost any game I've played. The only ones that tie with it or come close, imo, are those of the Tellius FE games and The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. So far, that is. Another member here, eterna, is already doing most of the Tellius crew, so I thought I'd talk about Awakening's characters. :) The playable ones outside of DLC and Spotpass, of course (barring paralogues). The only exception is the Avatar because there isn't much to say about him/her besides that he/she is capable of being totally broken, but has a generic character, yet neat outfit. Unlike eterna though, I'll be addressing character and design as well as stats and potential as a unit.

I'll also be going in order of recruitment...generally. I haven't actually recruited and used everyone yet, but I'll keep going as I do. For example, when I get Inigo and play around with him a good bit, I'll talk about him afterward.

Also, keep in mind that these are just my opinions for the most part. If you don't agree with them, that's fine, I just don't want any arguing or complaining about them.

So, let's get started! The list of completed evaluations is below. First up is Chrom, our main guy, of course.

Completed Evaluations

Chrom

Frederick

Lissa

Sully

Virion

Stahl

Vaike

Chrom

Design

Ah, Chrom, the main hero and the lord. When I first saw him, I was like "ANOTHER blue-haired male lord? Come on, be more original, IS. What happened to designing people like Lyn, Eliwood, and Ephraim?" Eliwood has red hair and Ephraim's hair is more of an aqua green (at least to me. I realize some people do see it as bluish though. Still, it's not the same old blue color we see a lot), and Lyn isn't even male and has green hair. I realize that it's kind of tradition for the lord to have blue hair and that Chrom is a descendant of Marth, but still. We haven't seen a lord with a completely different hair color since Eliwood and Lyn unless you count Micaiah, which as people here know, I don't. I was honestly hoping Ike would be the last blue-haired lord for a little while and that the next lord would be a female with red hair. But no... Oh well. This is a minor thing though, nothing to make a huge deal out of.

Now Chrom's outfit and stuff... I both hate it and love it, to be honest. I love his tunic and his cape. It made me think of Ike with the blue color and the tatteredness going on. same with his bare, muscley arm, only with a cool mark added to his shoulder. Ike is more muscley in RD, but still. I also think Chrom's shoulder guard looks awesome, even if it doesn't really look like it's attached. How is it attached to his shoulder? I can't tell. xP But then we get to the lower half of Chrom's body. Just...wtf is going on here? Really. The right boot looks fine to me, but those poofy pants just look goofy and what's with the mismatched boot? It just looks unnecessary, imo. I also think it's a bit odd for Chrom to just have one sleeve, but at the same time it does make sense because I'm sure he'd want some folks to be able to see his Mark of Naga.

Oh, and that Falchion of his looks awesome. WAY more awesome than Marth's, which is just boring as shit.

I also think Chrom is quite attractive, as are most lords, imo. I don't think he's the hottest guy in the game (you all know who I think that is lol) or the series (and you all definitely know who I think that is! XD), but even so. He's a real cutie.

Character

Okay, simply put, Chrom's character both bores me AND entertains me at the same time. it's hit or miss for me. Sometimes he cracks me up big time while other times I yawn. Like, he hilariously sucks at lying as shown in the DLC. Also, he appears to be clumsy since he breaks the most stuff. Again, lol. Oh, and his support with the female Avatar shows how bad he is with girls (yet ironically, he marries one...haha) in a humorous manner. But other times, I find myself going "Yawn...very nice, Chrom." This happens less often though, thankfully. I also love a few of the stunts he can pull with a sword. It's also funny how Chrom's kind of a lazy ass. As he says himself, if he isn't napping, he's swinging a sword. He loves his sleep lol.

But there's just other things about him that I just wanted to facepalm at. Like for example, he never noticed how feminine "Marth" sounded? Yet he still got fooled into believing this person was a guy. But he mistakes Libra for a woman, who also sounds feminine, yet looks more masculine, imo, aside from the hair braids. I just wanted to go "...seriously, Chrom?" I swear, the guy's a little moronic at times.

Oh, and, he carries candy around with him in battle. Again, I was like "...Chrom, dude, what the hell." I realize this was done to recruit Gaius, but Chrom could've easily stored the candy in the convoy and given it to Gaius after the battle. This was just weird to me. xP Though that recruitment conversation was funny. lol

Overall, I like Chrom's sense of honor and respect. He's a great leader and his passion is a lot like Ike's, actually, which I really like. Though, he's lucky he's got Frederick around and that the Avatar is a pal. He's also rather reckless and too quick to trust. But at least he's got nice, visible flaws as well as neat good points.

Stats and Playability

Now we get to how good Chrom is in the game as a battler. Like most lords, he's pretty damn good. He's awesome for much of the game, actually. He starts with an unbreakable sword, so you really don't have to give him anything else but vulneraries. His rapier has the same strength, but is advantageous against knights and cavaliers and has a crit rate though, so you want to use that as well. It just shouldn't be abused at all because rapiers won't be buyable for awhile. Still, his Falchion also does him justice against dragons, so players need to use the hell out of it. His stats look a lot like...yeah, you guessed it, Ike's, from what I've seen. High strength, speed, skill, and def, but crappy res. Can't take more than a few hits from magic.

Being swordlocked is a bit of a pain, but Chrom gains lances upon promotion, which is sweet. We haven't seen a lance-using lord since Ephraim. I was hoping for that too. And he gets Ike's Aether skill. Also sweet, I always loved Aether. But what's this? The animation for it is different this time and less cooler? Seriously, I get if IS didn't want to make Chrom a complete carbon copy of Ike, but the animation could've still looked cooler. xP Oh, and there's Rightful King too. Also a nice skill.

And finally, I get to Chrom's reclassing options. Frankly, I don't find them extremely impressive for him. Cavalier can give him Luna if he goes Great Knight, but why go for that when he gets Aether, which is Luna and Sol combined? Outdoor Fighter would be handy though. Archer just hinders him since it restricts him to bows for awhile. Dreadfighter is a sweet class, but Chrom hardly has a magic stat. Tomes would be useless on him. Especially if you still want him to be a Great Lord in the end.

To sum it up, Chrom is a great unit and he's capable of slaying the final bad guy, as all lords are. But he can be easily outdone by some guys, even Frederick, and get screwed in some areas. He's very good throughout the game, but not omg beastly.

Overall

Honestly, I wanted to really really like Chrom, I did. And I thought I would. Don't get me wrong, he's a cool dude. And I like that he seems to mainly be based off of Ike. But he comes off to me more as an Ike-wannabe that fails to match up and carry on his awesomeness.

Up Next: Frederick! Our favorite lovable butler knight! (And don't worry, I promise to show as little bias as possible...lol)

Edited January 5, 2014 by Anacybele

[Quick]

Are you gameplay-wise on Lunatic mode or below? If it's below the whole character overview wouldn't really mean much but whatever. Also Cavalier and the promotions doesn't give Sol.

Edited April 27, 2013 by Quick

[Anacybele]

Below that, since I'm sure most of us don't play on Lunatic. And really? That's weird. I assumed since Great Knight gets Luna, Paladin would get Sol. Huh...

[Emeraldfox]

Oh oh oh. Tell me when you get to Miriel/Nowi/Lon'qu/Kjelle/Basilio, I like them. But yeah, I count Micaiah as a lord for the sole fact that she's hugely plot relavant and Pellias riding her metephorical phallus, but that's off topic.

I expect Fredrick to be considered flawless, I can feel it.

[Nanami Touko]

Below that, since I'm sure most of us don't play on Lunatic.

On SF? Hah!

[AstraLunaSol]

You're thinking fe10

this isn't fe10

heros get sol

also people play lunatic, look at the size of the lunatic club thread

at least judge them on hard since hard is an actual difficulty

[shadowofchaos]

I assumed since Great Knight gets Luna, Paladin would get Sol. Huh...

A little research would help before you start rating characters.

Especially considering this page was available to you the whole time:

http://www.serenesforest.net/fe13/skills.html

[Anacybele]

You're thinking fe10

this isn't fe10

heros get sol

also people play lunatic, look at the size of the lunatic club thread

I knew Heroes got Sol. I just thought Paladins did too since they did in past games. Sorry...

And I never said NOBODY played Lunatic. I said not a lot of people do.

[Nanami Touko]

I said not a lot of people do.

You'd be wrong there.

At least do what ALS said and judge them on hard.

There are less people here that play normal than those who play lunatic.

[Sunwoo]

Eh, I'm not going to touch the "gameplay" part of Ana's evaluation because I play on normal mode too. (I just want to blitz through the game right now, to take off stress when I'm at grad school.)

To be fair on Chrom's character, he only seems to be "bad with girls" in female MU's support conversation. He has no problems talking to Sully, Sumia, and Maribelle. And any awkwardness from his and Olivia's supports is probably due to Olivia being super shy and running away from him and less so on Chrom's part. As for Gaius and candy, do realize that just before the chapter started nothing was going on, so he might have had the candy just on him at the time.

[Anacybele]

You'd be wrong there.

At least do what ALS said and judge them on hard.

There are less people here that play normal than those who play lunatic.

You'd be surprised. A lot of Awakening players are first time FE players. I'd imagine they all play on normal because they're newbies.

And I haven't played hard mode, so I can't judge it. I was trying to make my gameplay evaluation generic so that it would probably apply to any difficulty.

Sangyul: That's true, but I find Chrom's awkwardness with the female Avatar to be funny, so it's not a terrible flaw. lol

Edited April 27, 2013 by Anacybele

[ZemZem]

I can't wait until you evaluate Severa.

And Sumia, for that matter. Good luck, Ana.

[Nanami Touko]

You'd be surprised. A lot of Awakening players are first time FE players. I'd imagine they all play on normal because they're newbies.

And I haven't played hard mode, so I can't judge it. I was trying to make my gameplay evaluation generic so that it would probably apply to any difficulty.

There are less people here that play normal than those who play lunatic.

I said here, as in SF. On SF, there are more people playing lunatic. I know that the majority of new players to the game will be playing normal. and remember that not everyone is you and a lot of new FE13 players jumped right into hard/lunatic.

And oh well. You should try it. It's pretty easy.

Edited April 27, 2013 by Child of the Tenth Month

[Sunwoo]

Sangyul: That's true, but I find Chrom's awkwardness with the female Avatar to be funny, so it's not a terrible flaw. lol

Well, my point was that if Chrom's awkward around only ONE (or two, if you include Olivia) of his possible wives, I'm not exactly sure if "awkward with women" in general is a flaw Chrom has and if it's not so much, "awkward around certain women".

[Integrity]

Eh, I'm not going to touch the "gameplay" part of Ana's evaluation because I play on normal mode too. (I just want to blitz through the game right now, to take off stress when I'm at grad school.)

To be fair on Chrom's character, he only seems to be "bad with girls" in female MU's support conversation. He has no problems talking to Sully, Sumia, and Maribelle. And any awkwardness from his and Olivia's supports is probably due to Olivia being super shy and running away from him and less so on Chrom's part. As for Gaius and candy, do realize that just before the chapter started nothing was going on, so he might have had the candy just on him at the time.

Chrom's actually pretty suave with Olivia, considering that she's weird as shit around him all the time. There's no hint of him being bad with girls in any of his other supports or the rest of the dialogue of the whole game as far as I know.

[Klokinator]

Hard FEA = Lyn Easy Mode FE7.

Lunatic FEA = HHM+++ FE7

Such a jump in difficulty it's insane lol.

[Anacybele]

I just know people will disagree with what I'm going to say on Sumia's character, but opinions are opinions.

And I guess Chrom's not exactly bad with girls when y'all put it that way.

Also, sorry, but I'm not as skilled an FE player as many of you, so I refuse to even touch Lunatic. Hard mode, maybe someday.

[ZemZem]

I just know people will disagree with what I'm going to say on Sumia's character, but opinions are opinions.

As long as you don't let your bias get in the way, there's no problems, right?

[Anacybele]

As long as you don't let your bias get in the way, there's no problems, right?

I don't want to have any bias at all, but true.

So guys, I have to go to work shortly, but I'll do Freddy Bear when I get back. This'll be fun. <3

Edited April 27, 2013 by Anacybele

[AstraLunaSol]

Not to mention he's only bad with femu because he thought of her as not a lady :V

which doesn't really happen with anyone else

[shadykid]

Frederick summary: he sucks, and you should feel bad for liking him

#fishingforrage

[Integrity]

I don't want to have any bias at all, but true.

So guys, I have to go to work shortly, but I'll do Freddy Bear when I get back. This'll be fun. <3

how in God's name can you NOT have any bias when you're evaluating a character? ;/

[Quick]

Frederick summary: he sucks, and you should feel bad for liking him

#fishingforrage

He's also a terrible character in the game, with a terrible personality, coupled with the looks of an idiot.

how in God's name can you NOT have any bias when you're evaluating a character? ;/

Well, few is possible. Saying "I hate Sumia she's a bitch and is super annoying" is an example of extreme-bias, yet saying "I dislike Sumia because of reason, reason, and reason" is an example of a bias that is perfectly okay.

Edited April 27, 2013 by Quick

[Integrity]

Well, few is possible. Saying "I hate Sumia she's a bitch and is super annoying" is an example of extreme-bias, yet saying "I dislike Sumia because of reason, reason, and reason" is an example of a bias that is perfectly okay.

i wasn't aware that i'd said few

EDIT: also it's not ok to hate sumia for any reason

Edited April 27, 2013 by Integrity

[Dai]

Oh, and that Falchion of his looks awesome. WAY more awesome than Marth's, which is just boring as shit.

Yeah, I'm gonna have to disagree with you on this one. I think Marth's Falchion looks pretty cool. I like Chrom's(and subsequently Lucina's), although the guard on theirs looks...iffy to me. And the way it glows is a bit odd in my opinion. It's neat, just not my cup of tea. I'm an old-fashioned man.

Carry on. =D