Fire Emblem

x3 Well, you could, but pegasi (and well, most front-line classes, really) do way better as fed juggernauts, so you'd really only be crippling yourself (or leaving half the army twiddling their thumbs while the juggernauts take flight). Classes try to be important, but they largely boil down to two questions: "Do they have 1~2-range access?" and "How good is their mobility?" Unless the answers are "No." and "Cripplingly bad.", then it's all about the stats and keeping said stats ahead of the curve. Such is the result of Fire Emblems' system of infinite counterattacks and simple formulae.

FE: Genealogy Story Run 7PM PT Sun, Mon, Fri; Expert Unicorn Overlord 7PM PT Wed, Thurs: http://www.twitch.tv/kuroitsubasatenshi

1st gen Awakening and Fates strikes a nice balance for class changing. Allows some customization if you want it, but each unit has their own set that keeps everyone a bit distinct. And if you want to ignore it, it's perfectly doable with no issues aside from Donnel and Mozu.

Edited by Sterok on Jan 11th 2019 at 3:01:22 AM

Fair, and her bad bases definitely do her no favors. Most of what I was thinking about being cavalry doing her no favors though, is that it badly hurts her mobility in the Dawn Brigade's numerous indoors chapters due to how important ledge control and how helpful ledge traversal is.

Though it is worth appreciating is that nobody in RD is so bad as to be unusable, save perhaps for Tormod, king of poor availability once he finally returns (a chapter focusing on Tormod, Muarim, and Vika and giving them an excuse to level grind would have been welcome). I enjoyed doing an all low-tier unit run, and if anything more than a normal run (though, especially with how exploitable BEXP is, eventually the difference kind of goes away). Still gotta go back and do all-sword, all-lance, all-bow, all-axe, all-magic, and all-Laguz runs.

Resileafs: Radiant Dawn has 72 playable characters, which means there are 5,112 possible pairings, which would require 15,336 conversations. Other games may have similarly huge casts, but there are significantly fewer pairings. That's why I think making individual conversations for every pairing is a daunting task

Balmung: That's true, but it would at least mean she isn't completely useless; if she's a Gold Knight, she can at least hold her own in the densely-packed maps, and a high starting level would work to fix her lack of availability.

Regrading a Genealogy remake, I have not played Genealogy, but I know about the huge-ass maps, which would rather require a home console rather than just a handheld (I consider the Switch to be a home console). I think they could reasonably remake Genealogy using the Three Houses engine, and since Genealogy apparently takes place on a grander scale than the other games, having hundreds of soldiers visible on-screen would very much work in its favour.

Come to think of it, Three Houses looks to be taking some cues from Game of Thrones. Genealogy also has quite a bit in common with Game of Thrones, and I'm not just talking about the incest.

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Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, chapter 10: Princess Minerva

The Akaneia Alliance reaches the area where Catria said Maria was being held hostage. The prison is well guarded by Grustian troops, and Minerva is also here, leading a substantial air force. The enemy has promoted units for the first time.

I'm not going to start a map without Shiida, Cain, Abel, Ogma, and Nabarl. There are two treasure chests and some locked doors, so Julian comes along, as does Rickard so he can give Julian his lockpick. Hardin also joins as a good all-rounder, Bantu for stonewalling, Gordin to deal with fliers, Merric in case I need extra anti-armour, and Lena for healing. I also throw in Wolf to bring up the numbers.

When the battle begins, a text box advises me to hurry to rescue Maria. My army starts in the northwest and the prison entrance is in the south, so I quickly run down the map, pursued by Minerva's troops. At the entrance, I manage to take out a Thief before he can get into the prison, then I send Abel and Shiida west to deal with the enemy cavalry while the rest enters the prison, Bantu staying back to guard the entrance with Gordin behind. Minerva halts her advance by the northeast wall, so fortunately I won't have to fight her.

My Mercenaries take out a couple of Knights, and then my cavalry rushed the Grustian Archers and Sniper, taking them out handily. As Rickard raids the treasure chests, nabbing a levin sword and a Physic, Marth and Julian make for Maria's cell, and Abel and Shiida do a sterling job of clearing the western field. At the entrance, Gordin nabs a ton of free Exp by shooting the Dracoknights and Pegasus Knights with his bows. In the west, a homeowner tells me about the three great wizards Archbishop Miloah, Dark Pontifex Gharnef (say, isn't he the baddie?), and Archsage Gotoh. But Miloah is dead now. Another one tells me about how levin swords can pierce armour.

Marth speaks to Maria, who thanks him for saving her and asks him to explain what happened to her big sister. She also decides to join my army as another healer. It's good to have her, but I suspect I'll be sticking with Lena. Marth and Maria make for the entrance, and around this time a bunch of Cavaliers, Horsemen, and Knights appear in the northeast corner, while the last few enemies in the north and west begin advancing on Abel and Shiida, who are hanging around by the western settlement.

Abel and Shiida make quick work of the enemies who come after them, nabbing a Speedwing and a Hero Crest. Woohoo, promotions! Minerva flies ahead of the enemy reinforcements and approaches Marth to speak to him; she thanks him for rescuing Maria and apologises for fighting against him, but now that Maria is safe, her Pegasus Knights will be free to come to the Alliance's aid; alas, they have been separated (so, uh, what happened to Catria), but for now Minerva will lend me her spear. She also would like to for her traitorous brother to die by her own hand. Yes, another flier! Everybody retreats back inside the castle, which is still being guaded by Bantu, and Minerva gets the levin swords and a silver sword.

Bantu and Gordin soften up the reinforcements, and then Minerva, Cain, Ogma, Hardin, and Nabarl go kill them. With that, all that's left is the boss. Julian opens the northern door and my army advances.

Ogma stops by the storage tent to pick up the Hero Crest and becomes my first promotion. Sweet. Minerva uses the Speedwing to gain 6 speed, ameliorating her most glaring weakness. Cain and Abel buy silver lances at the armoury, and Minerva and Nabarl take down the boss with their anti-armour weapons.

When Marth seizes the castle, Nyna tells him more about Miloah. Miloah was a great sage who wielded the tome Aura, but he was killed by Doluna forces. However, he had a daughter, Linde, who can also wield the tome, but she has been sold into slavery. Welp, looks like that's my next stop.

Takings: Physic, Levin sword

New units: Maria, Minerva

Levelups: Abel, Shiida, Hardin, Bantu, Gordin, Ogma, Nabarl, Minerva

Promotions: Ogma

Ukrainian Red Cross

If Radiant Dawn where to get a remake, they really should scrap the "Everyone can support with everyone"-system.

"Death's vastness holds no peace. I come at the end of the long road—neither human, nor devil... All bends to my will." -Demifiend.

They should do that anyway. I liked seeing who could support with each other, and I feel like everyone supporting each other diminishes that. Also because that system is used for marriages I found I was missing out on fun friendly supports. Everything has to have a flirty undertone because they have to plausibly get married at the end of it, and there aren’t as many same-sex conversations either.

And it sort of gives the impression that even after they’re paired off, EVERYONE in Awakening is screwing each other.

I will never agree with the idea of getting rid of everyone supporting with each other. If anything, they should add more same-sex supports and more for the extra characters.

Edited by LordVatek on Jan 11th 2019 at 8:27:36 AM

This song needs more love.

...Wait, does Awakening have that system? Since I am not to well versed on the 3DS games.

"Death's vastness holds no peace. I come at the end of the long road—neither human, nor devil... All bends to my will." -Demifiend.

With a couple exceptions, everyone in Awakening can get S-rank with anyone of the opposite sex, yes.

Oh, I see. I had the idea of the support system in a Radiant Dawn remake to be like the ones from the GBA games, since trying to come up with unique supports for EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER would be way too time-consuming to do with the everyone can support with everyone system.

Edited by dood9780 on Jan 11th 2019 at 5:40:47 AM

"Death's vastness holds no peace. I come at the end of the long road—neither human, nor devil... All bends to my will." -Demifiend.

By generation.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Jan 11th 2019 at 8:40:48 AM

You cannot firmly grasp the true form of Squidward's technique!

Well if the next game doesn't have marriage, that should remove all the flirty undertones except for those who would naturally flirt. Hopefully they remove marriage, after two games I'm done with that particular mechanic, especially with how awkward it was in Fates.

I'm expecting Shipping Simulator but not kids after how they were implemented in Fates got roasted on both sides of the Pacific.

IIRC Awakening was even the first game to pioneer "Supports for everybody" for the franchise.

x8 That's just asking for a game to end up in development hell for two decades while they write the insanely huge script for it.

x5 Awakening and Fates have a sort of compromise system to that, but it felt like that was over-ambitious for them, since a lot of kid convos ended up having to be copypastas. The same-sex ones are limited, usually to two per character. They're also some of the best ones, if you ask me. Highly recommend Owain with M!Morgan, for example.

Edited by KuroiTsubasaTenshi on Jan 11th 2019 at 7:44:19 AM

FE: Genealogy Story Run 7PM PT Sun, Mon, Fri; Expert Unicorn Overlord 7PM PT Wed, Thurs: http://www.twitch.tv/kuroitsubasatenshi

They're not going to drop the romance aspect since shippers make up a huge part of the fanbase, but ideally they at least tone down S-supports so they aren't jumping straight to marriage after a completely platonic C-A support chain. Hopefully no children either.

I'd actually like them to take a page out of Warriors' book, where anybody can support with anybody with no restriction, but only certain pairs have actual conversations; that way everyone can reap the mechanical benefits of the Support system but they don't have to overburden the writing team.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Jan 11th 2019 at 8:46:32 AM

You cannot firmly grasp the true form of Squidward's technique!

I mean I don't expect it but if it's an issue, I would prefer if they went for a smaller cast instead.

Also Byleth is looking like an Avatar so there will almost certainly be marriage/romance.

Edited by LordVatek on Jan 11th 2019 at 8:47:06 AM

This song needs more love.

I have nothing against marriage. I just don’t need it to lead to a second generation. Just have an S-level that can only be achieved once per character.

The ideal system to me is one where every character has the ability to support with 4-8 others, depending on their importance, the Lords/Avatar can support with more or most of the cast, there’s an S-level that each character can reach once, but no limit to the number of conversations the can have below that (as opposed to the “five conversations per character” way the earlier game did it).

Even the small casts in the series have multiple dozens of characters. A good amount is 50-60. Radiant Dawn overdoes it at 72, but Sacred Stones has like, 30-something and it’s not enough variety sometimes. You basically have enough characters to get one of every class, plus a few extra cavaliers.

Edited by BadWolf21 on Jan 11th 2019 at 7:49:27 AM

Yeah, but pretty much everyone in RD is an absolute monster if you can get them to their third tier (and as a lance cavalier, her third tier is silver knight, not gold, which is swords and axes). Or really, about level 10-13 of second tier. Once a few stats start capping, BEXP breaks the rest of the game's balance in half.

And strictly speaking, boosting her level wouldn't help. Gotta boost her stats, too.

Edited by Balmung on Jan 11th 2019 at 11:23:25 AM

That's actually a really good idea & one of the highlight for Fire Emblem Warriors. It's a shame that it won't happen.

I disagree even though I find 8 to be a somewhat reasonable limitations. More supports means more ways to flesh out a character. Especially when they're not a Lord or an Avatar. That support limitation back in the GBA era is still incredibly dumb & fakest longevity I've seen for a game to have.

Allowing everyone to support everyone increases the amount of necessary writing exponentially while also limiting characterization by having everyone able to be friends/lovers with everyone else, regardless of personality.

Frankly it seems like a lose-lose to me.

Limiting the amount of supports available to a single character within a single game is just unnecessary though.

Edited by Clarste on Jan 12th 2019 at 2:01:06 AM

How so? It's not like you have to make them S-Support each other

Your conclusion does not flow logically from your premise.

Regarding support limitations, I would guess that was a balancing issue in the early days of the system, since characters would get the bonuses from every adjacent unit with which they have a support relationship. Awakening and Fates changed it up so that they only get the bonus from one adjacent unit, which means there's no reason to restrict the number of support conversations a character can unlock.

Balmung: You are correct.

Ukrainian Red Cross

S supports are garbage by their very design. Saving the romance for the S support alone is terrible. It needs to go away. If they want a romantic support, just have C-B-A which is romantic in nature. The GBA system of handling supports was better, even if you can't unlock the majority of them. Having a limit on the number of supports a character can have in one playthrough allows for support chains to be focused. You can have romantic supports from C to A if that character can't get to A with multiple characters. Otherwise, C to A is just random shit with a tacked on S support.

I like the S-ranked supports and really hope that they stay for future games (except for remakes of games that originally didn't have them, though I wouldn't be angry if they were added). I do hope that future games continue to do what Fates did with S-ranked supports: grant access to new classes depending on the pair that reached S-rank.