Fire Emblem

Yeah, the system data saved by your 3DS is not the same as a save file slot save. For a Switch comparison, after completing Cindered Shadows in Three Houses, it automatically writes to Threes Houses' that every playthrough will now have access to the Wolves and other DLC stuff. You can go on a total delete spree, cleaning out every single save slot, and it would not affect your access to those. Same deal with Awakening.

It is time for the Maddening Deer Banes Only run to field their ultimate weapon: ...Armour Lysithea?

Ghast released yesterday a video about 7 things he would like FE to do less in the future. What are y'all thoughts about it?

For those who don't feel like checking it, the points are:

• Low amount of Save Slots (equal/less than 5 making no sense given IS' usual excuse for them being low in the past no longer applies).
• Same turn reinforcements being used to make the game harder.
• Incomplete support ranks (both in the sense some supports give no boons while some support chains don't reach A rank).
• How some resources being unintentionally(?) infinite mess up the difficulty & progression (Think 3H fishing allowing you to raise professor rank super early once you figure out how it works).
• Gacha mechanics.
• Highly accessible reclassing removing unit identity.
• IS using self-inserts to promote power fantasy to increasingly new levels with each new entry.

Next self insert will be interesting to see.

I saw an argument the other day arguing just the opposite about reclassing; that in games without reclassing, every unit of the same class was fundamentally the same regardless of their stats. Every Myrmidon was a Fragile Speedster, and if one had a lower speed growth than another then the slower one was just a flat-out worse unit because they couldn't perform its classes role as well.

I kinda hope the next Avatar isn't some merc or some dragon character. Like a wyvern lord or something new like a merchant who studies sll sorts of skills a jack of all trades.

i think highly accessible reclassing nullifying unit identity is a bit of a moot point nowadays, considering personal skills have existed since Fates

i think personal skills go a long way to giving a unit their own identity, and after playing through Engage and re-playing through Fates i do think making personal skills stronger/more impactful might go a distance for that

i do agree that making the protagonist a self-insert for every game since (debatably) Awakening has gotten really boring, though. i guess Alear is slightly stronger in the personality department, but letting "your" character be highly customizable and letting the game have an actual developed main character is preferable, imo

Robin and Shez before their respective "actually host to an evil god" reveals are the closest to the ideal avatar, in my opinion. Instead of being some demigod power fantasy who keeps getting shilled in-universe, the avatar should just be some ordinary tactician/mercenary who happens to serve as the player's viewpoint character. Corrin and Alear were just... the worst.

As far as supports go, I wouldn't mind if they did what FE Warriors did; everybody can achieve C-A support ranks with everybody else, but only specific pairs have actual conversations. That way you can still reap the gameplay benefits of your units becoming stronger allies.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Dec 17th 2023 at 2:47:36 PM

I'm interested to see what the next Avatar character is like as well. I think the series did a good job with all of the Avatars, so I'm pretty optimistic that I will like the next one as well.

It'd be interesting to see what the next new game in the series is like, and how the Avatar character fits into the story and mechanics they want to put in. I really liked how Alear fit in with the themes of Engage, so I'm at least hoping the next Avatar will be similar in that regard.

• Yeah, the save slot thing has no real excuse.
• Either eliminate ambush spawns or telegraph them better. Awakening does the best job of telegraphing it, and even some of its maps are pretty dubious.
• Agreed on the Warriors way of doing handling the support ranks being a good way to do it. It also has the side effect of allowing the writers to just dodge writing anything for two characters who wouldn't result in good conversations.
• I think the unintentionally infinite resources are kind of whatever. There's still a cost to things like 3H and Engage fishing. Which is to say, having to spend extended amounts of time dealing with their jankness. I would argue that all the forced freebies that Engage introduces do far, far more to unbalance the game. And that's before accounting for the more optional ones, like the Well, completely destroying any semblance of balance (I think there's something to be said about me being able to have Endgame-ready builds in Chapter 7 when using it).
• The Engage gacha mechanics don't really bother me. Most C and B Bond Rings are good enough, so it really doesn't matter that the S-ranks are so unavailable—aside from making me wonder why the devs even bothered to put effort into something 99% of players won't ever see drop.
• I don't see any issue with highly accessible reclassing as long as it's designed around. DSFE leans very hard on weapon ranks to differentiate characters. Awakening makes Second Seals relatively rare, so you have to make a conscious choice on what you use. Fates is a bit looser on the reclassing Seals, but then requires friendship/marriage for the really desirable stuff, so there's a cost there. Three Houses has the boon/bane and combat art system. Engage is maybe the only one that went a little too far. Which is to say, it tried to do a softer combination DSFE and Awakening thing, with weapon proficiencies and somewhat restricted Second Seals. However, it then proceeded to make the weapon proficiencies not matter at all, since everyone is always max rank for their class, and it costs and absolutely trivial amount of Bond Fragments to get most units most proficiencies (especially with the likes of Leif around). But Engage probably also could have even rolled with that by just making the personal skills stronger.
• I'd argue that most of what people consider self-inserts are just customizable characters with personalities made for broader appeal (regardless of whether it works or not). For instance, Corrin has a very clear naive personality that isn't really self-inserty. Only Mark and Byleth really fall into the self-insert category. So rather than dwell on this, I'd say the writers should just focus on improving their main character writing.

Tonight on Maddening Deer Banes Only, a village burns down, and then we go fishing in celebration! Er, wait...

Well I think it would be neat to go back to a fully Lord focused narrative without the self insert aspects like the older games.

That said, I doubt they’ll ever drop the avatar system considering it’s been such a profitable draw for the series.

And characters like Alear and Corrin do blur the line between Lord and Avatar.

Maddening Deer Banes Only babysits Jeralt! Without Physic. Oh, boy.

I'm getting really sick of doing castle battles in Fates. Right now, I have 4296 BP and 4880 VP. I've done several playthroughs of each route, but are the last 3 items worth getting?

They're worth a lot of stats, but that's doubling the grind you've already done for things that are ultimately not necessary. I wouldn't do it.

Someone did a huge (+5000 voters) popularity poll about Engage's characters almost one year after launch, and I found it quite interesting.

Info to know about this poll:

• Some JP fans voted in it (no idea how many though).
• 64.7% of voters were male; 23.2% were female, and 9.4% were non-binary/other/didn't want to say.
• It didn't allow you to vote for Engage's Anna to avoid series mascot biases and such. Oh and Mitan and other very minor NP Cs were not elegible.
• You could vote for any characters you liked once.

The top 20 most popular Engage characters, almost one year after release, according to over 5000 people on the internet, are the following:

• 1.Yunaka

• 2.Ivy

• 3.Alcryst

• 4.Diamant

• 5.Sommie

• 6.Veyle

• 7.Lapis

• 8.Alear (Female)

• 9.Panette

• 10.Citrinne

• 11.Timerra

• 12.Merrin

• 13.Rosado

• 14.Pandreo

• 15.Goldmary

• 16.Chlóe

• 17.Fogado

• 18.Alear (Male)

• 19.Celine

• 20.Kagetsu

As for noteworthy info that came out thanks to it:

• The top 5 popular characters according to men are: Yunaka, Ivy, Diamant, Lapis & Veyle.
• The top 5 popular characters according to women are: Alcryst, Ivy, Yunaka, Alear (Female) & Diamant.
• The top 5 popular characters according to non-binary/others are: Alcryst, Yunaka, Rosado, Ivy & Sommie.
• Bunet is the most unpopular playable character with only 184 votes.
• Also, Hyacinth is the most unpopular NPC with only 60 votes.
• As for the DLC gang:
  • Nel is the most popular dude(tte) at 790 votes.
  • Save for Gregory, the Four Winds are far more popular than the Four Hounds.

The Winds seem more interedting than the Hounds.

Assuming this popularity poll only asked which character you liked the most, I wouldn't call the characters at the bottom of the poll "unpopular." They just have the least number of people who like them the most.

I'm having fun imagining Alcryst's reaction to learning he's more popular with the ladies than Diamant, according to that poll. I can see him either telling himself those are just "pity votes" or just flat-out bluescreening trying to make sense of it all.

He's clearly not familiar with the concept of Weakness Turns Her On.

In any case None of my faves broke the top ten which further proves everyone but me has terrible taste.

Edited by ShirowShirow on Dec 26th 2023 at 10:44:54 AM

I am not surprised Yunaka and Alcryst proved popular. I do kind of wish I'd used Diamont more, now.

...I have been thinking about a second playthrough...

As for Bunet... that's complicated. I don't think he has much of a conventional fanbase, but there are definitely people entertained by how unhinged he is.

Edited by MisterTambourineMan on Dec 26th 2023 at 6:39:18 AM

Alcryst gets a lot of fan art so I’m not surprised.

He’s got a lot of ships that people like with him between Alear, Lapis, Fogado, Celine and unfortunately Diamant & Citrinne(to a lesser extent)

TBH I'm just glad Bunet bit the bullet that would probably have gone to poor Saphir.

An older dark-skinned physical fighter that actually looks her age? God forbid it was a miracle she passed the design phase in the first place.

TBH the whole cast of Engage feels a bit overshadowed by the presence of the old heroes. Reminds me of the "Second Generation" of Fates, a collection of loveable weirdos that never really get the chance to shine thanks to the plot not being about them.

Still better than Honorable Cavalier #5 from the Kaga era...

I love your games Kaga, really do, but it must be said.

I do remember the last-placer in the original FEH Choose Your Legends (Oh hey they'll do another one soon) was one of said Honorable Cavaliers. I'm surprised they didn't decide to roll with it and make him playable later and have everyone constantly remark how shit he is.

Saphir doesn't look her age at all. She's supposed to be 35 according to the hidden age values but she looks like she's in her 50's or 60's.