#lucia plays fire emblem radiant dawn

[calamitaswrath]

Guys I'm not getting any more stats with Lucia what do I do :(

[nagargent]

toa anniversary munday!

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is.

Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing!

Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together.

Name: Nic

Pronouns: they/them

Birthday (no year): 14th July

Where are you from? What is your time zone? The UK (BST)

Roleplay experience: I started around like '06 via msn or stuff doing Harry Potter or Naruto rp with my friends.

Got any pets?: Catcat!

Favorite time of year: Summer - I hate the heat but like, I need the sunlight to keep myself together

Some interests and things you like: Reading, writing, languages and linguistics, astrophysics, mythology, history, animals uh... I find almost everything interesting and it definitely keeps me awake a lot.

Some funfacts & trivia about you: I fell asleep at a scout camp once in the toilets and didn't hear the tannoy that was sent out for me. My grandfather taught me how to stroke bees. I love water/the oceans/seas/rivers but never learned how to swim. Peas scare me. I'm pretty good at -- and rather competitive about trivia games and quizzes.

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play?: The Sims! Dragon Age, Persona, Story of Seasons, Rune Factory, Stardew Valley, Wildermyth

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: Fire or Fairy and I just think Dreepy is very endearing.

How did you get into Fire Emblem?: I saw a review of it on a news channel and decided to try it out. Then I became obsessed and haven't looked back since.

What Fire Emblem games have you played? I've watched playthroughs and read scripts for all but I played about half of fe5, fe7 (lyn and eliwood modes only though), fe8, 3/4 of fe9 before my emulator crashed, fe10 and everything post Awakening.

First Fire Emblem game: Fates

Favorite Fire Emblem game: Either Genealogy, Radiant Dawn or Three Houses

Any Fire Emblem crushes?: Ayra, Mercedes, Camilla, Lucia, Diamant, Jeorge, Sonya and oh my god I hate myself for this but Sylvain.

If you’ve played the following games, who was your first S support? Who would you S support nowadays? - Awakening: Chrom but now I'd probably opt for Libra or Henry? - Fates: Takumi before I knew what an S support was. Kaze as a neutral pick, Subaki for Hoshido and Niles for Nohr - Three Houses: Dimitri or Mercedes ? - Engage: Yunaka was my first!

Favorite Fire Emblem class: DARK FLIER. but also any pegasus class is so chefs kiss for me

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class? I'd want to be a pegasus knight or a mage but I could see myself being an armoured unit tbh

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? LION PRIDE LETSSSSSGOOOOOO

If you were an Engage character, which Emblem would you Engage with? Micaiah :D

How did you find TOA? I just searched the fire emblem rp tags on a whim one day and found the group. Had a nosy around and was really impressed and excited to join :)

Current TOA muses: Elincia, Goldmary and Julia

Who was your first TOA muse? If you don’t have them anymore, could you see yourself picking them up again? Lincie! :D

Have you had any other TOA muses? I've had quite a lot um... Eirika, Ares, Orochi, Mercedes, Mae, Manuela, f!Shez, Macuil, Lana, Forrest, Constance, Tana & Celine

Do you think you have a type of character you gravitate towards? I do feel a big pull to healers usually? Or pegasus knights.

What do you believe you enjoy writing the most? Character's bonding and forming relationships.

Favorite TOA-related memory: Unlocked 2021 Cha Cha Slide

How do you pronounce TOA? 🤔 Usually like noah but with a t but sometimes i call it twaaah just to be silly.

Got any delusions that didn’t see the light of day that you’d like to share? 😉 Tatiana, Safy, Rodrigue, Altena and Yunaka all have either blogs or partial apps. Of them Tatiana and Rodrigue whilst still outliers could potentially hit me with a steel chair at some point in the future.

[whitewashedhanzo]

These Fire Emblem posts are really throwing me back to when i was 12 and getting into fights in the comment sections defending ships (Ike / Ranulf and Lucia / Elincia at the time) on AMVs that combined angsty Three Days Grace music and the so awful and so gay cgis of Radiant Dawn. anyways my point is thanks for reminding me of that dark time and also keep fighting that good 9/10 FE fight, the TRUE Fire Emblem(s): Gay Solidarity 🌈

:( i love ike/ranulf and lucia/elincia OMG i was so mad that lucia didnt get a paired ending with elincia but elincia would marry geoffrey instead (who is a nice guy but he um..tastes like oatmeal?) like..no offense but geoffrey is the uglier twin.

ANYWAY its so wild seeing ppl who are into fire emblem cuz like As A Geek that was probably the most formative Fandom ive ever been in (like..i was in 4th grade when i started playing the gba games) and i lov seeing new fans getting into the series and also getting mad about the gay ike conspiracy. love u

[anonarat]

And done.

So this is going to be a bit different from my other Radiant Dawn posts, as I finished the game... early this morning. The Endgame wasn’t exactly short, except the second part. Zelgius went down like a punk after Ike was equipped with a hammer.

So, to start with, I think we had the hardest level in the game, Oliver’s mansion. Hard because you start with three liabilities, have to face a ridiculous number of reinforcements and there’s a priest with a sleep staff waiting to screw you over. This level also made me wish I’d stuck Heather with Ike, especially since on the next map she wasn’t as relevant as she might have been.

Nailah is pretty much the only reason I survived this map, as she killed most of the reinforcements by herself. It was also this map that I realised that apparently Marksmen have +1 range on bows, which is amazing. Finally for this map... Oliver is recruitable ;_;

He is an odious man, but the completionist in me refuses to kill him.

Fortunately, on the next map, we get to kill Izuka, so that eases some of the pain. The chump met his end by rewarping into attack range of Mia. He did not last long. We also got Volke again, and this time as a full blown assassin from the start.

Honestly, I wish that we got him and Bastian earlier, since Volke was my main thief throughout PoR, it would have been nice to have him slightly earlier. Bastian could not compete with Soren, Sanaki and Micaiah, my primary magic users (though the latter became so because they are forced characters).

We find out that Bertram was Renning. To be honest... this didn’t feel like much of a shock, not because the information wasn’t shocking, but because we never really got emotionally invested in Renning.

I also think I may have terrible luck with drawing cards for forging.

My Endgame team consisted of (let’s see if I can remember them all):

Micaiah, Sothe, Ike, Kurthnaga, Ena, Elincia, Sanaki, Heather, Nephenee, Lucia, Mia, Titania, Soren, Reyson, Mist, Nolan and Caineghis (as this is the only opportunity across both games to use him).

The first floor we get to finish kicking the snot out of the Begnion senators. Woo! ...Honestly, I don’t feel like Kilvas being under a blood pact makes much sense. Naesala does not strike me as someone so easily tricked, and during PoR, Kilvas was raiding all ships, including those from Begnion. I thought it might be something like this, but it more feels like a cheap excuse to have Naesala betray everyone... again.

Also, why on earth would Lekain carry around both blood pacts with him?

As I mentioned earlier, in part 2, Zelgius died on the first enemy turn, leaving me no chance to grab the Wishblade *grumble grumble* Mia got Alondite.

Can I just say, I loved the opportunity to bless weapons. It felt so... fitting, good, appropriate, cool... it just worked really well, okay? Of particular note, was Lucia getting a blessed Vague Katti, Titania getting Urvan blessed (because Titania should be the one to use Urvan) and Heather getting Baselard blessed.

...I accidentally got Blizzard on Soren blessed, but it actually worked out rather well, as having an infinite use high range spell was very nice.

Then we fight Deghinsea, and... that is a ridiculous boss to try to kill. Like, actually absurd. Plus we get introduced to the map-wide ridiculousness that late game bosses like to put out. Kurthnaga gets formshift and gets to see his dad die. We also get replacements for Sothe and Ena.

I’d also like to point out that I was bang on the money when I guessed the reason for Goldoa’s neutrality. I really wish that Almedha was a playable character now. Her supports and ending would have been rather interesting.

The first time I played the fourth map, I didn’t check the movement on those fire spirits. ...20 Movement continues the trend of the late game maps being absurd. I also had a difficult time actually killing Sephiran. One turn I got him down to 1HP but couldn’t get that final point of damage. I thought that Sanaki not being able to attack Sephiran was a very nice touch.

We find out that Sephiran was actually Lehran, which clears up a mystery that we didn’t even know was a mystery. Though apparently Lehran spoke for the bird tribes... but what is his actual descent? I mean some of the flashbacks indicate that he might be Branded, but then Yune’s conversation with Ashera about the Branded existing doesn’t make sense. He certainly doesn’t have any external characteristics of the bird tribe though.

Then we get the final fight against Ashera. I think I must have killed her around 10 times before I accidentally dealt a finishing blow with Ike. That, more than anything annoys me. Why on earth did it have to be Ike dealing the final blow, why couldn’t it be someone else, someone equally worthy of killing a god?

I mean, by the end of it, I had a set up whereby Elincia was killing Ashera once per turn (Three dragons surrounding her, with Amiti means she does 4x15 damage per attack, and then galdr her into action again).

Can I also say that Ashera and her aura having Nihil felt... cheap? If you didn’t want the tier 3 Beorc skills to wreck your bosses... maybe just... change them? It’s like I have all these awesome characters, but I can’t actually use them properly.

Of all the Fire Emblems that I’ve played, I think Ashera might be my favourite final boss though. That despair as I keep trying to kill her, and she gets up yet again. I managed to blow through about 15 charges on a Fortify staff just to keep everyone alive and killing. Yune bless the Hammerne stave to give me those charges.

To my knowledge, no other Fire Emblem end boss has had in excess of 1500 health (including her auras). She might technically have less, but that’s what she had for me.

Then we get to the bit that really makes no sense to me. All throughout the game the duality of Yune and Ashera gets driven home. So why on earth does Yune not die shortly after Ashera? Please, someone explain this to me.

Anyways, we get the unit endings, which it’s nice to see make a return after their weird semi-presence in PoR.

I’ll post some overall thoughts later I think, as this post has already gone on too long.

...Next time though, I think I’ll play on ‘Easy’.

[burgermiester]

Why Brom is the best Armored Unit in Radiant Dawn

First off, “best armored unit” is not the most auspicious title.  Its pretty rare for a Fire Emblem game to have worthwhile armor knights.  As a general rule, mounted units and fliers reach the enemies first and get the bulk of the kills/exp/functionality, unarmored foot units come next and get the scraps, and armor knights are left with the crumbs.  Radiant Dawn is not an exception in this regard, for the most part.  At least in Radiant Dawn there do exist chapters where your armor knights are useful because of “scenario” style chapters and occasional limited units to choose from. So instead of comparing the armors to each other in terms of stats and raw number of chapters they are available in, I think its more important to look at how many chapters they are in where they can contribute meaningfully and how much they do contribute, starting with the man of the hour:

Brom:

Brom has part 2.  I could probably stop typing right here but I dont know when to quit so I will continue.  2-1 has only Brom, Nephenee, and Heather.  Heather cant do much to most of the enemies on any difficulty, Nephenee cant really touch the enemy armors, including the boss, and on hard I dont even think she can do enough damage to feasibly take him on so that makes Brom your only option for the boss, and the best option to take on most enemies. That right there would be enough for me to call Brom the best armor in the game, because being the best unit in one chapter (and on hard being the only unit capable of beating the chapter)>being available but not worth using in a dozen others.  But it doesnt end there, in 2-2 hes one of the most capable and certainly tankiest fighters and you will probably have him leading the march through the dark cave, and you especially will on the turns where Mordecai is untransformed.  Lucia can get more kills but you have to be a bit cautious since a few lances or lucky other hits will put her down.  Brom gets to actually be a tank and do it well in the situation where it makes the most sense to have a tank (in cramped fog of war.)  Last, hes got 2-E.  Now, theres lots of ways to cheese this map as well as take it head-on, but even the cheesy strats involve blocking one of the two sides with Brom.  So hes not as crucial as in the other two chapters, but he still is absolutely contributing.  

Meg:

Poor Meg.  Shes got horrible bases, growths that clash with her class caps, and is stuck in the dawn brigade where shes competing with too many other growth units with too few exp to spread between them.  The chapters where youd want an armor, 3-6, 3-12 and 3-13, dont really beg for you to train her since Nolan, Jill and even Aran if you are dying for a tank all get you through those chapters more easily (and shell probably not have the defense to really tank 3-6).  I probably didnt even need to write this part, we all know ultimately unimpressive Meg’s combat capabilities are, even if it can be a lot of fun to use her for novelty’s sake.  

Tauroneo:

Brom has 3 chapters he can really contribute in, while Tauroneo has only 2*, yet one of those chapters is 3-13, which for many is the hardest chapter in the game.   That being said, like most defense chapters its very easy to beat it cheaply, so its hard for me to rate Tauroneo all that highly just for this chapter.  But even if you are cheesing it you will probably want to use Tauroneo, so I would consider him contributing as much in 3-13 as Brom in 2-E, even if thats perhaps a bit too generous considering other units can be trained up to plug important gaps whereas Brom is in a more preset role so hes always going to be necessary for a gap or 2.  In his only other chapter, 3-12, he unfortunately starts far on the left when youd want him on the right, and it takes a few turns for him to join the fight, although when hes there he kicks ass. But in any case, 3-12 can be beaten pretty much entirely by the ally units so any contributions are not that impressive.

*he can also contribute in the first map of 1-6, but you really want to be training Nolan and Jill and any other DB baby in part 1 so its a bit of a waste to let him get these easy kills, especially when its not that hard to beat the chapter without him.

Gatrie:

Finally, we have Gatrie.  Hes the guy that I have little doubt gamefaqs guides and tierers in general will call the best armor knight in the game.  And before I get to the real meat of Gatrie’s usefulness by my standards, I feel I must make a brief aside to address the general idea of usefulness and why Gatrie is cited as better than Brom, which is to say raw availability, bases and growths and starting level, and usable weapons/rank.  Brom actually has one chapter of availability more than Gatrie, but for the most part they are nearly the same.  Brom joins at level 2 and Gatrie 10, but in my experience using both sensibly and not giving either of them favoritism or anti-favoritism by the time they are in a party together Brom is close to level 10 and Gatrie to 13-15, so its not a big difference there, and if you look at their average stats on SF youll see its really not a big difference in stats at those levels, or indeed at any level. The only important stats Gatrie excels over Brom in is speed and strength, and its only by a point or two, so they are both doubling or not doubling or getting doubled by pretty much the exact same enemies.   And in actual damage Brom will be outperforming Gatrie because hes using axes, which more than make up for the couple points of str to outperform Gatrie with his weaker lances.  When taking all that into account I dont see either of them being significantly better than the other in a statoff, and since I still am saying that “how useful are they in the chapters where its worth using them?” is much more important than “how useful would they be if I forced myself to use them?” lets put this aside and go back to where Gatrie is uniquely useful.

So what does Gatrie do that only Gatrie can do? Well, hes got 2 chapters, 3-P and 3-1.  In 3-1 Gatrie is fantastic.  Its a small fog of war map with chokepoints and a time limit.  Gatrie excels at heading up the left path through the grass towards the boss, especially with Shinon at his back shooting from behind and through the fence, giving the enemies the old thunder and lightning maneuver while the more mobile members of the GM sweep around to clear out the rest of the map.  Its a bit like Brom’s contributions in 2-2 but I would say slightly better.  In 2-2 Brom is great, but you could potentially take the dark very slowly with just Lucia or any other character of your choosing if you desired, but in 3-1 theres a time limit so its all hands on deck, everyone has to help and Gatrie has a convenient spot he excels at.  Sadly, 3-P is not nearly as good for Gatrie.  Its textbook armor knight curse map design.  The enemies are all on one path, your more mobile units, in this case everyone else, will reach and kill enemies before Gatrie arrives.  He might as well not even exist.  

And speaking of might as well not even existing; the rest of the game.  From 3-3 onward Brom and Gatrie have identical availability, and its really not worth using either of them.  Just like 3-P, time and time again the poor armors just cant reach fighting before its over.  3-5 is a defense chapter where either of them might contribute but in the entire series 3-5 is perhaps the easiest defense chapter to play offensively, so thats not really an opportunity for them to be useful.  Plenty of chapters have reinforcements from behind that they could potentially fight, but to the question “why not instead of using armors just keep training all high movement units who can either finish chapters before reinforcements become an issue or run back and kill reinforcements and return to the main fight quickly” there is no objective answer in favor of armor knights.  If you were to ask yourself “I am determined to use one of the armor knights in every single chapter despite the fact that using no armor knight would be a better choice, so which one should I choose?” The answer might be Gatrie or it might be too close to call.  If you were to ask yourself the much more practical question “which units should I use?” the answer in regards to this subject at least, is, “however many deployment slots you have, Brom and Gatrie are equally unworthy of filling them.”  There are always better units to choose from than either of them.  They are comrades in obsolescence.

The Very Short Version:

When it comes to a class thats overall not worth using like Armors in a game with as strange of a structure as Radiant Dawn, comparing their usefulness is about looking at where each of them is actually worth using and how well they perform.  Meg has nothing, Tauroneo has two chapters where hes good, Gatrie has one chapter where hes great, and Brom has one chapter where hes good, one where hes great, and one where hes indispensable.  

[thetempesttactician-blog]

✘, ☯ for the mun's interpretation questions?

✘ That he isn’t weak. I understand that a good deal of blame for this one lies on Intelligent Systems themselves, after how much of Soren’s character development they centered entirely around Ike in Radiant Dawn, but the Fire Emblem fandom at large has the most inexplicable tendency to see and portray Soren as a fragile tsundere waif who would just fall apart without his beefy bara bestie.

While it’s true that he thinks the world of Ike and relies on him for support, Soren to me is the absolute farthest thing from weak. Soren survived Branded life on his own for goddesses only know how long, he’s made it through two continental wars, he’s probably the most powerful spellcaster on Tellius this side of Sephiran, and his sass is as sharp as his spells.

The guy is absolutely capable on his own. Ike just makes things easier, physically and psychologically.

☯ As most FE fans know, Soren is a pretty beloved fixture in the franchise, and with good reason. Amusingly enough, I actually hated him the first time I played through Path of Radiance (note: teen me was an asshole who couldn’t comprehend moral grays for fear of his head exploding), but in time I came to love him for all the same reasons as everyone else: his ruthlessness, his complexity, his sass, his wonderful hair. Where Lucia I loved from the moment I recruited her, Soren grew on me slowly, like the world’s most critical vine.

For the most part, I don’t think Soren’s reputation effects much of how I portray him; I just write him as I read his character and develop headcanons around him. That being said, there’s always going to be a little pressure, because the writer in me (or rather, the writer that is all of me) will never be able to shake the drive to write a Soren that the fans will love just as much as his portrayal in canon.

[cityofreverie]

The roaring sound of helicopters echo throughout the capital’s skies within the invisible glass dome…

Hours later… the twelve o’clock train pulls in … and out comes…

Anaithnid Saighdiuir - played by Justin (original character)

Decim - played by Emma (Death Parade canon)

Elzbieta "Ela" Bosak - played by Ellie ( Rainbow Six: Siege canon)

Garry - played by Rose (Ib canon)

Ismerila Saighdiuir - played by Ismer (original character)

Jacket - played by Kyle (Hotline Miami canon)

Koishi Komeiji - played by Kyle (Touhou canon)

Libra - played by Rose (Fire Emblem: Awakening canon)

Lucia Driscoll - played by Crissy (original character)

Lyn - played by Jay (Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade)

Maria Rossi - played by Cro (original character) 

Ramlethal Valentine - played by Kyle (Guilty Gear canon)

Ruby Rose - played by Kyle (RWBY canon)

Torrence Flexington - played by Theo (original character)

William “Slate” Beckworth - played by Dean (original character)

Zelgius / The Black Knight - played by John (Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance / Radiant Dawn canon)

…Once you arrive to Reverie, you’ll never want to go back!

[calamitaswrath]

I think Micaiah Fire Emblem may be fast approaching my grand group/pipeline of characters that make me go "gender" and "want" and "want gender" as I rotate them in my head

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Chapter 4

Oh thank goodness the base is unlocked this early. Still scarred from how long it took to get in Path of Radiance. So, base conversations!

Meeeeg! Peak design, right there. She's one of the characters from this game that I did already know about in advance!

Merchant talk, nothing too noteworthy there. But the way they're talking. . . are there any new options here compared to PoR?

And Kurth continues to be totally not important.

Ike's getting mentioned! That really didn't take long at all. From the sound of it, Micaiah's already over him, too, lol.

Ah. We're fighting laguz already, when everybody's still really squishy. . . oh boy. At least I gave Aran the Draco Shield that I got in an earlier chapter, so he should be able to tank a bit.

And the map still went well overall. Though I think by skipping over some of the tutorials, I must have missed some changes to laguz mechanics?

Also lol @ this game's twin thug bosses being laguz.

Rafiel. . . hold on, how many princes and princesses did the herons have?! We're at four now. That's enough to fill up an entire Fates royal family!

Is it a legal requirement for wolf laguz to be slutty? Because if so, then I'm not complaining.

Oh, so that explains why there weren't any wolves in the first game. They're from a really distant land.

So we're going to Gallia now? Feels familiar.

. . .And after looking up some more information on this chapter after finishing it, I found out that there were hidden items that I completely missed. FUCK

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Chapter 6

Uhh, we get an actual view of what civilians are doing! And they're getting suppressed and killed. 's what civilians do, in Fire Emblem I guess.

Ohh, Fiona's cute! And definitely the look of a character who's Not Going To Be Playable, I'm sure. What with her standing up to Jarod and everything.

"Late King Ashnard's orphan surfaces!" "Silver-Haired Maiden at Prince Pelleas's side!" - you just know that in another life, Izuka would have thrived at writing outrageous articles for a newspaper.

Not much else for the pre-battle cutscene, so let's go over the base conversations!

A whopping 1000 gold from a buncha villagers. . . yay. Look, the shop has got way more expensive stuff right around now that I want, so you better step up your fundraising game!

Oh yeah, I wonder why Kurth and Almedha look so similar. Real puzzler, that one. Come to think of it - if I'm half remembering Soren being involved in this whole family tree correctly, and Pelleas really is Almedha's son (having some doubts there since they don't really look that similar) that must be one convoluted family tree.

So, the battle - first stage went pretty well. It is a bit weird to use Jill and not have her stomp everything with the absurd stats she ended up with for me in PoR, but she's still pretty strong.

Second stage, though. . . er, everything did go well until I was rudely shown that the boss does in fact move, and he killed Leonardo. So, that was a reset. Second go went better, and the level-ups I did get still ended up well enough.

Cool gambit from Micaiah though to play into the boss' FE villain strategy of wanting to kill hostages to get Fiona to defect. It's a nice moment for Micaiah's character.

Fiona's the daughter of one of the original four riders? That's cool, nothing I would've thought from just looking at her.

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Chapter 3

So, Micaiah and Laura are in prison. At least they're not getting executed right away, so that's something!

Heyyy, Aimee's back! I wonder if Ike reported her for sexual harrassment and that's why she's in prison.

Uhh, first returning character from PoR. Maaaaybe this would've hit harder if I. . . well, had actually used Ilyana at all. The game doesn't really give her much focus though, given that she's asleep for her introduction.

Aimee's thirsty again! Maybe she realized that she ain't getting anywhere with Ike, and decided to look elsewhere. But Sothe ain't it, either, lady.

And we got "Kurth". All the look of a guy who's very unimportant, I'm certain.

So. . . everyone's breaking in just to break out? Sure. Sounds like the kind of strategy that'd get them more easily noticed, but sure.

Sothe can't distinguish light magic and thunder magic, smh. Micaiah really should've taken some time teaching him how to read.

Y'know, not to sound too mean, but. . . Ilyana really kinda reads like a Awakening or Fates character a bit, with how much they hammer home her gimmick of liking food. I like characters from those games mind you, but they are very gimmick-heavy.

. . .I accidentally killed Aran on the first attempt. Reset!

Oof, had some really shitty level-ups on this map. Is the Dawn Brigade generally just prone to getting screwed over by level-ups, or is this just me?

I still had an Energy Drop from the previous chapter, which went to Edward. It was between him and Nolan for me.

Other than that, things went smooth. I got a bit tripped up by information on the Wiki since apparently this map's objective vary between difficulties.

. . .Okay, some banger dialogue from Daniel and Jorge. Especially for something this early in the game.

ASHNARD FUCKS? ASHNARD FUCKS! FUCKNARD! ASHFUCK! . . .I mean, I do vaguely remember hearing that he has children, but still. It's a weird to think that Ashnard fucks.

Oh yeah our next destination sounds like a lovely place. What could possibly be threatening about the Desert of Death?

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Chapter 8

Begnion politics! . . .I got nothing.

The scene with Micaiah healing that random soldier is not noteworthy by itself, but the way the German translation handled his dialogue really was needlessly posh. It was like "Hm, fascinating. My wound is indeed healed."

And we're walking into a trap. Shouldn't Micaiah's. . . whatever her foresight is called warn her of that? But to be fair, the trap is so obvious that not even everyone's coming along, so. . . yeah.

Not much of anything to note on the base conversations. . . except for the one with Vika. I'll admit that the other day I already looked up who Micaiah tends to get paired with because since I haven't really seen much content of her over the years I legit didn't know. Now this! This doesn't disappoint. . . .But I also already looked up how Vika's available moving forward, and it really does look like this is all these two will get. Sadge. . .

NAILAH JOINS! And also Rafiel I guess.

Ah. Rafiel can't fly. I guess IntSys must've realized how broken that made Reyson in PoR, so they worked around that. . . that only makes me miss Reyson, though.

Bit of a bother with this map, couldn't save two NPC units, but ultimately all went well. Edward, Aran and Nolan are all promoted now, and they're really putting in some work, so that's good.

I already called what was going on with Muarim before the game itself even revealed it, hah. But with Izuka around, this all had to pay off sooner or later, I guess.

So Begnion's forces are to just stand down? That feels really rather anticlimactic. I already know what the basic structure of the game is going to be, so I guess this "arc" has to wrap up in the next two chapters, but I hope it does so satisfyingly at least. While I have enjoyed my time thus far, I would preferred it if all the story beats thus far had been at least a bit more drawn out.

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Chapter 7

. . .Did Izuka hit his head or something between games? I mean, I didn't see much of him in PoR, but he felt more coherent than. . . this. But also - the Dawn Brigade and revolutionary army trusting him feels about as sensical as the Nohrians working with Iago in Fates. . . .Probably even less so, considering that they were distrustful of Iago.

Base conversations, Meg and Zihark - . . .oh god, that was hilarious. But also, I suppose that was something that Brom and Zihark talked about in their supports back in PoR? I didn't get any for either of them, so I could see it.

Pelleas and Micaiah - okay, I'm. . . having a difficult time getting a good read on Pelleas. Is he a Branded, and just trying to obscure it? Or is he legitimately someone who has a bond with a spirit? And the way he talks about it with Micaiah. . . speaking of whom, so I guess she is a Branded? Def weird stuff going on with this convo.

I had like 5000 points of BEXP, so I levelled Micaiah a bunch, leaving her at level 18 (already read that her promotion is story-based), got Edward all the way up to his promotion after some of his stats already got maxed out, and got Aran really rather close to his promotion. I think Micaiah and Aran I'm not gonna use much for the next chapter, so I can make sure to get their three guaranteed stat-ups.

Ah, now we're getting to the point where I can't deploy everyone anymore. Honestly surprised it took this long. . . well, for the time being, I'm benching, Zihark, Ilyana, Leonardo and regrettably Fiona. After reading up some more on her, I just doubt that she's going to be worth it, which is a shame.

Tormod and Muarim are back! And the former really just looks a lot like Roy with his new, older design, I gotta say. And- . . .I just found another go-to unit for my team. Vika. Vika. Vika!! Oh my god.

Overall not much trouble with this map, and Edward is really tearing shit up now that he's promoted.

Now for the aftermath - . . .did Sothe and Tormod have supports in PoR? Because looking at their interactions here, there's some chemistry, I gotta say.

. . .Come to think of it, I forgot the hidden items again. Fuck! But since those were apparently just a coin and a master seal, probably not that big of a loss, especially since you can't sell master seals in this game.

Inch resting that all of what's going on in Daien is happening behind Sanaki's back. Speaking of her though - is she 13 now, or was she 13 in PoR? The writing here was a bit unclear on that.

Ah, and Micaiah's a branded after all. I wonder what kind of Laguz her other parent was?

Actually, something that's been bothering me this chapter - for whatever reason, there were these instances where my units would just not do any damage despite the battle forecast showing they would, and I have no idea why?? What's up with that?

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Chapter 5

You know, I haven't really commented on it much yet, but the graphical leap between Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn is honestly a rather nice one. The Gamecube and Wii may have been really rather close in terms of power, but for RD it really feels like they have much more detailed environments and character models. Case in point, the desert really does look rather striking.

So, we're still looking for that lost heir. What, isn't Rafiel good enough for us?

Base conversations! Now, let's see.

Conversation with Nailah and Volug - sooo, does Volug ever get any dialogue? I mean, having one character whose whole gimmick is that he never talks is fine, but. . . I dunno, for being one of only two wolves that we have, I think that's a bit of a missed opportunity. lol @ the way Nailah talks about him, though.

"We should be rich of heart and poor of pocket."

Conversation with Laura and Aran - oh shoot, I never realized that Micaiah is our first bandit protag in the series! Congrats to her on that!

Edward, Leonardo and Nolan get a conversation as well, so that's nice. I do rather hope that them being so relatively out of focus isn't going to be a trend, though since I already know that this game lacks traditional support conversations, I fear this will be the exactly the case. The Dawn Brigade really does get screwed over a lot on a meta-level, don't they?

On to the chapter - aaaand because I always at least look up gameplay details before I start these, I already knew that Tauroneo, Jill and Zihark were coming back here. Still, that's pretty nice to see, even if at first glance this seems like a rather odd combination of characters. Makes sense, though. . . .And I should probably read up on some more of Zihark's and Tauroneo's supports from Path of Radiance. Since I basically benched both of them, I didn't really see much of anything of either of them.

Not much of a problem with the map in terms of gameplay. By now, I get the feeling that at least some of my units are coming into their own, most notably Micaiah, Edward and Aran. I also know about bonus experience guaranteeing only three stat gains per level up, which can't be reset. . . which in exchange however means that you can abuse that once units hit a stat cap. Since all three of them are getting close to that, it will be Time™ soon.

Ah. Izuka's back. My friend did say that I wouldn't have to wait long for him to return, but I did not expect to meet him this soon. And. . . from the overall look of things, he did get just a bit more unhinged over the timeskip.

There's Pelleas, whose design I was at least alredy familiar with due to the aforementioned friend drawing him while doing a whole bunch of Tellius doodles, anyway. With his blue hair, he's definitely looking more like a standard FE protag, and- . . .Almedha. Woag

. . .Er, Women aside, I do find it interesting that this current setup is really rather similar to what the story for most of PoR was about. Secret rightful heir to the throne being helped by small group of fighters facing overwhelming odds - that has to be a deliberate parallel.

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Prologue

So! I already played this and the next two chapters about half a week ago, but thankfully there isn't too much going on in these chapters yet.

The opening cinematic is really cool. Lots of nice stuff in it, but I am curious how much of it actually happens in the game, and whether it is not perhaps just supposed to be evocative of the ~vibes~.

Thanks to me streaming these chapters for my friend who's obsessed with this game, I was able to unravel the Mystery™ of the game's difficulty settings. Ended up going with the supposed "easy" difficulty, since I assume that's best for a blind playthrough.

Oh god, the animated cutscenes have German voice acting. The generic enemy soldiers don't actually sound that bad, but Micaiah. . . hm. Mh.

Pretty standard setup for a Fire Emblem prologue chapter, eh? Bandits attack commoners, main characters gotta do something about it. Have to say though, the basic concept of the situation is really interesting - most FE games tend to end after the whole "and then the evil king was defeated" plot, but here we see the aftermath of what becomes of the "evil kingdom", and how it affects the general populace. Off the top of my head, I also can't really think of any FE game where the protagonists are framed as rebels like that, when that actually works rather well for a FE plot.

I already told my friend this, but I'm actually really curious about Micaiah as a protagonist. I don't really tend to hear a lot about her from people, and vaguely remember hearing that she gets overshadowed by Ike. So between a female protagonist that was (apparently?) done dirty by the story, the light magic, white hair and golden eyes, she's really in a good position to be a character I really like. Probably in a gender envy way too.

As for the other members of the Dawn Brigade so far. . . I honestly can't really make a comment. The only thing that comes to mind is that the FMA brainrot is far too strong in my head to not think of Edward Elric when I see the name "Edward".

Vulneraries with eight uses?? Damn, that's. . . wow. Restoring 20 HP too, while there are also these herbs that restore 10. Considering what I've heard of the game's difficulty, these must be pretty vital (hah) on higher difficulties.

First map is really no big issue..

Pfft, really laying it on a bit thick with the Begnion soldiers being framed as villains. The friend I was streaming this for did hype up Jarod as funny though, so I'm curious to see how this shakes out.

[calamitaswrath]

Lucia plays Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn: Part 4 Endgame Part 1

It's honestly a good thing that the Endgame is seperated into multiple parts, because oh my god it would make for such an enormous post if it wasn't.

So, everyone finally re-convening at the same spot. And hey, here's Caineghis! Didn't plan on using him, but cool to see that he's here.

Uh-oh, dragons joined Ashera! Well, I guess that still had to be resolved in some way, and this being a Fire Emblem game a fight is the "best" way to do it.

Base conversations! So Renning joins, which was just about obvious. He seems like a Cool Dude™, but there's no way I'm using him at this point. The friend I was streaming this all for also cautioned me against it from her own bad experiences, so. . . sorry, Renning.

Stefan's conversation: honestly not too surprising that the entire "reason" for the Branded being outcasts was based on a lie, but it still must have been pretty devastating to outright hear it like that. I do have to wonder how somebody like Micaiah or Soren would react to that information? . . .Actually, come to think of it - they even could have fit in Micaiah's reaction here, since it's Yune possessing her. Urgh, the whole possession really comes as a detriment to her character. . .

The dragon conversation: uhhh, a lot a of heavy and deep stuff with that one. This sort of thing is honestly one of the strengths of this game, I feel - the entire dragon drama is something that happens completely independently from both Ike and Micaiah, but it still works out just fine because these characters were properly established beforehand. In contrast to that, it often just sometimes feels in the other games that politics can't happen without the protagonists, even in Three Houses. And here in Tellius you not only got this dragon plot, but also the whole thing with Tibarn, Naesala, Reyson, and just the various bird tribes in general.

Caineghis - uhhh, we're getting Greil's axe! Ike didn't really have the rank to use it, but Titania did. So since Urvan is not locked to Ike, I just gave it to her instead - it just felt appropriate to me.

Couldn't get the conversation with Volke because I couldn't recruit him. But reading it up on the wiki:

I missed some gold on this one.

Ashera summons undead soldiers to fight, Yune despairs, and. . . Ike gives her a talking to. At this point I just wanna say, shoutout to @aeviann for making me think with her sketch of this scene (and a whole bunch of other banger sketches, but those are beside the point here) that this is some kind of soft and tender scene between Yune and Ike when it starts with Ike pulling at her ears. It still is a good scene in the end, but that's not the tone I was expecting it to start out with!

And Micaiah finally promotes! Clearly the only reason it's happening now is because Yune had not yet figured out how to kick herself in the nuts.

So, unit selection. The character I went with here are:

Ike, Micaiah, Kurthnaga and Ena (obviously), Soren (needs to be there with Ike. Do not seperate), Titania (because oh my god I love women), Nephenee (same as before), Sothe (I think he was a forced deployment?), Sanaki and Elincia (just felt necessary to bring them), Lucia (how could I not? Also, do not seperate her and Elincia. . . which I say as if I didn't pick Lucia before Elincia), Jill (I picked her over Haar because let's face it, he'd trivialize everything too much), Gatrie (because me and my friend were really rather memeing him up by this point, and I wanted more lance users), Tibarn, Naesala and Reyson (my friends' certified bird blorbos making them my blorbos-in-law, so they had to be there. But let's be honest, I also like them a lot), and last but most certainly not least, Vika. My own personal bird obsession in this game.

At this time I also finally used the option to smith some weapons. Says a lot about my money troubles in this game that I'm only getting to it now. . .

Heading into the tower - I have to say, I really dig the visual design in here. Reminds me a lot of Dragonspiral Tower from Pokémon Black and White and their sequels.

So the script at this point shows a flashback scene, but. . . I think those only unlock on subsequent playthroughs? I don't think I got it, at least.

Ahh, we're finally taking care of Lekain! The guy did surprise me by being more noteworthy of a villain than I thought he'd be, but at the end of the day, he's still a small fry compared to what is to come here. If him being the boss of the first stage here is any indication, I mean.

So, here's a fun detail I noticed during this map: if a character is muted (as in, unable to use magic), they can't actually do these mini support-conversations. Which makes sense I guess, but. . . pfft.

Battle conversations - so I didn't send Reyson against Hetzel, but. . . damn, he got a good line if they do end up fighting each other. "I was born this way [he means beautiful], and mere birth is not praiseworthy. Praise me instead for my strength. What I look like is irrelevant, so long as I have the power to protect my friends."

For Lekain, I sent in Naesala - and ha, I knew that he also had a blood pact!

And with him gone, that's two blood pacts taken out. There really was a lot already going on in this first part.