Alastor plays and ranks the whole series! Mission Complete! ...For now.

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

It's going to be new stuff regarding how Three Houses handles map design in light of rewinds, I promise.

Well, what you write wouldn't bother me, I thinking more your own sake, given how much keep pouring into this topic. -But keep with your dissection of a Bad FE as you see it.

Maybe replacing time rewind-stuff with "resurrection" from dying but not salvation-from-actual-death powers would've been better. All the writing would need then is make anyone who must die for plot drama's sake die very swiftly and completely- there is no hope of magically saving someone from a beheading.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

3 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Okay then. Though I'd agree that with lenticular that he's probably setting himself up for annoyance.

I am curious to see how he turns out. Hard Mode is forgiving enough that I expect Wyvernmitri to shine (after swimming up the Axe-bane-waterfall). But I wouldn't mind being proven wrong.

57 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Okay, this is amusing. People keep calling these bandits “thieves”, when in basically every other setting in Fire Emblem History, thieves and bandits are completely different things, and thieves have far more potential to be heroic. My guess? Slander. The church made the terms synonymous as a way to slander Nemesis's profession since for some reason they decided they couldn't slander the real person. The church wants there to be no distinction in the populace's mind between the profession of the man who bravely infiltrated the alien stronghold and assassinated the broodmother armed with nothing but stealth and his wits... and the violent, rape-and-pillage bandits who forever plague the land.

The Church's version of Nemesis isn't referred to as a "Thief", though. That's how Thales, an ostensible ally, refers to him. So saying "Thieves are bad" doesn't defame Nemesis.

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Nope, different guy. Yeah, it was a bit of a stretch. I find it amusing that Brad Venable is credited for voicing Kostas, Nader, and Nardel. Either Nardel is Nader's alias (I can't remember what he went by when disguising himself) and that alias has an entirely separate voice acting listing for some reason... or there's some guy in the game who's the spitting image of Nader in some paralogue I'm forgetting or never saw.

People often make that mistake. But Nader is definitely not Nardel!

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

But of course, this game is full of shit like that. I don't know if they patched this out, but I remember during the Battle of the Eagle and Lion seeing an enemy Ingrid throw javelins like they were hand-axes. Spinning them.

Don't tell Radiant Dawn's Halberdiers that we're not allowed to spin Javelins anymore!

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Also, I'm looking at the experience gauge, and for the life of me I can't fathom why they changed the “100 for a level but exp gets harder to come by” system of the previous games into the usual RPG fare of needing more exp for every level. The previous way is iconic and so much easier to get a grasp on. Smaller numbers make it easier to tell at a glance how many more kills you need for a level.

IMO the next game should take this in the opposite direction. Reduce the EXP needed to level up (say, to 10 for a level 1 unit, increasing by 2 per level), with an easy-to-calculate formula of how much EXP you're getting (i.e. 5 + enemy's level for every kill). This way, I can now when I'm feeding a kill whether it'll be enough to achieve the level-up. Rather than hoping the bar doesn't stop at 99.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

I'm checking out the marketplace, which you hilariously can visit even on the battlefield prep screen if you want, and I buy another iron lance for Dimitri since he burnt through his original one using tempest lance because for some fucking reason lances are singled out to have 10 fewer uses than the equivalent swords and fifteen fewer uses than the equivalent axes, and they don't let you repair things at this point for some reason, so your only option is to buy another one.

 

Is there really anything more hilarious about that compared to having a battlefield prep shop in any other game?

Quote

Dimitri advises we split up to “gain the advantage”, but, like, this is almost never advantageous unless there's an actual race against time involved. Which I really wish more Fire Emblem games did. I really wish there were a Fire Emblem game where there were continuous pressure to move forward at all times and multiple things to do in every map. There have been times when the game's had that sort of feel, but it's way less common than it really should be.

It's not much of an advantage per se, but I do find the way this level is designed that it's pretty expedient to send units left and straight simultaneously. It's less that it has any combat advantage and more that the level is easy enough and the enemy density sparse enough that you it just makes for a quicker clear (though I think it might be a boss kill chapter? If it is then less quicker clear and more quicker to gain all the exp clear).

Quote

 

 

Ironically, when everyone's stacked up vertically like this, on this bridge, the portraits over everyone's faces are actually making it harder for me to tell who's where, because everyone's portrait looks like it's over someone else's space.

 

I can't remember which it is, but I'm pretty sure you can remove the portraits with some button.

Quote

Okay, this is amusing. People keep calling these bandits “thieves”, when in basically every other setting in Fire Emblem History, thieves and bandits are completely different things, and thieves have far more potential to be heroic. My guess? Slander. The church made the terms synonymous as a way to slander Nemesis's profession since for some reason they decided they couldn't slander the real person. The church wants there to be no distinction in the populace's mind between the profession of the man who bravely infiltrated the alien stronghold and assassinated the broodmother armed with nothing but stealth and his wits... and the violent, rape-and-pillage bandits who forever plague the land.

#NemesisDidNothingWrong

The weird thing about the historical revisionism around Nemesis is that both sides of the conflict actually seem to treat him pretty well, despite him committing decide to one of the two factions. It's his actual in person appearance that seems to do the most disservice to him as an individual. I don't really get why Rhea doesn't hate him way more. Like she obviously despises him in the opening fight, but later she's perfectly fine with everyone calling him the King of Liberation. Either her propaganda machine is nowhere near as strong as people are lead to believe it is, or she just doesn't give two craps about the actual legacy of Nemesis and just hated him on a purely individual level.

Quote

Also, I'm looking at the experience gauge, and for the life of me I can't fathom why they changed the “100 for a level but exp gets harder to come by” system of the previous games into the usual RPG fare of needing more exp for every level. The previous way is iconic and so much easier to get a grasp on. Smaller numbers make it easier to tell at a glance how many more kills you need for a level.

Huh...I never noticed that was changed. Guess my mind just gravitates more towards progress bars than numbers.

 

Edited August 11, 2021 by Jotari

[Alastor15243]

3 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Is there really anything more hilarious about that compared to having a battlefield prep shop in any other game?

Yeah, because then presumably it's some merchant coming with you, and it doesn't literally have the exact same selection as the huge marketplace you just left.

 

5 minutes ago, Jotari said:

The weird thing about the historical revisionism around Nemesis is that both sides of the conflict actually seem to treat him pretty well. It's his actual in person appearance that seems to do the most disservice to him as an individual.

Yeah, pity we only see him as a reanimated ghoul.

[lenticular]

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Oh, and I hate Sothis too. She's way better now, with no memory of what she did in the past, but there is quite a bit to indicate that she was indeed an egotistical shit with a god complex before she died. Why else, pray tell, would she have apparently tailored her own magic runes to spout religious dogma about how she will abide in heaven forever? She was clearly completely on board with styling herself as a goddess to her new home's “lowly indigenous monkeys”.

I think it's a bit of a stretch to read too much into the writing on the magic symbol. We just don't know enough (read: anything) about the symbol and its origin to be able to use it as evidence for grand sweeping statements about character morality.

My take on Sothis is that she is definitely numinous. I can easily imagine her as a kami, for instance, or a member of a polytheistic pantheon. And we do know from some of Petra's comments that Brigid's religion is still much more along those lines, so it's not much of a stretch to imagine that Fódlan's religion prior to the Church of Seiros might have looked similar as well. To refer to Sothis as  a goddess is entirely reasonable; to refer to her as the goddess is considerably less so; to credit her as a creator figure is outright propaganda. But I find this fascinating because of real-world parallels in how monotheism can arise by the elevation of a single deity to be the supreme deity and then to start denying the existence of all other divinity.

[Jotari]

17 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Yeah, because then presumably it's some merchant coming with you, and it doesn't literally have the exact same selection as the huge marketplace you just left.

You know you'd be complaining about the absence of such a feature if it wasn't there.

[Alastor15243]

1 minute ago, Jotari said:

You know you'd be complaining about the absence of such a feature if it wasn't there.

Did I complain about it in Fates?

[Jotari]

3 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Did I complain about it in Fates?

Fates doesn't require selecting explore from a limited set of options to visit its markets. Nor did it have a weapon repair function or a battalion replenish function that becomes useful to make use of right before a battle. Or even such a significantly large time between gameplay chapters that would require reaffirming equipment before a battle starts. If the shop function wasn't available from the battle prep and you had to go back to the monastery (which is impossible by that point for chapter battles) then it would be significantly more frustrating.

Edited August 11, 2021 by Jotari

[Alastor15243]

5 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Fates doesn't require selecting explore from a limited set of options to visit its markets. Nor did it have a weapon repair function or a battalion replenish function that becomes useful to make use of right before a battle. Or even such a significantly large time between gameplay chapters that would require reaffirming equipment before a battle starts. If the shop function wasn't available from the battle prep and you had to go back to the monastery (which is impossible by that point for chapter battles) then it would be significantly more frustrating.

You can also do it from the "what am I going to do today?" menu right before going to the battle, something you can go back to.

[lenticular]

2 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

You can also do it from the "what am I going to do today?" menu right before going to the battle, something you can go back to.

Not in between paralogues/auxiliary battles, though.

[Alastor15243]

3 minutes ago, lenticular said:

Not in between paralogues/auxiliary battles, though.

True. At any rate I'm not saying that removing it in and of itself, with no other changes, would be an improvement. I'm just pointing out it's one more way the game's wonky grasp of time and space undermines any sense of immersion or realism that the calendar system might have otherwise afforded.

Edited August 11, 2021 by Alastor15243

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

2 hours ago, lenticular said:

To refer to Sothis as  a goddess is entirely reasonable; to refer to her as the goddess is considerably less so; to credit her as a creator figure is outright propaganda. But I find this fascinating because of real-world parallels in how monotheism can arise by the elevation of a single deity to be the supreme deity and then to start denying the existence of all other divinity.

ATENISM GANG

ATENISM GANG

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

I can't remember which it is, but I'm pretty sure you can remove the portraits with some button.

I wanna say X, but it might be R.

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

The weird thing about the historical revisionism around Nemesis is that both sides of the conflict actually seem to treat him pretty well, despite him committing decide to one of the two factions. It's his actual in person appearance that seems to do the most disservice to him as an individual. I don't really get why Rhea doesn't hate him way more. Like she obviously despises him in the opening fight, but later she's perfectly fine with everyone calling him the King of Liberation. Either her propaganda machine is nowhere near as strong as people are lead to believe it is, or she just doesn't give two craps about the actual legacy of Nemesis and just hated him on a purely individual level.

@RainbowMoon and I had something of a back-and-forth on this recently on the 3H subforum. My position is that the Church's version of Nemesis is the result of a "consensus history". Let's assume that Nemesis had many followers, even at the point of death. The best strategy for Seiros, to prevent further bloodshed, would be to partially rehabilitate Nemesis, while also obscuring his motives. The Nabateans he killed were instead "wicked gods", while Seiros killing him was justified because he "turned to evil". That way, the Church can assuage Nemesis's supporters, even bringing them into the fold, while ultimately blunting Nemesis's actual crusade. Thus bringing a peaceful end to a continent-spanning civil war - using carefully-constructed lies.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

ATENISM GANG

ATENISM GANG

I wanna say X, but it might be R.

@RainbowMoon and I had something of a back-and-forth on this recently on the 3H subforum. My position is that the Church's version of Nemesis is the result of a "consensus history". Let's assume that Nemesis had many followers, even at the point of death. The best strategy for Seiros, to prevent further bloodshed, would be to partially rehabilitate Nemesis, while also obscuring his motives. The Nabateans he killed were instead "wicked gods", while Seiros killing him was justified because he "turned to evil". That way, the Church can assuage Nemesis's supporters, even bringing them into the fold, while ultimately blunting Nemesis's actual crusade. Thus bringing a peaceful end to a continent-spanning civil war - using carefully-constructed lies.

At the time, yeah, sure, that makes sense. But Rhea has over a thousand years after the fact to alter history and change the facts. So she's either just not actually that great at convincing the populous to care what she cares about, or she genuinely doesn't care about Nemesis once he's dead and buried (I mean dead as far as she knows, though even when he's revived he's the one that seems to have more guff with her than vice versa, despite Rhea being shown to clearly not be over what he did with how preciously she treats the remaining bones of her people. Then again that's in Part 1, she's evidently been through a lot by the end of Part 2).

Also according to the timeline it took Seiros at least 133 years to finally defeat Nemesis 0.o Wowzer that's a hell of a long time. Makes the five year battle to unify the continent during the game something of a steam roll. Even the seven year post Nemesis clean up is longer that the continental war during the game. Seems to be something Fire Emblem does a lot, making the backstory wars much longer than the ones that happen in gameplay, the Crusaders in the backstory taking several decades even after the Miracle of Darna to manage a victory is the first example that springs to mind (which does put them on slightly more realistic footing, though 133 years for a single war seems obscene, like I know we've had long wars in real life such as the titular 100 years war, yet as I understand it those are more separate periods of conflict rather than a single war, and I can't imagine, given the personalities involved, that there could really be much momentary peace between Seiros and Nemesis). Also how did Nemesis not manage to produce an heir in all that time? He must have been either infertile or just super gay. Meanwhile the Elites, who did have defendants, must have been great, great, grand parents by the end of the war. I'm also not sure why Rhea ever abandoned the Saint Seiros moniker when she was already publicly beyond a super centenarian by the end of the war. When you've started a religion and have been fighting under the same face for 100 years why not just capitalize on the evident immortality you have and stick around?

Edited August 11, 2021 by Jotari

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

Seems to be something Fire Emblem does a lot, making the backstory wars much longer than the ones that happen in gameplay, the Crusaders in the backstory taking several decades even after the Miracle of Darna to manage a victory is the first example that springs to mind

It's narrative I think. They don't want to stretch a narrative out over so long a time, that is reason enough. In addition, reasons to justify massive time skips are few and writers either don't want to resort to them, or burn through them in a few games in the case of a franchise.

Next FE to use timeskips, chuck the heroes in cryostasis after they're majorly victorious. To be kept on ice until the next crisis emerges and it's time to pull them out of the freezer.

 

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

Also how did Nemesis not manage to produce an heir in all that time? He must have been either infertile or just super gay.

And neither really matters. Heirs don't always need to be sons and daughters. Yeah it'll end a dynasty, but that'd matter only if a single continuous bloodline is important to you. Dynasty changeovers are inevitable anyhow if the monarch both reigns and rules, no family can forever produce an unbroken chain of competent leaders.

Both Ancient Rome and premodern Japan got along just fine with very loose adoption rules at the elite level. Adopt a nephew, or even one of your greying beard, 'stache and copious back-hair generals barely younger than you. That can work.

And if it doesn't, leave it up to your generals to slaughter each other until one of them forcefully emerges as your successor. Can't say this wasn't detrimental to the Roman Empire, or the Eastern Roman Empire, but they miraculously survived for a while despite these succession problems. The Eastern Roman/Byzantine Empire ran into the "violent military coup" problem first in 602, and lasted until 1452, if not without bruises from civil warring. Heck, the famed Emperor Justinian who had lived in the century prior to that was a soldier of common background in his thirties when his uncle and predecessor went from general to emperor "peacefully" after the prior emperor's death.

Oh, and Holy Roman Empire- imperial elections. Usually resulted in hereditary succession through several dynasties, but the possibility of choosing otherwise always existed.

Edited August 12, 2021 by Interdimensional Observer

[Jotari]

7 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

It's narrative I think. They don't want to stretch a narrative out over so long a time, that is reason enough. In addition, reasons to justify massive time skips are few and writers either don't want to resort to them, or burn through them in a few games in the case of a franchise.

Next FE to use timeskips, chuck the heroes in cryostasis after they're majorly victorious. To be kept on ice until the next crisis emerges and it's time to pull them out of the freezer.

 

And neither really matters. Heirs don't always need to be sons and daughters. Yeah it'll end a dynasty, but that'd matter only if a single continuous bloodline is important to you. Dynasty changeovers are inevitable anyhow if the monarch both reigns and rules, no family can forever produce an unbroken chain of competent leaders.

Both Ancient Rome and premodern Japan got along just fine with very loose adoption rules at the elite level. Adopt a nephew, or even one of your greying beard, 'stache and copious back-hair generals barely younger than you. That can work.

And if it doesn't, leave it up to your generals to slaughter each other until one of them forcefully emerges as your successor. Can't say this wasn't detrimental to the Roman Empire, or the Eastern Roman Empire, but they miraculously survived for a while despite these succession problems. The Eastern Roman/Byzantine Empire ran into the "violent military coup" problem first in 602, and lasted until 1452, if not without bruises from civil warring. Heck, the famed Emperor Justinian who had lived in the century prior to that was a soldier of common background in his thirties when his uncle and predecessor went from general to emperor "peacefully" after the prior emperor's death.

Oh, and Holy Roman Empire- imperial elections. Usually resulted in hereditary succession through several dynasties, but the possibility of choosing otherwise always existed.

Sure you're right and all, but it's a bit irrelevant given Nemesis's dynasty did end with him.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

14 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

And neither really matters. Heirs don't always need to be sons and daughters. Yeah it'll end a dynasty, but that'd matter only if a single continuous bloodline is important to you. Dynasty changeovers are inevitable anyhow if the monarch both reigns and rules, no family can forever produce an unbroken chain of competent leaders.

An adoptive heir would lack the Crest of Flames, and thereby, the ability to wield the Sword of the Creator. Inheritance may not matter in the real world, but it does in one where magical blood is canonical.

...Admittedly, they may be able to use some weird "blood ritual", like how Jeralt got the Crest of Seiros.

16 hours ago, Jotari said:

At the time, yeah, sure, that makes sense. But Rhea has over a thousand years after the fact to alter history and change the facts. So she's either just not actually that great at convincing the populous to care what she cares about, or she genuinely doesn't care about Nemesis once he's dead and buried (I mean dead as far as she knows, though even when he's revived he's the one that seems to have more guff with her than vice versa, despite Rhea being shown to clearly not be over what he did with how preciously she treats the remaining bones of her people. Then again that's in Part 1, she's evidently been through a lot by the end of Part 2).

Then she'd be at risk of being "caught in a lie". She's said that the descendants of the Ten Elites were "blessed by the Goddess", and now she's saying that their ancestors were actually murderous thieves? Why should anyone take her, or the Church, seriously at that point?

16 hours ago, Jotari said:

Also according to the timeline it took Seiros at least 133 years to finally defeat Nemesis 0.o Wowzer that's a hell of a long time. Makes the five year battle to unify the continent during the game something of a steam roll. Even the seven year post Nemesis clean up is longer that the continental war during the game. Seems to be something Fire Emblem does a lot, making the backstory wars much longer than the ones that happen in gameplay, the Crusaders in the backstory taking several decades even after the Miracle of Darna to manage a victory is the first example that springs to mind (which does put them on slightly more realistic footing, though 133 years for a single war seems obscene, like I know we've had long wars in real life such as the titular 100 years war, yet as I understand it those are more separate periods of conflict rather than a single war, and I can't imagine, given the personalities involved, that there could really be much momentary peace between Seiros and Nemesis).

Checking the bad wiki, the war lasted from the year 32 to the year 98, with Nemesis having been killed in year 91. So, "only" 66 years.

The timing of the tragedy of the Red Canyon isn't made explicit, although it looks to have been before year -41 (when Seiros appeared in Enbarr). I assume 91 - (-41) + 1 is where you're getting 133 years from?

I'd be curious what Seiros was doing in the 74 years before the war started. Maybe she didn't immediately realize Nemesis was responsible for killing her kin? Also, what was Nemesis doing? Was he a major power then, or little more than a bandit leader?

[Jotari]

14 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

An adoptive heir would lack the Crest of Flames, and thereby, the ability to wield the Sword of the Creator. Inheritance may not matter in the real world, but it does in one where magical blood is canonical.

...Admittedly, they may be able to use some weird "blood ritual", like how Jeralt got the Crest of Seiros.

Then she'd be at risk of being "caught in a lie". She's said that the descendants of the Ten Elites were "blessed by the Goddess", and now she's saying that their ancestors were actually murderous thieves? Why should anyone take her, or the Church, seriously at that point?

Checking the bad wiki, the war lasted from the year 32 to the year 98, with Nemesis having been killed in year 91. So, "only" 66 years.

The timing of the tragedy of the Red Canyon isn't made explicit, although it looks to have been before year -41 (when Seiros appeared in Enbarr). I assume 91 - (-41) + 1 is where you're getting 133 years from?

I'd be curious what Seiros was doing in the 74 years before the war started. Maybe she didn't immediately realize Nemesis was responsible for killing her kin? Also, what was Nemesis doing? Was he a major power then, or little more than a bandit leader?

Yeah I was counting from the date Seiros first showed up, which I'm  pretty sure is confirmed to have happened after the massacre. Granted I did frame my  initial comment as "for her to finally defeat him", and then I guess kind of forgot about the dates when going on to suggest the war was fought for that long (also for anyone wondering where the +1 comes from, there was apparently a year 0 in Fodlan, unlike in our world). Though with the added context of it taking forty years to establish the empire and a further thirty years to actually get around to fighting Seiros, it does bring up more questions than it answers. Did it take her three quarters of a century to sleuth around to discover the truth? Or did it just take her that long to turn Adrestia into a force powerful enough to actually take Nemesis on? If it's the former I wonder how she even managed to discover the truth in the end after all that time, and if its the latter then I'm surprised she managed to have the patience and restraint to actually hold off on attacking so long. Course patience with an immortal being has a whole different connotation.

[lenticular]

22 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

...Admittedly, they may be able to use some weird "blood ritual", like how Jeralt got the Crest of Seiros.

If that were possible, then there probably wouldn't have been any need for the experiments that were done on Edelgard, her sinblings, Lysithea, etc. I assume that it only owrked on Jeralt (and the first Hresvelg emperor, etc.) because it was coming directly from Rhea/Seiros and hadn't been "diluted" by intervening human blood.

17 hours ago, Jotari said:

Also according to the timeline it took Seiros at least 133 years to finally defeat Nemesis 0.o Wowzer that's a hell of a long time.

Pretty much everything in the game that covers the timeline of the distant past comes from extremely unreliable sources, mind. And it would be very much in character for Rhea to exaggerate the timescales involved to try to portray a heroic age with larger than life characters who lived for centuries.

[Alastor15243]

2 minutes ago, lenticular said:

If that were possible, then there probably wouldn't have been any need for the experiments that were done on Edelgard, her sinblings, Lysithea, etc. I assume that it only owrked on Jeralt (and the first Hresvelg emperor, etc.) because it was coming directly from Rhea/Seiros and hadn't been "diluted" by intervening human blood.

Rhea did it on tons of high-ranking church members though, hence the white beasts in the Silver Snow final battle. Were all of them Crestless? Does she not let people with Crests get too high-ranking in the church?

Edited August 12, 2021 by Alastor15243

[lenticular]

Just now, Alastor15243 said:

Rhea did it on tons of high-ranking church members though, hence the white beasts in the Silver Snow final battle.

Yeah, but they were all taking transfusions directly from Rhea, no? My assumption is that you can get the crest of Seiros via transfusion directly from Seiros but not from some random human who happens to carry it.

[Jotari]

3 minutes ago, lenticular said:

Yeah, but they were all taking transfusions directly from Rhea, no? My assumption is that you can get the crest of Seiros via transfusion directly from Seiros but not from some random human who happens to carry it.

On this note I sort of wonder why none of the Agarthans have crests. They were the ones who managed to get Nemesis and the 10 elites crests, and some book seven suggest a few of the elites didn't partake in the Zanado massacre. So he had blood left over from it just lying around. Why did Thales never lap up some of that himself to get crest powers? Maybe it was considered too dangerous at the time and so they wanted to use humans as guinea pigs? And by the time of the game's era they didn't have any blood lying around and so resorted to Lysethia and Edelgard's experimentation to get it. Though they also had Rhea locked up for five years and never did anything with her.

[Alastor15243]

Three Houses Day 9: Monastery Busywork

Busy morning unfortunately, so this is gonna be a relatively short update. My main priority today is to answer a question that has been burning in the back of my mind for ages, and I've already mentioned that I'm going to solve it once and for all earlier in the playlog. I promise I'll at least get that far today.

So here comes the obligatory opening talk with Rhea for the month, and oh-so-conveniently, they've freshly received word of the next crisis we'll be dealing with a month from now.

Rhea: Lord Lonato is a minor lord of the Kingdom. He has been showing hostility toward the church for some time now.

…

…

…

…

…

So he let his adopted son go to school there?

Isn't he even the slightest bit worried that could have bad consequences, either for him or for Ashe?

Seteth: A vanguard unit from the knights of Seiros is already on its way to his stronghold, Castle Gaspard. Lord Lonato's army is nothing compared to the knights. It is quite possible the rebellion has already been suppressed.

Rhea: Even so, I would like for your class to travel with the knights' rear guard to deal with the aftermath.

Seteth: War zones are unpredictable. We do not expect you will have cause to battle, but be prepared for the worst.

This all seems... amazingly cavalier. Like, they don't have fucking clue one what this mission will even look like at this stage, but they're assigning it now anyway.

Also, so, I saw someone point this out... this begins the part of White Clouds that really, really feels Blue Lions centric. We get two missions in the Kingdom, a bunch on campus, one in an empty Empire field, one in some village whose country isn't really relevant, and that's it. The only country we get to “see” before Part 2 is the Kingdom, if you can call anything we do in Three Houses “seeing”. You'd think this and the one with Sylvain's brother would change depending on the route, no?

Rhea: This mission should prove useful in demonstrating to the students how foolish it would be to ever turn their blades on the church.

...Ah. Ah, so that's why she's so insistent on the class doing it. It's not actually primarily a service to the world, it's an extremely creepy threat.

And yet again we get an entire fucking week off of classes for some reason. Why do we get so many week-long vacations?

...Actually, oddly, if we only get 15 school days a month, that actually kinda justifies the complete lack of any proper vacations or holidays, since that still totals to exactly 180 school days a year, which is at least the modern American standard.

...Except they're implied to have class on Saturdays too. But actually, that works even better. Because if we count Saturdays too, then it's 18 school days a month, which is 216 a year, which is a little more than the modern Japanese standard.

Aaaaanyway...

...Time to do it.

Time to go to the market place, buy fishing supplies...

...and time how the fuck long it takes to expend a month's worth of bait.

...Nope, can't buy bait yet. Ah well, guess I'll do the month's quests first.

...God damn it, I had an epiphany about how to explain further why the Monastery rubs me the wrong way so much, but I feel gross even attempting to put it into words. The thing is that this game just feels so tailor-made to piss me off, has so many off-putting things in so many areas, that I just can't keep up with it all. It's all coming at me so fast that the past week's worth of entries have just felt like rapid-fire bitchfests without nearly the amount of substance I set out to put into these things when I started this. I feel like this is still day one of the playlog, nine entries in, and I'm still experiencing information overload because complaints are just occurring to me way too fast, and I'm just hoping it'll eventually slow down to enough of a trickle that I can dedicate more time to playing than writing and actually make some damned progress towards finishing this slog of a game, but I don't even know if that'll ever happen.

I feel like I need a new system for this game, but I have no idea what that system would be. But the “talk about whatever comes to mind as you play” system that used to work for me now has me feeling like I'm just vomiting disjointed complaints onto the page because I don't have time to properly address every single one of them.

It's almost like I'm in a debate with this game, and the game is Gish galloping me.

Christ.

...Fuck it, this isn't making the playlog go any faster. I'm just going to shut the fuck up, complete the monastery visit, and get back to you when I'm done. No matter what happens, I will not go back to this laptop until the next free time event.

It is currently 12:18 PM. I'll let you know what time it is when I return.

Alright, I'm back, at 12:39. So 21 minutes later. I did 11 counts of fishing (fastest possible time with that, since I got perfects continuously until the very last A press), got a support with Annette, recruited Constance, finished all the quests for the month, and did the lessons for everyone.

Given that I started timing myself at some point while it was already in progress... I'm going to hazard a guess that at bare minimum, all of that took half an hour.

Which, given that none of it was fun... is a lot of time to invest into a game.

I've also got an auxiliary battle lined up for quests, I think paralogues start opening up this month...

...Yeah, no matter how quickly I try to optimize getting through this game, I don't think it's physically possible to continue commentary on it at the rate I've been going. We'll just get nowhere fast.

...But how to handle this instead...?

...I think I'm going to try something out tomorrow... and do the exact same thing I just did, but for literally everything leading up to the end-of-month mission. Just play through it while refusing to commentate, tell you how long it took, and then comment on what I can still remember to talk about after the fact.

...Shit, I also have supports I need to talk about, let's get those out of the way now, since I can't skip over those...

...Oh thank goodness, it's just one. Ashe and Sylvain.

...I am... profoundly confused. All I can really read from this is that Sylvain's got some vendetta against the knighthood, because... he just seems to have contempt for it and Ashe's commitment to becoming one, and his arguments don't make sense and... honestly feel like they trip over each other at one point.

...And then he seems to just be using this as a segue to... start picking up chicks.

I really don't get what Sylvain's trying to accomplish here. Is he trying (unsuccessfully) to get Ashe to be like him... so he can feel better about doing it himself? Or is it because he'd get some sick satisfaction out of corrupting him? I genuinely do not get the impression he actually believes his flirting with women is in any way part of being a good knight or a good person.

...It's kind of hilarious that I'm so lost here. I've used this guy extensively in my Verdant Wind campaign and I barely remember anything about his supports, so I feel completely in the dark about his motivations here except for the one thing about him resenting his duties as a Crest-bearer, trying to have fun while he can, and thinking all women are materialistic gold-diggers that only want him for his crest.

Yeah, uh... the support system of this game... no, fuck it, it doesn't feel like the right time to rant about this. All I'll say for now, to sum it up in one sentence, is that the game just vomits so fucking many supports on you due to how easy they are to get, to the point that basically every character in the game has completely overstayed their welcome for me, I don't give much of a shit about any of them, and also I struggle to remember even a single one of their supports by the time the campaign is done.

...Ugh, I'm running out of time for today. Gotta end things here.

Hopefully I'll get the hang of this soon.

Stay safe, everyone.

[Shadow Mir]

58 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Yeah, uh... the support system of this game... no, fuck it, it doesn't feel like the right time to rant about this. All I'll say for now, to sum it up in one sentence, is that the game just vomits so fucking many supports on you due to how easy they are to get, to the point that basically every character in the game has completely overstayed their welcome for me, I don't give much of a shit about any of them, and also I struggle to remember even a single one of their supports by the time the campaign is done.

I'm gonna be really blunt - you sound like NOTHING the series does about supports pleases you.

Edited August 12, 2021 by Shadow Mir

[Alastor15243]

21 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

I'm gonna be really blunt - you sound like NOTHING the series does about supports pleases you.

I've had complaints about most implementations, but that doesn't mean I don't like the support system itself. It certainly doesn't mean nothing the series ever does with them pleases me.

Edited August 12, 2021 by Alastor15243

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

On this note I sort of wonder why none of the Agarthans have crests. They were the ones who managed to get Nemesis and the 10 elites crests, and some book seven suggest a few of the elites didn't partake in the Zanado massacre. So he had blood left over from it just lying around. Why did Thales never lap up some of that himself to get crest powers? Maybe it was considered too dangerous at the time and so they wanted to use humans as guinea pigs? And by the time of the game's era they didn't have any blood lying around and so resorted to Lysethia and Edelgard's experimentation to get it. Though they also had Rhea locked up for five years and never did anything with her.

Important distinction - Edelgard had Rhea locked up. We don't know whether or not the Agarthans were aware of her capture. The fact that Rhea is found alive and (relatively) unharmed suggests they were not. Even though that's an implausibly big secret for Edelgard to keep for that long.

3 hours ago, lenticular said:

Yeah, but they were all taking transfusions directly from Rhea, no? My assumption is that you can get the crest of Seiros via transfusion directly from Seiros but not from some random human who happens to carry it.

Maybe? I honestly don't know. There's nothing in terms of presentation that distinguishes Rhea's Major Crest of Seiros from Jeralt's Major Crest of Seiros. Maybe Major Crest bearers can transfuse it away, but Minor Crest bearers cannot? Seems just as plausible. 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Rhea: This mission should prove useful in demonstrating to the students how foolish it would be to ever turn their blades on the church.

...Ah. Ah, so that's why she's so insistent on the class doing it. It's not actually primarily a service to the world, it's an extremely creepy threat.

These are my favorite Rhea moments. The kind that hint toward her "psycho control freak" side that takes over on CF.

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

It's almost like I'm in a debate with this game, and the game is Gish galloping me.

Christ.

Oh? You don't like Three Houses supports? But what about Dimitri/Marianne, huh? Or Felix/Dedue? How about Alois/Shamir, huh? That's not even mentioning Ferdinand/Linhardt, or Balthus/Constance. What's that? You thought I'd forget to bring up Edelgard/Dorothea? You thought wrong. And if you think you can get out of this without Flayn/Seteth or Ashe/Ingrid coming up, well, you'd better think again.

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

I've also got an auxiliary battle lined up for quests, I think paralogues start opening up this month...

The first proper Paralogue won't show up until Chapter 6. I generally like how this game does Paralogues, but it really feels like they drop them onto you in a "zero to sixty" fashion.