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My extremely objective and carefully researched opinion on Edelgard is that, based on the amount of cute fanart I've seen of her and Abby, she's good and everything she does is good.
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Jun 14, 2020 07:51
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AradoBalanga posted:
The Agartheans in general aren’t very bright, just look at the number of times they could have ended the war pretty much instantly by dropping the ICBM stockpile: did they really have no one in Enbarr to confirm Edelgard’s death? They have already shown they can teleport, all they had to do was warping in and out of the palace to confirm it then launch about 5 of them while we’re still in the capital, and then bye Fell Star. Not to mention all the times we were out of the monastery and engaging imperial forces. Sure, that doesn’t make for a very engaging game but when you give the villain nukes and teleportation in a medieval setting you should make an effort to explain why they aren’t using it in the most obvious way until it’s too late to make a difference. Still three routes to go through, so we’ll see if this is ever adressed.
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Jun 14, 2020 08:02
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Melomane Mallet posted:The difference is usually that it's in response to an invasion that has happened to your side and you're just finishing the war against the original instigator. Edelgard is the instigator in this scenario, hth. IMO, political stuff on the scale of nations can be pretty complicated and having hard and fast "that's just always 100% wrong full stop" rules is probably not going to always work, even before you even get into the various fantasy aspects of Fire Emblem stories like immortal rulers or absurdly evil magic cults or w/e. Edit: Cut a bunch of stuff, and this should probably continue in the FE general thread, as it's not really about the LP any more. Shinji117 fucked around with this message at 08:13 on Jun 14, 2020 |
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Jun 14, 2020 08:08
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I love the Shambala track. You've had all sorts of epic fantasy music throughout the game, then you get confront the evil in the shadows, the deadliest foe you've faced yet and suddenly WUB WUB WUB WUB I don't even like dubstep and I thought it was totally rad
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Jun 14, 2020 11:29
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Melomane Mallet posted:Edelgard is the instigator in this scenario, hth. Personally, I think that what she does, she does for extremely understandable and sympathetic reasons, and if you look at her own route in isolation it's easy to get on board with her actions even being necessary. But I feel the very existence of the other routes disproves Edelgard's assertion that there is no other way and that only she has the strength to save Fodlan. I don't think Edelgard is necessarily evil, but I do think war is bad and this game does not validate Edelgard's position.
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Jun 14, 2020 12:43
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My overall assessment would be 1) of all routes Edelgard’s has the best outcome. 2) the outcomes on other routes would never have been possible without the war 3) specific things to Silver Snow we can discuss next time. Anyway! So our pals the molemen claim to be Agarthans, the civilization that went to war with Sothis and necessitated her sleep (the one she was murdered during), and presumably that was the war that Nemesis was retroactively declared the hero of in the Church’s false history. A lot of the ills of Fodlan are rooted in that deception. We don’t have all the info, but this is the foundation of it.
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Jun 14, 2020 14:19
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AFancyQuestionMark posted:Imperialism is a term for conquering countries for their wealth and resources not a synonym for "invasion", hth. She is an emperor looking to conquer other sovereign nations to make them part of her empire.
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Jun 14, 2020 16:13
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There’s no point, goons love Edelgard too much to accept that maybe she did some things wrong.
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Jun 14, 2020 17:42
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it's a meme, why are so many people taking it at face value 
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Jun 14, 2020 17:46
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 Update 48. (SSLP Test Poster version.)
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Jun 14, 2020 18:05
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There's still three routes left to display all the things Edelgard didn't do wrong, let people form their own opinions. I made sure to meet the requirements for being able to marry Rhea on my SS run, but when I got to this point, I ended up picking Seteth with little deliberation. He's just a good egg, through and through.
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Jun 14, 2020 18:27
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Is Sothis choice something to be seen later, because it seems to be physically impossible.
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Jun 14, 2020 20:35
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GuyUpNorth posted:Is Sothis choice something to be seen later, because it seems to be physically impossible. I didn't opt to marry Sothis, partially because no-one voted for her whenever I had votes open, and partially because I personally would not be comfortable ending a run with marrying a character who looks like a child. Essentially, the Sothis S rank is just Sothis managing to re-manifest despite having been absorbed into Abby's self, and both of them declaring eternal love for each other. However, due to other people, y'know, not being able to see Sothis, Abby would get an "unpaired" epilogue.
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Jun 14, 2020 20:41
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They do wear a wedding ring in that ending, so Fodlan's famous war hero pretty much marries their imaginary friend/anime body pillow and noone dares to say anything.
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Jun 14, 2020 20:52
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I forget, have we established that Rhea is only available to S Rank in this route? And subsequently, once we finish this route, would it be kosher to talk about it despite not technically seeing it?
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Jun 14, 2020 21:06
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CmdrKing posted:I forget, have we established that Rhea is only available to S Rank in this route? And subsequently, once we finish this route, would it be kosher to talk about it despite not technically seeing it? I did not establish that, because I neglected to mention it. Oops. Yeah, once I post the final Silver Snow update, feel free to talk about it.
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Jun 14, 2020 21:09
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FrenchBen posted:The Agartheans in general aren’t very bright, just look at the number of times they could have ended the war pretty much instantly by dropping the ICBM stockpile: did they really have no one in Enbarr to confirm Edelgard’s death? They have already shown they can teleport, all they had to do was warping in and out of the palace to confirm it then launch about 5 of them while we’re still in the capital, and then bye Fell Star. Not to mention all the times we were out of the monastery and engaging imperial forces. Sure, that doesn’t make for a very engaging game but when you give the villain nukes and teleportation in a medieval setting you should make an effort to explain why they aren’t using it in the most obvious way until it’s too late to make a difference. Still three routes to go through, so we’ll see if this is ever adressed. The ICBMs are an example where the game narrative falls apart basically. Since they're so far removed from the established capabilities we have on hand, they're all extreme plot-convenience devices. It doesn't really help that for them chucking nukes around, they don't seem to ACCOMPLISH anything with them.
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Jun 14, 2020 23:37
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biosterous posted:it's a meme, why are so many people taking it at face value Probably because there have been multiple goons that have completely unironically argued she did nothing wrong in the various threads, and they've been given a lot of cover by other goons who might be willing to admit she did a few things wrong but it was justified. And it's become incredibly tiresome trying to separate out those meming from those who are 100% trying to push that "nothing wrong" viewpoint. Like, just from a few posts ago... AFancyQuestionMark posted:Imperialism is a term for conquering countries for their wealth and resources not a synonym for "invasion", hth. This is rewriting the actual literary meaning, and its usage for most of history, to try and pretend this concept with huge negative connotations doesn't apply to her. Like I'm not even arguing here whether Edelgard is justified or not, or whether what she did qualified as imperialism or not, but pointing out that this 100% unironic "argument" was was to make poo poo up. Or maybe they're mixing it up with colonialism or something, I don't know. edit: I'm being completely serious here, but just for example there was someone early in the spoiler thread comparing what she did to the French Revolution, and then saying literally EVERYTHING the French Revolution and Reign of Terror did was completely justified and perfectly fine. And no, they weren't joking or meming. Lord Koth fucked around with this message at 00:15 on Jun 15, 2020 |
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Jun 15, 2020 00:08
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Update 49. (SSLP Test Poster version.)
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Jun 15, 2020 00:26
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Holy poo poo, Bernadetta. MVP of the entire run!
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Jun 15, 2020 00:35
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I've never had Bernie turn out half that well. Or an archer get MVP that many times in general. And man, that final boss seems rough without Ashes and Dust.
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Jun 15, 2020 00:37
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I think it is extremely telling that even on her own route Rhea turns into a monster that you have to put down.
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Jun 15, 2020 00:58
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Lord Koth posted:edit: I'm being completely serious here, but just for example there was someone early in the spoiler thread comparing what she did to the French Revolution, and then saying literally EVERYTHING the French Revolution and Reign of Terror did was completely justified and perfectly fine. And no, they weren't joking or meming. the most moral thing a person can be, is a pretty albino
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Jun 15, 2020 01:00
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Small error: you say Catherine is Shamir's adjutant, when she's actually Caspar's adjutant. Also, farewell Professional Death Goddess Bernadetta. If we do poach you for other routes, I only hope you turn out as powerful as you did here.
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Jun 15, 2020 01:05
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AradoBalanga posted:Also, farewell Professional Death Goddess Bernadetta. If we do poach you for other routes, I only hope you turn out as powerful as you did here. Boy are you gonna be happy when we do Azure Moon and Crimson Flower.
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Jun 15, 2020 01:07
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It is just a meme based on other stuff and if you want to argue about the points then go head into the main thread instead of trying to bring back stuff here.
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Jun 15, 2020 01:07
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Ragnar Homsar posted:Boy are you gonna be happy when we do Azure Moon and Crimson Flower. 
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Jun 15, 2020 01:09
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"Scholars published Dorothea and Byleth's love poems" is one of my favorite ending details from any Fire Emblem game. It is just absolutely the gayest goddamned thing. So, surprise! You were the result of a long line of science experiments! Which were intended to erase your personality at some point and cause Sothis to be fully revived! I hadn't paid enough attention here, but Rhea's wording is suggestive of a theory about I've been pondering for a while. quote:
Everything? How much everything are we talking here? Like, your race was basically wiped out, did you think Sothis could bring your dead friends back to life? But then... she probably did think that. After all, she thought she could revive Sothis by making a homunculus with Sothis' blood and stuffing her Crest Stone in it. ... and but for Sothis not wanting to do it, that does in fact work! So if you have a human body with the blood of a dragon, and that same dragon's original Crest Stone, you can theoretically revive them. So what if the entire system of nobility, the canonization of the 10 Elites, and the church keeping careful tabs on their Relics isn't intended as a system to maintain order in the land, but just a way to get the humans to maintain themselves as spare parts to revive the Nabatean race? Which in turn means that reform was always impossible, because Rhea doesn't especially care about the well being of humanity, and the system was designed to advance her actual goals all along. Now, Rhea never says more than "my only goal for 1000 years was to revive my mother" about this topic, but the possibility has been stuck in my head for months and it's somehow more consistent with her behavior and the teachings of the Church than anything the rest of the cast learns or speculates throughout. Anyway, so we could have married Rhea, which is only true on Silver Snow. If we had, she'd definitively survive after transforming to human form in the cathedral and then we'd jump to her S Support. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZXBRDTbM94 (this is all her supports, but it's in english while the S Support standalone I found was in Japanese) This is just amazingly creepy to me. "I really really wanted you to become my mom and hold me in your arms again, but also I love you and we should be married and I'll help you reign over an eternal peace". Just... brrr, so much wrong.
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Jun 15, 2020 01:33
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I thought that I could regain all I had lost, if only I could revive my mother...
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bernie 2020 I guess What happens if you choose to marry Rhea before everything goes to poo poo? edit: answered right above me, lol
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Jun 15, 2020 01:38
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CmdrKing posted:If we had, she'd definitively survive after transforming to human form in the cathedral and then we'd jump to her S Support. The salient bit about S-ranking Rhea is that Sothis apparently slaps some sense into her off-screen. Presumably "WHY THE gently caress DID YOU MAKE AN ENTIRE RELIGION ABOUT ME WHEN THIS poo poo IS LITERALLY THE LAST THING I WOULD HAVE EVER WANTED YOU GODDAMN DUMBASS DAUGHTER! NOW GO TO YOUR ROOM AND FIX THIS poo poo!" Why this would be off-screen and only happen if you S-rank Rhea is left as an exercise for the reader. And this whole thing with the end of Silver Snow creates a whole bunch of plot holes for the Crimson Flower route. Leraika posted:bernie 2020 I guess She survives, says Sothis talked to her, and she's really sorry now about this one thousand years of tyranny based on lies and Sothis made it very clear to her that you are not her and oh btw will you marry me? She's actually one of the few S-ranks who proposes to Byleth rather than the other way around, complete with unique art for her wedding ring.
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Jun 15, 2020 01:38
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Hm. Perhaps I should include the Rhea S rank as an extra lore thing once we're done with all the routes that involve her, since that's some pretty important insight into Rhea's reasoning for why she does the things she does.
Rea fucked around with this message at 01:44 on Jun 15, 2020 |
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Jun 15, 2020 01:42
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CmdrKing posted:Which in turn means that reform was always impossible, because Rhea doesn't especially care about the well being of humanity, and the system was designed to advance her actual goals all along. Ding ding ding! There's also a bit more I want to say re: Rhea and glorification of herself, but I can't seem to find her discussing her past role in the formation of the Church and would prefer not to be Spoiler Man.
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Jun 15, 2020 01:50
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TheGreatEvilKing posted:Ding ding ding! Yeah, that's more Verdant Wind's thing. Oh, also, I feel like I should mention preemptively how things are gonna work now that we've finished a full run. For Verdant Wind Part 1, I'll be cutting out every battle, and just showing plot scenes that are either new or significantly different from the first run. For Part 2, I'll unfortunately have to skip over all but three of the maps, since the rest are just repeats of Silver Snow maps. For Azure Moon, I'll be showing everything but unchanged plot important scenes. This is the run where I bumped the difficulty up to Maddening, and showing the differences in Part 1 is pretty important. For Crimson Flower, I'll be starting straight at the choice of whether or not to ally with Edelgard, and backfilling all of the supports I did up to that point. All of Part 2 will be shown. No objections, yeah?
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Jun 15, 2020 01:54
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Sounds good. Anyway, Rhea's an interesting character to dissect unto herself, as opposed to her role as Seiros and the setting at large, but that gets more into 3H's themes of trauma. And even if we can talk about her in that light without seeing her on every route, it feels wrong to dive into how the game talks about trauma before tackling Azure Moon.
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Jun 15, 2020 02:00
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Congrats on finishing the first route! This route was the last one I did, and after 400+ hours I'd become a little burnt out on the game. But I did enjoy the route more than all but Verdant Wind, which I thought was slightly better/more complete. It did seem kind of redundant, overall, though, since as was mentioned, all but three Part 2 maps of Verdant Wind are duplicated on this route.
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Jun 15, 2020 02:27
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So we just saw the one point where the game gaffed so bad I literally burst out into audible laughter. That scene before you deploy for battle where seteth is being traumatized by having to put down what family he has left because she has magical rabies? His voice actor works really hard to sell this is a painful and tragic moment. The music on the other hand is a high voltage "gently caress yeah! It's endgame. Get pumped!" track that just turns the mood into a comical farce. FrenchBen posted:The Agartheans in general aren’t very bright, just look at the number of times they could have ended the war pretty much instantly by dropping the ICBM stockpile: did they really have no one in Enbarr to confirm Edelgard’s death? They have already shown they can teleport, all they had to do was warping in and out of the palace to confirm it then launch about 5 of them while we’re still in the capital, and then bye Fell Star. Not to mention all the times we were out of the monastery and engaging imperial forces. Sure, that doesn’t make for a very engaging game but when you give the villain nukes and teleportation in a medieval setting you should make an effort to explain why they aren’t using it in the most obvious way until it’s too late to make a difference. Still three routes to go through, so we’ll see if this is ever adressed. They were allied with edelgard. Even if it was in the "backstab each other later" manner. Why the only nuked us the once before we find them does get explained, but it will have to wait for our final route.
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Jun 15, 2020 03:16
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Ragnar Homsar posted:Yeah, that's more Verdant Wind's thing. Can you at least show us the level ups? For some reason, I really like watching Numbers Go Up.  (Also, apologies for setting off yet another round of the Eternal Edelgard Argument.)
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Jun 15, 2020 05:12
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Melomane Mallet posted:(Also, apologies for setting off yet another round of the Eternal Edelgard Argument.) 
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Jun 15, 2020 05:41
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"In this rite, one pledges to serve the goddess, and in return, receives a Crest Stone fragment and blood. The ones who have transformed alongside Rhea just now are the ones who have accepted those gifts." This line just made me crack up when I played it. "Yeah, so the chuch has pretty much been doing weird crest blood magic poo poo on all of their priests since forever, honestly we're just as bad as the slitherers." And it's just randomly thrown in at the last battle, nobody so much as comments on it. I really hope that Abby discontinued that practice.
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Jun 15, 2020 09:49
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A somewhat jarring thing for me is how Rhea just tells you that she used her blood to save Jeralt's life in the past. So... it makes me think of how much Jeralt knew about what was going on. How much information was he given after being saved? Did he not realize anything until like 20 years later of 'I haven't aged a bit, what's going on?' When he takes Abby after his wife dies in childbirth and flees, how much did he really know about Rhea's machinations? Cause Rhea said that she ripped out the crest stone from the mother and stuck it in the child. So... did Jeralt see his wife's body after that bit? Jeralt remains kind of an interesting curiousity to me, even if his death was telegraphed way too hard. He was waving around his own technicolor death flag right in your face with him saying he had something important to tell you after the mission.
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Jun 15, 2020 10:24
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